Ash Wednesday, March 5, 2025
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
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Blow the trumpet in Zion!
Proclaim a fast, call an assembly;
Gather the people, assemble the elders,
gather the children and the infants at the breast.
First thing in the morning yesterday, a little home school, mostly difficult, because the second thing is to visit Andi and Aki along with new son Finn. Miles and Jasper could hardly wait for the eleven minute drive to St. David’s North, Women’s Clinic, Room 2220 on the second floor. The baby slept in the room with his parents, so for the very first time, there they all were.
Big room, big couch, big bed, Andi smiled at us all. Welcome! Jasper gave Finn a card he had made at school that said, “Welcome to the world!” Aki took picture after picture, and we did too. Finn didn’t say much. He slept, he opened his eyes, he slept again. When I held him he cried, but that’s because I held him too much like a football and not enough like a baby. Makes sense to me.
Andi smiled at her eight and five year old boys and said, “There’s a present for each of you in the corner.” Their eyes sparkled and they ran to find two bags with two cameras. After that they took pictures too! And their photos popped out of the camera in seconds, a children’s Polaroid camera which also, as they gradually discovered, took video with sound as well as still shots, and added emojis and effects at the push of a button.
The cameras occupied both Jasper and Miles for the rest of the day, actually. We spent awhile at the hospital and took them to spend the afternoon with Miles’ childhood nanny Diane, who walked with them to a duck pond, helped them with several crafts, and made dinner for them with a custard-Oreo dessert. All of which were photo opportunities, of course.
Andi loves to take pictures, as do I. We went on at least one photo scavenger hunt around the U of I campus, and our friends and families went on several others with us. Once we even got booted out of the Barton Creek Mall in South Austin, because we might have been industrial spies or some such thing. We left and took our cameras to the hippie part of South Congress Avenue and had a much better time.
By evening two consecutive nights with less than enough sleep and the excitement of Finn’s birth at last took its toll, and as we watched a short travelogue about the Orient Express on YouTube, the boys began to fight over nothing. At least it seemed like nothing to the adults in the room. It escalated, and ended eventually after much trial and tribulation, when I read a story to them while they got eventually quiet in their nighttime tent, The Mystery of the Monkey’s Maze, from the Casebook of Seymour Sleuth.
Grandparents have no business being parents. We remind ourselves of that over and over. We are too tired to take on a task that requires – even more than wisdom – patience. It is enough that we provide a physical and palpable presence. In whatever imperfect and inadequate way, we represent God’s presence, which is omni-present in the lives of every one of his children.
Even now, says the LORD,
return to me with your whole heart.
Today Miles will read the part of Lysander in his class performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream (abridged). At noon we hope to get to St. Matt’s Episcopal for the Eucharist and Lenten ashes. After school we’ll pick up the boys, take them home to their parents, and greet Finn for the first time in his new home.
Return to the LORD, your God.
For gracious and merciful is he,
slow to anger, rich in kindness,
and relenting in punishment.
Perhaps he will again relent
and leave behind him a blessing.
(Joel 2, Psalm 51, 2 Corinthians 5, Psalm 95, Matthew 6)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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