Spiritual things, Japan, and all. that. jazz.....

Nathanael and I went to the first meeting of Luther League for the year. New leader is very called to be there and I think it's a good fit. Nathanael was enjoying himself and the other kids. And the leader explained that the youth group was to be threefold in its makeup- one of those 3 being spiritual- Christian, that is- otherwise, it's just a group of kids doing stuff. The other 2 are group dynamics and service. With group dynamics and service you get the Y (though their original intent was also Christian-oriented). With the spiritual dimension added, with prayer and Christian focus, then you have character building. You can get the growth that will not pass away someday as will all temporal things.

After much hassle (Sprint, for one, with whom I have out-of-country calling service, which I pay $4 a month for, but that I STILL for some reason don't have, even after MUCH waiting and frustration with the worst Customer Service in the entire known universe)...going to Steph's to get keys, going downtown, getting in the office...I ended up talking with Shinjo Iwao-san for some time. He just HAPPENED to be in his office when I called. We made some neat plans and I think he was being polite and is probably wondering how in the heck he'll tell us he can't really use us but come visit my class anyway....since they already have similar partnerships set up...well, he said, "by the way it's a national holiday, grandparents' day, so....none of your other contacts will be open. In fact where I am, I'm the only one here"....so....LOLOL...maybe all the hassle was a divine message that it's wasn't worth the trouble...but then God rewarded the trouble with at least having the one contact I wanted to speak with in the office at that particular moment on his day off. :) OK it's just my interpretation of events but it COULD be true! God has in the past used much more direct cause-effect ways of dealing with me. We have some arrangements, God and I.

And yes I'm calling Mr. Iwao "san" because he's 63 years old!

Micah has had a meltdown with Brian which culminated in Brian breaking Micah's walkie talkie, one of the set of two I got for Micah's birthday, for the purposes of him and Brian being able to have fun communicating with them, which they did for a long time. Well Brian paid me and Micah the $40 that I said one costs, though they probably only come in sets of two. I've had issues with his father, who was in his right mind the past few days, but got drunk and verbally abusive when he took his kids AND Micah to King's Island a while back. Now Micah's thick as thieves with Matt, whom he originally did NOT like. Well I took my kids and Matt to the park today as today was unbelievably gorgeous, pristine, and sparkling clear. The poplars trembled in the wind and their leaves' silvery undersides were like a picture of Heaven to me. Well what did the kids do in the park? After about an hour there a park ranger comes to me with Micah and Matt in tow saying "Is THIS yours?" (pointing to Micah who had already started trying to explain that he "made a bad decision...") Well it turns out he threw a plastic bottle of tapwater from the second story of the park recreational center because "it was funny" in a David- Letterman-throws-watermelons-from-the-Ed-Sullivan-theatre sort of way. The problem was that in Micah's case there were actually people under there who were in danger of being ambushed by plastic bottles of water so the ranger dragged them both to me. One of the other things Micah was sure to do was exonerate Matt. Matt's usually the nuisance but Micah pointed out Matt had nothing to do with it. That was good of Micah because if Matt had done it Micah would surely have let me know.
Matt's got sticky fingers and is generally a bull in a china shop and has a potty mouth. But he's also quite attention-starved, lonely, and spiritually hungry. He enjoys the Sunday School. I wish I could always say the same for my kids. Or even me. So I am glad that he came with Micah to Sunday School this a.m. (first day of classes for this fall). And Nathanael had his class with the same group that met later this evening.