Frankly Speaking

Have you ever wondered where that word came from?  Well, for those of you that don’t know, listen up.

I was looking down at Christian’s head last night, trying to see what in the world was causing so much itching and I saw some red spots!  What in the world, and suddenly, it came screeching into my mind.  Lice!  Yes, there was some kind of memo sent home from school.  A few weeks ago, I had checked Christian’s head, all was good, and I threw it away,  Now what was it that it said?  What were the signs?  What should I do?  Something about shampoo…

I went on line and found terrorizing statements like “brain tumor found in children that used lice shampoo.”  AAAAAA, get off the internet.  Christian began running around the house screaming “get them out, get them out, aaaaa I feel them crawling around!”

Christian was quite excited about our adventure.  We had to go out to the grocery store at 9:00 p.m.  which was past his bedtime, and he was thrilled.  The lady asked if she could help me and I was not about to let her know what had just happened.  After all, what could I say?  “My child has lice.  What aisle is the lice killing shampoo in?”  So we just wandered around the store and finally found it!  Quick, get two packages, it says we have to wash again in 7 days…to kill the lice that have hatched from the eggs!  Quickly, let’s run to the checkout and get this done.

I turned the boxes over on the counter, hoping that no one would know we were lice carriers!  We arrived at the checkout lady who promptly said “Who’s got em?”  I quickly pointed at Christian, thinking, he’s a kid, it’s ok for him to have them.  Not worrying about the horror of Christian being betrayed by his mother!  Now just let us out of the store!  Instead, she embarked on her own lice story of being a cosmetologist and having a drunk man come in with lice and she had to just throw everything away!  Then she said there wasn’t a price on the box.  Was she going to speak out over the loudspeaker “I need a check on aisle 8 for lice killing shampoo!”  Just close your eyes Robbie and this will soon be over.  Instead, she decided to run and check for herself, while the long line behind us waited.  All of them looking at us, thinking those thoughts.  I’m sure they were all thinking “get those lice carriers out of here!”.  Stare at the ceiling, the door, Christian, this will all be over soon.  And within minutes we were out.

Christian looked over at me and said “Wow, nice story about the lice.  I feel so loved.”  He was still smiling, so we laughed and ran for the car.  We washed the hair “picked the nits” and watched Miracle on 34th street.  It was a tender moment.  Then there was the realization that everything that Christian’s head had touched in the last week had to be washed!  Let’s see, I put my head on his pillow to read stories at night, he slept in my bed when Mike was gone…500 loads later (ok, maybe I exaggerated), I think we’ve got it covered, or picked.

The school called this morning to report that Christian had gleefully reported his lice condition and that he had to stay up until mindnight! To get all the nits.  Of course he’s going to be very tired today (never missing an opportunity for sympathy for the schoolwork) and I’m sure he’s excitedly telling the story and chasing the girls with his head that has “lice” in it.

The fun part is that Christian finds this all a lot of fun.  He’s great for me, when I just want to say “That’s it!  I quit!”  I’m not quite sure what I would be quitting, but it would feel good to say it.

The best part is being with other Christians who have been so kind during this time.  The way they have called, brought over soup when I was sick, prayed with us for Christian’s macular degeneration and then just going to church yesterday and being in worship was wonderful.  Finding out that Christian might possibly go blind in the future has been so hard to handle some days.  When you add to that a son just out of rehab, and a little Lexie in heaven, there’s only way way to get through the day.  God.  He always has the answer and to remember - a head full of lice is small potatoes.  Don’t forget to laugh.

Our message:  Call upon the shalom of God when you’re in the middle of the storm.  I want the peace of god, The God of peace to come and inhabit this temple, that’s being shaken.  Little by little, we will take back this territory that the enemy has stolen, and I believe God is going to restore not only what we have lost, but even more than I can imagine.

Shalom,

Robbie