When the Unabomber Came to Visit

I've been wallowing around in random, old memories the past few days. It all started on Friday when I picked the boys up for school and Sam was wearing a huge pair of women's sunglasses, but that story will require pictures that I've got to go rummage around for, so it will have to wait for another day. But the story that goes with the sunglasses led my mind down another path that is also a good story to tell.

We were fresh out of seminary (and by we, I mean Steve, but I feel like I should get some credit too since I was bringin home the bacon.) And we were at our first church, in a tiny little town called Crowell. I had never heard of that town before we moved there, and it is a rare day indeed whenever I mention to someone that we lived there, and they have heard of it too. When it does happen, you feel like you have an instant bond with this person. Anyway, tiny town. About 900 people. Steve was pastoring 2 small churches, and we loved it there. We loved the people, and we still do. Well, one day, Steve was home for some reason, and he got a call from Myrtie, our church treasurer. She was in a panic, and it turns out she had been in the church, all by herself, in the basement, thinking she was completely alone when she went into a room, and there was the unabomber.

Okay, obviously, not really the unabomber, but the dude bore an uncanny resemblance to him. So Steve hotfoots it to the church to save our sweet treasurer from the Unabomber, and he does what any normal person would do when the unabomber is in your church alone, wandering around, looking for God only knows what. He invites him to our home for a meal. Yes, yes he did.

So, Steve and the unabomber show back up at our house, and I am giving Steve the raised eyebrows, are you crazy look, and he proceeds to heat him up a plate of leftovers. We sat down to visit with him because we are southerners and southerners are polite, even to the unabomber, when he is invited over to your house. The unabomber starts talking about how he needs a new comb because he has lice. My eyebrows nearly reach my hairline, and my head immediately starts itching. Steve says that he'll take him to the drugstore and get him some lice shampoo, but says he's got some old combs he can have. The unabomber gets decidedly upset by this, because he needs new combs, dammit! Didn't we just hear him say he had lice? Oh yes, yes we heard. Was he implying our combs would have lice? I didn't question him on it. He also had no place to stay, and I began to shake my head emphatically at Steve just in case he had any crazy notion of inviting lice-infested unabomber to spend the night at our house. There weren't that many motels in Crowell, after all. Thankfully, Steve had more sense than that, and they left as soon as the unabomber had finished his meal to go get him some lice shampoo and get him a room in the one motel in town.

So, all was well, but as Steve left for work the next day, he suggested that I go ahead and lock the doors since the unabomber was still in town, and he knew where we lived. That made me feel a little uneasy, but not that bad. It was later that afternoon when I was visiting with my mom on the phone, and I was telling her about the unabomber when I looked back and saw my back doorknob being jiggled. Then, through the cracks in the blinds, I could see the unabomber!

My heart started racing, and my knees started shaking. "OH my GOD! MOM! It's the UNABOMBER! He's here, and he's trying to get in the house!"

"Well, leave! Get out of there! GO NOW!" I'm sure she was just as scared as I was.

I told her I was taking her with me, so I kept her on the cordless phone and ran out the front door and across the street. We had only been there a few weeks, so I really didn't know any of my neighbors well enough to go ring their doorbells and explain that I was running away from the unabomber. So I just stood there across the street from my house, watching it with concern. Then, I realized that I had left our new puppy in the house, at the mercy of the unabomber! What kind of a mother was I? My mom refused to let me go back in there and get her, and I was too scared to go anyway. So, I was still just standing out there, wondering what to do, when the front door of the house opened, and out came Steve, "What in the world are you doing out there?" he called out.

Oh, I nearly passed out from relief! My knees were shaking so bad, I literally nearly collapsed right there. Turns out, he was bringing the unabomber back over for one final meal before he headed out of town, but Steve was standing to the side of the door, and I couldn't see him through the blinds. I laughed at myself for freaking out, so glad that it turned out to be nothing. And after that, Steve and I came to an agreement that he wouldn't bring anyone else over to the house that he would think I needed to lock the doors from! They could make do with an Allsup's burrito if they had to. One of our first adventures in ministry, and it still makes me laugh!

Sail Fail

At supper tonight we were telling stories, and you know how one story makes you think of another that makes you think of another? Well, that happened to me tonight, and I thought of something I haven't thought of in a long time.


After my freshman year in college, I worked at a summer camp for the summer. A recruiter had come to our campus ministry and they needed counselors for this camp where kids got to horseback ride, learn to sail, play on water slides and water parks, canoe, and the list goes on and on. I thought that sounded like fun, so I signed up and my adventure began.


The counselors arrived about 10 days before the campers, and we were trained in that time so we could teach the campers. Now, horses have never been my thing - I'm pretty much scared to death of them. They just seem so unpredictable and you're supposed to be controlling them, but I never felt empowered enough to control this huge beast that was carrying me for crying out loud! By the very nature of that arrangement, it would seem the horse was in control, and that was true for pretty much every horse I rode. So, I knew this was not going to be my favorite activity, but I'm a pretty good actress so I figured I could fake it. It turned out that they had "wranglers" who would teach the actual lessons about horseback riding, and we were just there for encouragement and crowd control. I learned to fake it pretty well, and horseback riding turned out to be not so bad.



On the other hand, I was really looking forward to the sailing part. I have always loved the water, and sailing just sounded so adventurous and exotic. Remember, I'm from Lubbock, Texas - we don't have a lot of water around there. And so I eagerly went to the sailboat training, envisioning gliding across the smooth water with the wind in my hair. I dutifully learned all the proper terms like port and starboard and jib and boom, and happily took to the water for my first try. There was no gliding, there wasn't even any puttering. I would have been thrilled to just drift with the wind, but my boat pretty much went no where. I watched as the other people would glide happily past me, their hair blowing in the breeze, laughing joyfully, and I would try mightily to position my sails in the exact same position as theirs so I could glide happily too. But, alas, there was never any gliding. I figured it would just take a few tries and I would be a pro at this, not to worry.



The first group of campers came, and when it as sailing day, we all went to the sailboats and each of the counselors had about 6 campers that they would take with them on their sailboat. Can I just say there is no pressure like 6 eight year old girls staring at you, waiting to happily glide across the water and you are just sitting, going no where? Looking back, I blame it on the wind. I'm from west Texas, and here you don't have to lick your finger and hold it in the air to know which direction the wind is blowing. It is blowing in the direction that nearly knocks you over. But in east Texas there didn't seem to be any wind, and yet the blasted other counselors would manage to find the minuscule breeze, turn their sails in just the right position and their sails would fill and they would glide quickly across the water, their laughter mocking me as they went past our stagnant boat.



A few lucky times, I managed to catch a breeze, and we would go sailing smoothly across the water. But I could never enjoy these times because I knew what was going to happen. We would run out of lake, I would be forced to turn, and the fun would come to a grinding halt. It was miserable. My campers would look at me expectantly at first, then later with sheer disappointment. They would listen to my feeble explanations of there being no wind and then say accusingly, "But look at Stacey's boat! They're sailing." Damn that Stacey! Couldn't she just fake it for me? But noooo, she had to glide happily across the water, rubbing it into my sorry face that I was a sailing failure. I remember one time the boom actually caught a gust of wind, came flying across the boat, narrowly missed knocking one of the girls clean in the water, but hit me square in the knee, causing it to gush with blood. I was actually thankful for the injury because then the girls felt sorry for me and didn't make me feel so bad that we weren't going anywhere.

Eventually I learned that I was just never going to get the hang of sailing and would try my best to get sailing as my "off" period. I would bribe the other counselors with whatever was necessary if they wouldn't make me go to my place of shame. If I had to go, I would do my best to try to make it fun in other ways, such as suggesting we all jump in the water and then try to climb back on the boat, pretending a shark was about to eat us all. For some reason this was never as appealing as gliding smoothly over the water. I guess there are some things just not meant for land lubbers.

Thank you for letting me share my shortcomings with you. My name is Alayna, and I am a sailing failure.

How to get Noticed

So, as I've mentioned in some of my previous posts, we're doing this thing called "Outflow" in our church, and part of it is just encouraging you to notice other people. You know, not being so caught up in yourself, and your own life that you take the time to open your eyes and look around. Is there someone around you who looks down or alone or happy? And is there something you can do about it? Because after you notice someone, the next logical step is caring about that person. And so, in our Sunday School class, we were talking about how it is a part of our culture to mind your own business, and not look like you are staring at someone else.

But that got me to thinking, that somehow, when you have 4 kids, you are exempt from that social rule. Believe me, when you have 4 kids, people notice you. You attract attention everywhere you go. You can see people pointing, whispering, counting, and occassionally, they'll even ask you if they're all yours. I've always wanted to come up with a witty comment to that one, "Nah...we just pick up kids everywhere we go like some people pick up trash." or "They're all mine, except that one (whichever one is acting bad that day) Do you want him?" Anyway, my point is, people notice us, but I realized that what keeps me from noticing other people is I'm usually busy keeping up with all of mine, counting to 4 over and over again, and just monitoring there whereabouts.

So, today was our last Sunday of Outflow, and the day where the church leaves the building and goes out into the community to show people that God loves them by doing practical or nice things for them. So, we had groups that were giving out cokes on the street corner, buying groceries for people who live in motels, giving out coupons for free Dippin Dots, giving out care packages to fast food workers, "buying down" the price of gas at a gas station to make it under $2, and lots more things. And I haven't talked to everybody at all, but here is my favorite story from the day so far.

Steve's group was giving out Cokes to people who stopped at a red light, and after they had been there a while, this lady came back by, and excitedly told them this story. She had been inviting this friend of hers to church with her (not our church) and this girl was really struggling to believe that God could love her. And then, out of the blue, someone gave her this cross necklace, and she had been wearing it, and was starting to think maybe, just maybe, God did love her. And she had gone to church with her friend that morning, and for some reason, she was craving a Coke in the worst way. She even leaned over to her friend and whispered how bad she wanted a Coke, and then as they were leaving church, they stopped at this red light, and a person came up to the window and asked if they would like a free Coke! Of course they said yes, and then she just held this Coke in her hands, that had a card attached that said "This is our simple way of saying God Loves You." Wow! She just looked at it and said, "I guess He does love me after all." Can you believe that? Something so simple as giving out a Coke at a corner could make someone realize that God really does love them and wants to know them? It just gives me chill bumps and makes me want to do nice things for people all the time. So, go out and notice people today! And if it happens to be someone with 4 kids, tell her how nice and well-behaved her kids are, even if it isn't true! I think God might even approve of that little white lie! Okay, maybe not, but be nice to her anyway!

Birds & Bees & Almonds, Oh My!

So last year Levi came home from school and said, "Oh! Mom, Mrs. Riley told me to ask you a question."

"Okay, shoot!"

"How does the DNA get from the dad to the mom?"

Deer in the headlights. Heart rate speeding up. I am so not ready for this! He's only 8! Why am I freaking out about this? I've told countless kids about sex in youth groups, but those were not my children, the same children who I get to see the joy on their faces on Christmas morning when they see what Santa brought them. Somehow knowing about sex and believing in Santa do not seem to go hand in hand.

But then God had pity on me, and Joey came into the room, screaming his head off, with a scraped knee. Thank you God for scraped knees! I took Joey to the bathroom to doctor up his boo-boo, but Levi followed me in there, waiting expectantly for the answer, so I stalled. "Ummm. What IS DNA?"

"You don't know what DNA is?"

"Well, yeah, I just want to see if YOU do."

So, he gave me some explanation, and I finally punted, "Well, it is really very complicated, and I'll have to think about how to explain it and get back to you."

And he never asked me about it again, and I was fine with that. Then, Dr. Leman came to our church, and he was talking about telling your kids about sex, and he said 8-10 year olds think about sex a lot! What? How can they think about it if they don't know what it is? And, he goes on to add, if you haven't told them by the time they're 8, you're behind! I wanted to put my fingers in my ears and say, "La la la la, I can't hear you!" But I reluctantly faced facts, and I bought his book, "The Chicken's Guide to Talking Turkey to your Kids about Sex." And basically, it said you should just be low-key, no stress, no squirmy discomfort when you talk to your kids. Yeah, sure. He called it "Kitchen Table Sex Ed." Part of that sounded good - no Big Talk, where you are both uncomfortable, and when it is done, you can take a deep breath, and wipe that off your list of things to do. No, instead it should be a natural progression, where you and your kids are comfortable talking about all things, and they know they can come to you to ask you any questions they have.

That sounds great! In theory. He said you should use every day objects that you have around the house to illustrate your impromptu talks. For example, whole almonds are about the exact size and shape of ovaries. Hmmm...yes, I can just imagine this conversation. "You know, kids, while I'm eating these almonds, I just can't help but think of...well, ovaries." Yeah, that's a natural conversation that happens every day at our house! On the upside, it could give me some much-coveted time alone - the next time my kids see me reaching for a banana, their eyes would widen with horror, and they would flee the room!

So, one day, I just decided to bite the bullet, and give it a go. Levi & I were eating at Chili's alone, and I brought up his question.
"Levi, do you remember when you asked me how the DNA got from the dad to the mom, and I never answered it?"
"Yeah."
"Well, it's when they have sex. Do you know what that is?" At this point I am having to seriously fight back the urge to giggle like a junior high boy. What is wrong with me?
"Yeah. I looked it up in the dictionary."
Okay, so he has been thinking about it! "Well, that's good. Do you want me to explain anything about it or do you have any questions about it?"
"No."
Thank God! "Okay, great! Well, if you ever do, you can ask me or dad anytime you want." And we will try not to faint or giggle like a little boy. And we went on to order our food, and I felt good that the ice had been broken.

Fast forward a few weeks later, and we are sitting in church, and Steve is preaching a sermon about Gomer, the prostitute. I knew it was coming. Levi leans over and whispers, "What's a prostitute, Mom?"

Oh, dear God! Okay, breathe, breathe, kitchen table sex-ed, I can do this. "It's when people have sex for money."

"Have sex for money, have sex for money," he kept repeating, like he was trying to figure it all out in his head. Just kill me now. And I know this child, I guarantee you he is wondering if this might be a good way to earn that extra money he's always needing. "What is sex again?"
"Remember it's what you looked up in the dictionary."
"I know, but I can't remember now what it was."
Of course you can't! Okay, kitchen table sex ed is one thing, but church pew sex ed is entirely different. I finally said, "We'll have to talk about this at home." And dad can explain it to you since he's the one who's preaching a sermon about a prostitute!

Okay, so here's my thing about Kitchen Table Sex-Ed. The problem is, our kitchen table is full. With kids younger than Levi. Joey is already fascinated with his penis. It's nothing at all for him to just announce proudly to a complete stranger, "I have a penis! Do you have a penis?" Let me tell you, there is nothing that breaks the ice with a total stranger quite like moving past all the normal social niceties right to talking about your private parts. Yep, you're instantly bonded. Taking a 3 year old out in public is not for the faint of heart. So, I'm just thinking that he does not need to be armed with any more info than he already has.

And, yet the awkward "sex talk" is something I would be fine to forego. I remember my mom reading a book to me, complete with pictures when I was probably a little younger than Levi. And what did I do? Run right over to the next-door neighbor to tell her this new and shocking news. It began with, "You are NOT GOING TO BELIEVE what you have to DO to get a baby!" Of course, she didn't believe me because who would do something so shocking and gross? And yet, I had seen the pictures - I had proof. So, I guess if we did go ahead with the awkward talk, we would only have to tell Levi, and he would tell Sam, who would tell the younger ones with great relish and most likely everyone else he knows too. I don't think I'm ready for that. So, for now, I guess we just go on with the waiting. Until the next question comes up. Please don't let it be at church.

My Second 911 call

Well, I have officially made my second 911 call since I've been in Midland. I wonder if they've got some kind of file on me now? If they do, I'm afraid it would be labelled "Crazy Lady who keeps calling for non-emergency reasons." I will say, this call was much less stressful than that first call.

Okay, so this was last Wednesday, and I was trying to get my house cleaned. The little kids wanted to go outside in the front yard and play. Our neighborhood is super quiet during the day. We live on a culdesac, and there is no traffic to speak of. However, they are usually not allowed in the front yard without direct supervision. It was a beautiful day though, so I said they could play right there in the yard, and we would leave the front door open. Joey just wanted to dig in the flower bed that is literally 18 inches from the front door, and Lily-Grace was playing with him.

So, all was going well, and I was getting some cleaning done, when the phone rang, and it was my friend. So, while I was chatting with her, I decided I would just go and sit outside with them. While I was on the phone with her, some motion caught my eye, and I looked up and saw 2 Hispanic men running out of the alley across the street from my house, they crossed the street, and kept running down another alley. That is weird. You just don't normally see grown men running during the day who were definitely not running for exercise. But they weren't carrying stolen TV's or anything like that, so I decided to let it pass.

Then, I called Steve to ask him something, and while I was on the phone with him, I looked up and right across the street were 2 more Hispanic men. One of them made eye contact with me, then crossed the street in a run, and disappeared between one of the houses on our culdesac. Okay, this is really getting weird! I told Steve about it, and asked him if he thought it was weird.
"Umm...yeah I think it's weird! Grown men just don't go running around the neighborhood in pairs. You need to get the kids inside, lock the doors, and call the police."

"Really? You really think so?"

"Yes, I think so! Now hang up and go do it!"

So, I hung up, but I calmly swept up all the dirt that Joey had piled up on the sidewalk and thought about my options.

Well, they seem to be gone, so what harm have they done? Maybe they were playing hide and go seek? What am I going to tell them when I call? There were 4 men running around here, and I just don't think that's okay! Yeah, that sounds reasonable. But, what if they had just committed some heinous crime, and as they were running away (because they were so dumb as to have no other get away plans other than foot) that one guy saw me, so they'll be back to take me out later. Yeah, I think I've watched too many crime shows. Also, I haven't taken a shower yet, and I really don't want to talk to cops when I look this bad. But, on the other hand, they're cops, they're used to dealing with people at their worst.

But, what finally cinched it for me was the thought that what if they had robbed somebody's house or committed some other awful crime, and the police came around asking questions later to see if anybody saw anything, I would have to say, "Yes, I saw 4 men running from their house, but I didn't call because I hadn't showered yet." So, I bit the bullet and called 911.

"911. Do you need an ambulance, fire truck, or police?"

"Umm, well, I don't think so..." and I went on to tell him the whole story. When he asked if I wanted to talk to a police officer, I told him only if they really thought they needed to. I resisted the urge to tell him that I was Mrs. Kravitz. God knows that's what I felt like.



Anyway, he said that an officer would be there shortly. And, lo and behold, if the one and only cop that I know in the whole city of Midland wasn't walking up my path a few minutes later with his partner. How peachy! I explained the whole story to them, and they said they had looked in the alleys and hadn't seen anyone. Then they started asking me if they were teenagers. No, I definitely could tell they were adults. I was starting to feel really stupid, when another guy from the neighborhood sees the cops and stops to ask some questions.

"I was just wondering what was going on here. I saw one guy hiding in the back of that red truck over there. There must have been 6 or 8 of them in the alley behind that house."

Hmmm...maybe they WERE playing hide and go seek! I was just relieved that I had a witness, and I didn't have to feel completely like Mrs. Kravitz anymore. But then he goes on to say that he saw a Border Patrol car go speeding by.

"Ohh!" both police officers said. There was a house nearby that was getting a new roof, and the Border Patrol will target the roofing jobs. When they see them pull up, they all flee like rabbits who smell a wolf!

Everyone was relieved the mystery was solved, and the cops went on their way to go deal with real emergencies or eat donuts or whatever! I have to say that there is a part of me that hopes they got away. It seems like they're here working hard to earn better money than they could get in Mexico. On the other hand, I'm sure those 2 guys who ran down my street were hiding out in somebody's backyard. Can I just tell you how freaked out I would have been if we had been playing in our backyard and 2 guys hopped over the fence?!? I can guarantee you there wouldn't have been any second thoughts about whether or not I'd had a shower before I called 911!

I Made The Team!

At the boys' school they have a pickle/popcorn day every other Friday where they sell pickles, popcorn, and Capri Suns to the kids to raise money. They like to have parent volunteers come in and pop the popcorn. They also use a phone tree with a recorded message whenever there is an announcement to make. Today I received this phone call:

It was the principal, and she said, "We still need three more people to pop popcorn for tomorrow. The first three people to call..." What? Their kid will get an A? extra credit? You'll get a portion of the proceeds? Where can this possibly be going?

"...will be put on the Popcorn Team." What?!? No WAY! Unbelievable! I wonder if I'll get to start?

Needless to say, I wasted no time in writing down that number and calling as fast as I could, hoping and praying that somehow my call would get through the tremendous volume of callers, each one of us vying for a coveted position on The Popcorn Team.

Yeah, so what if I was always on the B team? Never picked first for playground games of kickball? None of that matters now. Look at me now - First string. Popcorn Team. Eat your heart out, baby!

Tell Us A Story!

Our family usually eats dinner together. I really do enjoy that time even though it is almost guaranteed that someone will complain about what we are having, and there is also a pretty good chance that at least one child will gag while trying to "at least taste" some truly disgusting food - like mashed potatoes. Where did I get these children? I could eat mashed potatoes every day of my life and die a happy woman.

Anyway, supper time at our house is fairly lively and never quiet. We had a friend and his son (who is an only child) come eat with us, and they just sat and watched everything with wide-eyed wonder, and proclaimed, "This is better than dinner and a movie." Thanks, we do what we can to entertain the masses. It's not hard. Well, sometime a while back the kids asked us to tell them a story about when we were little, and so we did, and a tradition was unintentionally born.

Now, I have to tell you that I love a good story, and I realize there is an art to telling it right. I've grown up in a family of storytellers. We used to go to my Grandmother's house at least once a month and have Sunday dinner with all our extended family. And the grown-up table was always full of stories and laughter. As I got a little older, I would sometimes even forego playing with my cousins to sit and listen to the stories. I loved them, and I learned how to tell a good story. A good story does not include just the facts, you've got to add in what you were thinking and feeling and what everyone's reactions were, what made it funny or sad, what makes it something to remember. I remember when something would happen to me, I'd think, I've got to remember this to tell it at Grandmother's house.

Steve told me early on that he would never want to do my grandparent's funerals - too much pressure to tell the stories just the right way! I laughed at him, but he was absolutely right. Whenever there was a story to tell about our life, he might start out telling it, but I usually couldn't help myself, and I'd start interjecting things until he would finally say, "Why don't you just tell the story?" But I've got to say, that hasn't happened in a while - I think I'm starting to rub off on him. And at my grandparents' funerals, I bullied my cousins into getting up there with me and telling the stories ourselves, and I'm so glad we did. It would have been very inappropriate for me to start interjecting things into the stories from my pew at the church, but I just don't know if I could've sat still and listened to someone else mess up the stories!

But anyway, back to our supper table. So, our kids want us to tell our stories. And this is fun, and the kids get a chance to know about us as kids. But when you do this night after night, you start to run out of stories to tell! I didn't think it was possible, but apparently it is. So, last night I had an idea. We would tell a story after they told a story. They can tell a story from school or one of their favorite memories, and then we tell a story. I like this. As a bonus, if one of them tells a story, they all want a turn, and so we can get by with only telling one story a night. And Lily's stories almost always start out as "Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess..." and the boys groan. And Joey's stories start and end with "Um, um, um..." this can go on for several minutes, but he is highly offended if you try to interrupt him. He has the floor, and he intends to keep it!

But Levi's stories are starting to have hints of the humor that we can all appreciate. He's starting to know when something would be appreciated by us all, and it is a tiny little glimpse into the person he will become. And I like it, and it makes me sad all at the same time. They are growing up before my eyes. And so the tradition carries on. I hope we raise four storytellers so someday when they come home, our table is filled with laughter and stories and shared memories. So, don't be surprised if you come over to our house to eat, and you are asked to tell us a story about when you were little. We need some new material!