Cold and short for the warm and long

Last night, Jadon and Evangelina successfully attempted their first "Nigeria shower": showering using only the maximum amount of COLD water that could fill 2 4-ball tennis ball cans, based on what I shared with them about my experience in dorms on the Ile-Ife Adventist Hospital compound back in 2002.  They were proud to say that they were getting ready to serve God and His kingdom wherever He calls them.

Connections

 Daddy: Why do you always bring your husband to work? 

 Jadon: And why are you always wearing the same pair of pants?

Hammed-up Hamlet: What Was the Question?

Recently I taught Evangelina the Taiwanese folksong "Thi(n) O*-o*" (Dark Skies) as she showed interest in both singing as well as the Taiwanese language.  The lyrics are as follows:

Thi(n) o*-o*, boe lo ho*

Akong gia ti-thau, boe kut o*

Kut a-kut, kut a-kut, kut-tio chit boe soan-liu-ko*.

Hi(n)-a, he(n)-a, chin-chia(n) chhu-bi!

Akong boe chu kiam, Ama boe chu chia(n),

Nng lang sio-pha long phoa tia(n), long phoa tia(n), long phoa tia(n)!

Hi(n)-a, he(n)-a, chin-chia(n) chhu-bi!

Seeing our joy in singing together, including to the delight of Akong and Ama (both sides), Jadon has surprisingly picked up on nearly the whole song.  The final line, "Hi(n)-a, he(n)-a, chin-chia(n) chhu-bi!" ("Hee-hee, ha-ha, that's reeeal interestin'") is particularly funny to him, and he will sing those lyrics to himself on occasion.  Most recently, I heard his own Shakespearean use of his newfound Taiwanese: "Chhu-bi... or not chhu-bi?!"

It's been awhile... let's do it in style!

At first I thought it'd been over twenty years since my last college course until I remembered I'd taken the Bible overview course at Westminster Seminary in Escondido back in 2005, in preparation for fulltime mission service.  All the same, over 14 years is a pretty long time since attending class, studying, and taking tests for a college course.  It's been especially meaningful, however, as I'm taking this new course (Spanish 3, which is a good fit even though we had tested into higher levels) with my 13 year old son!  Below, our first day of class together, as well as today in the car as we crammed for the midterm. 

Sibling alliances, sibling diplomacy, sibling translation

Recently I was irked with our daughter.  She was speaking and acting disrespectfully toward me during our out-of-state trip which required us to rent a minivan, of which we had our pick (being value-minded Taiwanese-Americans, we chose the top-of-the-line American model available to us, the Chrysler Pacifica).  It was replete with leather seats, premium audio with satellite radio, Bluetooth cellphone connectivity, motorized sliding doors, motorized back hatch, rear A/C controls, heated seats (which we "threatened" to use on them in the hot muggy Colorado summer weather if they misbehaved)... all foreign features for kids whose family cars are 14 - 22 years old!

Anyway, as we were driving I had gone on and on about how Evanglina needed to be more respectful to her parents... namely me at the time.

After some time of silence, I heard Evangelina comment in what I thought was a sarcastic tone, "I really like all this lecturing."

"What????!!!!!!"  I nearly blew my top, and was about about to lay it into her afresh!

Thankfully, Jadon intervened in a rather calm and matter-of-fact way: "Dad, Evangelina meant 'luxury' when she said 'lecturing.'"

Deflated from my narcissism, I thanked him for his effective "Mina-ese"-to-English translation. 

preparation for fatherhood: what more could a Dad ask for?

About a month ago our 12 year old gave me the best Father's Day gift he could give me, even though it was not intentionally done on Father's Day, but rather happened as a culmination of a desire to spend time with the little ones at church, and finally having the time to do so with the end of school and having no hockey games, etc.  He'd submitted his service application to Mrs. Diana Matthews the Sunday prior, and we knew Mrs. Matthews had her hands full with upcoming Vacation Bible School plans to start the day after Father's Day.  He was eager to get started even though we didn't hear back from her, so I coached him on what to say in case he was able to find her that next Sunday morning: "No pressure at all, but I know you've been busy with Camp Compass so you may not have been able to get to our email.  If it's OK with you I'm willing to start today..."

We did find her that Father's Day morning at the teachers' prayer meeting, and from a distance I saw him nervously give his spiel, to which by the looks of his big smile she had said "Yes"!

Afterward, he came to me excitedly recounting his time with the 2 and 3 year olds:

- Daddy, you don't know how hard it is to take care of six kids!

- he was teamed up with a gal in his grade, as well as a high school gal

- "really fun!"

- he had made his own play structure with chairs and a foldable popup playtents (Bob the Builder)

- apparently he was so into the helping little ones mode that after church when we went to Costco we bumped into a 2 year old boy from Compass who had just finished a food sample, and Jadon nearly automatically took his trash from the little one "because that's what I was doing the whole time" with the kids

What really made me know he had joyfully found his niche is what he said to JJ as he recounted the stories to her: "I really want six kids, Mommy, even if they're naughty!"

TRUTH even amidst fiction

Over dinner at a nearby restaurant, Jadon was recounting to us with significant drama one of his recent dreams.  Apparently, if I remember the vivid details correctly [I hardly ever remember my dreams, let alone their details], Jadon dreamt that the four of us were somehow stuck in an underground river at a crossroads where we had to decide among four possible pathways in order to survive and escape.  Mommy, being the most valiant and loving [hey!], said that she would go first, and if she screamed in terror as she went down her watery pathway, that would be her signal to us that we should choose another path.  Unfortunately as she traversed down her chosen tunnel, she screamed in terror, and we knew she had died.

I, being the other brave and loving parent [whew, at least I didn't chicken out and go third or fourth!], chose a different tunnel with the same instructions to the children, but unfortunately, it was another fatal mistake, & they heard my screams of terror as I died as well.

Meanwhile, Evangelina silently listened with rapt attention and head cocked forward, as usual when she hears a dramatic story unfold.  Her eyes welled up with tears at the scary thought of losing both her parents to a watery grave, but what she asked next was telling of what was truly important to her: "Jadon, in your dream did Daddy and Mommy know Jesus?"

Might mishaps elapse? ...Perhaps!

Jadon was scrambling to complete a practice test for his algebra class in order to qualify for an important exam the next day, and in order to encourage him to get it done quickly, I decided to jump into the problems myself.  We both worked feverishly past what we hoped would be his bedtime, & to be frank it was a stimulating time for my brain.  Jadon, knowing that it might have been decades since I last did any such problems, commented, "Wow, Dad, your SYNAPSES must be exploding!", except he pronounced the word "synapse" "SIGH-napse."  

I corrected him, "Well for YOU you may be having SIGH-napses, but since I'm a SINNER, I'm having SIN-napses."

He added shortly, "Oh, it's like the connections in your brain when you're thinking something bad while you're asleep."

Another beat later, I finally got it: "SIN-NAPS"...

[The little sinner did beat this old sinner to the finish line, good for him.]

¡Cállate con la paz de Dios! (Shut up with the peace of the Lord!)

Jadon in hushed tones as we approach the gate with Daddy holding his Spanish history study guide in hand and quizzing him: "OK, OK, OK... the Lord give you peace!"  (He's referring to the song of blessing I often sing for the kids when sending them off, based on Numbers 6:24-26.)

Tough love? Love is always tough!

Daddy: I love you Son.

Jadon: I love you too Daddy.

Daddy: I know you do Son.  Thank you.  Loving is kinda hard isn't it?  Saying it is pretty easy, but actually loving is really tough.

Jadon: Yeah...

Daddy: Kissing is easy too, isn't it?

Jadon: Except when you're mad.

Would you like to buy matching yellow sheets, Sir?

Passing by a small nearby mall in our car the other day, Jadon asked, "Daddy and Mommy, does 'Mattress Liquidators' mean they pee on the beds?"

I guess I could use the help...

As told to me by Jadon:

J:  do you know what I got for your birthday? A cellphone that does your homework for you

E:  I want to do my own homework...

(then after thinking about it a little)... Can it do my Chungdahm [writing composition class]?

A good friend wished me Happy Birthday today...

Twice today Jadon told me tongue-in-cheek, "You're mean!" when I played some little practical jokes on him:

1st when I alternately gunned and choked the throttle on our little "speedboat" while he was trying to pee into a plastic water bottle. 

2nd just now when I crept up behind him while he was falling asleep and stood over him in a menacing way, and startled him when he happened to open his eyes. 

My response to both?  "Just making memories, Son.  Making memories."

Happy April Fool's Day Jadon!

Time for your shot!

Tonight Jadon showed me this drawing he made last week.  He's drawn the self-styled character J-Fett, but this time he added another character for me, somehow shorter than J-Fett (or is it just that my character is standing farther back in the paper than J-Fett?).  Jadon explained that the Dad character was code named "Diddle Doctor" and even had the motto, "Time for your shot!"  My gun was a patented syringe-shooter, and I had an ample supply of "Poison" shots, "healing" shots, and even "killing shots" on my arm for that extra-annoying person that can be used when simple poisoning is inadequate.