First Day of Second Grade and Other Matters of Eternal Significance

Today was the first day of second grade for Casey and everything's new: new teacher, new pencils, new Bible, new haircut, new erasers. That's why living your life on a school schedule is so great -- there's a beginning in August/September when you get to buy all new supplies and there's a definite ending in May/June when you can throw all the used-up stuff away (and some of the more bizarre art projects). Once you're grown, you don't have regular beginnings and endings, so time can sometimes just drag on or fly by, depending on your employment situation and how much laundry is piled up by the washer. And before you know it, you have a house full of irrelevant paper, pens with no ink, and computer printers for which Best Buy no longer even sells ink.

I had a good friend once in graduate school who'd had a hysterectomy a year or two before entering grad school. She told me that time slowed down after her operation because she no longer had her cycle to measure out her life with. I think about that exactly once a month when I'm wishing I no longer had a cycle to measure out my life with.

So here is the obligatory first day of second grade photo:



Because Casey (he's the one on the left, by the way) went back to school today, that means yesterday was the annual "Day of Torture." The annual Day of Torture typically includes getting a haircut, trying to find the missing items on our school supply list (this year it was 4 x 6 blank index cards; last year it was red checking pencils), and a visit to Risse Brothers Uniform Store.

For those of you who have not accepted Jesus Christ as your personal savior, your eternity will be spent in Risse Brothers Uniform Store, where you will eternally ask for sizes and colors in mandatory uniform items that are not in stock (an extremely rude salesclerk will eternally tell you). The extremely rude salesclerk will stare at you disdainfully while standing amongst her woefully (and, I am convinced, purposefully) understocked shelves, in such a way that suggests perhaps she looks down on you for not thinking to shop for said mandatory uniform items earlier in the afterlife. Then when you ask her when the items will be in, she will sneer at you, shrug, and say, "What do you care? You're here for eternity" and walk away.

Trust me when I tell you, there is no better time than today to trust Jesus.