It started out as your standard game of King of the Mountain: Old guy on top of the mountain. Six kids of both genders and all ages attempting to knock old guy off of said mountain. That’s how it started.
It ended with old guy breaking a rib and crawling to a bench where he rested for a few minutes and then whined for 24 hours (so far) every time he laughed, coughed or sneezed.
I was on all fours tickling my nephew Kase (recently six, pictured on my back above). I was laughing. I was distracted. Obviously, in hindsight, I now recognize this as part of their elaborate strategy.
Then, my son, Gresham (also recently six), my own flesh and blood, the mastermind behind the assault I’m pretty sure, speared me in the ribs with his head after a good running start.
And down the mountain I came. And retaliated with such trademark old guy moves as tickle time..
and the dreaded booty punch.
-------------------------
*This statistic is the result of only one round of research conducted at Pump It Up, a non-Brant-certified non-regulation fighting space, in combat against recently six year-olds.
I didn’t write this. One of many Wayne Kirkpatrick songs I wish I did. This is God Is With Us performed on the Gloria! Christmas Tour - made beautiful by the cello stylings of one Cara Slaybaugh. Enjoy.
Today I’m 35. Noah was promised 70 years so that means I’m exactly middle aged...So says my (older) wife the theologian this morning.
A much younger me once thought of middle age as some sort of switch, like you go to bed able to tie your own shoes and wipe yourself and you wake up middle aged and in need of a little assistance. Turns out the first morning of 35 is a lot like the last morning of 34. I’m still tying my own shoes and I’ve gone potty with no help whatsoever. It’s just the number that’s changed. (That and I now say and type the word “potty” without flinching.)
I woke up middle-aged this morning and Becky still loved me. And for reasons I’ve never understood, she still thought I was hot. We laid in bed talking and laughing for a while, listening to a CD she made me of the worst versions of “Happy Birthday” she could find. Then I got dressed. All by myself. Then, also, I went potty. All by myself.
Then I took my (older) sister - in town for Christmas - to meet the Cuban Assassin. And I kicked 35’s butt with a very large number of push-ups and crunches.
And now I’m blogging. I can see the screen as well as I could yesterday. The words are just as difficult to find with all the noise swirling around me in this house. And it’s just as weird to me as always that I have anything left to say and anyone left to say it to.
Yep, the first day of middle-age feels exactly like yesterday, except with cake and a little more gratitude than usual for such a great life.
I’d like a gift from you now. Well, from those of you older than I am (Nancy, Beth, Brian, Cristy, I could go on and on and on). Dispense some wisdom to me will ya? If you could tell the younger 35 you one thing (or twenty) what would you say? What do you wish the younger you knew at my age?
Travis calls Brandon the little brother he never wished he had. Brandon earns this title every day. He’s twenty-three, very from Georgia, says things like “smilin’ like a possum eatin’ briars” and he’s generally constantly obnoxious...in a very tolerable to extremely entertaining sort of way.
Brandon, for instance, walks onto the bus every night after the show and picks on the first person he sees sitting in the front lounge. This usually involves taunting and some form of physical contact. Last night, Travis was in the front lounge. Cindy Morgan and a camera were too.
Travis knows something about Brandon that we’ve all found, um, handy on this tour: He’s ticklish. Ticklish like a little girl. And laughs shrieks like one too.
And Travis has children, you see, which means he’s much practiced at the whole tickling thing. He has form and endurance down.
And so do I.
And when Brandon finally wet himself, well, it made me smile like a possum eatin’ briars.
