Am I retired?

In case you are dyslexic or you are a skim-reader (no, not that you are a reader with no fat) or perhaps one of my middle school or high school youth group attendees my title does not ask, "Am I retarded."  What does this have to do with anything?  Well, it simply has to do with being stuck living in between a middle school world and a 50 years + club without any company from folks my own age.  I feel retired but my kids think I'm retarded.  We had to talk about appropriate language at youth group (don't use the words gay or retarded as adjectives describing situations or people unless they actually fit).  I haven't posted in a while-- a month to be exact.  I tried to take good pictures but I don't think I should pursue a career in photography.  Trying to capture my everyday activities and adventures has turned out to be a fairly lame representation on film.  Oh well, this is just a blog, right?   

I finally have a basic daily routine.  I'd love to share it with you.

7 am- wake-up, drink coffee, read paper

8:15 - out the door to play tennis with the old people (sometimes we have to call ambulances because the people are so old)

11- back from playing tennis with the old people

11:10- to the gym to lift weights

12:30 pm- lunch because I'm hungry

1:30- WORK

5 pm- diddle around, take Coop for a walk, watch t.v. or something

(Wed. 4-8 is youth group)

(Sun. 4-7 is h.s. youth group)

Now that we're on the topic of youth group...I'd love to share my most recent stories.

The middle school youth group is split into 2 groups: 5th and 6th graders and 7th and 8th graders.  I had to split the group because there were too many casualties (yes, actual injuries) and too many kids to have them meet at the same time.  Plus, seriously- what do a 5th grader and an 8th grader have in common?

So, last week the 5th and 6th grade y.g. were discussing God' creativity.  I asked the group to share ways they saw God's creativity at work in the world.  One of the kids raised his hand (this is one of the triplets that I used to babysit for when they were in diapers) and said that he guessed that the way a baby is made is pretty creative.  He went on to elaborate, "I mean, I don't know what God was thinking.  It's pretty gross, the way the man does... well, you know and the lady just... um, yeah.  But pretty creative.  Oh, yeah and the way the baby comes out... creative but NASTY!"  Then all the other kids said, "Yeah, we just had growth and development.  God is so weird."  The week before one of the girls came early to discuss with me what she had learned in growth and development class because she felt awkward talking to her mom about it.  If only she new how awkward I felt listening.  A lot of times the church is the last place people talk about sex unless it's in pre-marital counseling so I felt like I needed to keep my cool when the kids started talking about creepy God and his creepy sex.  Can you really tell middle-schoolers that sex is beautiful and will be awesome when they're that young?  

On the other spectrum, the 7th and 8th graders are an all boys group.  I have no business hanging out with 13 and 14 year old boys.  They think I'm as ridiculous as I think they are.  They have raging man-boy hormones and I'm like the Church Lady -- the asexual great aunt.  So, our fusion of a group is always interesting.  I can't, for the life of me, figure out why they come.  I give them crappy snacks and make them talk about Jesus, whom they don't seem to particularly care about outside of the Baby Jesus references from Talladega Nights and mocking Pentecostal Churches.  Watch, 50 percent of them will end up pastors someday.  Anyway, we were discussing Jesus the other evening and we watched the clip from Dogma about Buddy Jesus and I asked them to draw a picture of who they thought Jesus looked like (so we could talk about how often we try to put Jesus in a box for our own comfort).  They drew pictures of penises (or peni for the plural?) and tried to disguise them as rocket ships and sand castles (straight out of Super Bad).  Right, good lesson Christy.

Other than that, things are going well.  One step at a time.  I have posted pictures of Cooper wearing his new goggles for when he sticks his head out the window.  Pictures of my favorite mountains right by our cabin, most of the peaks my dad and I have climbed.  And Maggie's going away party.  Oh, there is a few weird ones of Cooper's new friend Cole and them sitting in my friend's car like they're in jail.  Maybe a few other weird ones.  Here's to you friends!