There's a blog I like called Looky Daddy where it was recently discovered that their little girl is having seizures and the dad writes about it in a light and heartbreaking way - a glorious mix of comedy with tragedy. Nothing in the universe can be worse than the helplessness of not being able to fix everything for your child.

You want to know how God must feel? Watch, helplessly, as your child suffers. And I don't think it's that God can't or refuses to help us ... it's just that pain and suffering are great teachers for individuals and those who love us. And how we choose to deal with suffering shows our true character better than anything I know.

It's like when you take your kids to be vaccinated. They scream and cry as you hold them down for the torture, knowing it is for their own good, but with those nagging doubts of "is this REALLY necessary?" They look you in the eyes and feel betrayed that you LET them be hurt. And then the pain goes away, the ice cream is yummy and life is good again.

I guess we all just need to learn how to push through to the ice cream.

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Another blog I read, This Slow Day Moved Along posed the question, Would you be willing to change your sex if you could live for 400+ years? I blew over the sex change part (do you give up PMS and pregnancy and the chance to create and nourish life - for outdoor plumbing? And the whole one versus multiples ... I think there are pro's and con's and I'll just take what I have), and thought on the 400 years part - read my comment, if you like, by clicking the link. This is the blog of an old friend, now English prof ... so I'm always highly self-conscious leaving comments there. But I thought 400 years of life would become quite tedious; I'd like to move on to whatever comes next way before that. Reading books is nice, but there aren't that many original plot lines to persue ... and I'm still a firm believer of "life is suffering;" I'm grateful for the pain (when I'm past it): the deep dark lows make the amazing joys all that much better.

The difference, it seems, is what you think happens after death. Even if this life is all there is to it (and how much would that suck!) I'll live like it's not ... I'll hope that it's not. And when I die, and if there's so much more to learn ... I will not be surprised.

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We've been on a Moses kick here - having netflixxed 2 animated Moses movies, 10 Commandments (sucked, don't waste time or money) and Prince of Egypt (truly moving and inspiring! Buy it today). I just looked behind me as the music swelled - my kid is wearing his brown "jedi" robe and holding a , pretending to lead the Children of Israel across the Red Sea. And I cry. It's very important to me that my little boy is emulating a Prophet. That today, rather than Anakin Skywalker, it is Moses who is his hero.

Go MOSES!

To refer back to the first part of this blog, one of the comments about the little girl whose having seisures, someone said they'd like to have tea with her and listen as she explained her view of the world. It's like that with all kids. They are all so amazing and sweet ... they all have their stories and personalities ... why don't we parents stop more often to have tea and chat with them? Even just people ... any person. Gets me all C. S. Lewis-y - we're all amazing divine beings. Gods and Goddesses in the making. Anyway, I 've been called away, so I'm off to act it out now.

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And here's my cute baby. At 2, if they don't know the word that is the opposite or they don't want something, they say, "no [whatever]." Like if your arm is falling off or you need it to put out a fire, as you go to put them down, they say, "NO DOWN!"



To put gramma's mind at ease, I told him to "SIT."