Friday I had to babysit while Janice went out to eat with some of friends. I’m not complaining because another friend of her’s had dropped off a big bowl of spaghetti that afternoon. Janice has good friends and I wanted her to be free to foster these stomach filling relationships. Besides, the poor woman needs a break every now and then.
I’ve been accused of not being able to multitask. For example; if I have my mind on a project, aliens could abduct all my neighbors, set the neighborhood ablaze, and zoom back to space in a bluish green blaze of glory and I wouldn’t notice until Janice would come home from Aldi’s.
“Where did the neighborhood go? Oh and can you go get the groceries out of the van for me?”
I’d mumble something and look up from the desk. “I don’t know, maybe there was a gas explosion.”
This laser-focus-on-one-thing-at-a-time means that I’m not equipped to babysit a toddler at a reasonable level of competency.
Take Friday night for example. Our kitchen sink occasionally gets backed up and won’t drain correctly so Janice decided I should fix it. I had tried several cans of what is essentially sink laxatives (Draino) but just as I feared, this patient needed more invasive measures. I decided to tackle this project while babysitting.
First I opened the cupboard doors below the sink. It looked like someone had built a child’s jungle gym under there! Should I take off the monkey bars first or the merry-go-round? I solved this dilemma by loosening all the pipes then tapping them in an authoritative, confident manner so that they all fell off at once. There was greenish water everywhere. Done and done.
Adi was one cupboard door over. “Dat, dat, dat.” She was pulling the toaster out by its cord. Meh, I shrugged to myself, can’t do much harm if it’s not plugged in. As long as she’s happy…
Next step was to find the clogged pipe. I picked up the pieces and took them to the bathroom sink to flush them out. I took a coat hanger apart and twisted one end around a scrubby brush then pulled it through. I got a lot of icky junk all over the bathroom sink. Mission accomplished.
I walked out of the downstairs bathroom and suddenly noticed Adi running around with an egg in her hand. Wait a minute, why does she have an egg?
Then I saw the toaster on the floor surrounded by a pool of yellow egg yolks.
“Oh no!” I told Adi. “What did you do?”
She ran over to the toaster with the last egg and showed me how she was trying to fit the eggs into the toaster slots. I sprinted across the kitchen like a panicked ballerina, employing a frantic, rapid tiptoeing technique to avoid water and egg puddles, and plucked the egg from her fingertips. Honestly, one more egg wouldn’t have made a difference anyway. It was purely a symbolic gesture.
I grabbed a roll of paper towels and began trying to move a whole chicken coop of broken eggs into the trash can.
I got that mess cleaned up about 90% of the way. Good enough.
I started trying to put the jungle gym that was under the sink back together again.
“Dat, dat, ok.” Adi was trying to get an apple off of the shelf. I unwrapped my appendages from of the jungle gym under the sink.
“Come on Adi, now? Can’t you wait?”
She squealed. I sighed.
I took the apple so I could peel the skins off and cut it into pieces. My hands were dirty so I stick them under the sink and turned the faucet on. I felt my feet getting wet.
“WHAT THE…” I look down and see Adi mentally taking notes of my words so she can repeat what I say. “I mean… what a unfortunate situation. Haha. I forgot the drain was torn apart and now my feet are wet. Haha.”
I peel the apple, cut it into slices, dump them into a colorful bowl and hand the bowl to Adi. I turn back to the sink and resume my wrestling match with the pipes.
Once I got the sink all buttoned up, I turned my attention back to my child who is now cleaning the downstairs toilet with our motley collection of hot pads.
“Aww. Your mommy would be so proud of you.”
Here’s a word of advice. Rent your first house so that you can perfect your parenting skills. Then, once your kids are, say, eighteen you can buy your own house and keep it nice and clean forever.
The good news is that we have 18.55% of our support raised (as of September 16, 2018). Once we get to 100% of our monthly support quota pledged, we can move to Coshocton, find a new rental house, and start working on missionary airplanes everyday in the hangar at MMS Aviation.
We can always use prayer support! Thanks to you who committed to pray for us on a weekly basis. I have a list of you guys and we will try to return the favor often.
I hate to end every blog asking for supporters but hey, sometimes people forget about what we’re actually trying to accomplish. Consider it a friendly reminder.
From small town Indiana,
Josh & family
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