St. Croix Thaw

I've been sad the past two weeks as the temperature has warmed. Yes, sad. It means that my good friend, the frozen St. Croix River is thawing.

I have been watching the areas of open water grow larger. Late last week, patches of ice began to flow in some areas.

If I were single, with no responsibilities, I honestly would have attempted running on the ice flows. Images of Ernest Shackleton were in my mind.

This week, I spotted an ice damn forming up near the boom site and have watched it work its way down river all week. Today, early this morning, it passed under the lift bridge. The entire river north of the lift bridge has thawed.

I'm sad. My running gateway is gone. A beautiful, silent, desolate trail is gone until next year. I regret not running the entire distance from Stillwater to St. Croix Falls/Taylors Falls. It was possible for the river was frozen the entire 25 some miles. What saddens me is that it is not even possible to attempt until next year.

Today, Marty mentioned that she knew I was sad about the river trail "passing away." She suggested I try running on the water. I told her that I had actually given it a thought.

Going Potty in a Foreign Language

I've blogged here in the past about the trials and intricacies of visiting the biffy while out on a long trail run. Well, maybe I haven't...maybe I should. Of course, one doesn't actually VISIT a biffy out in the woods, but that will be for another blog post.

Before Marty left for Ethiopia to pick up our two new daughters, she did something brilliant. She learned a few critical words in Amharic in the likelihood that she would need to communicate with Lizzie, the two year old. Marty learned how to say in Amharic such things as:
come,
no,
lunch,
sit down,
thank you,
coffee,
I love you, home, and
do you have to go potty?

These proved to be very helpful to Marty.

When Marty and the kids got home, a few of these words have continued to be used such as "buna" (coffee) and "shint te bayt" (do you have to go potty?). So, when Lizzie comes running up saying "papa" and rubbing her pants, I am able to say "shint t bayt?," she nods her head, and we go to the bathroom.

Well, the last few days, we have been using the word "potty" instead of the Amharic. Lizzie understands completely. However, Zeke is now correcting us by saying "shint te bayt!"

Marty in Ethiopia

Here

PHOTOS

See some recent photos of the girls here.
Emma is taking care of uploading photos right now.
Marty and I are pretty busy: me catching up at work from being out of the office last week; Marty with the major part of taking care of kids.

Doing the Library One Muffin at a Time

We woke up yesterday morning in an Embassy Suites hotel. This meant a big breakfast downstairs. Zeke ate enough to pay for the whole hotel experience.

Then we went swimming again. Then we packed. Then we got in the Suburban to drive to the Minneapolis Public Library, a library supposedly unlike any other. As we walked to the Suburban, Zeke said he was hungry. So, he ate some snacks on the trip to the library.

We parked in a parking structure a block away from the library. As we approached, everyone noticed that there was a Dunn Brothers in the library (coffee shop) - including Zeke.

Zeke immediately said that he'd like a muffin. I ignored his request, and we marched into the library in search of one of the infamous, rolling-stacks rooms.

"I want a muffin, dad," said Zeke as we pushed buttons to make room-length stacks roll sideways.

"I want a muffin, dad," said Zeke as Eli stood between stacks while the rest of us frantically pushed buttons to get the stacks to squish him.

"I want a muffin, dad," said Zeke as we left the stacks in search of the old childrens' book stack room.

"I want a muffin, dad," said Zeke as I played dumb and tried to get a hesitant librarian to take us into the old-childrens'-book stack-room by feigning a desire to know if they had any George MacDonald classics.

"I want a muffin, dad," said Zeke as the librarian decided how to spell MacDonald.

"I want a muffin, dad," said Zeke as I realized that Zeke must be hungry.

"I want a muffin, dad," said Zeke as we left the library and headed for Dunn Brothers.

"I want a muffin, dad," said Zeke as I ordered a blueberry muffin for him and, falling off the wagon (see MANY earlier posts to read about the long journey to become relatively caffeine-free), a double shot espresso for dad.

"Thanks for the muffin," said Zeke as we left the library and raced to get home in time for fiddle lessons.

Providence

Wow. It is one of the timeless philosophical questions; like free-will.
I'm more of an arm chair theologian than I am an arm chair philosopher. Probably because I'm older.

When I was younger, I liked to argue. Plus, I had the energy and time to philosophize. Plus, philosophy lends itself better to open-ended, unsettled questioning.

Now, I'm too busy and need to conserve what energy I have. Theology tends to provide systems of thought and final answers that one can either accept, deny or spend time debating.

I believe in providence. I'm pretty radical in my belief that God controls everything. Sometimes, I get a real, down and dirty glimpse of it in the details of the Button family. And it's usually comical. I also believe that God delights in our joy and that this is often humorous.

Marty is in Ethiopia. I am here. She and our good friend Lisa have had in their "possession" two little girls for the past week, as they've waited for an embassy appointment. I, alone, have had in my possession, five relatively big and complicated children (one of whom needs an ever constant and steady hand while peeing) for the past week while we've waited for mom to return home.

Knowing that this time without mom would be great at first and then become like a wagon with its wheels falling off, I did some pre alone-with-dad preparation. About a month ago, I looked into taking the kids to the big water park/hotel down by the mega mall as a way to break up the week and fill up our time. It turns out that this water park is only open on the weekends, and only until 5pm. I needed something mid-week.
So, I changed plans and booked us in the Embassy Suites, a place near and dear to us all. I scheduled our night out for Tuesday night.

In the meantime, Marty and I were also preparing stacks of papers for our embassy appointment, to be on Thursday at 2pm in Addis Ababa. At this meeting, the consulate officer would be deciding whether to grant the girls entrance visas into the U.S. We spent hours filling out forms, checking the forms and then scanning and making extra copies of the forms.

Several days before Marty left, I realized that there was a scheduling conflict in my week-without-mom-survival-plans, and so I switched our hotel night to Wednesday. No big deal as long as we made it home before fiddle lessons on Thursday afternoon.

Marty and Lisa took off for Ethiopia. Emails haven't worked, and besides two hard-to-hear, always-fading-in-and-out telephone calls, the only way to communicate has been through Facebook. Who would have thought?!

This morning at 5:40am, the silence in our Embassy Suite hotel room was shattered by Marty's ring-tone on my cell phone, which, by the way, obnoxiously yells and then screams, "Message, message, messssssaaaaaagge!" In crystal clear clarity, Marty screamed that she had just left the embassy and it went well. Visas granted, mom will not need to stay in Ethiopia another two weeks to solve an indiscriminately determined important-to-the-consulate detail, and the wheels on this parenting-alone wagon will not completely fall off. We chatted a few more minutes, then I went back to sleep, glad that none of the kids woke up.

About two hours later, I told the kids of the good news. Visas granted, mom is COMING HOME!! After the excitement settled, Emma said, "Dad, we were all in an embassy at the same time."

I was stunned. The change in hotel nights, the 9 hour difference between us and Ethiopia, the particular chain of hotel that we ended up in. Sure, it's coincidental. But my theology says that God is so concerned about me and my family that He literally moves the world on our behalf. There are about 5 more stories like that from this week. I'm guessing that Marty will have several dozen to tell when she arrives home.

Marty called at 2:45 pm her time - 5:45 am here in MN.
we were granted visas for both girls.
This was the last legal hurdle.
No one in the next year woke up! The kids and I spent the night at a hotel to help break up the motherless 10 days.