Archive: That'll Blog

Seriously, sweet readers. I feel at a bloggy loss for what to write. Abigail had her first sleepover on Friday night. It was fun. We started our Beth Moore Bible study this week at church. I get to try on bridesmaid dresses on Saturday. Paul went to Zumba with me yesterday.

Heck, I'm just gonna post an archive. It has got to be more interesting than my last week.

June 20, 2007
That'll Blog

I don't know exactly how to start this blog, but I know I feel like writing. I have had these fleeting thoughts over the last couple of weeks, and I think, that'll blog. That sounds funny, but when faced with a life lesson of some sort, Paul always says, "That'll preach." I love that....you can have something really funny or really sad or really ordinary, and turn it into some lesson or story or sermon, even.

For instance, last weekend we were canoeing with friends from college. It was so fun to float down the White River and feel like we were real outdoorsy people (which is a laugh for pretty much all of us). Anyway, there were eight of us in four canoes. Paul and I were in a canoe together. We were pretty boastful about how good we were at this game...the first ones out of the gate, way ahead of our friends, taunting them to catch up to us. We laughed at Cherish and Joanna's canoe, way behind ours, always getting turned horizontally or caught on the river bottom. I felt so special to kindly point out to Joanna that she was holding the paddle wrong, and that she would get more leverage if she put one hand on top of the paddle instead of holding both hands on the side. About two minutes after that correction, we saw some "rough" waters ahead (as weakly rough as White River currents get). Every time we hit any kind of current, Cherish and Joanna's canoe would get turned around, and they would laugh hysterically for ten minutes trying to get their oars going in the same direction to get turned around. So, Paul and I saw the currents ahead, and looked back at the girls' canoe, just waiting to see how they got through this one. Problem was, WE weren't focused on getting through this one. Before the girls' canoe even hit the currents, our canoe was completely flipped. We were both up to our shoulders in water, my flip-flops were escaping me upstream (Paul told me to leave my tennis shoes on, but my feet were ho-ot), and our backback of belongings was completely soaked. The only canoe in the group to flip. And, oh, did the girls get a good laugh at us. My face felt hot, either from sunburn or from the embarrassment of Joanna asking, "How was I supposed to hold my paddle again, Amy?" And Paul said, "That'll preach." (Oh, so if any of you are sitting in on one of his sermons any time soon and hear this exact story, act all interested and surprised).

So, we took our eyes off the road ahead. So, we were more focused on correcting our friends than on keeping our own oars going in the same direction. Oh, and the girls were fine. I mean, they got a little turned around every once in a while, but they never got truly off course, and they were having a great time. So, we ended up all wet. Lesson learned, God. We're listening.

But the best part of the lesson is, our friends that were ahead of us stopped. They waited on us to get our canoe back on track. They caught our stuff out of the water that had already floated out of our reach. And they only teased us a little. We deserved that.

This was not the blog I planned to write tonight, but it is what came out. God has been teaching me a lot lately. When it happens, Paul says, "That'll preach." I think, that'll blog.