What If Today Is Not Perfect?

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This is “back to school” day for many homeschooling families. If you are like I was in our homeschooling years, you’ve been hoping for today to be an especially good day. One thing I know for certain: being flexible . . . rolling with the punches . . .  laughing when things go a bit bonkers . . . will probably make it better than trying to make everything “just so.”

Our son John says that Ray and I are magnets for adventure. Our 50th wedding anniversary was no exception! It wasn’t “just so,” but it was wonderful.

We had the perfect day planned. Our daughter Mary Evelyn and her family invited us to come to their house for an anniversary breakfast before we headed south to Chattanooga, Tennessee, to spend the night at the Chattanooga Choo Choo, just like we had after our wedding 50 years before.

Adventure 1 – Breakfast

While we were getting ready to leave for their house, Mary Evelyn sent me a text: “I’ll do my best on breakfast, but our power just went out!” By the light of an oil lamp, we enjoyed fruit and oven-baked home fries which had been far enough along before the power went out. Well into our meal, the power came back on and Mary Evelyn went back into the kitchen to finish cooking the bacon, which made a nice breakfast dessert.

Mary Evelyn wanted a picture of us on our actual anniversary. Here we are in front of their Christmas tree.

I wanted to recreate our leaving-on-our-honeymoon picture. Here is that one:

Here we are 50 years later:

Adventure 2 – Lunch

We did a little shopping in Cookeville before beginning our two-hour journey to the Choo Choo. Since the population of Tennessee between our area and Chattanooga is pretty sparse, Ray and I stopped at a national fast food chain before heading into the “wilderness.” We bought a fish, French fries, and hush puppy meal to eat in the car as we drove south on the quiet Highway 111. I took the first bite of fish. I can’t describe that taste, but it was similar to something you might find on the cleaning aisle at the grocery store. I had never tasted anything quite like it. I tried one more bite before advising Ray not even to try it. I really like hush puppies. This one was raw. I guess I should have known they were having a bit of struggle that day when I pulled our “napkin” out of our drive-thru bag.

We ended up having another two-course meal—first the French fries and then many miles later, we shared a mushroom Swiss burger at a restaurant/convenience store/gas station. It was delicious.

The Choo Choo

The Choo Choo was wonderful. The hotel has a building with many traditional rooms, but we wanted to stay in a train car, just as we had in 1974.

We had a nice afternoon and did a little shopping in the nearby eclectic gift shop.

Adventure 3 – Dinner

Ray had called ahead to ask the hotel for recommendations for a nice place to have dinner. The front desk agent recommended a nice Italian restaurant very near the hotel. The weather had been rainy all day, just as it had been in 1974, so we drove to the restaurant. By the time we arrived, it was almost time for our reservation. Ray dropped me off at the door and went to park. We had noticed that my phone battery was very low. We had left our portable charger at home. I went to our table and waited . . . and waited.

Finally, Ray called: “I couldn’t find a parking place so I have come back to the hotel and am going to walk to the restaurant.” I was very concerned about him. After all his health issues, his stamina has not fully recovered. Also, it has not been long since Ray recovered from a bad respiratory infection with a terrible lingering cough. I waited and prayed and waited and prayed, hoping that my phone would hold out until he arrived.

You can imagine my relief when he sat down beside me. That’s when he told me that he had stepped in a puddle in the hotel parking lot. His sock and shoe were soaking wet after that dark, cold, rainy walk. I got him to take off his shoe and sock and put his foot in my lap under the table, where I rubbed his foot and dried it with my black cloth napkin. Then he told me that his other foot was wet, too. We repeated the process.

I don’t want to embarrass Ray by showing you the picture I took of his foot and my napkin under the table, but try to imagine that. Without consulting each other, we both concluded that it looked a lot like the ghost of Christmas yet to come in Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.

I never told our kind waiter why I asked for another napkin, and I don’t think anyone knew about our under-the-table medical procedure.

We had a scrumptious dinner, followed by a complimentary scoop of buttermilk blackberry ice cream to share in honor of our anniversary.

Then Ray put his wet shoes and socks back on, and we both huddled under the umbrella for a rainy walk back to the hotel. Walking into the lobby of the train station—beautiful in its Christmas finery—was a welcome relief.

 

Our train car was a welcome sight.

Inside Ray read me our whole wedding ceremony, we repeated our vows, and he sang to me “And Suddenly, Charlene,” the song Ray wrote and his dear friend Keith sang at our wedding. It was the perfect end of an adventurous day for this pair of adventure magnets.

It’s okay if your school day today isn’t picture perfect. The imperfect ones make much better stories and precious memories, too.

And He has said to me,
“My grace is sufficient for you,
for power is perfected in weakness.”
Most gladly, therefore,
I will rather boast about my weaknesses,
so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.
2 Corinthians 12:9

 

 

 

 

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