Feeling Concerned? Encouragement, Mirth, and a Thought or Two

One of my cousins from Germany is coming to live with us for a year. She'll be able to experience American culture, go to the same high school I did, and hang out with her most amazing cousins! <cough> But my wife is really concerned. She was homeschooled through high school, so the idea of sending our sweet relative into that "wretched hive of scum and villainy" is terrifying.

Also, she's not looking forward to figuring out how to navigate the halls and bureaucracy of a public school.

You may not be doing anything as dramatic as all that. But if you are feeling any trepidation about this coming year at all, I think you--like me--will find great comfort in some of these back to school prayers. I regularly need the reminder to cast my cares on the Lord. And if you're returning to homeschooling this year, and feeling overwhelmed by the more advanced things you'll need to teach, I highly recommend you check out the post The Kindergarten Box.

God is writing your student's story. I am regularly overwhelmed by the feeling of responsibility to see "my kids" turn out well. But I'm not the one making that happen. My job is to demonstrate Christ's grace in my life and let His love lead them in following Him.

That's easy to write. It's hard to live.

As Brittany and I were discussing the upcoming transition to being high school "parents/guardians," we realized we needed to figure out how the school handles their schedule. Way back in the day, I had four classes a day. It was easy. A year or two after I graduated, the school switched to an incredibly complex schedule with eight periods a day which alternated every other day unless there a half day in which case some classes were put on a difference schedule and ...honestly, it never made sense. But then it struck me. "I wonder if the current, constantly-in-flux schedules of schools are designed to prepare kids for working in retail?"

Schools were originally designed to produce factory workers. That fit with my ridged, consistent schedule in high school. But today, few kids work in factories. Most of my friends work in retail. Their schedules are constantly changing, never set, and all over the place. So too with modern school schedules. I doubt anyone sat down to create classes this way, but it certainly feels like the idea to structure a schedule in this fashion came from the retail model.

Just the latest crazy idea to strike my brain. Thoughts?

And I don't know about your house, but laundry is a reality in ours. So is forgetting to set it out to dry. If you've felt you've been losing that battle, perhaps this haiku will make you smile.

Continuing in this random humor conclusion, I enjoyed this brief post about missionaries.

Finally, as we move into the weekend and more people have time to post things on Facebook, their blogs, and other dark places of the internet, I found the step-by-step guide on How to Be Outraged on the Internet to be strangely uplifting. The comments, in particular, brought tears of mirth to my eyes.

Mrs. C

Lots of rather random stuff for you on this Friday afternoon. Enjoy!

 ~Luke Holzmann
Filmmaker, Writer, Empty Nester