The Rains Came...and Went. MLK Day

The rains have come and gone and what once seemed like a storm of Biblical proportions now seems a faint memory. The fog has come to replace the rain and it has left the land sodden and weary. We finally got a day of sunshine yesterday and it warmed back up into the low sixties and the park across the street was ripe with families, soccer players, baseball players and kids running and yelling and being outdoors. I was able to mow the lawn, wash the car and clean up the back yard and side yard of leaves and papers and things blown about in the latest series of storms. We are supposed to have sun and fog all week.

Saturday was a bit different in that the sun never did win the battle over the fog and it was socked in all day. I finally ventured out to the golf course for the first time this year and it was a cold, wet and early experience. I had trouble finding partners to play with me and it ended up just Mel and I at 7:24 in the morning. The sun was up by the time we teed off, but you would have had trouble proving it as it was overcast with a chill and wetness to the air. We teed off on the back nine as the front was still a bit overwet from the storms. I struggled in the cold and the wet and managed just a 45 in the conditions. I was able to pull the round together on the backside and shot a 42 for 87. Mel struggled to an 89 and we sought the shelter of the indoors. I called Darla and invited her to lunch. I went home first to change out of my wet and dirty clothes and we had a nice lunch together while the boys were in Linden helping out Darla's Dad with some chores out at the farm. Darla's Dad, Earl, has graciously financed the boys' trip to Mexico this Easter by having them help him out at the farm and paying them $100 a day for their labor. He needed the help out at the farm, but more than that he knows the value of this trip to the boy's development as Christian men and citizens of this country and I applaud him for his love of the boys and his stewardship of their development. He is a wonderful role model to the boys of a Christian man in the way that he lives his life and in the way that he loves the Lord.

It is Martin Luther King, Jr Day here in the United States. The state and feds have the day off, the banks, the Post Office, but schlubs like me are at work. The roads were nearly empty this morning when I drove in at 6:30. Martin Luther King is still a vivid symbol of philisophical change and the fight for equality in the US. As was mentioned in church yesterday, King said in his famous speech, "I have a dream that one day my four children will be judged not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. I have a dream." That dream has not been realized in this world and may never be, but there is a place that it is a stunning reality and that is at the foot of the cross. Jesus does not see color or circumstances, he sees character, evidenced by the way he treated the prostitute, the beggar and the criminals as he was dying on the cross. Praise God, eh?

David's basketball team is beginning to jell and Ike has started to play like he is one of the premier players in the Sacramento area. We won two league games last week and now stand at 3-1 in league and 10-7-1 overall. We are tied for first in the league and play the other team tied for first, Natomas, tomorrow night. Unfortunately, we will have to play that game without the services of Ike. Ike has had to put up with a lot of trash talk and the chant of "overated" every time he misses a shot or a dunk. It has been eating at him, but for the most part he has responded with his play on the court. Thursday night, his anger boiled over after the Woodland game. The fans had been taunting him all night, yelling some racial comments and other assorted badgering. He missed a shot late in the game and the fans went wild yelling all manner of things at him and chanting the dreaded "Overated" when he ran up and down the floor. Frankly, Ike should have let it go as he scored 28 points and had 23 rebounds, but as he walked off the floor after dunking the ball off of a perfect alley-oop from David to win the game 64-63, he ran at the group of fans and began yelling at them and cursing them. Our Principal ran on the court and pushed him back toward our bench and actually pushed him into the opposing coach, who stuck his hand in Ike's face and yelled at him to get into the locker room as fans began pouring onto the court and it was getting ugly. Ike slapped the coach's hand and told him to "get out of my face". For that, Ike earned a one game suspension, right at the wrong time. David will start the next game at Power Forward and unfortunately, Natomas features the other 6'8" center in our league and now we will feel like so many other teams do when they play us. We have no one to match up with their center. Actually, we do, but he'll be sitting on the bench in street clothes. We had one other player suspended for the game who came off the bench and began yelling at the fans in Ike's defense. He is a key reserve, but won't hurt us as much as the absence of Ike. Ike has already verbally accepted a scholarship to Wyoming and I think it hurts his decision making. If he was still trying to impress the scouts, he would have his head in the game more. Oh, well, we'll see how we do this week.

Saturday night, Darla and I had dinner with Mel and Cora at their house in Carmichael. Mel was a wine importer in Paris for several years and Cora has run a catering operation. They are tremendous hosts and always cook five course meals when we join them for dinner. Saturday's dinner was no exception as we dined on fish soup, green salad, cooked tomatoes, lamb, gorgonzola cheeses, fruit, brushetta and a dessert of hot chocolate sauce over a chocolate tort cake filled with more chocolate sauce. Darla is on Weight Watchers and has lost a great deal of weight, but used up her flex points on that dinner for the next month. We ate with Mark and Pamela from the club and some friends of Mel and Cora, Ed and Mary. It was a nice evening.

Darla and I have signed up for a Life Group at church. We will begin the study, "40 Days of Purpose" in February and have it run up to Easter. The entire church is going through the study and we will kick off the study with a presentation by Dave Dravecky, a wonderful Christian witness and a former pitcher for the San Francisco Giants, who lost his left pitching arm to cancer during his prime years as a pitcher. Our Life Group will be Monday nights and is in our neighborhood. I look forward to the study as I've heard many friends talk about the conviction that they felt during the study.

I haven't heard from Jennifer in awhile. Did you get our package, Jen? She is getting ready to start a new mission on a communications building in Kuwait. I received some pictures from Jennifer and will post one on the site that I am using as my background on my computer. Can a soldier look cute? Check out the picture and you tell me.

I play in my first golf tournament of the year next Saturday and also play in my first poker game of the year the Friday night before. Boy, do I plan these things or what? Darla will be going to the Bay area to visit her friend, Joni, and it will just be poker, golf and male bonding next weekend. Pray for me. Take care. Ciao.