Carla: Why can’t I be a ten-year-old boy? I’ve always wanted to dress like a ten-year-old boy!
Scott: You often do.

I never before noticed the “perplexed but not despairing” line in 2 Corinthians 4:8. That would’ve been a good thread to hang onto through doubt.

I must learn how to recognize when it is time to take a break. It is a combination of the demands of my soul and the demands of the world around me. At some crossover point the demands of my soul win.

[overheard while Sullivan and Éa build a precarious fort]:

Éa: Sully, did you just swear!?
Sullivan: What!? No!
Éa: No really, Sully, did you say the S word?
Sullivan: No! Only Mom does that!

I enjoyed today how although I was worried that I wasn’t going to be able to bring anything to church, at the last minute as we approached our taking of the wine and bread, I thought of “What A Friend I’ve Found” by Delirious?, which I had just run through with Carla, the Rookes, and Ben last weekend on a whim. I need to remember not to worry so much. Just follow my whim. Especially with music making. I ought not make music simply because I have a voice for it. I ought to make music when it is in the service of love only. Is love the post hoc pretext that covers a selfish ambition for praise or usefulness? Or is love the actual, prompting reason I’m doing the singing? Let it always be the latter.

Carla reports that last night, out of the blue before bed, Éa said, “I think that Daddy’s mune to stuff.”

“You think he’s immune? To what?” replied Carla.

“No, the opposite of that. Mune.”

“I don’t think that’s a word.”

“Really? Well then what’s the opposite of ‘immune’?”

“Susceptible.”

“What?! That sounds like some sort of a….PORT a potty! …like ‘appropriate receptacle’! (lots of laughter by both parties)”

And then I wrapped my ankle brace around my uterus.

— Carla

Carla: Scott, you’re not perfect.
Scott: I know. But I’m trying!

Today, watching a fan while I was supposed to listening in math class, I figured out how servo motors work.

— Sullivan

My feelings aren’t the most articulate bunch of neuronal events.

— Scott

Éa [doing math]: Mom, is two minus six plus ten six?
Carla: Umm…wait a minute…
Éa: Also known as twelve minus six equals six.
Scott: Umm…wait…

Scott: Sometimes I wish I were the smaller one.
Carla: Why, so you could beat me up?

Carla, after a long evening trimming the hedges: Whew, that was a lot of work. Éa, when you grow up, do you want to be the man of the house?
Éa, matter of factly: I hope so.

Oh my gosh. Jesus.

— Carla

“It’s disturbing how many people bring knives on dates.”

— Sullivan, reflecting on romantic carvings in the wooden observatory deck on the Bog Trail at Black Moshannon

“I also have some lead. I want to mail it to my Aunt Joanna in California and see how she reacts.”

— Sullivan, showing off his elements collection

Sullivan: Mom, can you snuggle me?
Carla: I already snuggled you.
Sullivan: But that one didn’t take.

Mom, why is mama’s milk discontinued?

— Éa

“Emotional support feels terrible.”

— Carla

Don’t worry: The water on the floor is tears.

— Éa

Sullivan: Yeah, even Mimi’s inflatable balls are giant! [LAUGHTER] Put that on Familypants, Dad!
Scott: I’m not sure that I will…

If I’m ever going to become a successful scientist, I’m going to need less hair.

— Sullivan

Jesus said to him, “Today, salvation has come to this household because he too is a son of Abraham. The Human One came to seek and save the lost” (Luke 19:9-10).

What prompted Jesus to announce that Zacchaeus was saved? Zacchaeus’ change of mind to no longer do wrong by people and to do right by them with his money. Not the empty sinner’s prayer or anything like it. Who are the lost? Not those who don’t believe in Him. It’s those who don’t follow Him in His ways. Salvation is right behavior. Or something.

Since Carla keeps the house, I should keep the things in the house where she keeps them. Moving papers or whatever of hers or the kids away from where she put it would be like her moving my digital files for, say, tax records, around on my computer.

• “But now it seems that good is not the same in all worlds; that Maleldil has forbidden in one what He allows in another“ (Tinidril).
• “…the vast astronomical distances which are God’s quarantine regulations…”
• “Ransom felt himself more and more in the presence of a monomaniac.”
• “The fatal touch of invited grandeur, of enjoyed pathos—the assumption, however slight, of a rôle—seemed a hateful vulgarity“ ( of Tinidril under the influence of the Un-man).
• “Not for the first time he found himself questioning Divine Justice. He could not understand why Maleldil should remain absent when the Enemy was there in person.”
• “He writhed and ground his teeth, but could not help seeing. Thus, and not otherwise, the world was made. Either something or nothing must depend on individual choices. And if something, who could set bounds to it?
• “Then came blessed relief. He suddenly realised that he did not know what he could do. He almost laughed with joy. All this horror had been premature. No definite task...