Grace is Messy

Day One

Vacation has started and it seems to begin the same way every year--with grandson Josh getting sick, all over everything. We had just finished the mandatory travel breakfast at The Waffle House (our son-in-law's favorite) in Franklin, Tennessee, and were en route to Winstead Hill Park, when Mount Vesuvius erupted. Caught in the spray were Josh, the van where Josh was sitting, and the hanging clothes my wife and I had brought to wear for a business meeting later in the evening. Our first pressing priority was to locate a car wash complete with vacuum unit and deodorizer. Thanks to a quick search on the 'Around Me' iPhone app, we found one just 121 feet from where I had pulled over, and quickly started a decontamination process even NASA would envy. The bad news is that our vacation transport needed drastic and immediate help; the good news is that as soon as Josh emptied, color returned to his cheeks, pluck to his spirit, and the whole fumigation process became (for him) somewhat humorous. 

As soon as we could re-enter the van without feeling the urge to follow suit, our task was to find a laundromat. As luck would have it, the King Neptune Laundromat was situated catty-cornered across from the car wash.  I used the change machine to turn a $10 bill into enough quarters for laundry soap, dryer sheets, and two loads of clothes washed and dried.  The others took the car and went to play on Winstead Hill, a city park that once constituted my great great something's plantation, while Jo and I stayed to complete the laundry service. Once the money was changed and machines loaded, Jo and I settled into hard plastic chairs and we were able to discuss the unexpected anointing of our day. Jo was quite calm about the incident and entirely practical as to how to move forward. She is the wise and stable one, seemingly at all times, and I have learned to respect her greatly and do my best to adopt her response to adversity as my own.  All of life is grace, but sometimes grace is messy, and it helps to have a good example of how to deal with the clutter.