I wrote this post on Saturday morning in the Denver Airport.  I'm leaving it unaltered for the sake of historical accuracy...or I'm low on time.  By the way, I did meet up with Dan Seeley at an Irish pub...we had coffee, ah fatherhood.

Sometimes life events conspire to make one grateful for God’s gifts.  When I spent my junior year in England, we had a Luther College professor teaching and minding us.  He and his family lived a block away.  They became like our family that year.  The Faldets had two daughters, Elizabeth was 14 at the time and Pearl was 7.  I had a lot of fun with them, especially Pearl.  They came over to our flat and ate dinner with us every evening, after which we’d socialize for a while.  My motto, particularly as it related to the excitable Pearl, was “wind ‘em up and send ‘em home.”

It was with a heavy heart that I learned this week they the girls along with Elizabeth’s boyfriend, and another family friend were in a car accident in Houston County, MN that killed the family friend and landed Pearl in the ICU.  Early signs are good for Pearl’s recovery, but I can’t imagine how horrifying that car accident must have been.

I have been away from Anders a lot this month with a week in Louisville, then a week of extreme commuting to Minneapolis, and I’m writing this post in the Denver airport after a week at CU for a history seminar.  Anders has not been sleeping well at night.  It has been hard to get him to stay in bed in the evenings and his sleep has been fitful.  I wonder if he is anxious about being away from home?  Me being gone so much?  Thinking about starting “school” (daycare) in August?

Much like the owl babies from the story with the same name, Anders thinks a lot.  He is much more a boy of caution and thoughtfulness than he is a boy of action.  It could be that all three factors are at play.  I’ll be around for all but two nights in July when Anna and I head up to Grand Marais, so that might help a bit.  Or maybe not.  Parenthood is trial and error, mostly error, along with constant and persistent experimentation.

Boulder was memorable.  The Gilder Lehrman Institute on America’s forgotten wars was excellent.  I enjoyed the colleagues I met.  The last couple days I hit my stride, evening hiking to the top of one of the Flat Irons (mountains) west of Boulder.  Things did not start auspiciously, however.  I suffered four days of altitude sickness: dehydration, headaches, no sweating, and fitful sleep—of course the sleep problem could have been the result of the room temperature being well into the 90s in our non-air-conditioned dorm room during the hottest June in Boulder History.  The 3^rd floor sauna had an east-facing window that started baking around 5:30 am when the sun started shinning in the room.             

Then on Tuesday afternoon lightening hit Flagstaff Mountain sparking a wildfire that spread to the east side (our side) of the mountain.  We watched the fire slowly creep down the mountain around supper time.  A constant aerial barrage of red slurry fire retardants stopped the spread of the fire and it was almost half contained by the time I left Boulder this morning.  Seeing a wildfire across a meadow just three miles away is a memory I will not soon forget. 

Well, that’s all for now.  I didn’t sleep well in the Sauna last night.  I’m excited to see the A’s this afternoon and perhaps even a Dan Seeley sighting tonight!  Whatchadointonight?!