DailySusan Humor Blog

SHE'S ALWAYS ON VACATION

We were happy to take the whole family up to our favorite place, the Canadian border, last week, but especially Maddy, 5, because it was her first trip to the North Woods. She was at her wackiest, though, and I’m not sure the stoic Norwegians are going to get over her for quite some time. She kind of took the place by storm.

As we roamed around the resort restaurant, game room, trading post, dock, playground and beach on the last day, the older five of us were struck by how everybody said, “Hi, Maddy!” and “Bye, Maddy!” No one knew OUR names, or spoke to US. The kids hugged her; the grown-ups smiled benevolently. A little boy gave her the cherry off his Shirley Temple, the ultimate demonstration of esteem.

She does cut a memorable swath: all week, she was calling me “The Mother of All Lords.” No, she didn’t hear it on TV or some video game. She just made it up. Do you KNOW how it feels to have your child yell, in front of a beach full of strangers, “Can I swim out to the water trampoline, O Mother of All Lords?”

We had quite a Solitaire Smackdown going every evening in the cabin, but her grandmother brought a special kiddie card game for her along the lines of “Go Fish.” Somebody was always playing it with her so that she could partake in the card-o-rama. Every time her request for a card was rebuffed, or the game didn’t go her way, though, she would mutter, “Humpff!” Pretty soon, we ALL were doing it.

Then there was the tubing, being pulled around by the boat on a special inner tube. All week, she was afraid to try it. Too “dan’jrous.”

Then finally, on the last day, she relented. Tucked into the inner tube between two young-adult sisters, and pulled with utmost caution by her dad the boat captain, she beamed and chattered throughout the whole ride, screaming with delight at every bump and turn. Afterwards, we asked the sisters what kind of stuff she had been saying all that time. Here’s one example:

“Did I mention ‘fun’?”

Did I mention what she said when she got a load of a huge wooden statue of a voyageur on the road in to the resort? You know, kind of a combination lumberjack, fur trapper and canoeist, with a plaid shirt and maximum facial hair? She proclaimed that it was:

“Tall Bunion.”

All we could say was . . . HUMPFF!

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Prayer request: A grocery clerk in Orr, Minn., confided that his dream is to become a Christian vocalist. Nicholas had just returned from a big Christian concert, where he had been allowed to sing with a few bands and share his original lyrics. We exhorted him to have patience and to hang in there, because it’s a long, long road, but it would be so, so worth it just to try. Lord, we pray that Nicholas will continue to seek Your face and Your will for his life. We pray that his dream will come true and he will be able to sing far and wide, for Your glory. (1 Corinthians 15:58)