Do Not Be Anxious Part 3

“And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it.” 

-Luke 12:29

I was anxious about the next phase of our Danish grandkids visit: Seattle in December.  We had just spent a delightful visit in warm, sunny Palm Springs visiting Disneyland and basking in a private pool and hot tub.  We looked at the 10 day forecast for Seattle.  Rain, rain and more rain.  No private pool.  No Disneyland.  What are we going to do?  Having the Danish grandkids visit was still a big deal for me.  And now I’m taking them from Sunnyland to Iceland with two weeks to go in the visit.  The familiar anxiety kicks in. 

I began to fret over everything again.  How will we get from SeaTac to home?  There are seven of us with lots of luggage.  Will the house be ready ? Is it clean?  Has the lake risen?  Will we have enough room for everyone to be comfortable?  What will we do to entertain them?  Are there enough things in the house to keep them entertained and occupied?  What kind of outings can we go on in the rain?  What will we do about Christmas?  What kind of gifts would they like?  Should we even give gifts?  And what about their parents?  They said they wanted to go shopping.  Where should we take them?  They said they wanted to go skiing.  Let’s boost the anxiety level up six notches!  Where to go?  We’ll need equipment and proper clothing.  We’ll need to schedule lessons.  Will there be snow?  What about shopping?  Where should we go?  (This turned out to be the easiest of all my anxieties to remedy.  Can you say Bell Square?)

So having learned absolutely nothing over the past two weeks, I continued to feed my anxiety, my worry, my fears.  I imagined all that might go wrong.  I anticipated grandkids (9, 11, 15) bored to tears with being in rainy Seattle, tired of a “not cool” Grandma and Grandpa, missing their friends back in Denmark and counting the days until they could fly back home.  I imagined my trendy, fashionable daughter complaining about the bad shopping.  I feared my son-in-law restless and bored, and not finding any good soccer matches to watch.  And so I continue to envision scores of non-existent scenarios to torture myself with, all without any help or basis in reality.

“But, Bob?  What about all you’ve shared about God providing and allaying all your silly fears?  Have you learned nothing?”  Busted!  Guilty as charged.  Though I can’t say that I’ve learned nothing.  Maybe just not as much as I would have hoped.  As Paul Harvey would say, “Here’s the rest of the story.”

Keith Ferrin had left his mini van at SeaTac, so we had a large enough vehicle to get everyone home.  It did rain, but the grandkids were philosophical about it, saying that the weather was similar in Denmark.  Everything was in order when we arrived home.  They were happy with our internet, our TV and streaming options, and everyone had their own bed and the privacy they wanted.

But the biggest surprise was going to the basement.  The grandkids found carpet ball, ping pong, cornhole, nerf guns and other games and cushions.  They spent most of their free time playing down there.  They were so impressed with Grandma and Grandpa’s basement that they wanted their parents to build one when they got home!

Christmas was a wonderful family event and two of the Danish grandkids helped me ready the Grinch.  They found delight spending time with their cool, older cousins (especially Hannah), including building gingerbread houses. Lars found all the soccer he could watch.  Darlene got to go to Bell Square, the North Bend outlet mall, the downtown stores and most of the stores around Issaquah, Sammamish and Redmond.

 Outings: Mt. Vernon and the Magical Strings, Snoqualmie Falls, the Seattle waterfront with Wings Over Seattle, the Wheel and the gum wall at Pike Place Market, Ye Olde Curiosity shop with the mummies, the lights at the Bellevue Arboretum, and the troll in Issaquah.  Except for skiing, they saw, did and visited everything and everyone they wanted.  When we put them on the plane for Denmark on January 3, we were all happy and sad at the same time.  This visit disproved Ben Franklin’s quote: “Guests, like fish, begin to smell after three days.”  After three weeks, we were happy for the best visit we’d ever had, and sad to see them go.

I fear I am the poster child for being slow to trust God.  Fortunately, He gives me many opportunities to learn (like this one).  But wait!  There’s more!  We haven’t even gotten to Carol’s shoulder surgery.  More anxieties await!