Parents, Make the Most of Time!* Words From COVID 19 quarantine

 Parents, make the most of time. In middle school, my mother decided she needed to be very intentional about family time together. We all had our evening meals together and Sunday after church family lunches when my father didn’t have hospital rounds, but that was about to change with our rehearsals and practices and all the things that begin to require time away from home about that age. Mom enrolled us all in weekly snow ski lessons through a local community college. The lessons, equipment, and lift tickets were all much cheaper than what the ski mountains charged and so it was not too expensive for a family of four. So, for 6-8 weeks each winter for 4 winters we took off Tuesday nights after school and put on our warm clothes. In the beginning, we felt like Ralphie’s little brother Randy in the movie “A Christmas Story,” overstuffed into too many layers of warm clothes…”I can’t put my arms down..” Though we soon learned how warm you can get while wrestling a pair of skis, gripping a tow rope and trying to avoid the ankle biters that point their little skis down hill and take a straight line down with Kamikaze abandon. We went to the Rolf Lanz Ski School in Gatlinburg the first year. Rolf wanted more and more people to enjoy his favorite sport even in the South. He would come out and say something funny in his Swiss broken English and we would all laugh, pretending we actually understood him. He encouraged us and sent us out with his Ski School instructors. The college changed the classes to Cataloochee Ski Mountain the next few years. It was less than 2 hours drive each way and we skied the night session from 6-10. You definitely didn’t want to fall near the snow making machines or you would be flash frozen like meat and coated in wet ice. One year we added some cousins from Morristown to our snow family. We carpooled with them from a stop on the interstate. This was Southern Appalachian mountain skiing at its best, with man-made snow, lots of icy patches and long lift lines, but we had a blast… we all eagerly learned a new sport together as a family. This was an “US” experience that we got to enjoy together, making lifelong memories of what it meant to be a part of our family. We talked excitedly on the way about what we hoped to learn that night, spoke about how many inches the base snow may be, and teased each other about who would fall first. My mom always had a great sandwich dinner, snacks and hot chocolate for the trip, though we still all got a little hungry when the instructor told us to put our skis in the “pizza slice” position so we could turn and stop easier, later we learned the “French fry” position when we learned to turn with our skis parallel. When we arrived on the mountain we got some equipment and learned to put on our boots and skis… they wisely gave us no poles for fear of impalement of self and shish kebobbing of other skiers in uncontrolled falls. Skis could also be feared projectiles if they came off in this pre-ski-brake era of the 1970’s; my sister was a victim of a runaway ski and had to be taken to the ski patrol first aid room for evaluation… she was fine, more scared than scarred. After skiing, in tired amusement, we drove home and laughed with each other about falling as we got our glove pulled off on the tow rope, or experienced the T-bar that hit you in the butt and dragged you up the hill as you sat on it and hoped you got off before being whipped around the pole at the top and dragged back down the hill, or when we locked our skis with someone in line, falling into a frozen game of Twister, which other beginners often joined as they were unable to avoid the human avalanche that moved at a glacier pace down the bunny hill. We arrived home very late, fell into bed happily exhausted, and had no trouble sleeping a little before the school bus arrived the next morning. By the end of the first season, we had become novice skiers, we had graduated from beginners and were on our way next year toward intermediate and the actual ski lift. We also learned a little more about each other on the rides back and forth. The next day at school we were a little tired, but it was all worth it for some fun and intentional family time.

My mother understood that fun time together as a family was important and she planned to make it happen, but she also understood that time with God and His people was also important making sure we made it to church each week. She even gave us Bibles with daily readings. Connections with God and people take time and time is a limited commodity. When the Apostle Paul was talking to the church family at Ephesus, He reminded them that God’s people use their time wisely doing stuff that pleases God, like valuing other people and living unselfishly. He tells them, “Pay careful attention, then, to how you live—not as unwise people but as wise— making the most of the time, because the days are evil. So don't be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is. Ephesians 5:15-17 (CSBBible) During these crazy COVID times, we may needta make more special plans with those we are staying at home with, to capture this time and make it special and to value those relationships even more. Time with God and His people takes some initiative too as gathering can put people at greater risk, but there are ways to do it wisely.

Hang in there people! God is with us! I’m praying for you all!