I have been thinking about the cross a fair amount this weekend. We are in South Carolina to celebrate 50 years of my Dad doing chalk drawings as part of his ministry (it should go without saying that what I write here represents my thoughts, so any beef should be directed at me). The drawing that he has done more than any other—and that he did this weekend—is a scene of three crosses on the hill of Calvary. The drawing is one of the indelible images in my mind.

Yet the cross is an inescapable image in the American South. It adorns churches on seemingly every block. One can find the cross on billboards and bumper stickers on virtually every interstate and highway across the region.

It was a bumper sticker that began to haunt me these last couple of days. And it was one I had already seen everywhere from Nashville to New York state. There is a decent chance you have seen a variation of it too. It is a series of pictograms that typically leads off with a cross, a gun, and a heart with the message “Pro God, Pro Gun, Pro Life” underneath.

It is January 2001. I am 17 years old and standing in the pulpit of a Baptist church in Southeast Kentucky. Our senior class in youth group was visiting the area—where our youth group would visit for a week in summers—for the weekend. I don’t remember what my purpose in that pulpit was. Maybe I was giving a sermon, maybe I was just sharing some thoughts.

What I do remember is that I started talking about Whose Line Is It Anyway? I’d like to think I was the first person in that pulpit to reference the improv variety show, but maybe not. I was talking about how life is like an improv, how you have to make things up as you go along. Whereas on Whose Line “everything is made up and the points don’t matter,” in our lives everything is made up and everything matters. Seventeen year old me thought that was a killer line oozing with profundity. It feels a little heavy handed to me now, but the kid’s heart was in the right place.

I should clarify that I have never done improv comedy before. Yet the format has long interested me and, though I am not the first, I do think it has much to teach us about living. One of the basic ideas in improvisational comedy is “Yes, and…” which is basically this: you accept what another scene partner has stated (“yes”) and then build your actions off of that scenario (“and”). You can disagree with the direction that your partner(s) take the scene in, but you can’t just blow up the premise because you don’t like it. You have to work together and work with what you have.

One of my favorite things happens maybe once a month if we are really on our game. It is those school mornings where both you and your brother get out of bed at the first call, each of you does an efficient job of getting ready, and we do not get ensnarled in some ungodly traffic quagmire on the way to school. Because if all those things happen and the weather is nice, you and I will get to your school and you’ll ask if we can go for a walk before you head into study hall.

We talk sometimes about school, more often about Star Wars or the latest minutiae you have absorbed about DC Comics. Even more precious is when those conversations turn to your worries, your hopes, your friends, and your questions about the world. I am typically a fast walker and have to consciously remind myself to go at the pace of the person who I am with (your mom will attest to this quirk of mine), but I don’t seem to have that issue on these morning walks with you. I like the slower pace. It is on those mornings in which we get to walk one or two laps around the field at your school that things don’t feel like they are flying by so quickly.

You are turning 14 years old today and then three days from now you will have your 8th grade graduation. It is hard to remember life without you and in my mind’s eye, you have always been a kid. Now though you are barreling towards high school and are a year off from learning how to drive and your voice is deep and you occasionally shave. Do not misunderstand me, you are still very much a kid and will always be our kid. Yet it is getting more and more difficult to deny that adulthood is creeping closer.

For a while you have been trying to master riding your bike. Considering that all you have to work with was a uneven alleyway behind our house, you had made pretty good progress. And then a couple of weeks ago while I was out of town, you decided that you were going to finally figure it out. And you did. Like in one afternoon. I left town holding on to your handrails and bike seat. And by the time you turned 11, you and I were riding nearly 4 miles together on the Greenway.

You have probably grown more in this past year than in any other since you were brand new. The growth hasn’t been so much in inches and pounds (though there has definitely been growth there), but in your capability in taking on the world around you. That growth has been staggeringly difficult at times this past year. Yet when I think back on where you were last March or at other points along this year, I am amazed at how far you’ve come. You’re not done of course, but none of us are.

One of the ways I have seen you mature in this past year is that you have grown into your big-heartedness. You have always had big feelings, but I have watched you hone those feelings into a desire to help the vulnerable. You want to take care of what is around you whether that is taking care of the earth on the Green Team at school or your humongous love for every animal you encounter or the concern for marginalized people when we talk about what you are learning.

One of the more difficult quests that I have faced as a father (and when I was a youth minister) is finding quality devotionals. There are questions of theology, age appropriateness, interest, etc. and it’s all kind of a crapshoot. It is one thing when you are trying to find that devotional for yourself. It is another thing entirely when you are trying to pass that devotional along to a young person about which you care and want to help foster some sort of spiritual practice.

Compounding problems is that there are so many devotionals that adhere to an incredibly narrow views of gender. Try to find a devotional for girls that is not in princess-like pastels or a devotional for boys that is not steeped in sports metaphors. It’s difficult. And the Christian publishing industry skews more towards the more-conservative-than-our-family-is side of things. This is not to say that there aren’t good devotionals out there, but with our oldest, it finally got to the point where I decided, “Fine…I’ll do it myself” (Foreshadowing…genre foreshadowing, not action foreshadowing).

So I am writing a devotional for Jim based on our shared love for nerd culture—comics, Star Wars, video games, Pixar, the MCU, etc.—and calling it Holy Nerdery. I know, this is a huge shock given virtually everything that I have ever written on this blog. While I am getting my ideas together, I thought that I’d write here a little about why my nerdery and Christian faith actually go hand in hand.

First, I am really glad that my son is living in a world where being a nerd is a bit more socially acceptable. This was not always the case. I was embarrassed about my comic book collecting when I was his age. I would admit to being a nerd in a self-deprecating way but it wasn’t until my college girlfriend (now wife) started wearing an “I ❤️ Nerds” shirt that I took the title as a badge of honor. Now it is a bit more mainstream. Heck, I went to see Dune this past week and the theater was packed. Dune! Glad things are different for the kids today.

A few weeks ago, EA told me that I should go on an adventure at the end of the month. She would be heading to QuiltCon in Raleigh for about five days which would leave me solo parenting for a bit. She knew that I would need some sort of break and distraction. First I checked to see if there was any space at the Abbey of Gethsemani where I had such a profound spiritual experience last year. When I found out that they were full, I decided to fly off in a wildly different direction. I wanted to see if I could go to Disney World with my brother and sister.

(“Monastery or Disney World” is probably a succinct encapsulation of where my interests lie)

So I texted both my siblings and asked if I could kidnap them for a couple of days at the end of the month for a Sibling Adventure. We’d meet down in Orlando, share a hotel room, spend a day hopping around several Disney parks, and then hurry back home to our respective families. It was a ridiculous idea and I was pretty doubtful that it could come together in such a short time. Both Taylor and Shari excitedly agreed and (more importantly) all our spouses signed off on the idea. This ludicrous scheme was going to happen.

EA teaches high school and therefore usually leaves our house before the sun is up. Since she has to be awake at such an ungodly hour, every morning she goes to Chick-fil-A to get a large Coca-Cola. The employee that regularly brings out EA’s Coke is a woman by the name of Monica. Over the last several years, EA and Monica have become pretty good friends one drive-thru at a time. EA has made Monica birthday presents and has said that Monica’s kindness has helped her on many a difficult day.

EA is heading out of town after school for a few days. She woke up the boys a little earlier this morning to tell them goodbye before she left. Then I got them moving to get ready for school. Our youngest started strong with his routine, but the though of not seeing his mom until the end of the week began to take its toll. It was a struggle to get Liam into the car and even then he was scared that he wouldn’t be able to go to school.

I had told the boys the night before that we would get Chick-fil-A breakfast as a treat since Mom was going out of town. In the drive-thru line, Liam looked like he was about to jump out of the car and run home. We pulled up to the window and who was there but Monica. She smiled warmly at Liam and reached through to him a five. A minute later, she came back out and brought a cookie for both Liam and his brother before going back inside.