Wake Me Up When September Ends

September was a very full month. Full of good, and unfortunately, full of bad too. We made it home just in time for Labor Day weekend, and it felt so good to be in our home church, and then to celebrate Labor Day with our family and friends. Looking back over the month, it was actually a nice respite. Starting that next day, we hit the ground running and haven't slowed down yet.

The first week back was full tilt for me, catching up on some administrative things in the office and getting ready for a client trade show we attend every September. Each evening we tried (and usually succeeded) to have dinner with family or friends, and sometimes both. When you're only in town a short period of time, you tend to create as many opportunities as you can to spend quality time with the people you care about, and that's what we did.

On Saturday the 6th, I got to do something so amazingly cool that it has to be included in this post: I got to play cops and robbers, but for real! Let me explain. My good friend, Micah, has a buddy who is a member of a local area SWAT team. They were doing some training exercises and needed a couple of "bad guys" willing to shoot at them and get shot at. Each drill used Simunition, which are live, plastic-like rounds fired from real weapons, howbeit at reduced velocities from a normal bullet. They still fly anywhere from 400-600 feet per second, and are designed to leave a colored mark wherever they impact. We took along our Glocks, the SWAT team had pistols and M4's, and we ran through several designed scenarios where we, as the bad guys, had to attack or hold off the police officers, and they had to follow procedure to effectively neutralize us. To keep from going on and on, let's just say we both came home with quite a few cuts, scrapes, and bruises from being shot multiple times, but we gave plenty of our own. Matter of fact, we shot so well that they invited both of us back to reprise our roles the next time they train. That was a pretty solid endorsement if you ask me.

In early August, my PawPaw Rathbun had been diagnosed with lung cancer and only given a few months to live. After my mom spent some time with him during the first week of September, she shared with me that he wasn't doing well. We had already planned to visit my grandparents as the first stop on our next trip, but I didn't want to regret not getting up there soon enough, so Molly and I cleared our schedules and headed to Oil City, LA on Monday the 8th after I finished working. We didn't get there until late that evening and PawPaw was already asleep. Early the next morning I got up and sat with PawPaw and we talked for almost three hours, just me and him. Molly and I spent two full days sitting around with family, talking to MawMaw and PawPaw, just enjoying each other's company. On Wednesday we had to head back to finish getting ready for my trade show.

On Saturday the 13th, Molly and I headed over to Austin so that we could get to the convention center early the next morning to start setting up our booth for my trade show. Sunday was filled with a lot of manual labor - setting up a 10'x30' booth filled with displays and merchandise takes time - so nearly 11 hours later we wrapped up a few last minute things and left the convention center. A couple of my team members had come over from Houston to help us set up the booth, so before they headed back I wanted to treat them to a nice meal. Moonshine, one of our favorite places, is directly behind the convention center and we told them to meet us there. I didn't have any cash on me to valet, so we parked on the side street beside the restaurant, which connects to the feeder road of I35. I've eaten at Moonshine numerous times, and parked in that location many of those times without any issue, but I had a bad feeling about parking my truck there. I hadn't kept my concealed carry on me since we had been working all day, but when we got out of my truck, I opened my back door and got it out of my backpack, which was in the backseat, and put it on. I tucked the backpack down behind my seat and laid a travel pillow over it. With my tinted windows, you couldn't see anything in the backseat, much less my bag. When we had walked almost all the way to the restaurant, I asked Molly if I had locked the truck, and since neither of us could remember, I trotted back down and made sure it was locked and the alarm set. After a wonderful dinner, I headed back to get the truck; halfway down the street I saw that my rear driver's side window was shattered. I immediately knew my bag was gone. Sure enough, it was. As I immediately scanned the area, I noticed a man sitting in his truck across the street. I asked him if he had seen anyone by the truck. He exclaimed loudly, "Man, less than 10 minutes ago a guy with a backpack walked from over there and got in a white Mazda and drove off! I didn't notice your window was broken, so I just thought he was leaving his car and catching a ride with someone else!" I missed that joker by less than 10 minutes. God probably had a hand in that, because I might be waiting on a trial right now if I had caught him in the act. Anyhow, my backpack is essentially what I live out of: my MacBook, two iPads, wireless router, Mophie juice pack, numerous charges, adapters, and cables, credit card readers, an HD camcorder, a Mont Blanc pen I received as a graduation present that I use for important meetings, plus two business journals, several documents, and quite a few business cards that I've collected over the previous month - I had over $6,000 worth of items in there. The digital information was all backed up, but much of what was in there I can't recover. I was sick. That is absolutely one of the worst ways you can start an out of town business trip. I was up until 1:30am on the phone with the police and then the insurance company, trying to make sure I had all of the bases covered to document and hopefully recoup what was taken. At some point that evening, I do remember consciously saying "Thank you God for your many blessings." I wanted to make sure that in my anger and frustration I didn't lose perspective of how blessed I truly am, even when something bad like this happens.

After a fairly sleepless night, we were up at 6am and headed to work the show. What followed was five days of complete craziness, in a good way. We were swamped the whole time, and had a record week for the business. At some point that day, I got more bad news: my insurance agent called to let me know that auto insurance would cover the window (which was good news, and expected), but that it doesn't cover the contents of a vehicle; homeowners insurance covers that. Since you're reading this blog...about our lives full time on the road...you may already see where this is going. When we sold our house in May, we no longer needed homeowners insurance, and therefore were not covered. I asked if our fifth wheel insurance would cover the loss, but apparently that only covers the contents of the trailer itself. We were up a creek. That evening we went and purchased a new MacBook since I have to have one to run the business. Even though it's a company paid expense, spending money for such an unnecessary purpose as theft replacement was painful. By Friday evening, we were exhausted. After cleaning up, we ran to Fogo de Chao to celebrate the success of the week, then happily headed to my in-laws farm a couple of hours away and promptly crashed.

The next week began in an amazing way. During an incredible church service on Sunday, our people gave an offering of over $105,000 for Sheaves for Christ, a missions-based program of the UPCI. If you're reading this and aren't familiar with our church, this is a pretty incredible feat because have about 200 saints, which means that the average per capita was over $500! I'm so excited because God always blesses sacrificial giving and I can't wait to see what He does in our church.

Our friends Chris and Danielle Green were in town since he was preaching Sunday and Wednesday for our church. Molly and I left the kids with my mom on Tuesday evening and took Chris and Danielle to our favorite Thai spot in The Woodlands, then for coffee and ice cream. It was nice to chill with good company. Wednesday night followed the same vein that Sunday left off in, and we had one of the most powerful services I've ever been a part of. God spoke some things directly to me that I needed to hear; He always knows exactly what we need. We spent Thursday evening with Aubrey, one of our close family friends, and Friday night we celebrated my friend Micah's birthday.

On Friday the 26th at about 2:30 in the morning, Mom called to let me know that PawPaw had passed away. Instead of leaving after service on Sunday as was our plan, we had to get everything packed and the whole trailer ready to go by Saturday morning so we could be there for the viewing Saturday night and the funeral on Sunday. We rolled into Oil City around 6:30, just in time to visit with everyone at the viewing. It was wonderful seeing the faces of so many old family friends, many of whom I hadn't seen since I was a kid. MawMaw had asked me to sing at PawPaw's funeral, and she wanted me to sing whatever was on my heart. As long as I can remember, MawMaw and PawPaw have lived in the same log cabin on Ferry Lake Road, but it struck me that the next time I see PawPaw, he'll be living at a new address, so I sang Address Change Notification. It only seemed fitting. Watching my MawMaw begin to worship as I started that chorus is something I'll never forget. Both of my brothers spoke, and both did a fabulous job. I think PawPaw would have been proud.

Since we already had our trailer at the local RV park, we decided to spend the rest of Sunday and Monday there with family before heading out. We've now been on the road again for a week, and it's already been incredibly eventful...but this is already the longest post I think I've written, so I'll let Molly tell you about that in our next post.

Looking back over September, I have a few takeaways:

• It takes some effort to fit everything in, but you'll never regret the time spent with family and  friends.

• Thanking God for what you do have helps you keep perspective when bad things happen.

• You can't out-give God. Two days after we gave in that offering for our church, I found out that our business insurance would cover the theft, paying for the replacement of my stolen items.

~J