Belated thanksgivings

I am thankful for my neighborhood and neighbors. It's a quirky place but I love it. Undercover Lane is not a fancy gated community but it's not a drug infested crime zone either. It's somewhere in the middle. It could be grandma's neighborhood or dumpsville depending on which house you're looking at.

I came home late this afternoon from my handy-boy gig. I'm working the most frustrating job yet...building a roof onto a 10' X 6' stone-walled storage building. It's probably an easy job except I don't know what the hell I'm doing. But that's the challenge and I'm learning to love challenges. Every time I get going on it I discover there's some new tool I need that I didn't know existed. Like I have to drill into cement and stone. I didn't know they made special drill bits for that. Fletch is probably laughing at me.

But I come home and the hood is hopping. The Sanford's are outside. Frieda is contemplating getting a new(er) car because her van needs $1200 of work. But they're not moping around and miserable. They're hanging out like there was a party or something.

Then I saw Agent Wife across the street with the Valdezes. The kids were racing Agent Offspring and another baby in strollers. The Valdezes niece (kid's cousin) developed leukemia in June and has spent much of her time in Ft. Worth at the hospital. Meanwhile, that kid's dad has been out of work and the mom is pregnant. Everything crashed in their world at once. But again...a party atmosphere. Nobody's long-faced.

Then there's Obi-Wan, the eternal joyous one regardless of the misery his legs and feet give him. We got to spend good time with him tonight.

Everybody is in great need but nobody is acting pathetic.

Thank you for these people we live by, Lord. Their faith in things getting better encourages me.