But I’m gonna do it anyway.

This is the story about the time that Suz got her sister Lizzie embroiled in a classic “Come on, it’ll be fun” type of adventure involving sunburn, evangelism, multiple near car collisions, multiple real stroller-on-toe collisions, horse poop, post-partum (am I still allowed to classify myself as such?) sprints, and a whole lot of GREEN.  No, this has nothing to do with Al Gore, and I’m definitely not talking about money.  Ireland, baby!  St. Patty’s day!  Erinn go bragh! Am I the only one who looked up pics of the Old Country (Chicago) with the river dyed green today?

Let me just start by saying that I had gotten up at the bright and early hour of 3:15 a.m.  The reason for that was that I had been so tired the day before, that I had crashed while putting the kids to bed at 8 p.m.  So when Samuel cried at 3:15, my body thought that the 7 continuous hours of sleep was likened to a mighty angelic visitation, and would not go back to sleep.  One thing about me is that if I’ve had sleep, I get ideas.  Lots and lots of them.  And if I have several hours before the kids wake up to concoct these ideas, it just gets crazy.  You’ll know I haven’t had sleep if I don’t have about 3 x’s as many things planned for the day as are actually possible.

The International House of Prayer (IHOP), where we are fellowshipping here in KC, has an evangelistic outreach at the annual St. Patrick’s Day parade that everyone’s invited to join in, marching behind their float.  My sister Amy had challenged OJ and me to go, but I had scoffed at the time.  “If you’ll babysit!” was pretty much my response.   But I must have not had much sleep…for the last 5 months.  Because after my rich seven hour stretch, what did I wake up and think?  “Let’s go to the parade!  Lizzie and Glorie (my niece) can come with us!”

So, we loaded up the minivan, even transferring Glorie’s sacred carseat (I don’t think it had ever been transferred before, and she’s two!) to our car, and headed into town.  Neither of us had ever been to this `parade, and it’s been too many years since I did anything of note in Chi-town, so I forgot what events in a city of any size actually are like.  Only one word for it…fwam-packed.  Fwam-packed with cars coming from the highway, fwam-packed with pedestrians trying to get hit by cars, (Which makes sense.  If you’re going to get hit by a car, do it when they’re only going 3 mph.) and, of course, fwam-packed with the neighborhood folks wearing all sorts of insane getups that they can justify because they are green.

By the way, this neighborhood was no Sesame Street, people.  Think Boyz N the Hood.  Did I spell that wrong right?  Right wrong?  Anyway, we knew we were in for an adventure from the moment Lizzie pounded that auto-lock, and warned me to look out for the jacked-up Grand Marquis that was about to t-bone us.

All joking aside, our hearts grew really heavy as we drove through the poverty closer to the parade.  My words were, “This is a wasteland.”  The IHOP-ers had carpooled in together hours before (not feasible for us with the kiddos)nd had to find some reserved parking.  Long story short, God’s favor was on us, and we scored a ridiculous spot right next to the action when a police officer lifted the police line to let us through.  So we all piled out, with that odd feeling you have when you’ve worked so hard to get somewhere that you feel that the whole ordeal should be over.  But no, it’s just beginning.

Our task was to find the IHOP float (#92) several blocks down behind the starting line.  The parade had already started and the streets were lined (fwam-packed) with people.  Crazy people, mostly.  Or maybe those were really the only clothes they owned that were green; I don’t know.  So Lizzie led with the Graco and I followed with Ariel and Judah in the double jogger and Samuel strapped to my chest in the Ergo.  Despite all efforts, we were neither subtle nor unobtrusive, and I heard the words “big a– stroller” more than once, my friends.  Or this comment, “That is a lot of kids.”  I tried to make reassuring remarks to the kids, who could not hear me anymore than I could hear them.  I said “Excuse me,” more times than I can count, and for the most part received friendly efforts at making way.  But there were exceptions.  There was one time that a lady with a rotund belly protruding into the tiny space stopped us cold.  The stroller itself rolled past under the belly, and I was concentrating so hard, it was not until the handle itself reached the height of the obstruction that I realized we were blocked.  I repeated, “excuse me,” but to no avail.  She just watched disinterestedly as I lifted, twisted, and pivoted the double jogger around her waist.  Other times, the oncoming flow of foot traffic just didn’t stop, and so I stood waiting while Lizzie got further and further away, completely unable to move and sardined in between way too many shades of green.

It was an intense battle, but eventually, we ended up walking away from the parade, two blocks down, to be able to move freely, and then down and back up to find our group.  They were a sight for sore eyes!  A huge float in the shape of a green mountain, with a young man dressed like St. Patrick at the top, and hundreds of green t-shirted IHOP-ers milling about.

We walked up to be warmly welcomed with this warning, “Don’t step in the horse poop!”  Apparently, the next float after us was not a vehicle, but an equine attraction.  Fortunately, as a mom of three, I am very comfortable around poop, so that was not problematic.  How to feed the baby his bottle, sunblock everyone, and take Ariel to the (port-a?)-potty, however, was.  But I assured Lizzie I had it all under control.

Lizzie and Suz sunblock the kids

Handing out the snacks, whipping Samuel out of his carrier for the bottle, and spraying everyone down was a piece of cake, but then came the potty trip.  Word on the street was that a block down there were actual flushing toilets, and I knew I couldn’t risk a potty accident in the middle of the parade, so Ariel and I made a run for it.  It seemed like there were still 20 or so floats to go ahead of us, so I left Lizzie with the strollers and a young friend holding Samuel, and ran off with Ariel on my hip.  When we returned to our waiting area, it looked really empty.  I thought maybe I had come to the wrong spot until I saw the telltale horse poop and the awful reality dawned on me.  So I grabbed Ariel and began to run wildly through the street to catch up.  Mind you, this is a parade, so, yes, there were hundreds of people along the road to see this, my first post-partum jog.  As we got closer, this is what we saw…

Here we go!

They were not moving slowly, either.  Lizzie was towards the back holding Samuel, with two friends pushing the two strollers.  Running alongside, I dropped Ariel in the jogger, and did an intricate dance with them all, involving exchanging strollers and babies and vice versa, until all three of my children were again with me.  And then…there we were.  In the parade.  “Wave to the people!” I yelled to the kids.

“What???”  they yelled back.

You’re probably picking up on how difficult this had been.  But here’s the good part.  Over the loudspeaker came St. Patty’s brogue, briefly presenting in the time span of a watcher’s hearing a warm greeting and clear appeal to repent and follow Jesus.  After his fifteen second speech, an awesome worship song would ring out, “HALLELUJAH!  Grace like rain pours down…Turn to Jesus…HALLELUJAH…all my stains are washed away!”  And there were several hundred of us, with streamers in our hands, getting to walk right straight through that wasteland, shining with jubilant joy.  The more times we heard those lines…HALLELUJAH!!!…the more fun it got.  People began jumping and skipping down the street, rejoicing and waving to the crowds.  HALLELUJAH!!!  There’s an answer.  There’s an answer!!!  You don’t have to live like you’re living or be who you’ve been or die in your sins…HALLELUJAH!!!  It was the most shining contrast imaginable to the mobile deejays and casino floats around us.  WOW!!!  I got too excited several times, losing Samuel’s hat and then almost overturning the jogger when I bent down to retrieve it.  That was another scene.

But it was exhilarating.

FOLLOW JESUS!!!

Now I’m really way too tired, but I’ll finish up with this.  We made our way back to the car beet red and blistered, and faced the intimidating traffic to make our way out again.  We gave the kids ridiculous amounts of treats to make up for the lack of naps and long waits, and headed home.  The end of the adventure was far from the parade, near Target, almost hitting a car that was turning right into our lane, honking loudly, and then realizing it was an IHOP-er…the envangelist in charge of the entire parade!  We laughed really hard, and said the same thing, “He must be EXHAUSTED!!!”

Hope your St. Patty’s Day was glorious, too.