I have a lot of news to cover for today,
but will need to go out of order because the top story is about Rowen; and
happened this afternoon.
We were biking the trails in the park this
afternoon – Rowen, Tim, Michael, and me – and Rowen went off-trail and wiped
out instead of running into a younger kid who had been trying to go the wrong
way down the same trail and had gotten stuck.
She didn’t see him until the last second, and when she went off-trail;
her front wheel dug in and she went over the handlebars.
Why is that the top story of the day? Because a few of us know that she actually
got hurt a bit worse than the ‘official’ story.
I knew as soon as I reached her that she’d broken her left wrist along
with getting some cuts and bruises from the fall. The good news is that nobody else knew that –
though Tim told us that he was sure it must be broken based on his expert
assessment of her crash. Rowen was
pretty sure that she’d broken it; but didn’t get that confirmed until we
stopped in at her house so that she could get cleaned up and changed while we
sent the boys on ahead to let Aunt Deborah know that we were on the way.
If either of the boys didn’t totally buy
the excuse of Rowen wanting to get cleaned up and changed before going to see
whichever doctor she ended up with, they didn’t say anything; and that worked
out for the best because Rowen ended up getting Uncle Mark because Uncle Adam
was at the lab working with Dillon this afternoon. Okay, so I knew where Uncle Adam was, and
suggested stopping at Rowen’s house so that I could heal her broken wrist and
save her spending the summer in a cast; but I wouldn’t have let that happen
anyway – even if I’d needed to recruit Aunt Deborah to help me.
It was much easier to do it this way;
though I didn’t completely heal Rowen right then. Her wrist was sprained too, and while I’ll
heal her the rest of the way over the next week or two, and make sure that it
doesn’t really bother her at all; Michael and Tim wouldn’t have believed that
she wasn’t hurt at all after seeing her in real pain and being very careful not
to move her wrist as we biked back from the park and then on to the
clinic. If Mom hadn’t been at the lab
too, we’d have stopped in there instead, but I honestly wasn’t worried about
being able to handle a couple of fractures; and Rowen thought that it was a
cool as I did.
Uncle Mark took Rowen in right away;
cleaned and bandaged a couple of the bigger cuts; and had her wrist x-rayed to make
sure that it wasn’t broken before wrapping it in a tensor bandage and sending
us off with a prescription for ice cream cones and some quiet time for the rest
of the day. Patricia and Owen had been
called, but didn’t come to the clinic when Aunt Deborah assured them that the
x-ray was just a precaution and that Rowen had likely only sprained her wrist;
so we checked in with them first on the way to the Emporium for the ice
cream. We went to my house after that;
and spent the rest of the afternoon mostly floating around in the river because
it was another scorcher with the humidex hitting one-seventeen or eighteen.
With that news covered, though; let’s back
up and start with the other top news of the day – our first football workout at
the Norton’s farm. Technically, the ‘our’
part of that isn’t accurate; but Rebecca, Rowen, Emma, and I all joined in for
some parts of the practice; and the bike ride each way was a workout too –
especially when the return trip has that climb back up the ridge near the end
of the ride. I wasn’t totally surprised
that Rebecca decided to go along with us, but considering her usual lack of
biking enthusiasm; she must have really wanted to spend the extra time with
Lucas to put those miles on her lightly-used mountain bike.
The Norton farm is a few miles south of
town, and I thought that it was a nice ride out into the valley – especially early
in the morning. Lucas had already
finished his morning chores by the time we got there; so the boys got right
into their warm-up and workout while Rebecca, Rowen, and I had drinks and a
chat with Claire and Emma. Rebecca wasn’t
as interested in doing the same drills that Rowen and I had done yesterday with
the boys, but she gave it a try; and had more fun with Lucas while doing that
than Rowen and I had with Tim and Michael respectively. Their results weren’t as impressive, since
they came in fifth and sixth every time; but they didn’t seem to have a problem
with that.
Ben wasn’t really able to play along with
us, but he and Emma both joined in when Michael, Lucas, and Tim were ready to
run routes and practice both running and throwing plays with me as quarterback
again. Lucas want to be a running back on
the team – even though he knows that means competing against Caleb Palmer, but
he doesn’t really have the size to be on the offensive or defensive lines and
readily admits that he doesn’t have the hand skills to be a decent
receiver. He proved that last point to
me today the few times I tried throwing the ball his way; though he isn’t
actually terrible at it. Rebecca, Rowen,
Emma, and Ben mostly played defense against us; though that wasn’t really
challenging enough for Michael, Tim, or Lucas most of the time – even if Lucas
and Tim did have some fun with Rebecca and Rowen while we played.
The work on the farm didn’t stop for us,
and Lucas needed to get back to helping his father; so we stuck to our approved
time limit with ten minutes to spare so that Rebecca and Lucas could say a
proper goodbye to each other before he needed to get back to work and we needed
to start our ride back to town. We went
for a long swim after getting back; had a self-serve lunch at Michael’s house;
and then Michael, Tim, Rowen, and I went biking at the park. We hadn’t been there all that long when Rowen
had her little accident; so I’ve already covered that part of the report, and
after our swim and relax part of the afternoon; Tim took Rowen home for dinner
and a quiet evening with him while Michael and I had dinner at his house before
we needed to get to the church for our teen praise team practice.
While the first Sunday in August isn’t as
big of a deal for the teens, the teen praise team still does the music for that
service; so we’re doing two practices to get ready for it – the one we just
had; and the one we’ll have next week.
Since it’s mostly a normal service; we only have one piece of special
music to get ready along with the usual worship songs. Michael and I will do a couple of practices on
our own too between now and then; but we both have the songs memorized already
anyway. It was really hot in the church
sanctuary, so Michael and I went for a swim after we got back to his house; and
then spent some time with his parents in the living room while Rebecca was
hanging out with Jenny, Jonathan, and some of their friends.
It seems funny to think about Jenny and
Jonathan right now as I write this because I haven’t really seen much of them
at all since Sunday. They’re mostly
doing their own thing, and whatever that is – it doesn’t require hanging out
with us. I will leave that thought
there, if only because Michael and I got some alone time tonight after his
parents went to bed and while Rebecca, Jake, and Stephanie were all out; and we
certainly weren’t interested in hanging out with anyone else while we were
playing! ;^)
That’s the main reason why I didn’t get
home until long after Ethan and Ehlana went to bed, and Mom and Dad were on
their way up to bed by then too; so we just did a quick recap that included the
detailed news about Rowen that I hadn’t been able to pass on before then. Mom was not upset about me doing that for
Rowen; but the news will be passed on to the council and Grandma Emerson. I don’t expect that to be a problem either;
though this is the first Magi Healing I’ve done without prior adult approval.
Okay, no, I didn’t have approval for Gawain’s
healing either; but that was a completely different situation.
Moving along, I had a bedtime text-chat
with Rowen while doing my bedtime computing; and she had a good night too –
though she and Tim didn’t exactly follow doctor’s orders. Then again, I seriously doubt that any doctor
is going to order two teens to make out all night to help one of them feel
better. That doesn’t mean the therapy
isn’t valid – just parentally controversial.
I’d better not go there either right now or
I’ll be tempted to sneak back over to Michael’s house – and we might have a
tough time explaining that to the parental units in the morning. Instead of doing that, I’m going to wrap this
up and get some sleep. It’s a work day
tomorrow, so I’ll be doing that for part of the day; and then I want to spend
some time with Ethan and Ehlana. Mom and
Dad haven’t decided whether they want to go out after baseball practice
tomorrow; but I may be babysitting tomorrow night too. Since that could mean a late night, and we’ll
definitely have a late night with our Thursday night camping; so I’ll take the
extra down time now while I can get it.
Until next time...
...Live long and prosper, fellow Magi of
the Light!
