Choose Life!

Sometimes my wife's blog is so good I just have to steal her entries!

Choose Life

As we drove to the stone quarry in St. Mary's for a day of swimming (to be followed by dinner at an all-you-can-eat ribs place) Karis boldly claimed, "This is going to be the BEST day of my summer".
It was a pretty awesome day. The swimming refreshed us. Justin was a little dare-devil doing cannon balls off the diving board. We biked the "Grand Trunk" trail. We explored the woods. And we swam some more.
But our mood mirrored the weather. It was bright sunny and warm one minute, and then a big black cloud would blow in and we'd be chilly and rained on. The weather we blame on - well, what do you blame the weather on? The mood - that was a matter of choice. You see, the quarry is VERY, VERY deep, and in order for kids to swim without a life jacket they need to pass an arduous swim test that includes 3 minutes of treading water. Karis was convinced that she could do it, but try as she might she only made it to 1 minute 43 seconds (very good effort!!). So on went the life jacket. And thus began the tears.

"Why would they MAKE me wear a life jacket? How could they be so mean? What would happen if I didn't obey the rules?" She just couldn't get over it. It was now the WORST day of her summer. All this while watching her brother (clad in the very same life jacket) sliding down the slide off the dock, jumping off the diving board, swimming around the rocks.
I was tempted to go in to lecture mode. "Choose to obey and choose life". "The rules are there to give you life." "The rules are there to ensure that you have the BEST day of summer." "The life jacket is not a constraint, it's LIFE". "If you attempt to go without the life jacket you could DIE." "Get over the issue of rules and get on with life." "Obey and Live".
It kind of reminded me of a verse in Deuteronomy after the giving of the law when God says "What I am commanding you is not too difficult for you ... See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction ... Now choose life, so that you and your children may live". The law doesn't kill us - it gives us life. The life jacket doesn't kill us it gives us life and opportunity for FUN. It's not difficult.
It was a good day despite the tears and a few rain drops. And maybe we learned a little lesson.
PS After biking 50 km back from the quarry to the restaurant George got his money out of the all-you-can-eat ribs. (The kids and I drove - he's the only one nutty enough to bike it back!)