Life went on pretty well with the kids in school. Papa had lived with us for 6 weeks when we realized this wasn’t going to work much longer. It was actually the weekend my adoption was finalized (if you haven’t read that story, it is a MUST! Not only is the story heart-warming but it also won a writing contest and I got to have a 1-on-1 meeting with Bethany House Publishing!) that we realized the magnitude of the situation.

It started with an argument over Papa saying his electric razor was at his house. I was helping him pack his suitcase for the weekend – he was staying with other family while we went to Arkansas for the adoption court date.

“Why would it be at your house Papa? I asked. “You don’t go over there to shave.”

“Sure I do!” he bantered back, in stubborn Smith fashion.

“Papa, you’ve never taken a shower over there before,” I reiterated, racking my brain trying to figure out where he was coming from.

“Yes I have. I did just yesterday,” he stated firmly.

I retraced yesterday’s footsteps. Nope. He had been at my house all day. It was too cold for him to walk over to his house. I remembered clearly…unless he did it without me knowing.

In fact, as I thought about it, yesterday was a weird day. Papa had taken like a 4 hour nap – I had gone to check on him like an infant to make sure he was still breathing.

When he woke up he was all discombobulated and didn’t make any sense. He kept asking where I had gone. He said, “Where were you?”

“Uh, I’ve been here all afternoon watching you sleep Papa,” I said.

“No you weren’t,” he replied. He’s always been good at picking a fight, but this was getting frustrating!

He told me how he’d been looking for me and calling my name, but I never came. When I asked more questions he told me he had gone over to his house and taken a bath in the lake. He said he fell on his way out of the lake and it was cold. So he kept calling for me, but I never came. Then he said he walked all the way back to my house in the cold and fell again in the woods in-between our houses.

I didn’t know what to think. I knew I’d watched this man sleep for the past 4 hours and now he was telling me that he’d been taking a shower in the lake and fell several times?! I felt like I was going crazy trying to keep the facts straight in my head!

I truly wondered if he’d dreamed it or had an out-of-body experience of some sort.

So this story is playing though my mind as we’re arguing about where his electric razor is. And time’s ticking by; we need to be leaving soon.

Out of other ideas, I said, “OK, if you say your razor is at your house, then get in the car and let’s go get it.”

So we drove the two blocks to his house, got out and walked inside. Right as we walked in I saw towels draped over the chairs in the living room. He told me, “See, those were the towels I used when I took a shower over here yesterday.”

Yesterday, shesterday, what are you talking about Papa, I thought to myself.

I shiver as we proceed to the bathroom (it’s 53 degrees in the house) where there’s some clothes waded up on the counter. He tells me confidently why those are there and insists his razor is somewhere. We never found it, but I found all the evidence I needed that he had definitely taken a shower over there within the week.

We drove back to my house and finished packing, my mind in a whirl and my nerves on edge. Caleb was still at home (doing some sort of school) and I told him some of the story, trying to help it make sense to me.

The only explanation we could come up with was Papa went over to his house while we took a walk by ourselves – on Sunday. This was Friday.

That also means he took shower in his 53 degree house. That’s why it was so cold! And he fell getting out the shower and on the way back to my house, which explained the bumps and bruises on his arm and leg.

I couldn’t believe it! And to think he remembered it 5 days after it happened, yet thought it was yesterday…goodness! (Yes, Lord, I see why I’m not home-schooling all of my children, WOW!)

Anyway, that was the day we concluded it was no longer safe for my grandfather to stay with us. He was not able to go to his house alone and piddle around. And it looked like it wasn’t safe for us to leave him alone for long either, which crossed both of the boundary lines we had set up in the beginning.

During the weekend stay with my parents, we all got on the same page and talked over other arrangements.

As soon as my kids found out Papa was leaving they said, “So are we going back to home-schooling again?”

“Funny, but no. Not yet,” I responded.

Download today’s scripture by clicking the link below –

find-rest-o-my-soul-in-god-alonemy-hope-comes-from-him-psalm-62-5

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This post is apart of a series called 31 stories of hope for every homeschooler. To see the whole series, click HERE

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