Day 107- A Pixie First

Joel had a Little League game tonight.  I have a lot of fond memories from Little League ball parks.  My siblings and I all played ball growing up and spent a lot of time at ball parks.  Some (not all or even the best) of my memories revolved around the concession stand.  I loved the sno-cones.  They made them in those little flimsy paper cones so you could get it all over you. You'd think that after eating it, smearing it all over your face and dripping it all over your clothes you'd be done with it. You would be wrong.  Then, you wad it up and play paper cup ball with it using your hand as a bat. This insures that you get that last little bit of sticky on  you.

One of the coveted snacks at the concession stand was the giant pixie stix. This is a giant tube of colored sugar. Tonight, I had a giant pixie stix as my "first."

It's been well over 20 years since I had a giant pixie stix.  They also had those little bitty paper pixie stix that had about a half a teaspoon of pixie (pixie dust, pixie stix or is the stix the tube??) in them.  After you put it in your mouth (that had to be sanitary) to get the first bit, the paper would gum all up from your saliva and you'd have to tear it to try to get at the rest of the pixie stuff and it would still stick together and so you'd bite it because you were getting close to the pixie stuff and you could not afford to spill any.  These were the ones that I usually got. My parents were not big pixie stix kind of people.

I think the maker of the giant pixie stix was a sadistic person who hated parents. The parents were put in a bind.  You could say no which was probably wise and your kids felt left out and whined (except if your Dad was around) about not having the big pixie stix.  Or, you could buy them one.  This meant that after staying at the ball park way past bed time you could then bring your child home on a wild sugar high insuring bed time will be even later.  Who thought this was a good idea to sell at ball park?
                                               

I finally got a giant pixie stix

Pixie stuff

I ate part of my pixie stix when I left the game to go to teach my Bible study class.  I ate enough to turn my tongue purple; I thought I should eat at least that much. I did resist the temptation to stick my tongue out at the class and ask if my tongue was purple.  I also resisted the temptation to put my purple tongue on this blog.  I ate the rest of it on the way home from class tonight at about 10:00. I have to admit that it tasted pretty good and I did eat the whole thing. Laura said I had to eat the whole thing in order for it to be a "first."  I disagreed but that stuff is hard to quit eating once you start.

There does come a time in life when you need to put away childish things. Things that are kind of fun but are really bad for you. I'm not referring to fun things like play and sports. I'm thinking more of things like being bitter at someone, not forgiving someone, excluding someone because they are different from you, or letting something get you addicted.  Addictions can be anything from drugs, alcohol and food to video games, FB, texting, TV, entertainment, and pixie stix. Those are childish things that Christians sometimes do not put away as they grow. Gathering up in groups and talking about people that we don't like and excluding people that are different from us ought to be left behind sometime in elementary school probably. It is very unbecoming among adult believers.

So, let's put away childish things that inhibit Jesus giving us abundant life. Now, with this pixie stix in me and the rest of the family in bed, I think I'll go chase dog around...

Growing up in the abundant life
Barry

3 things I thank God for today
1. My Little League baseball coaches
2. A new baby that was born today; Jack David McDaniel
3. Lungs that work well