Sharritt Christmas Letter

 Our Christmas letter which is a family affair follows.

Merry Christmas, 2010, dearest Friends

We hope this letter finds you doing well. With small variations, that is how Roger  starts his weekly letters to Ben and Grace as they have both left the house and permitted us to start on our new and excellent adventures.

It truly was a year split into thirds as we look back at events. Although, Roger contends that it could be  halves; pre and post IPAD (his June birthday gift).

The first third was all about Grace’s college visits, scholarship applications, graduation party, sacrifices to the Boilermaker admissions gods, and suddenly it was over. Decisions were made, whew! Scholarships won, woohoo! Cheese-cake eaten, mmmmm! Ball State chosen, curses! Then it was over.

The second was all about hair-raising summer experiences; a mission trip to build a house in Tijuana, Mexico, being dumped by a rapid called Surprise in West Virginia, a tree top tour in West Virginia, two and a half days in Gettysburg, and ending with a 25^th anniversary square dance.

In mid-June, Bev, Grace and Roger got on a plane to San Diego then across the border to Tijuana to help build a 20 x 30 two room home for a family of four. If the new math still works, that is 600 square feet. We had the privilege of assisting Youth With a Mission in their Homes of Hope project. Feliz Navidad!

After a week at home and hooking up with Ben after the completion of his assistance with the constitutional mandate of counting the huddled masses, the Sharritt’s  took off on a traditional family vacation for a week of fun in West Virginia, Gettysburg, and with friends in Ohio.

We had the most wonder tour guide for our whitewater trip. George took the 20 minute ride to our white water rafting drop off point to give us a few safety pointers. Number 1, wear your helmet and your life jacket. Number 2, if you fall out of your boat lean back and point your toes in the air. If you don’t your feet will get caught under a rock and you will have to exercise your evolutionary skills and breath through your gills. Number 3, if one of the safety crew is worried about you they will tap their head and if you are okay you should tap your head in response. If you don’t, they will come and rescue you and hold your hand while the ambulance takes 45 minutes to get you evacuated. Imagine Roger’s surprise when he was blatantly breaking the rules by trying to find the bottom of a rapid called surprise with his foot and looking up at George tapping his helmet—and vaguely thinking, “Why is George tapping his helmet?” as the rapids swirled around him.

The next day, Bev and Grace went on a tree top tour, across cable bridges, stopping on platforms looking around the Appalachians and flying down a zip-line. Ben’s skate park sonar kicked in and he went skating. After the near miss in Surprise and a prior near miss in a van in the hills of Mexico with a high center of gravity, (and several stupid gringos that flunked high school physics), Roger decided not to tempt the fates a third time. Also the concept of dying in the air seemed very possible after land and sea nearly did him in.

Off to Gettysburg: we highly recommend going with young children. They are much less likely to give you sass when you insist they stand at the bottom of Little Round Top while you throw rocks at them just to give them perspective. Roger felt quite blessed that he has a family who would tramp around several square miles with him while he teared up with emotion over things unseen and not fully understood. The vacation finished at friends where they took care of some very road weary travelers. Thank you Moe family!

This middle part of the year finished with Bev and Roger celebrating 25 years by doing what we did that day in 1985: square dance with each other and our favorite folks. Eugene Peterson compares the work of the trinity with dancers in a square dance, weaving in and out of each other in intricate, but coordinated movements.  What a joy it was to whirl and twirl with so many of you that have been part of the dance of our lives through the years. Bev tried to run with the momentum of Roger’s enthusiasm after this dance, and invited Roger to a Contra Dancing group that meets in Indy. We have gone once, but some of the moves require making eye contact with strangers; something Roger avoids like ……um …… Bev avoids guys who have B.O and wear skirts . . . oh, yeah, they were there too. Here’s to many more years of dancing!

September: Part 3, 2010. Sharritt’s spreading out in all directions, except, alas, west, to Purdue. Bev and Roger, after finding that aiming their laser-like parental attention on each other leads only to situations involving unwanted eye contact, are discovering a new rhythm to life. We both have set fitness goals, exercising more, and eating food that Roger brings in from his garden. Roger has re-started writing his blog, with great discipline and enjoys readership from here to Turkey! Fall brought Roger’s entry into the world of social networking, allowing him to spread the word about the blog, and to talk smack with his nieces and nephews about holiday dodge ball shenanigans.

Ben’s news: This year I continued studying elementary education at IU, and I am now more than halfway done, hopefully. I went door to door for the census this year, to make sure all of the people were counted, not only did this provide some good exercise in the months of May and June, it also paid for my rent for the whole summer. I also worked at Woodward Skate Camp this summer, if you have an extra 1000 dollars laying around and have a child that is excited about skateboarding, send them to Woodward, just be wary that your child might O. D. on Red Bull. The camp was not what I expected, but I got to meet a lot of awesome people.

Grace’s news: This spring, after running myself ragged with senior year business, I received a blessing from Ball State University in the form of free schooling. Ball State was a place I never seriously considered, but I love it there. I’ve made a lot of new friends and experienced new things like musical puppet shows, skydiving, swing dancing, goodwill pranking, and one a.m. fire alarms. I’m getting ready for spring semester and a trip to Rome and London for the summer followed by (hopefully) a year of study abroad in Ghana. I have never been so excited about my life.

When Ben left for college two years ago, we wrote him that it was like he was going through a door where he could keep his life private from us except those parts that he wanted to  show us. With Grace’s departure, it became truer for us. They are learning to time the telling of their adventures with their folks (Grace, you tell us AFTER you go skydiving, not before!)  We love the people they are becoming.

Adventure, heartache, uncertainty, success, there is so much more to share but so little time. We hope that your life adventures both confront and restore you!

 The Sharritts