“And we urge you, brethren, admonish the unruly, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with all men.” Thessalonians 5:14

I’ve been looking over a list of author questions for an interview I’m doing with a blog, and one of the questions got me to thinking about how energetic—that’s a modest word—I was as a kid. Generally, I make a point of not overthinking my childhood because it can be rather exhausting for my old and weathered mind, but once my head gets wrapped around an idea, I tend to go for it. So, I was sitting there sorting through some of the more . . . interesting moments in my young life that might be entertaining for those who would come across the interview. You have to understand, I was a curious youngster and, well, to be honest I was the type of kid who would have had a Kool-Aid mustache as a permanent fixture on their upper lip (though I wasn’t really allowed to have Kool-Aid because it made me more hyper than usual). If you continue reading, you’ll understand why I was having a little trouble coming up with one singular crazy childhood memory that really jumped out at me.

I decided I could talk about the time when I was four or five and stuck a dead skunk on my head so I could look like Davy “Cricket” (I was curious, remember?). The horrified looks on my mom’s and grandma’s faces are priceless now, but at the time I was very disgruntled that they didn’t like my fashion statement. Or I could tell my future audience about my first time at the “big girl’s” tea party. My grandma Ruth, a fellow storyteller, used to throw these fantastically elaborate tea parties for all her grand-girls each summer. I was five and had been dying to go to one of the grown up parties that my two older sisters had been going to for years, so I was ecstatic to be invited that year. Unfortunately, that excitement turned into energy in my little body (the equivalent of five Snickers bars in a middle school boy). Since I was all hopped up on joy, I spent ten plus minutes before the party officially started running around the elegantly decorated table in my party dress, snatching whatever food my little hands could hold and munching on pre-tea snacks as my grandma chased after me. Then there was that year when I was really young that I ate all the erasers off the pencils. Mom tried to break that habit by putting cayenne pepper on all the erasers, but apparently I was born with a thirst for spice, so. . . For the record, I’ve been cold-turkey off the stuff for nearly two decades. Praise the LORD!

Somehow, amidst all these musings about my eventful childhood, I remembered with great clarity how I learned the alphabet. Seems like an odd jump to go from chewing erasers and inventing skunk hats (it was revolutionary, I tell you!) to my ABC’s, but this is how my train of thought works. First off, let me tell you that my grandpa Don is awesome. He is the most patient man you will ever meet, my co-demiser of the evilius gopherous (gopher) species, the man who taught me to tie my shoes, and he is my favorite person to cook and bake for—he loves food as much as I do!

I think I was in kindergarten, and my mom could not for the life of her get me to sit down for more than a minute to learn the alphabet. So, she called in her dad, the master of the ABC’s and a former teacher. Somehow, my grandpa realized that it wasn’t the letters I was having trouble with, but rather sitting still that was keeping me from concentrating. Patient man that he was, he brought out the chart and plastic letters and allowed me to climb on the back of his chair, duck under the table, jump up and down in place, hang upside down from the chair seat, and run around in circles while I shouted the letters back to him. Needless to say, I had my ABC’s memorized by lunch. God seriously gifted him with patience, and I have no idea how he sat there so calmly that morning, but I’m glad he did.

It helps to have someone who understands you. I realize that not everyone has someone in their life who is patient enough to figure them out, but my life is full of encouraging people—my grandpa is one of these special people. I know I would have eventually learned my ABC’s, because my mom is an incredible teacher and learned from the best, but I like to think that my grandpa gave me that little push toward my future in writing, so I should thank him for jump-starting my career. I mean, what author doesn’t know the alphabet?

“Patience is the companion of wisdom.” -Saint Augustine