So Kim and I had to stay after church one Sunday about a month ago for Safe Haven training. This is the video you have to watch (state law) if you are going to be working with anyone under the age of eighteen in any church or camp or probably any other volunteer organization. Everyone working AWANA or Sunday School or youth group or any such thing was required to stay and watch the video and participate in the discussion.
For lunch, the church provided pizza for everybody who had to stay. Since Kim and I were both there, obviously Robbie had to stick around as well (he went in the nursery after lunch), so we all had pizza.
Now, Robbie had had pizza before, but he became very, very excited about this particular meal as Kim and I took turns cutting off small pieces to feed him from our pizzas. (I really do try to share my food, Kim is just so much faster at cutting hers up into pieces that she usually beats me to it) Anyway, we all had a pretty good meal.
The next week, we pull into church on Sunday morning and, from the back seat, Robbie pipes up with "Pizza!" No, we explain to him, there's no pizza today. "Pizza!" he exclaims again. No, we tell him, all gone pizza. "No pizza," he says. "All gone pizza." When we walk in the front door, he points to the area where we were fed the week before, and again, "Pizza!" No, Robbie, all gone pizza. "All gone pizza." And yet again the same thing as we left church for lunch.
The next week, as we pulled up to church, he heralds our arrival by shouting "All gone pizza" while we pull into a parking space. And for the next few weeks, that's what he said every time we arrived at church: "All gone pizza."
Well, go figure, last night for the AWANA directors meeting (Kim goes to those, I don't), they provided pizza for dinner. "Pizza! Pizza! Pizza!" So Kim shares some small bites of hers with him, and once she's done with her food he looks on her plate and then says "More pizza!" Well, one of the ladies in the serving line saw Kim come up for second and asked Robbie, "Do you need more pizza?" "Pizza!" So, rather than give Kim a piece for him, she starts to hand one to Robbie, who grabs it with both hands, and before my wife--who has great Mommy-reflexes, by the way--can stop him, he's chomping into the slice that may be as big as his face while holding the crust with both hands.
And he keeps going.
And he finishes the whole. Dang. Slice.
That, my friends, is a child that I am very proud to call "My boy."
