How much water would a woodchuck swallow...

I am renowned for my listening skills. Compassionate. Empathetically intuitive. I consistently and selflessly put the needs of others ahead of my own. It's why I'm your ideal friend. You're welcome.

So naturally, I was eager to share my exciting day with my daughter, Sydney...you know, to boost her up.

"Mom!" she exclaimed when I dialed her  number, "I've been trying to get hold of you all day! Didn't you notice all my missed calls?"

"Sydney," I explained (for the millionth time), "You know I have more important things to do than check my phone all the time!"

"But Mom," Sydney interrupted (rudely), "I wanted to tell you..."

"Syd! You're not going to believe what your dad and I saw on our drive to church this morning!" I paused for dramatic effect. "A woodchuck drinking from a puddle! Can you believe that?!?"

"Wow! That was something," Sydney admitted enviously, pausing to take a breath.

"Oh!" I added quickly, "I also saw a baby squirrel!"

"You do love squirrels, Mom," Sydney affirmed. "Speaking of that, I saw something today too..."

"Oh! Oh! Oh!" I squealed, almost forgetting, "AND I saw a small spotted fawn cavorting in a field of flowers! Completely magical!"

"That's great, Mom! I saw something pretty special today as well..." Sydney started to say before I glanced at my watch.

"Oops...you'll have to tell me later, hun! Our self-imposed eight-minute conversation is done for today! I'll talk to you later! Love you!"

Brad glanced over at me from the couch. "What did you think of Sydney's little beach experience this morning?" he asked me. I sighed and rolled my eyes. That man talks incessantly on the phone to his daughters. So annoying.

"What beach experience?" I asked still buzzing from having seen a puddle-dipping woodchuck.I mean, how many people can say that they've seen that?

"She saw about ten dolphins swimming within ten to fifteen feet of her," he said.

"That's incredible!" I marveled, "I can't believe she didn't tell me!"

Field Day Shirt Show

 EVERY year! What on earth is wrong with me? Wait. Don't answer that. I'm sensitive.

So as Field Day approached, I racked my brain to think of a t-shirt logo that encompasses Room 24's enigmatic spirit. Cherub H really loved carrots, zealously consuming them EVERY day. We could be Mosiman's Crazy Carrots. No-oo-oo. The Pusheen Cat craze swept through the room, occupying all of our spare coloring time. How about Mosiman's Perky Pusheens? No...it sounds naughty. We finally circled back to our real-time, all-out war with the Acme Book Company. "We made a meme!" Cherub E shouted, spotting the monkey and unicorn emblazoned on his t-shirt. Finally...we were The Mosiman Memes!

You'd think the hard part would be meticulously fabric painting the figures on each shirt but NO-OO-OO...the HARD part is trying not to care as they are DESECRATED by the unique artistic vision of, let's be real here...nine & ten-year-old boys. For three days, I repeat my mantra, "It's your shirt...of course you can decorate your meme monkey as a tribute to Heath Ledger's Joker."  "It's your shirt, darling...I agree that buck-teeth on a monkey would look adorable!" "Why bother to color the horn of your unicorn when you can depict a puddle of blood dripping from your unicorn's muzzle...it is, after all, YOUR shirt!" And then there were some for which I had absolutely NO words.

"Why do you do this again?" my friend George laughed as he inspected the pile of colorful shirts. He held up one. "The green monkey is my favorite, by the way." I rested my head down on my arms. "I like to give the students ownership of their shirts," I mumbled. "Well...in that case, they turned out great," George assured me, "There is NO mistaking that kids created these." Lifting my head, I rallied to color my own shirt...leaving it to dry just in time for Field Day. "Mrs. Mosiman! I love your shirt!" my little darlings squealed when they spotted me wearing our team uniform the following morning. "I love ALL of our shirts," I smiled, "They each reflect our individual personalities." I glanced at the hemorrhaging unicorn and suppressed a shiver. I'm not sure I want to know what that design reflects about its owner.

Power-Reading Psalms

Reading the Psalms is all about tone. Now...please don't mistake tone for attitude. Tone tends to be more about feeling while attitude...well, attitude is more typically what gets you into trouble. As in: "Lose the attitude there, buster!"

For those of you who didn't know, of the 153 Psalms, David wrote about half. He was the Taylor Swift of his time. Well, more accurately, T-Swizzle would be considered the King David of our time. "Bad Blood" is especially reflective of the type of tone David would employ.

Again...Psalms are all about tone. Initially, it may feel that David is doing quite a bit of whining and complaining...asking for chiropractic care, for example:  Psalm 22:14:  My bones are out of joint. Or respite from dry mouth syndrome:  Psalm 22: 15: My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. Or even petitioning for a foot brace: Psalm 18:36 so that my ankles do not give way. Occasionally, it seems that David is looking to be up-graded from economy class: Psalm 31: 8: You have set my feet in a spacious place. Often it appears that he just has it in for his enemies: Psalm 35:6: May their path be dark and slippery. And yes...a well-placed banana peel could certainly do the trick here. But, no. David is NOT whining. What he is expressing is a nifty little Bible term called lamenting. Since my pastor decided to force his parishioners to power-read through the Psalms in four weeks without even so much as a CHEAT day, I have been making full use of my lamenting. My spiritual adviser will be delighted to learn that I'm even applying it to my every day life! Example: "Brad, you ate the last Hostess cupcake! I hope it was stale and devoid of the delicious creamy filling."

Believe it or not...I HAVE been working on my tone. For where, when read aloud, it seems like David is making demands of God~~dare I say~trying to boss The Big Guy around...I have had to adjust my tone from demanding (and whining) to petitioning~dare I say~begging. Obviously, it's more entertaining to be read the other way but knowing David's history and penchant for getting himself into loads of trouble, it's pretty clear that this fellow desperately needs God's help and is pleading for intervention. I can't seem to resist, though, the "Aha" series that we've recently encountered. Example: Psalm 40: 15 May all those who say to me, "Aha! Aha!" I am in my dramatic reading glory. One might choose to read it as Einstein discovering the Theory of Relativity. (insert German accent here) A-ha! Or Sherlock Holmes revealing the perpetrator of a diabolical crime. (insert snooty British accent here) A-ha! Finally catching hold of that elusive splinter with your tweezers. A-ha! Or Amy Mosiman catching her husband eating the last Hostess cupcake! A-HA! Thank goodness for Psalm 146:7: He upholds the cause of the oppressed (me) and gives Hostess cupcakes to the hungry (also me). Translation unknown