Category: Z3 Adventures

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#TBT Delfest 2018

This is a story that needs to be told.

Dustbowl Revival was on our Delfest radar before a friend’s recommendation put them high on our priority list. We got to their set late due to Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band’s epic performance, but lucked out as they charged into the crowd and joined us in the cheap seats.

Isaac chanced into the front row with a tiger’s blood water ice and soon-to-be-cousin Tony’s leather hat.

The lead singer took notice and traded hats for the grand finale. Isaac’s smile conveys more than I can in words.

After that we just had to go to the meet and greet.

The band was exceptionally cordial and everyone signed Isaac’s shirt. It’s usually a sleep shirt and I have no idea why he was wearing it. Only just now do I realize the Delaware connections to Aldersgate United Methodist Church and some fine 5k sponsors, not the least of which is McCrery and Harra Funeral Home who handled Mary’s memorial arrangements with the highest care.

All of our learning is woven into what we’ve already learned. This small moment in our lives would not have been possible, or at least not as grand, if not for so many strands laid down before it.

I’m grateful for the big, crazy patchwork of a life we have. Our world expands even when it feels like it may have contracted.

Not one thread can be taken away. We can only add.

God bless,

Jason

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Bold Healing

“You know, I think this just might be the best summer eva.”

This declaration of a widower to motherless children may seem ludicrous. Maybe I have more confidence and chutzpah than I have any right to, but my ten-year-old responded with an easy, “Yeah, Dad, I agree.”

Summer’s not even here, yet we’re between road trips, on our way to a four-day music festival, and getting ready for my sons to appear in two Shakespeare productions, a jiu-jitsu tournament or two, and innumerable Delaware events.

I’ve been asked how I do all that I do with my sons. My first thought is that they’re not mine. They’re beautiful individuals who are stuck with me as their caregiver for a time. I feel a responsibility to not just prepare them for the world, but to launch them on mini quests into it. It is eternally challenging, frustrating, exhausting, and fulfilling. Their ability to navigate difficult situations rivals most adults I observe. They’ve had a crash course in unfairness, yet know they can make this world better by exploring and mastering it.

So, yeah, I think we’re looking ahead to the best summer eva.

God bless,

Jason

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Birthday Excursions

My sons lost their mother shortly before their birthdays. I opted for a combined party as Mary was the party planner and I was nearly overwhelmed with new duties. It was a great success as the boys share many friends and homeschooling has allowed us to easily form bonds with entire families.

Everyone was very generous in their gift giving, but it was too much for me. Too much for the boys as well, they’ve hardly been through everything in a year.

This year they were more enthusiastic than I expected in trading a party for more outings with friends and bigger adventures with Dad.

I watch my younger run through the streets of Detroit in a robe with friends and I am grateful for our wandering spirits. We’re different and God has handed us a different life. My sons embrace that better than I do and I am blessed to have them as examples.

Have a God blessed adventure today,

Jason

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A Labyrinthine Crossroads

I love options to the point of obsession. I find as many possible would-be adventures as I can and listen to the winds to tell me which way to go.

The answer doesn’t always come easily. Mary was my adventure muse. I’d lay out the choices and we’d figure out what was meant for us. Now, travelling as a single dad with my sons, I often find myself praying to God for guidance and listening more closely to those winds. The Holy Spirt has taken us on many exciting, relaxing, and entirely fulfilling journeys. Spirit is breath and I feel Him wash over my skin when I’m most present in the air around me.

I’m not listening this morning. The sun warms the campsite and excites the air into swirling gusts, but I feel deaf to its message. I make my coffee, read, meditate, write…none of my usual techniques seem to work.

I might call a day off for a feeling like this. I’ve done it many times before and it works, but we’ve got friends to support, adventures that will expire, a campsite to ready for more rain, and plenty of dirty clothes to clean.
God bless,

Jason

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This Is Why

Sometimes I ask myself why God took my wife to join him after her 47 years on Earth.

I find answers every day. Today it’s this image. A camper van with three seats. My sons and I will once again fill these seats and embark on an adventure into new territories. 

There isn’t room for anyone else on our path right now. I know, if only for today, that’s why we’re a family of three.

God bless,

Jason

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Curate Your Community

We are surrounded by impressive people who bring brilliance, strength, fun, compassion, beauty, bravery, passion, challenge, faith, joy, and love into our world. We gravitate towards excellence and engage it whenever possible. It’s no accident. After 12 hours of adventure in Philadelphia with home-educating families, Brazilian jiu-jitsu bad-asses, an FBI agent, and a couple librarians, I remembered why we frequently pause our adventures to connect with so many people.

I didn’t know it would lead to a holistic learning lifestyle when I first watched my sons asking museum security about a painting. I didn’t know chatting with a martial arts school at a crowded event about their summer camps would blossom into the most consistent component of our learning environment. I didn’t know small talking with homeschooling and unschooling moms would build a support structure that has buoyed us in hard times and created opportunities we would have otherwise missed.

I’ve learned that opportunity is everywhere and it is almost always locked away in a human who can’t wait to reveal it to you. I’ve learned that human connection is the key. Not just to experiences and knowledge, but to deeper understanding of God and the world around us. “Oneness” doesn’t mean we’re all the same, it means there are threads that join each of us together, one at a time. When we are open enough to see these threads and wrap our hands around them, we find something new in ourselves.

Each individual you meaningfully relate with becomes part of your community. Get into the habit of just chatting with people and soon you will find that you have an amazing world opening up around you.

Have a God blessed day,
Jason

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Goodbye, Plan A

Over the last 24 hours virtually every planned activity was cancelled or changed. Most Plan B’s bit the dust as well. I finger-pointed, fussed, and generally acted like Fate’s victim, for a while.

Last night we ended up in Bellevue State Park for a full moon hike that cleared our heads and lead to easy sleep. Today, Delaware snow and unforeseen confusions wiped out all our plans, but we ended up on top of a hill in Brandywine Creek State Park for a short afternoon of sledding before the rain came.

Two of those sleds were rescued from the trash; the tube was given to us by a friendly family we camped next to in Asheville, North Carolina; one hat came from Aunt Ann; another from Cousin Marley; and my niece is wearing my late wife’s snow pants. One picture tells the messy story of hand-me-downs, gifts, and adventures that compose our big, beautiful life.


It’s hard to be grateful when things don’t seem to be going your way. I fought off my confusion today to see more clearly, to understand that things are going to work out, to know that I’ve come pretty far from where I was.

God bless,
Jason

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Road Trip Exhaustion

As we wrap up another adventure I’m feeling worn right down, but oh so blessed. We’ve found traveling companions who go as hard as we do and can smile as they roll with the punches. We giggle and play, hike and seek, and somehow survive the new dynamic of six in a vehicle instead of the road-tested Zerbey Three.

We even squeezed in a two-hour ecology tour before an eight-hour excursion today. The learning lifestyle takes us many places and follows us where we least expect.

God bless,
Jason

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Keep Going

Musket and cannon firings, a dolphin sighting, free admission to a wildlife preserve, eating on the fly, trail hiking and running with walkie-talkies while only getting half lost, coffee and smoothie power-ups all around, hopping a fence for some open field ball and game playing, hitting the Redbox kiosk, grabbing a couple freezer pizzas to complement the movie, and surviving some children who have been over doing it like real warriors.

Today was one of those days that doesn’t make sense on paper. The kind of day that shouldn’t have been possible. But we did it all and wouldn’t trade in a minute of it.

We’re blessed with a world full of wonders. Get out there and find a few.

God bless,
Jason

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Road Trip Rhythms

When five-hour road trips turn into ten-hour slogs, a minivan full of six people can get tricky. When those six people have never traveled together, the hazards can be greater. Repeat that pattern two days in a row? Tricky can turn to sticky.

Somehow we managed. Two families with young children on the road for nearly twenty hours in two days. There was screen time, quiet time, reading, singing, games, drawing, fighting, talking, snacking, laughing, eye-spying, lots of stops, and a bit more fighting. No secrets, just constant trying. It’s been my go-to strategy: when nothing works, try something new, or something old again.

God bless,
Jason