Eight years ago this week Christopher was in the hospital with complications following his cochlear implant. One of us was in the bed with him, night and day keeping him happy and immobile. Have you ever tried to keep a three year old, who has almost no language, in bed at a 45 degree angle for four days?

I wouldn’t recommend it.

Did I mention we weren’t supposed to let him cry?

Three years of consistent training and discipline went out the window.

You only want to eat your dessert? Fine.

You want the tray to stay. No problem.

What’s that? You want to watch Winnie the Pooh for the 307th time? Let me just rewind it.

Are you making a pretty picture on your bed with marker? That’s so nice.

When we were released at the end of the week we were…I don’t know if I can find a word to describe the depth of our exhaustion. On the long drive home Paul and I talked about all the things we needed to do in the coming days. We were both dreading raking the leaves. Every year we would have over 30 bags. It was a daunting prospect in a normal year, but with how tired we were, all the catch up Paul was going to have to do at the office combined with Christopher’s new persona which was 1 part dictator, 1 part demon, not to mention a little Bird who was eager to have us home, the thought was overwhelming.

Pulling up to our house we were amazed to find all the leaves were gone. I began to cry. “That is being a neighbor.” I said. Later that day we went to find out who had done it. Our next door neighbors denied helping and didn’t know who had. We walked to our neighbor’s across the street. Nate, the teenage son of the family said they hadn’t done it either. There was something suspicious about the way he said it. We pressed him.

“We didn’t rake your lawn, but Saturday night there was a huge storm,” We knew. At the hospital, across the state, the generators went on, “and everything blew off your yard.” We looked at the long fence that lined their property.

“Did your fence catch all of it?” Paul asked.

“A lot, but not all. Some blew down the street.”

We thanked Nate for his unplanned service to us. And we thanked God for orchestrating it.