The Line Writer Rediscovered

I want to publicly thank all of you who have offered support during this difficult time period. As you may know from reading my previous entry, my grandson Noah, a.k.a. The Line Writer, was involved in a serious car wreck yesterday evening. He was ejected from his car at highway speed and the vehicle ended up on top of him. He is conscious and fairly lucid, with a bit of short-term memory issues. He has a broken shoulder and burns to his face, other shoulder and torso from being pinned against the car's hot exhaust pipes after the wreck. There are also bad abrasions from "road rash," along with major bruising. He is expected to be hospitalized for several weeks while he undergoes skin grafts for the burns. Then will come a lengthy period of rehabilitation. But we are only taking this day by day.

Today, after returning from a hospital visit, I was leafing through a folder of Noah's old typings and unearthed some short pieces that were never published to his Line Writer blog, which I have now done so.

I was reflecting on these short typings, many just snippets no longer than a Tweet or Facebook posting. Yet here they are, some seven or so years later. The lesson I take from this is to never underestimate the power of planting a typewriter in a kid's life, even if he does lose interest in it after starting puberty and the only remaining evidence is a folder of these paper scraps. Plant the seed, water it, give it some light and stand back, because you never know what might spring forth, perhaps many years later.

Today at the hospital Noah was asking if I'd draw him some mazes for him to solve. Sure, I said. But now, as I sit here typing, I'm think that this marvelous kid probably said that as much to make me feel better as for himself. That's why he's such a great person. I suppose now I better get busy drawing. As my friend Michael told me today, "God's got this." And I believe him.