Criminal Justice

Hey. This is Ryan. We were getting ready for Lisha's new Relief Society president to drop by yesterday -- you know, the usual: vacuum, tidy up the living room, shut the doors to every other room in the house -- when I glanced over and saw a crime being committed.

The crime:


The weapon:


The perpetrator:


The hardest thing was to control my anger. We do not have the $250 to fix the van. We know it's $250 to fix because our insurance, of course, won't cover it. We've scraped enough up to fix it, but it's gonna take some finagling. All of this was put into rage against Luke, but I put him in his room before I did anything too drastic. He was scared. I went in there and asked the normal Dad things like, "What were you thinking?" and "Why did you do this?" He couldn't answer because of his heaving sobs. Finally, I told him he was grounded from video games and computer for a month. This is probably the most effective thing that will cripple this kid.

Also, he has to pay for as much of the window as possible. Lisha is taking him to the shop tomorrow with his piggy bank (he's saved about $20) and he's telling the repairman what he did and hope he accepts his money. He also has to say he's sorry for making the repairman fix the window. Last thing, the money we would have spent on his birthday presents and Christmas presents will now go toward the window.

As for the money, basically our prayers for help were answered the minute Lisha hung up with the phone with the insurance company. The phone rang almost instantly with someone offering to help. We are truly blessed.

I hope he's learned his lesson. We've certainly learned ours: Chain your kids to the tree in the yard with a leash long enough to form a three-foot diameter.