Stick in the eye

Sorry I missed yesterday.... got away from me.

Last evening I was playing soccer with my two boys and the ball went into the woods (which it does basically every time someone shoots and misses the net). My eldest son (by 20 minutes) went in to retrieve and came jumping out a few seconds later holding his eye and yelling. I assumed he was stung by a bee based on his reaction. After I got him to calm down, I was able to look at he had a deep scratch on the outside of his eyelid and also looked like something in his eye. We got inside and were able to get the blood off and start rinsing with water. After a while we could tell what we were dealing with and there was nothing serious involved. His eye is a bit puffy with a deep scratch and we were able to work dirt/bark/etc out of the eye.

This is not the first time he has taken a stick in the eye. Last year it was a bit scarier as he actually scratched his eyeball with a stick.... his eye was bleeding and we actually took him in for that one. I remember telling him that now he could actually speak as an expert if someone said to him, "It's better than a sharp stick in the eye." (My gift of empathy, remember).

I told him last night that I find it interesting that he runs into sticks/twigs/branches in his eye. You would think if something hits you in the eye, you would have seen it coming (again, empathy).

I found a paralle to how I continue to run through the woods of leadership and take sticks in the eye... you would think I would see some things coming, but either I have a blind spot, I'm just not paying attention, or someone is standing off to the side swinging a stick at me. It's not as dramatic as that might sound and its not just about leadership... I think in life we all run into things that we should have seen coming (results of poor decisions, etc). Hopefully the implications of these things are better than a sharp stick in the eye.