Sometimes ya just gotta

Welcome visitors!

This will only come as news to those among you who have been away for the past month, or who come and go by way of University Boulevard.  To you who use the Woodmoor Circle entrance, you already know.  We re-paved the ramp!

Well, to say we “re-paved” does not quite do justice to the job; we replacedwhat had fairly disintegrated under snowplow pounding and above ground that was so waterlogged it shifted and slid.  As some parishioners pointed out to me, it had become urgent.

Originally the contractor had scheduled the work for this week – Friday, the day after the Holy Day.  But something in their schedule changed and with two days notice, they came in mid-July.  It was the day I left for vacation.  

The pavement grinder chews up what was left
of our old ramp and puts it in the truck for removal.

Before I left, I went out to greet the workers and take some pictures for you.  Then somewhat delayed, I loaded my car and climbed in just as the pavement-grinder was leaving the site on its flatbed truck.  The low bed scraped and stuck on the hump in front of the carport, and there I sat, trapped in my running car with this heavy machinery between me and my vacation.  You can imagine what went through my head.

But the driver liberated the flatbed and even got it over the hump at the front of the driveway, but in the process did damage that got us a brand-new speed bump, too, all the better for moms in their Catholic Assault Vehicles to “catch air” over as they race their precious cargo to drop-off.

The finished product -
can you resist speeding on it?

The finished product is smooth as glass, and glorious. Imagine what a whole parking lot of such pristine pavement would be like!  But to “keep it real,” you should know that the driveway work cost just shy of $20,000.  Now, mentally calculate two things: first, how many driveways worth of work are there in our paved lots?  And second, how many weeks of your weekly offerings would it take to pay for just this driveway?  As the nice man says on the radio: not a sermon, just a thought.  

It’s still steamy summer and urgency is blessedly absent from most of our days, but don’t neglect the Holy Day this week for the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  Just as it falls to kids to remember their moms’ birthdays, and spouses to observe their wedding anniversaries, so does it fall to us to keep holy this day the Lord has made so by the great things he has done for His Holy Mother, and for us.  We freely offer love, which when ordered toward God is called worship, to Him who has revealed what our bodies and our lives are for, in His plan: glory.  Look at it as our freshly-paved ramp – to heaven.  See you Thursday!

Monsignor Smith