Friday Five: Grand Tour

This week's RevGals Friday Five:

One of our original ring members, jo(e), wrote yesterday about a trip she and her sisters are taking overseas with their parents, to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary. Many other RevGals are headed for the Festival of Homiletics in the coming week (click here for information on a RevGals meetup!!). In honor of these upcoming trips, herewith your Grand Tour Friday Five. Name five places that fall into the following categories:

1) Favorite Destination -- someplace you've visited once or often and would gladly go again
The Holy Land. It took my breath away. I know God is everywhere, but somehow it felt like God was just a little closer in that beautiful place.

2) Unfavorite Destination -- someplace you wish you had never been (and why)
I can't believe I'm saying this, but - Egypt. Oddly enough, my visit to Egypt came right after Israel. We went for only a few days. Maybe it was because Israel was such a spiritual high, maybe I was tired and ready to go home. To be fair to the country, we were only in Cairo, so perhaps I didn't get a fair impression. But I just didn't like it, and found many things about it depressing, such as seeing the banks of the Nile littered with rubbish.

3) Fantasy Destination -- someplace to visit if cost and/or time did not matter
Ooh, almost too many to mention! Ireland and Scotland. A Reformation Tour - Wittenburg, Zurich, Geneva. Alaska - a cruise and Denali. New England when the leaves are changing.

4) Fictional Destination -- someplace from a book or movie or other art or media form you would love to visit, although it exists only in imagination
Mitford, from the Jan Karon books.

5) Funny Destination -- the funniest place name you've ever visited or want to visit
I can't think of any, although recently Dave and I were driving across our beautiful, often times desolate state and drove by "Hell's Half-Acre." Dave wanted to stop but I said no.

Musings for a Monday

Really, more of an update, but I'm in the mood for alliteration. Maybe I should say I have an attitude for alliteration? I haven't blogged for a couple of weeks, but there are some posts brewing. Here are some observations and reflections:

Worship attendance was down for Pentecost/Mother's Day. Perhaps because it was an absolutely gorgeous day, perhaps because alot of people are out of town for graduations, and went to visit their mothers, grown children, etc. At any rate, I felt like I was really having to work hard to create my own mood of celebration and excitement for the day we celebrate as the birthday of the church.

Thursday I ordered balloons for the sanctuary from the store, to be picked up at 8:00 a.m. Walked in at 8:15 and the manager had "spaced it" (his words). "How long will it take to blow them up?" I queried. "About ten minutes." 30 minutes later, I left with said balloons. This was with three people blowing them up. But they looked nice in the sanctuary, and those that were there appreciated how it looked.

One of said balloon blower-uppers asked if these were for a birthday party. "Yes, they are for Pentecost - the birthday of the church." "Wasn't Pentecost before Easter? When people put a cross on their doors so that the angels would come to their house?" Sigh.

As I stood there waiting for balloons, I endured a "Happy Mother's Day" greeting from another man walking through the store. "I'm not a mother," I responded, none too warmly or graciously. Which brings me to my next point . . .

This is my third Mother's day here. Prior to my first, the worship committee asked me what I wanted to "do" for Mother's Day - would I preach a Mother's Day sermon, should we hand out flowers, etc? There apparently wasn't much of a tradition established, which I found interesting. I told the committee it would not be my practice to preach a Mother's Day sermon. Mother's Day is challenging for many women, I said, and I explained the many reasons. I said I would mention it in the prayers of the people, and try to encompass the many nuances of the mother-child relationship. I left the practice of handing out flowers to their decision, but said that at my home church they handed out flowers to every woman, and as a single woman it still bothered me. They decided not to hand out flowers either. One of the women on the worship committee was grateful, saying "Mother's Day is the one day my sister stays away from church because it's just too painful for her." Fast forward to this Mother's Day . . .

I found out a few days ago that once again I'm not pregnant. This is after seventeen months of trying. After four times when I felt it was a strong possibility I was. After taking many pregnancy tests and hoping and praying for the word to appear that would bring us such joy, only to see the two words that once again shattered my hopes and my heart. I tell myself each month that I'm not going to hope again, but when the time comes close I can't help to look for signs that this month might be different. This time seemed like an even heavier disappointment. Maybe it was because it was so close to Mother's Day.

So imagine the blow I felt when I walked into fellowship hall and found two trays full of silk roses put together with bows and baby's breath with a note attached, "these are to be given out at church to all of the mothers." To be fair, they were from the person who was also hosting fellowship time, and she is not very connected to the church. She is connected through family and she attends worship only very occasionally. She has many struggles and challenges and is a bit of a lost soul. For the next hour as I went about worship preparations I also crafted in my mind my words to her, words that would lift up how this day is challenging - for those who have lost children, those who can't have children, those who have never know the nurture of a mother-child relationship, those mothers and children who are estranged from one another - words that would hopefully not hurt her feelings and affirm her giving of this gift (she really is good at that type of thing), and suggest these lovely flowers be made available during fellowship time for all women.

It turns out my efforts at choosing the right words were for naught. A family member of this person - who is very active in the church - arrived. She said, "She brought all of the food for fellowship, but she can't be here because she was invited to the basketball game (Near-by Big City hosted a playoff game against my hometown team). She wanted these flowers to be given out, but I don't know what you want to do with them . . ." The person telling me this also knows my feelings about Mother's Day and my current struggles. We went with my plan to put them out next to the fellowship snacks and make it clear that these were for all women.

Now more than ever I'm aware of the challenge of Mother's Day for so many. There are times when other issues have been distant from me. Then I meet someone for whom an issue is very real. And by knowing that person and hearing their struggles the issue then becomes realer for me, too, and I become more sensitive to it. I wonder sometimes if articulating the pain of this day would help people to understand, but then I don't want people to think that I don't want to make a big deal out of Mother's Day on Sunday morning just because I have a hard time with it.

And finally, all of these words, all of this heartache, simply because this month turned out the same as the past seventeen.

Finally . . .

Friday Five: Old vs. Modern

Singing Owl offers this week's Friday Five:

Yesterday I had two separate conversations in which people were musing about how much change is occurring. The WW II generation, of which my mom is a part, went from horse and buggy to automobiles, saw the lessening, or even the end of many diseases, went from widespread use of kerosene lamps and outhouses (in the country, and most folks were rural)) to a totally electrified and plumbed society. The fastest means of communication was a telegraph. The second conversation--gulp--was about MY generation and how much change occurred in the last half of the 20th century. The person said his 13 year old had not seen a vinyl record album until a few days before, couldn't remember a time without cell phones, and on and on.

As for the questions!

1. What modern convenience/invention could you absolutely, positively not live without?
Living in Wyoming, where in late April we are still having storms blow through giving us a dusting of an inch or so of snow, I'll say indoor plumbing!

2. What modern convenience/invention do you wish had never seen the light of day? Why?
Email! Which seems odd because I use it so much. And before Dave & I began dating, the courtship began as we flirted via email - "I was reading (insert old theologian here - Calvin, Augustine, Luther) today and I found this great quote." How nerdy & pathetic is that? Later there were also lovely, romantic emails exchanged, which we've both saved.

But how many misunderstandings, hurt feelings, etc. have come about as a result of an email which is sent hastily in the heat and emotion of a moment, and which we can't take back! Last year as I wrote thank-you notes for wedding gifts, I thought of how letter writing is a lost art - choosing the perfect stationery, the right pen, and giving long, thoughtful consideration to the words penned - words that because they are put to paper have deep meaning. Then the long "pause" that occurs after the envelope is sealed and the letter awaits being mailed. Further time for reflection ensues; if it is one of those "heat of the moment" letters we have time to reconsider. Finally, on the other end, there is the excitement of the recipient when, upon opening the mailbox, discovers that someone took the time to choose the perfect stationery, the right pen, give long, thoughtful consideration to the words penned, and thought enough of you to take the time to write.

3. Do you own a music-playing device older than a CD player? More than one? Ifso, do you use it (them)?
I have a cassette player, but it's included in one of those small stereo systems that includes a cd player as well. And I don't own an iPod.

4. Do you find the rapid change in our world exciting, scary, a mix...or somethingelse?
Mostly scary. The rapid change doesn't give us time to think, just because we have the technocology, capability, etc., to do something, does it mean we should do it?

5. What did our forebears have that we have lost and you'd like to regain? Bonus points if you have a suggestion of how to begin that process.
Tagging on to number 4, they lived in a world that was slower, and they had time to give long, careful thought and reflection to life and how it should be lived. But perhaps I'm looking at it through my nostalgia glasses that have that tint of rose to them.

Enough Already.

Really.

It's Tuesday . . .

So it's time for our weekly marital, er, discussion.

What will grace our television screen tonight?

American Idol?

Or The Deadliest Catch?

There's also the showdown between the Angels - yaaaayy!!!! - and the Red Sox (booooo!).

Should be a fun night in our home.

The day is definitely looking up when . . .

a four-year old boy, the son of a very dedicated volunteer, comes into your office and yells "rraaarr" to scare you, and genuinely scares you, and then you gather him up in your arms and you both dissolve into giggles; you because you feel silly for having been scared and he for feeling so proud that he got the genuine response for which he was hoping. Then he says "I love you Pastor Kim. I missed you" - and you'd just seen him on Sunday.

I needed that today.

God is still good, all the time.