You Can Take The Girl Out Of Vegas...

Do This Right Now

2012-01-18T20:17:00.001-06:00

Friends, before you even read the rest of this post, do this immediately:

Go to The Blue Door Pub's website: http://thebdp.com/
Under "Vote here!" in the upper right hand corner, click the button for The Uff-da Blucy
Vote!
Check back the next day to see if you can vote again; it seems you can only vote once from any given computer.
Go to any other computer to which you have access and try to vote again. And again. And again. And tell your friends to do the same.
You have only until the 25th, so do it now.

Here's what you're doing and why it will make me a very, very happy girl:

My dear husband and I love The Blue Door Pub. It's a tiny little joint in the Merriam Park neighborhood, and it's delightful. They specialize in Blucys, which takes the Twin Cities' quintessential burger the Jucy Lucy and makes it a bit more highbrow by packing it with blue cheese. They've got all sorts of varieties - the Breakfast Blucy, with bacon and an egg; the Cajun Blucy, with pepperjack cheese and jalapenos; or my favorite the Merriam Park, stuffed with bacon, garlic, and blue cheese and topped with red currant jelly. I'm not kidding when I say they're probably the best burgers in the world, much less the best I've ever eaten.

The place is regularly packed, so for us to get a meal there involves a lengthy process of one of us staking out a spot in the wait line (no reservations allowed!) to hang out for 45 minutes (or more!) until we can get a table. The wait is always worth it, because you are rewarded with delicious food, perfectly appointed beers, and remarkably friendly service. On almost any given day, I'd head to the BDP.

Part of their deal is what they call the BOM - the burger of the moment. It rotates periodically and features more eccentric burger options. (My husband loves the Pastramilicious, which basically stuffs meat with meat, which is probably in violation of several Levitical codes.) Once a year, the BDP has a contest where people can send in their ideas for a BOM. The top five are selected to be voted on by the public. The winner not only wins the joy and fame of having their burger as the coveted BOM, but they also get something like $100 in gift cards for the BDP.

My dear husband and I have been cooking up the idea for The Uff-da Blucy for quite some time. It's basically a tater tot hotdish on a burger. "But you don't like tater tot hotdish," you might be thinking. You're right. But my heritage dictates that there be some kind of hotdish affinity in my blood, and if you can pitch it to me in the form of a burger, I'm all ears. Or tastebuds. Whatever. Anyway, we submitted our creation this year - after taste-testing it in the comfort of our own kitchen and determining that it was a delight - and could only hope we'd made the cut.

Just today, we learned that we were in the final five. The viewing public is left to vote on the options. Right now, the running is tight. We need you to help us get past the competition! Our blucy is right on top of the descriptions for a reason: it's the best one! Vote, vote, and vote some more, then get your friends to do the same. When we win, we'll take you out for a blucy. It's on us.

Thanks for your votes!

Kids Say The Darndest Things

2012-01-12T10:37:00.000-06:00

At some point, I had this great post worked up in my head. I was going to talk about 2011 and how it wasn't exactly my greatest year. I was going to reflect on how, for the first time in my life, I was really not looking forward to my birthday. (Sure, 30 was hard, but now I'm solidly in my 30s, and can I really say I've been and done what I'd hoped for?) I was going to talk about how sometimes you are simply out of control of events in your life, and for this overachieving perfectionist, that is a really hard thing to accept.

That sounds sort of maudlin and self-indulgent, to be honest. Instead, I'd like to share the biggest and greatest laugh I've had so far this year. I realize we're less than two weeks in, but seriously, you want this post way more than the one I was going to write.

I teach the confirmation classes here at my church. Every Wednesday, I face somewhere around 120 young people, seventh through ninth grade, and try to help them understand why their faith is vital to their lives. We start with music, announcements, or other kinds of introductions, then I teach a lesson for about a half an hour. For the second half hour, they break off into small groups for further conversation and reflection. Before I cut them loose, I like to try to leave them with something that will transition well into good conversations for them. Maybe a pointed question, or a challenge, or a personal story - something that will help their small group leaders start a conversation right away.

We're currently talking about the 10 Commandments. This week we talked about commandments two and three (for those of you in the Catholic or Lutheran tradition, it's "don't take the Lord's name in vain" and "remember the Sabbath"; for my friends in other Christian traditions, make like I'm talking about commandments three and four) and why they are important to our faith lives. By not using God's name as a swear word, and by ensuring we leave space in our lives for time to worship and learn about God, we're showing that God really is important to our lives. I wanted to try to find away to get them thinking about where their hearts and minds really are, and how their schedules and language reflect that. So, at the end of our teaching time, I showed them this video:

A great video, right? A fun and poignant way to ask the question of what you're really all about. I played the video, and the kids laughed, and afterwards I asked them to consider what this might mean to them. The 10 Commandments are meant to help order our lives and help us live in a way that's congruent with our faith. If you held that stethoscope up to your chest, what would you hear? I asked them: what is the song of your heart?

The room got very quiet, and the voice of one girl in the third row said, hesitantly, without a trace of sarcasm or boastfulness, "...'Sexy And I Know It'?" Which, for your reference, is this song (warning: video contains a whole lot of junk shakin'):

A few people sitting around her overheard, and immediately waited to see what I'd say. I smiled, and told her that it was actually a pretty sweet response. "Maybe stick that one in your pocket for later, huh?" She smiled and nodded.

Could I have stomped on her for making such an inappropriate reference at such a poignant moment? Sure. But the truth was, her response was so funny - and so apt for a 7th grade girl - that I couldn't hate on her. It was just too good.

So, what song would your heart sing? Maybe it's the Hallelujah chorus. Maybe it's LMFAO. Either way, more power to you.

They're Pretty Much The Same

2011-12-09T17:13:00.001-06:00

I grew up just two hours from the campus of Concordia College, my mom's alma mater. Every year, they put on this incredible Christmas concert. There would be a huge mural for a backdrop, emphasizing the year's theme. The choirs, orchestra, and bell choir would play some of the most amazing music I would hear all year. It was like going to church, with lessons, hymns, and litanies, but with a crowd of thousands. Even when I was a squirrely little kid who could hardly sit through the two-hour concert, I knew I was seeing something special. Eventually, the Christmas concerts would become instrumental in my decision to attend Concordia myself. I knew I wanted to be a part of just such an incredible event every year.

As one of the Lutheran colleges in the upper Midwest, Concordia shares a lot of things with our sister schools like Gustavus, Luther, and St. Olaf. One of them is a yearly Christmas concert. Another is searing rivalry. Each school is confident that it's the better one, and the other school is clearly second in line. Not bad, mind you - just not best. Concordia comes with a particular inferiority complex, it seems, as it's far north and formed later in history. Many of the others came first and have a more metropolitan crowd. Even its strong choral tradition, a big selling point for me as a prospective student, owes a great deal to St. Olaf's.

Maybe this is why I've never been a big fan of the preening contests. After all, I almost went to Gustavus or St. Olaf, so it's not like I saw them as anything other than high-quality schools that valued a liberal arts education, faith-based learning, and music. I chose Concordia, and it was certainly the right school for me, but it probably could have easily gone another way. My college boyfriend was an Ole, and while we occasionally jabbed each other, I'd like to think that we both actually appreciated the chance to visit another campus and appreciate it as a place that was very dear to a person who was very dear.

This is not to say I don't wear my Cobber ring with eminent pride, or feel a natural affinity to other Concordia graduates, or even sign my newsletter articles with "Soli Deo Gloria". I just don't feel that it serves any beneficial purpose to make several very similar, very excellent schools into competitors. Perhaps the sooner these schools could appreciate and support each other, the sooner the Lutheran world would understand the worth in a wider church body. Or something. At the very least, we could stop enacting the campus equivalent of a small-town rivalry.

Perhaps it was in that spirit that I did something I've never done before: I went, along with my husband and parents, to the St. Olaf Christmas Festival. The senior pastor fell into some free tickets that he couldn't use, since he was already going, and offered them to me. My parents would be in town, so I invited them to join us. Seeing as the campus is on the wrong side of the state from them, they jumped at the chance to do something they'd never had the opportunity to do before. Besides, they were going to the Concordia Christmas Concert the Friday before, and we could finally compare the behemoths of music once and for all.

I did feel a little weird driving onto the college campus for the first time in about ten years. It felt foreign and familiar all at the same time. I didn't feel the same level of excitement as I filed into the fieldhouse. After all, whenever I've gone to the Concordia Christmas Concert, I was reliving the four years I sung in it. I had no shared experience at St. Olaf. I felt strangely voyeuristic as I waited in line for the bathroom before the concert and heard the Ole choir singing their sectional songs. There was no mural to marvel at before the show began. Sure, it was different.

At the end of the concert, I asked my mom how it compared. After we talked about how wonderful the orchestra was, how great the choirs were, and what a wonderful afternoon it had been, we came to a similar conclusion: they're pretty much the same. She reflected, "Everyone has always said, 'Oh, the St. Olaf Christmas concert, that's the big one, you've got to see it, it sets the standard.' I'm not so sure. I don't think the Concordia one is far off the mark." I contended that, if there was a mark, they were both flat on it. Ultimately, it's not about one being better, or one trying to keep up. It's about two different choral traditions doing an amazing job of marking Christmas with worship and song.

Okay, yes: there were things I didn't like. For instance, the Concordia tradition dictates no moving during the concert. Unless there's a carefully choreographed movement, you don't sway, rock, bob, or shift. Shoulders relaxed, feet square, eyes straight ahead. You don't even lift a hand to your face to itch your nose. While this seems militant in practice, I experienced why it's advantageous. While the entire St. Olaf choral program swayed to the music, I got sea sick. I didn't anticipate it, but it was actually really distracting.

I also didn't like the way the concert ended. At Concordia, there are no bows. After the Compline is sung, the choirs dash out and the conductors disappear. Sure, people clap, but no one person or set of people are there to receive it. The applause is recognized as an expression of thanks for the offering. At St. Olaf, the choirs remained in the hall during the applause. The conductors and narrator stood up front, taking bows and receiving the standing ovation. For a long time. I think it's perhaps a matter of semantics: the Concordia concert thinks of itself as more of a worship service, for which applause is not expected or received. The St. Olaf one is a concert, where applause and bows make more sense.

But those were matters of preference for me. And, since I was unable to go to any of the Concordia Christmas concerts this year, I am poorly suited for a real side-by-side comparison. But maybe that's as it should be. It's not about stacking them up and seeing who makes the cut. It's about recognizing that any time talented young men and women gather together to make excellent music that brings us back to the manger, something is right. It doesn't matter if that happens in Moorhead, or in Northfield, or in St. Peter, or anywhere on or off a college campus. It is a good thing, and should be recognized as such.

So thanks, St. Olaf, for letting me enjoy your Christmas Fest. And thanks also for turning off the alarms in the building so my Cobber ring wouldn't set off all the sensors. Next time, let's come celebrate at my place.

Those Women

2011-11-22T14:16:00.001-06:00

Without stating the obvious too carefully, I've never not been a woman in ministry. In other words, I've always been aware of my gender and the fact that it's not, for most people, the preferred or even acceptable version for their clergy. Either on my own or through family members, I've heard that women aren't supposed to be pastors. Nonetheless, while I have had moments of concern about this, it's never been a large problem for me. I cannot recall a day in my life where I did not know that women could be pastors. I have not faced a significantly burdensome hurdle to my studies, ordination, or ministry because of my gender. I am not in any way minimizing the discrimination that women face in their vocations around the world, much less as pastors; I am only saying that for my personal life and work, it's rarely been a real obstacle.

On the other side of the equation, I realize that I am a woman of a generation that understands the word feminism, but in a perhaps different way that generations before it heard of the word and its meaning. We live in an almost post-feminist age where, on the surface, equality and opportunity for women and men is expected. We're not facing, say, an inability to vote or own property. Feminism today is a bit more theoretical. It is more about exposing inherent assumptions, challenging archetypes, and rethinking authority. With that, I can say that I've always considered myself a feminist by virtue of my gender, my ambitions, my perceptions of humanity, and my understanding of my worth (and the worth of all people, really) as a fully created and embodied child of God. I am, however, in sort of a post-feminist stage of my life. Here I am, a former pageant girl, married, and in a stereotypically male-dominated field. I'm not sure how I'm supposed to see myself as a feminist in this day and age, and I'm not always sure that I'm the best advocate for the feminist worldview.

I guess what I'm really saying is: I'm not sure I'd call myself a feminist, even though I'm probably well-poised to be a really good one. I assume equality, and expect the same of others even when they demonstrate an inability or unwillingness to comply. And usually, that worldview works. I'm not stupid enough to think I face no discrimination by virtue of my gender, but I'm also not suspicious enough to see misogyny at every turn.

My abject anger as response to my recent story in ministry therefore comes to me as quite a surprise.

Two weeks ago, the senior pastor was not around for church on Sunday since he was on his annual family deer hunting trip. It's a well-known part of life in this congregation, as he's been doing it since he first arrived here almost 25 years ago. This left me and the intern to carry church on Sunday, which is in no way difficult or even unusual. (You should know, for purposes of this story, that our intern is female, incredibly intelligent, almost ridiculously gracious, much beloved by this congregation, and has more feminism in her right thumb than I've possibly expressed in my lifetime.) The intern preached, and I presided over all three services. We typically have full communion at all three services on the first Sunday of the month, but we bumped it back a week to give more time and attention to All Saints Sunday, so we celebrated communion while the senior pastor was gone. Not a deal at all; I regularly preside over communion, and I especially love doing it on a full communion Sunday because I get to sing the full liturgy instead of just doing the bare-bones service we do on other Sundays.

Church went well that Sunday, if a little long because of communion. But when the senior pastor got back, he heard lots of great things - sure, church was long, but the sermon was great, the music was great, and people loved gathering around the table. As he's always known, things work perfectly well in his absence.

This last Sunday, the week after he was gone, he received a comment from a parishioner, who we will call S for the purposes of this conversation. It was just before worship was about to start, so my colleague could barely process it, and had to relate the exchange to me much later. S was furious. S is already furious, mostly because we're doing a different set of lectionary readings this year that start in Genesis and go to the New Testament instead of the whole threeish readings a week culminating with a reading from one of the gospels. S is ticked that we're not talking about Jesus for, like, four months - which is already deeply flawed theologically and liturgically, since we talk about Jesus every week and God is very much revealed fully throughout the entirety of the scriptures. S was also already furious because S spends most of his life furious at something. He's just one of those guys. He's usually harmless, but it is a bit exhausting.

At any rate, S pulled my colleague aside to inform him that he was so glad he was back from deer hunting after the way things went last week. When asked what happened last week, S said (and here I am quoting from my colleague's exact recounting of the exchange): "Those women led us in a high Catholic liturgy." S could not believe that, without the senior pastor keeping things honest, things suddenly turned into another denomination entirely. Never mind that our liturgy is actually remarkably similar to that of our Catholic sisters and brothers as it is; he saw such a thing as inherently pejorative and worthy of outrage.

As the senior pastor related this to me, I could only shake my head. S was probably referring to the fact that we did the full sung liturgy before communion, something we only do about once a month. He's already upset about what's happening in worship, and that blinded him to the fact that we sing the full liturgy once a month every month, as we have for years and years. He, as a faithful same-pew-every-Sunday worshiper should know that. It was amazing to me to realize that someone's initial dissatisfaction with an whole other thing can spill out into another topic entirely.

The senior pastor agreed, and said he would be actually photocopying the past 12 months worth of communion bulletins to prove to S that we didn't do anything on Sunday that we don't typically do. But then I thought about the comment again. Those women. Those women led us in something that they shouldn't have, that we're not supposed to be doing. Those women. And then it dawned on me: he wasn't mad because he was just misplacing his anger about not reading the gospel on Sunday, he was mad because women can't be trusted to lead worship without a man keeping them in line.

Like I've made clear, I rarely fly my feminist flag. And yet, in spite of more than three years of me preaching, presiding, and providing pastoral care in this congregation, S was stating rather clearly that he did not think a woman could be trusted to lead worship.

Just today, I finally had the chance to relay this story to the intern. She literally shook with frustration (and not just her head), which is remarkable considering how stoic she typically is. She saw his statement immediately for what it was: prejudicial. She didn't give S the benefit of the doubt; she intuited immediately that he believed that we could not properly preside. Those women misled and betrayed the congregation, just as women do.

I do realize that I am perhaps being unduly harsh on S. When we are angry, frustrated, or marginalized, we do tend to say and do things that we know we shouldn't. But I think being angry is a lot like being drunk. You can pretend that you didn't mean to say what you said, and that you can't be held accountable for what spewed out of your mouth, but in your altered state you weren't saying anything you don't actually think. You just lost the filter to keep you from saying it. So, while it's possible that S was really just upset and not thinking, I'm more inclined to believe that his anger was not only a product of his misogyny, but also revealing of his misogyny.

Maybe it doesn't matter how post-feminist I think I am, or how this world knows it should expect equality, or how I've never felt terribly held back my gender. Just because I don't want to see something doesn't mean it's not there. Sorry S, but those women aren't going anywhere any time soon. Next time, pay better attention in church.

Zombie Pub Crawl, You Used To Be Cool

2011-10-31T22:05:00.000-05:00

A few years ago, we discovered the Zombie Pub Crawl for the first time. It seemed to be the perfect marriage of some of our great loves: Halloween, beer, and zombies. And indeed, we had a ridiculously awesome time. That first time around was a great experience. We loved it so much that we sent a second time (which is where I was unwittingly discovered by some parishioners via mass media) and last year, even though it was starting to get really formal and they actually started charging, we went again and had fun. This year, prices went up and the venue changed. Instead of just being in Minneapolis, it crossed the river to a second location in St. Paul. On paper, it sounds like a good idea. It made us a bit worried, however, because it sounded like it was getting a little corporate. Still, we got our tickets, invited friends, and started gearing up.Then, two things happened. One, we got really distracted in a busy life and totally forgot that we needed to get ready. I mean, we barely got costumes together a week before the big event. And second, our fears were confirmed: the ZPC sold out. Lots of musical acts, little concern for kitchy zombie creep out factors. I mean, they even told people they'd get the police involved if they spilled blood around. That's what the ZPC is all about, man!

Still, we managed to get ourselves together for the big day. Sure, we were barely prepared, but three of our friends who'd come with us to previous ZPCs had managed to get costumes and tickets together. We rolled out for the pub crawl and its promises of beer specials and crazy outfits and plenty of fake blood. Almost as soon as we showed up, something seemed... not quite right. As MK said: "Zombie Pub Crawl, you used to be cool."

And not that it wasn't cool. It was cool. There was the right, wonderful mix of weirdos, drunks, and horror aficionados. There were lots of really innovative costumes, from the typical recently deceased celebrities to the more creative and disturbing. I had a great time running around and trying to get photographs of anyone I possibly could. I was so serious about getting people to pose for photos that I got asked more than a few times about what paper or service I worked for. I wasn't sure that any reputable agency would send a reporter out dressed as a white trash zombie, but I appreciated the sentiment. Plus, it gave the the chance to meet people - and we all know I can't resist a crowd full of potential new friends, even if they are dressed like the unholy walking dead.


Possibly an actual zombie.

The enormous crowd was the biggest it's ever had, which was good since Guinness World Records was indeed on hand to try to set the record for Largest Gathering Of Zombies. (Yes, such a thing exists.) But because the gathering was spread out between two cities, it was hard to get a feel for the crush of creepers in the city. There was none of that original flash mob feel, no spontaneity, no energy. There were great costumes, and lots of people, and tons of bloody creepiness. It just felt... well, I was about to say it felt a little soulless, but then I realized that soullessness was perhaps a required part of a city-wide gathering of zombies. I guess what I'm trying to say is that it didn't quite have the sparkle that it used to have.

Making matters worse is the fact that I've become an absolute zombie snob. I have started to judge people on the basis of their zombie costumes. For instance: don't you ever, ever dare come to the ZPC dressed as a prom queen or bride. You'll think you're original; you're not. Everyone and their mom comes as one of those. We counted almost 60 brides alone. And those of you who dress as medical professionals, you're on a tight rope as well. There are a million of them. The only reason you get away with it is because in a real zombie invasion, the infection would probably hit hospitals and their employees hardest. Plus, zombies in scrubs are actually pretty creepy; you're supposed to be able to trust medical professionals. At least you're being realistic, though, which is more than I can say for the imaginary character zombies. Video game and cartoon characters? C'mon, they're not real. They could never turn into a zombie. You really just took last year's Halloween costume, poured blood down it, and called yourself a Zombie Fill-In-The-Blank. And don't get me started on the zluts, or slombies. Yes, just as Halloween dictates that every girl costume must be a sexy version of a thing, so ZPC somehow drives girls to dress as slutty zombies. Seriously? What's sexy about tons of blood and chomping on brains? You're not hot; you're actually sick and creepy.

See what I mean? I can't help but judge.

But still, we had fun. We enjoyed our little taste of early Halloween, and made it home in time to scrub the blood and liquid latex off before church the next morning. And this time, we didn't get busted by people from the church. Just an innocent, anonymous excursion with a few thousand of my newest, closest zombie friends. Zombie Pub Crawl, you used to be cool - and odds are, I'll be there again next year to make sure you've got your groove back.

And as pictured at the left, the bloody handprint on our car window when we tried to leave indicated to us that, yes, the spirit of the ZPC lives on. In an undead way, of course. What do we want? BRAINS! When do we want them? BRAINS!

Wedded Bliss

2011-10-30T16:32:00.002-05:00

I will be honest with you: I didn't think I was ever going to get married. Ever since I was a little girl, I was fairly certain that marriage was not for me. It was a combination of things, probably. I've always been overly independent and headstrong, meaning the partnership of marriage was probably not my best option. I felt that perhaps feminism and the institution of marriage were not compatible. Also, whenever you tell people you're never getting married, it gets kind of a rise out of them - and everyone knows I'm all about negative attention.

As I dated, I thought often about whether the guy I was with was a person I would marry. (Hi, ex-boyfriends who read this blog!) While I loved each guy, I never felt like it was the right kind of love, the kind that made me want to share a lifetime. Since they were by and large perfectly nice guys, I assumed that this meant that most people were faking love in their marriages. Sure, there were lots of great and happy couples, those few and far between that really had hit the romantic jackpot, but maybe it happened less often than I thought. Or, more likely still, it simply wouldn't happen to me. That was fine. I didn't think I was ever going to get married.

So I serial dated, stayed very busy with school and pageants and life, and while I often longed for consistent romantic love (and made some terrible decisions while trying to meet that need) I generally conceded that marriage would not be for me.

I met Chris on a very random whim. He was the friend of a guy I was just getting to know at school, and I met him on a blind date that I'd only go on with the assertion that it was indeed not a date. It was very clear, by the end of the night, that it was indeed a date.

I do not really believe in love at first sight. I think that, to truly and actually love someone in a way that would result in a lifetime together, you have to actually know each other. And yet, I could tell you that almost as soon as I met Chris, I knew something was different about him. Maybe I did not love him just yet, but I knew that I wanted to. Suddenly, I wanted to spend all my time with him. I could be independent, be myself, be a feminist, and be with him, and somehow it worked. While he didn't fit all the categories that I thought would make for a good husband for me (how could I ever marry a guy who isn't a singer?) he fit all the categories that I never knew actually mattered for my life's partner.

There is literally not a single thing that I would change about Chris and our relationship. Well, save one: I wish we'd brought people along with us. We knew very quickly how very important this relationship was to us, and how dramatically we were both changing our life's plans to be together. But we did not do a very good job of telling people that. To be honest, I think it was because I was sure people would think I was crazy for wanting to marry a guy I'd basically just met, and I didn't know how to explain to them that this relationship was one of the few things in my life that I've ever been absolutely sure about. I should've tried, however, because explaining to friends and family that I was engaged to a man I'd known for five months, that that we'd be marrying four months later, was even harder. It's really my only regret in my relationship with Chris. That, and wishing I wasn't a full foot shorter than him, but I can't lose sleep about that.

Right after we were married, life was a whirlwind. I graduated from seminary. We moved to Rome, then London, then back to Rome, then home again. Our first year of marriage taught us how to be a true partnership, coming to better love and trust each other with each adventure and crisis. He stood by my side as I became a pastor, and has been the most rational, practical, supportive husband I could possibly have in the midst of a challenging, chaotic, and intensive career. We have come to love each other's families as our own; we have come to know our friends as mutual friends. It has been a blessing. He is a blessing.

On Friday, Chris and I celebrated our fifth wedding anniversary. It hardly seems possible. I do not understand how it can simultaneously feel like we've been together so much longer than that, and yet as if our wedding day was just yesterday. We celebrated by spending a night away in a B&B, going to a lovely supper, and doing some hiking. Mostly, we just wanted to be together. In the midst of a sometimes-hectic life, it was the best gift possible.

I didn't think I was going to get married. I sure didn't think I'd be the kind of girl who would gush on and on about how truly blessed she is by her husband, of all things. I do not adhere to all sorts of relationship philosophies, like soul mates, or finding "the one", or how when you stop looking for someone you'll find the perfect someone, or even that there is such a thing as a perfect someone. Hopefully, you can find some solace in that. I know only that the man I married five years ago is the one I want to be married to for another 60 years, because he makes me happy, challenges me, supports me, cares for me, lets me be myself, and loves me for it. It is all I need, and all I could ever want.

Happy anniversary, Chris. Io sono tua.

(For those of you worried I've gone too deep into the mushiness of girldom, fear not. I'll talk Zombie Pub Crawl tomorrow, just in time for Halloween.)

The First Class

2011-09-24T18:01:00.000-05:00

This fall marks three complete years of pastordom for me. It was three years ago on the day after Labor Day that I started at this church, and the three-year anniversary of my ordination was four days ago. While three years might seem like a sort of arbitrary celebration, in the ELCA three years is the length of what's called First Call; in other words, your semi-provisional, pseudo-apprenticeship status as a new pastor officially ends after three years. After three years, it's generally acceptable to switch to a new call (church-talk for pastor position). You also lose some of the imposed learning and mentoring requirements. Basically, you're on your own now, kid.

I have no intention of switching calls, even though the First Call portion of my first call has passed. While there's hardly a day that goes by where I don't wonder if congregational ministry is the right place for me, I know that right now, I love being at this church. One reminder of that is the group of young people that will confirm their faith and affirm their baptisms in Sunday's confirmation service tomorrow morning.

Part of my job is to teach the confirmation classes, which means spending Wednesday nights trying to teach over 100 seventh, eighth, and ninth graders about who God is and why that's important. Most of the time, I still don't know what I'm doing, and I'm generally certain I could be doing things much better. But then, I've been learning as they've been learning, and somewhere in between good stuff is happening. At our church, students get confirmed in the fall of their tenth grade year. That means that the youth getting confirmed tomorrow are the first batch that I have known for the entire three years that they've been in the confirmation program.

I seriously love these kids. It's a small class, so with a few exceptions, I've gotten to know them well - some very well. They're smart, funny, responsible, hard-working, and sassy. Some of them are difficult, but none of them are trouble. They were excited to learn with me, and have really shaped the way I think about confirmation. This morning we had rehearsal for the service tomorrow, and we encourage the kids to come dressed well because we take our pictures. Every guy was in a tie, and every girl was in a dress. I'm not even sure I wore a dress when I was confirmed. I am proud of them.

This first class means a lot to me in many ways. First, they're sort of a touchstone for my time as a pastor. Their three-year confirmation studies lined up with my three-year First Call. We learned together. Next, they're sort of a sign of accomplishment for me. Not only did I not screw them up entirely, but somehow I might have even helped them get to the point where they want to publicly affirm their faith. Finally, they're great kids. If I start getting frustrated that I tend to attract crazy people, or that ministry puts you right in the middle of so much brokenness, or how some people use being Christian as an excuse for being a jerk, I can remember these young men and women and how they give me hope.

While there is a sadness in knowing that I won't see these fine men and women each Wednesday night, there's a joy in knowing that I got to help them shape the faith that will guide and inspire them for the rest of their lives. I hope they remember that faith; I will remember them. Together, we have come through our apprenticeships, and now, it's time for real life.

Post #1: You're No Campers, Pups

2011-09-09T16:17:00.001-05:00

If you're wondering why this post is numbered, see this post. If you're wondering why I'm on #1, it's because I started at the end. Here's #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, and #7 (or just scroll down), if you're the sort who likes to read them in order. If you're wondering why I initially started at the end, don't worry, you're at the beginning now.

It was going to be that kind of summer: the kind of summer that is almost no summer at all. As you can tell by the posts I have now amassed below this one, and from how long it actually took me to write all the catch-up posts, it has indeed been that kind of summer: the kind of summer where you don't really get to enjoy much summer. My husband and I, however, love to camp and hike, and the only real time to do that well in Minnesota is during the summer. We knew we'd have to scratch out some time to do just that, so we found a couple of days back in June to go visit St. Croix State Park, a favorite of ours not far from where we live. We wanted to take our lovely canoe out on the river, stay in some of the boat-in sites, and best yet, we decided to bring the pups along.

Max and Lilly are very good dogs, in spite of their propensity to do things like murder small furry animals and vomit up nasty stuff. Lilly can get pretty nervous, and Max can get pretty bossy, but otherwise they're pretty great pups. They love being outside and they love being with us, so we figured they might actually be able to manage coming on a little canoe camping trip with us. Plus, we'd only be out for two nights, so our gear would be kept to a minimum. This is essential considering a good chunk of our canoe would be taken up with 120 pounds of dog.

You may or may not realize that much of our outdoorsiness is often ill-fated. Our Boundary Waters trip two years ago ended too soon when my Eagle Scout husband put a hatchet to his hand. Our canoe day-trip last year left us and our canoe much worse for wear. Even our hiking throughout Australia and New Zealand last fall was drenched in constant rain and fog. While we have both been accused of living rather charmed lives, our camping trips are typically anything but. It's a good thing we love camping - and each other. And we should've realized that all would not go to plan when we talked to the canoe folks at the campground about our plans. Turns out you can only go one way down the St. Croix, eliminating our hope to do an out-and-back. Turns out the fee to be picked up at the end of your trip is exorbitant if you're not renting all your gear from the outfitter. Turns out we were going to have to re-think our plans.

At any rate, we decided that this would all totally work out. Sure enough, we got us, our two pups, and all our gear into our lovely canoe. One family watching us load up was rightly skeptical: "Are you really taking your dogs with?" they asked. This coming from a family of four very small kids. I had to stop myself from asking, "Are you really sleeping in a tent with four kids under the age of six?"

We got out on the river without any troubles on a beautiful afternoon. The dogs behaved, the canoe cooperated, and we worked hard on wearing ourselves out. Not long down the line, however, we came across our first problem: the campsite. The one we wanted to spend the night in looked more like a place to put your boat into the water, because it was. Sure, it was also a campsite, but did you want to sleep where people would be coming and going through your site all day? No thanks. This put a serious cramp in our plans, but we could make it work. Just as we decided to leave, Max had the same idea: he slipped out of his collar and started running. Fast. I was sure we would lose him inside Minnesota's largest state park. He ran in circles, wider and wider, until finally he came to a stop right in front of us. It was like he just needed to burn off some energy... or remind us that he was the one in charge. We got back out on the water as fast as we could.

We came to the second site down the way and were more pleased. It was a beautiful, open peninsula on the edge of a stream, perfectly suited to our needs. Sure, the latrine was by far the most primitive one I've ever seen, but hey, any port in a storm. And as a bonus, the trail was not far at all from our site, making it a plausible idea that we could bushwhack through the undergrowth, find the trail, hike back, move the car, re-park, hike up, and come back to our site, leaving us a short down-river paddle to get back to the car at the end of the trip. Perfect. Too perfect. But we didn't realize that just yet.

The pups, for starters, were far from satisfied with the situation. It's a State Park, so they can't roam free like they prefer. They had to stay on-leash, and they had to be good. They're not good at either thing. They kept tangling themselves up, trying to bolt off, or generally pouting. Even worse was the sleeping situation. Our tent is big enough for two people and our gear, but it has these great awnings. So, we set up a nice little screened-in bed for them under the awning. They were not having it. All night they kept thrashing around, getting tangled in the screen, trying to pull down the tent, and not understanding that they couldn't nudge open the tent door to come walk all over us.

The next morning, after next-to-no sleep, we tried the bushwhack. It was a failure of epic proportions. Not only was the underbrush far too thick to actually get through, but the trail was an indiscernible distance from us. And the pups, ever the wet blankets, were having none of it. They were covered in ticks and burrs faster than I ever could've imagined, until I realized I was in the exact same boat. We doubled back and returned to the site, exhausted, sweaty, filthy, and frustrated.

Our only option would be to paddle upstream, in spite of previous warnings not to do just that, with two bored and fussy pups hopping around inside. We needed the rest, so we just zipped the pups into the tent with us that night and put up with them taking up most of the floor space.

The end of the story is a bit anticlimactic: in spite of the dogs constantly trying to stand up in the canoe, we made it back to the dock we'd passed previously. We put in and my rugged husband opted to hike back the rest of the way. The dogs generally cooperated with this. Husband and car returned, gear was loaded up, and pups promptly started sleeping in the back, like they were the ones who'd done all the work. We poked around the park a little longer, then decided to head home for showers, soft beds, and a fenced-in yard.

Don't get me wrong: I love my dogs, and I love camping. Ill-fatedness aside, it was beautiful weather and a lovely chance to get away. I think my dogs just might not really be campers. Oh well. You can't win 'em all, even when you live a charmed life.

Post #2: On Butt Glue, Mismatched Earrings, And The Privileged Status Of An Old Queen

2011-09-03T21:38:00.001-05:00

If you're wondering why this post is numbered, see this post. If you're wondering why I'm on #2, here's #3, #4, #5, #6, and #7, 'cause you're pretty far behind. If you're wondering why I started at the end, don't worry, I'm almost back at the beginning.

I bluff big about a lot of things, mostly because they're the things I'm least sure about, or because I believe them the least. One of those things is about being important. I'll talk like I know I'm something special, mostly because I'm pretty sure I'm pretty normal. I'm a pretty darned boring girl. So when you hear me talk about how I'm pretty amazing, or whatever other bravado I throw your way, know it's because I'm convinced I have about zero evidence to support that.

One of the few things I've got going that is the whole pageant thing. It was, however, eight years ago this June that I became Miss Minnesota. I get older every year, and not a single article of my cute pageant clothes fit any more. In fact, it's getting to be that one of the places I feel least special or remarkable is at pageant stuff, because I'm pretty aware of my distinct normality. And yet, some of the most above-par folks I know are in the pageant world, so I keep going back. I help out with some locals and occasionally get involved in state stuff. I like having a chance to let other wonderful young women have an extraordinary experience and help them realize, if only for a brief time, that they are truly special.

This year I wanted to try a new thing. There was a call put out for experienced backstage dressers during the Miss Minnesota pageant, and I offered to help during preliminary nights. Dressers are the ladies who hang out in the dressing rooms with the contestants and do whatever they need you to do. Zip dresses, fasten earrings, latch shoes (surprisingly hard to do for those contestants with fake nails, I might note), calm nerves, flounce dress trains, ensure cues are followed, and basically be the best stage mom meets best friend you can possibly be. I was actually sort of looking forward to it.

When I showed up for my first night, I wasn't sure who I was supposed to report to or where, but I did know where the dressing rooms were. So I went there. I walked right into the dressing rooms and started working. I said hi to the girls I knew, double-checked the names of girls I thought I knew, and introduced myself to those I didn't. I did not use any titles, only my name. I figured only a handful of the girls knew I was a former. But I got right to work, asking about quick changes and offering thoughts on blush application.

But something happened without my knowing it: everyone knew who I was. There are, in my opinion, two kind of former Miss Minnesotas: very recent and very removed. The ones who were done a couple of years ago are ones everyone remembers; the ones from 15 and 20 years ago are respected as classy, mature role models. Those of us in the middle are too busy starting careers, making babies, and trying to figure out if we'll ever tell anyone about that crazy year we spent as Miss Minnesota. We don't actually expect to be known. And yet, a whole dressing room full of girls knew me as a former - or, as I prefer, and old queen.

Instantly, these girls trusted me. I was, in fact, the hottest commodity in that dressing room. The best part was that the first part of competition was swimsuit, and every single girl wanted me to tape their boobs or, better yet, glue their butt. You see, what does a swimsuit do best? Ride up, of course. When you're in front of a judge, you can't exactly pick a wedgie. Most girls use a fabric adhesive to stick the suit bottoms to their bottoms. Problem is, it's hard to glue your own butt. So, you need someone to smear the glue across your bum, dry it a bit (you don't want it to soak through the suit and show a wet spot), and stick it perfectly in place.

That, my friends, was my job: patting glue onto beauty queen butts.

Here's the thing about it. For all of their high-maintenance appearance, most pageant girls are really pretty low-key. A lot of things - fake nails, fake lashes, fake boobs, fake tans - are just means to an end. They've got scholarships to pay, causes to advocate, and talents to perform. They are extremely pragmatic about someone going nose-to-cheek with their butt. That said, they're also mostly perfectionists. They want someone who will do the best possible job, because that's what they do. That someone was me.

As evidence of how much they seemed to respect me, and how laid back they actually were, on the second night I wore a cute top and fun earrings. Almost half-way through the second half of the show, I finally looked at myself in the mirror. I had two different earrings in. Two very, very different earrings. I turned to the girls waiting in that room and said, "Was just no one going to mention that I'm wearing two different earrings?" They all paused and looked. One girl said, "That's weird. I was totally going to compliment you on how cute your earrings were." Another said, "Wanna borrow a pair of mine that match?"

It was priceless.

Afterwards, I had to tell them that I wouldn't be around for finals night. While they were straight-forward about the show going on, they seemed to be a little sad. I'd like to think that it's because, even though I don't think too highly of myself all the time, they realized some value in having a goofy, hard-working, knowledgeable old queen backstage with them. Maybe I'm not as painfully normal as I tend to let myself believe. After all, I'm pretty fantastic at gluing down pageant swimsuits.

Post #3: Whither Weddings?

2011-08-29T19:39:00.000-05:00

If you're wondering why this post is numbered, see this post. If you're wondering why I'm on #3, here's #4, #5, #6, and #7. If you're wondering why I started at the end, don't worry, I'm almost back at the beginning.

I might as well be honest with you, right up front: I'm not always that big on weddings.

First of all, I was never really the kind of girl who dreamed about weddings. I never planned my own wedding, never had my Barbies act weddings out (possibly partly due to the significant lack of Kens in my rotation for my Barbies to marry), and never actually even really thought that I would even get married. It wasn't a terribly big deal to me. As friends and family members started to get married, the bigger draw for me was the opportunity to see people that you don't get to see much and the dance afterwards. Weddings? Eh, whatever.

This has gotten even worse now that I'm a pastor. Weddings are really a ton of work for clergy. You have to meet with the couple to help them plan their wedding, you have to shepherd them through pre-marital counseling, and deal with the pressured family dynamic of a big event. The icing on the wedding cake is the fact that most rehearsals are on a Friday and most ceremonies are mid-day on a Saturday. Friday and Saturday are my weekend. This means I work straight through a weekend, making two continuous weeks of work with no day off. Starting in about May and going through September, my weekends off are limited and precious. It makes it really hard to really appreciate someone's special day.

Nonetheless, loved ones still get married. I find I have to kind of set aside my feelings about weddings and remind myself that this wedding isn't work, this is the day where someone I love commits themselves to someone they love, and that's a big deal. It's not usually a big deal. But now that I'm a pastor, I get called on more and more to do weddings for friends and family. Suddenly, I'm walking in that strange grey area: am I working, or am I celebrating? Not that the two are mutually exclusive, but it does get to be sort of murky territory. Generally, I don't mind - just as I don't mind getting asked to sing, or be a bridesmaid, or read scripture, or usher, or any of those great places of honor alongside the couple - but it does start to get to be interesting.

My little sister got married this summer. Before I left for home to be part of the ceremony, I would tell people why I was headed home and they always asked the same question: "Are you doing the wedding?" It was a little strange to me, actually, that it was the immediate assumption. I actually wasn't doing the wedding. I was a bridesmaid, and I was singing during the service, and I was happy to be doing that. I was glad I could be just a sister and not a pastor. Plus, my brother-in-law is not only a pastor, but he was my little sister's pastor, and it made far more sense for him to be part of the ceremony, which is exactly what he did.

And so I got to be just as sister, alongside my big sister and my little sister's best college friend, who might as well be another sister by now. There was a lot of work to be done when we got home, since in lieu of a dance my sister opted to have folks come back to the farm after supper for games, drinks, and sparklers. There was so much to be done that I almost forgot there was a wedding happening - that is, until the day of the rehearsal. Suddenly, it was real: my little sister was getting married. This would be the last of my parent's kids to get married. It was real.

We had a lot of fun. The rehearsal dinner was at the golf course, with a delicious catered barbeque. In true small-town style, we cleaned up the room after we were done and got to pack all the leftovers home with us. The farm house was packed full of people, with every flat surface taken up by people, their stuff, and all the accoutrement of a wedding. In the midst of all the work getting done, one of the jobs was always to entertain my big sister's three wonderful kids, ages 4 1/2 and 1. It was my first time seeing the boys since Christmas, and they have grown into chunky, hilarious, adorable little boys. My niece could not have been more excited to be a flower girl, and she looked perfect in her white dress. We took photos at the farm, ate a delicious meal out at the Legion, and all came back to games, beers, a bonfire, and great conversation with friends and family alike until the mosquitoes got the best of us, and it was time to turn in. The thunderstorm even waited until the last guests left before it opened up.

At the end of the weekend, everyone seemed to be exhausted. Weddings are, after all, a lot of work. But somewhere in all that work, there was time to reconnect with family and reflect on weddings in general. And I remembered that even though weddings are, for me, strictly business, for pretty much anyone else they are a treasured day of love and promises, families united, and hope for relationship. I'm still not a big wedding person, but even I can be persuaded.

Plus, any time I get to spend with these two cuties is time well-spent:

Post #4: I Should Preach With A Jumbotron More Often

2011-08-29T18:47:00.001-05:00

If you're wondering why this post is numbered, see this post. If you're wondering why I'm on #4, here's #5, #6, and #7. If you're wondering why I started at the end, don't worry, I'm almost half-way through.

I don't know how it happened, but somehow I've started to get tapped as the representative young, female clergy person in a lot of different events. It started two years ago when I was asked to preach at worship during the controversial ELCA Churchwide Assembly in 2009. Since then I've been elected to two committee positions (the synodical and churchwide disciplinary committees, like I'm the kind of person who knows how to follow rules or something), have been asked to preach at a neighboring synod's women's gathering, am traveling to another church just south of here to preach for a special worship at their church, am leading a women's retreat in January, and am basically doing more than I should be doing. But a lot of that previous stuff was mostly reinforced by a second major preaching gig: preacher at closing worship for the Women of the ELCA's Triennial Gathering in Spokane this past July. It was kind of a big deal.

At this point, I'm beginning to think I'm past getting nervous for this sort of thing, so I was really looking forward to it. I had many months of lead time on getting ready, so I wasn't too worried about the whole thing. Then suddenly, after a very busy and wild summer, I realized the gathering was days away and I had no sermon. I will shamefully admit that I worked on the stupid thing on the plane on the ride over. I fine-tuned and practiced it in my hotel room that night, when I should have been getting out and meeting people. Overconfidence, I'll never let you sneak up on me like that again.

Anyway, I managed to finish the sermon and feel half-way good about it. So, I was free to enjoy the events of the Gathering. There was a strange thing about mingling with all the women there for the Gathering, something I hadn't anticipated: people recognized me. My photo had been in all the publicity information for the past several months, and my name was clearly displayed on the name badge I had to wear to get into each event. People recognized me at lunch, during workshops, in the bathroom, even in the gate at the airport before I'd even left for Washington. I suddenly felt very conspicuous.

Fortunately, I got recognized more for an even better reason: I started to meet people. In particular, I started to meet some women about my age. See, the WELCA Gathering tends to skew a little older, but they're trying to work on that. So, I managed to get in on a few intentional gatherings of younger women at the Gathering. I once found myself at a supper table with three other women under 40 - two pastors and one church secretary. It was incredibly affirming to be with other young women working in the church, facing some of the same struggles and frustrations, able to celebrate similar victories and excitements. If I had had to pay my admission to the event (free entry is a perk of a presenter!), I would have said it was worth the price of admission.

However, the day of preaching fast approached. As did, interestingly enough, a migraine. I spent the afternoon laid low with a scorcher, hoping and praying that I'd be well enough to preach the sermon I'd spent that whole plane ride writing. Sure enough, heavy drugs and a good nap got me together in time to report for my preaching duties. I met my fellow worship leaders, got fitted for my robe, got a mic hooked up, stashed my sermon away, and waited. And waited. And waited. As it turns out, they'd decided to have a full group meeting before worship to ensure that no one would come to one thing and not the other. In the meantime, us worship leaders had to kill time back stage. I filled that time by getting very, very nervous.

I couldn't tell you what it was about. The crowd I was about to preach to probably wasn't any bigger than the group I preached to at the Assembly two years ago, and that crowd was a whole lot more hostile than this group of happy, fulfilled women. The only thing I can figure is that two years ago, I didn't truly realize what a big deal it was. I distinctly remember getting sweaty about two minutes into the sermon, as it all truly sunk in for the first time. This time around, there was no naivete. This was real. Don't screw up. So, I texted a prayer request in to my family (at which point they all got worried, because they realized that I was worried) and tried to calm myself down. Nonetheless, I got pretty sweaty. It's what I do.

That's me at the pulpit in the middle, on the big ol' stage.

I had to ramp myself up so much for the whole thing that by the time I was up to preach, I was pretty pumped. While I did manage to not talk at the speed of light, which is a typical speaking fault of mine, I did manage to talk a little bit like I was on something. I was loud, boisterous, overly-demonstrative, and dramatic. Considering I was speaking to an enormous crowd, it wasn't inappropriate. It was just a little weird. And exhausting. But I did get through the sermon, and I even think I did pretty well. There were laughs, sighs, cheers, claps, and amens from the congregation, which is always a good thing. When I sat down, I felt like I had truly preached, and not just jetted nervously through a quickly-composed text. Thank you, Holy Spirit. (You can watch, if you want. Go to this link, click on the button below the video screen labeled 'Gathering Meeting Saturday Evening', and skip to 55:31. From there you can hear both lessons and my sermon.)

But I'd learned something else along the way: I learned how to preach with onstage jumbotrons. You see, there were big screens on either side of the stage so that the folks way in the back could see what was going on. It's not actually something I've done before. So, when I got up to preach, I tried to look up and around as often as possible to make eye contact with the crowd. As I did that, I noticed a couple of things.

First, the only people looking back at me were the people sitting directly in the center in the first five rows. They were the only people closer to me than to a screen, so they were looking right at me. Next, I noticed that everyone else was looking at the screens, not at me. This meant that they were all craning their necks one way or the other, so when I looked out, they appeared to be completely uninterested in me. This threw me until I realized that they were looking at me - they were looking at the me on the screen. This meant that every time I turned my head to make eye contact with people to the side, I cut everyone off from eye contact. I wasn't making eye contact with the people in the first five rows, and since the camera caught me looking off to the side, I wasn't making eye contact with people watching on the jumbotron, either. Plus, every time I looked to the side, I saw myself on the screen just out the corner of my eye, and had to fight the temptation to turn all the way around and see how I looked on the big screen.

It was a surprisingly sharp learning curve, and all while I was preaching. It kinda threw me. It got to where by the end, when I reached my big point and the crowd was with me and started cheering, I actually kept talking. I talked right over them. Bad form, preacher. But I was surprisingly more distracted than I thought I'd be.

Serving communion, as seen from the jumbotron

Afterwards, I helped with the rest of worship. I served communion, and loved making eye contact with some of the ladies that I'd seen in the congregation up until this point. Whenever I take communion in some kind of large gathering, I love when I end up at the preacher's communion station and being able to see the reality, the humanity of the person behind the pulpit. I hope I got to do that for some people that night, too.

Afterwards, a very strange thing happened. People seemed to really like the sermon, and really wanted me to know that. A young woman came up to me, crying, saying that my sermon was what she'd been needing to hear all weekend and finally felt fulfilled by. Two younger women asked me where my church was, and if they could join us in worship. Women I knew, women I didn't know, women who felt moved or excited or impassioned all came up to meet me at the stage before I could even take my robe off to thank me, to talk to me, to celebrate with me. It was incredible. The talked to me all the way through the convention center as I stumbled off to my hotel room to sleep. They talked to me all morning the next day, as we all loaded up to get to the airport. The talked to me in the airport. I took a side trip for a few days to visit my sisters, and even days later, they were still finding me in the airport to talk to me. Now, a month later, I am hearing from people who know people who heard my sermon, and they are relaying their thanks. It is overwhelming.

Back home, the senior pastor asked me how things went. When I mentioned how people seemed to really respond to it, he cautioned me: remember that other churches and people don't get to snatch me away. He made it kind of a mock threat, but I do think on some level that he's a little concerned that I'll get lured away by another call. He doesn't need to worry. Unless a church has a jumbotron, I'm not interested. I'm getting pretty good at preaching on those, you know.

Post #5: Itchy Feet

2011-08-24T21:15:00.000-05:00

If you're wondering why this post is numbered, see this post. If you're wondering why I'm on #5, here's #6 and #7. If you're wondering why I started at the end, it's because I decided to be difficult. If you're wondering why I'm being difficult, you don't know me very well.

Six months after my 18th birthday, I established a really good habit of not staying in the same spot for longer than about 10 months, and balancing it all out with significant international travel. I went to Israel when I was 18, then left for college for nine months and spent the summer at camp, a cycle I repeated my sophomore year. I put a trip to Europe in-between, making the summer I spent at school add up to a record 11 months in one spot for my senior year of college. I left for Scandinavia, moved home, then went to seminary. I lasted five months of seminary before I went to Southeast Asia, then managed to stay roughly at seminary (minus pageant travels) for nearly a year and a half. Then a year in Vegas, then another year and a half back. Then a year lived overseas, broken into chunks. Then I moved back here, and haven't moved since.

Sure, I've done some traveling since then. Mexico, Jamaica, Australia, and New Zealand were all wonderful, and I had a great time. But I've still managed to stay put, by and large, for the longest consecutive period in my adult life. Same house, same bed, same job, same weather, same man. (This is officially the longest I've ever been in a relationship.) And while there is much to love, I have to admit: I'm getting pretty itchy feet. I am not used to being in one place, doing one thing, for so long.

When I first started out in the real world, I was still certain that I would be headed out to school again very soon. I was sure it would be somewhere far away, somewhere in a city or on a coast, at a big and prestigious university. I would be moving again, because that is what I have known in what I can only jokingly refer to as my adult life. And now, as itchy as my feet are, I'm beginning to wonder: do I want this because it is what I want, or because it's all I've ever known before?

I got a chance to meet an old friend for lunch while I was home for my sister's wedding. She and I met up at the local cafe. She brought photos of her recent trip, and I brought stories of the travails of growing up. We both came to the table expecting to just catch up on life, love, relationships, and careers. Instead, we stumbled upon a strange realization: we were both having the same third-life crisis. We were both feeling pretty settled, pretty safe, pretty good about our lives where they were at, even though it wasn't quite what we'd imagined a decade ago that our lives would've looked like. And that begged the question of whether feeling stable was something to embrace or something to fight.

Oddly enough, this realization was incredible. I thought that my apprehension was particular to me somehow, whether because of my career or my personality. Instead, it's more universal. It's not because I'm some crazy girl who doesn't know how to be in one place for very long - although the fact that I haven't done that sure doesn't help. It's more because this is the stage of life we're in. Many of us at this general age have been roughly transient in most of our lives, and don't know how to do anything else. Once we're given a chance to lead a steady, focused life, it feels weird. We have two options. We can fight it, or we can embrace it.

I'd like to think I can embrace it and not lose the part of me that likes to see, hear, experience, do, go, and be. I can keep doing what I'm doing - because it's worthwhile work and I'm good at it - and that doesn't mean I'm settling, copping out, or running away. If I change what I'm doing, whether to do something similar to now or something completely different, it will be because it is a good move for me, my future, and the life I share with my loved ones, and not just some kind of reactionary, fear-based leap. This is good. This is practical. This is adult.

I guess I'm just going to have to find something else to scratch this itch. The world is a big, weird, wild place, after all.

Post #6: I Must Really Love You!

2011-08-10T15:31:00.000-05:00

If you're wondering why this post is numbered, see this post. If you're wondering why this subject isn't listed in the post, it's because it's in the comments. If you're wondering why I'm on #6, it's because this post was #7. If you're wondering why I started at the end, it's because I decided to be difficult. If you're wondering why I'm being difficult, you don't know me very well.

I'm the kind of girl who collects friends. It must be that Woo strength on my StrengthFinders profile. There's hardly a corner of my life that doesn't have a network of friends connected to it. High school, college, seminary, pageants, church life, and all the sub-genres in-between have resulted in my 500+ facebook friends and my ability to run into someone I know almost any where I go.

The dark side of this tendency is that while I've got quantity, I've rarely got quality. Admittedly, I don't so much wear my heart on my sleeve as much as strip it down and show it to anyone who'll talk to me, which does sort of give the illusion of me having lots of close friends. It's not exactly true: what I have are lots of trusted acquaintances, lots of people who know me well in a certain circumstance or situation, lots of people I'm somehow connected to, and a few actual close friends.

I am really, really fortunate to have all of these people in my life, whether they're close and tight friends or distant and loose contacts. I like being a social butterfly. I like running into old friends and making new ones. Regardless, I'm particularly happy that I have that handful of good, dear friends who have come through bad and good things with me and are still giving me the time of day. One of those dear friends is my girl JB.

JB and I met because we had people in common - namely, my soon-to-be brother-in-law, who we were mutually classmates with. Eventually, JB and I became friends of our own accord. She followed me to Miss America, helped me move to Vegas, listened to me cry and swear and yell and encourage and do all those things that friends do. And I can't lie: there have been times where I wasn't sure JB and I were going to make it as friends. Life isn't always easy, and when that happens, we tend to be hardest on those we care about most. If JB and I were married (and some have suggested that we might as well be) I suspect we would've been separated at least once, and probably should have gone to some couples counseling. But the truth is that we're stronger friends for it. While I certainly don't advocate adversity as relationship building, it happened for us. And I'm really, really glad for it.

JB is a big believer in Birthday Month, which means that you get to celebrate your birthday for longer than just the one day. She goes by calendar month, meaning that for one month in the middle of the summer, we get to celebrate her for 31 days. I'm pretty okay with that, especially since I'm often on the run that month and don't have to feel bad if I miss the precise date, as long as I get in a couple of days worth of birthday fun during the month. This year, I managed to score us some tickets in the Legends Club of the new Target Field for her birthday. It's a pretty sweet set-up, with exclusive food vendors and climate-controlled indoor seating options.

This is particularly notable because we went to a noon game, and it was about 110 degrees out. I am not kidding.

Back when I lived in Vegas, it would easily get up to 112 degrees or so in the summer. It was a terrible, soul-sucking heat. I burned my hands on my steering wheel and my feet on the pavement. For the first time in my life, I had to buy Gatorade to replace the electrolytes that my body was constantly sweating out. I needed body lotion that was as thick as toothpaste, because the desert sun kept scorching my skin. But in the midst of it all, people kept repeating the popular mantra: "It's not the heat, it's the humidity. This isn't so bad. It's a dry heat." Baloney. Heat is heat. If it's physically dangerous to be outside, it doesn't matter what the dew point is. It's hot.

That said, a day at the ballpark in Minnesota in the depths of a summer heat wave is a slightly different experience. You couldn't sweat enough. You couldn't drink enough water. Nothing gave you any relief. If you were in the sun, you were baking. If you were in the shade, you were stifling. It was not a fun day for baseball.

One thing helped. (Well, two things, if you count the fact that we could sneak into the Legends Club air conditioning for two out of three innings at a time to cool off.) I was with my girl. We were talking, catching up, having fun, watching baseball, and celebrating her birthday. Afterwards, we met up with our respective downtown-employee men for a beer. I was a sweaty, stinky mess, but it wasn't a big deal. I was with a good friend, we were celebrating, and life was good - even life on an oppressively hot and humid Minnesota day.

So, to JB and all my dear friends for whom I do occasionally ridiculous things: thank you. It's a privilege to be your friend, and an honor that you love me back.

Post #7: Digital Creeperdom / Real Stalking

2011-07-28T17:06:00.000-05:00

If you're wondering why this post is numbered, see this post. If you're wondering why this subject isn't listed in the post, it's because it's in the comments. If you're wondering why I'm starting at the end, it's because I decided to be difficult. If you're wondering why I'm being difficult, you don't know me very well.

On Sunday, I had brunch with an old friend who I haven't seen in a while. We talked a bit about staying in touch, knowing what people are up to in the digital age, and the strangeness of facebook. I professed my love for the Stalker's Best Friend while she was a little more apprehensive about the prolific digital sharing of one's deepest truths and identity. And while I do love that I can stay in touch with folks, find people that I thought I'd lost, and just generally waste time in relationships rather than my typical Hollywood gossip trash, she's also right. It's a slippery slope of stalkerdom, folks.

In that vein, I present to you three situations that demonstrate the range of online identities and my interaction with them. I think they each fall somewhere on the spectrum of continuing relationships, digital creeping, and actual stalking enabled by technology.

Situation 1: Annie
Annie and I were best friends in, like, kindergarten. Our moms knew each other and we went over to each others' houses for play dates (before they were called play dates). Then she moved further north, and we did our best to stay friends via parent orchestrated overnights. Then she moved over to the neighboring state, and it got a little harder. By the time we each left for college, we were going to school in the same town; however, it had been so long since we'd really known each other, outside of a few meetings here and there, that it was hard to try to get together. Plus, college means meeting and making all sorts of new friends, which made trying to put the effort into reconnecting with an old friend kind of hard.

We lost touch. During my college years I probably could have tracked her down pretty easily, but I was caught up in my own navel-gazing and career-sorting and apparently couldn't be bothered, which was too bad. I generally always felt like Annie and I had a lot in common, but geography had intervened. As I continued to grow up, one of my big regrets for people I'd lost touch with was her.

Here is where facebook proves to be awesome. Every so often, if I was feeling curious, I'd search for her name. Unbeknownst to me, she was now more regularly going by her full name, as opposed to her nickname, meaning it would be pretty hard for me to find her. Instead, she found me. We friended each other. We talked. We started reading each others' blogs. We found that we had a surprising amount in common in spite of very different paths in life. When she came to town, we even managed to meet up for drinks and a seriously awesome burst of conversation. It really felt good.

I'm well aware that we live on different ends of this continent and probably won't be able to get together very often. I'm also aware that in spite of hearing about her joys and frustrations on her blog, seeing pictures of her friends on facebook, and hearing her comments on my life in this blog, we don't actually know each other particularly well. If this were the real world, and not the digital world, we'd probably be the equivalent of good acquaintances. I am very okay with that. Having rediscovered my childhood best friend and gained a connection to a like-minded young woman makes me happy. Thank you, technology!

Situation 2: Robin
Robin and I both grew up in the Valley. She went to East Side, I to my tiny hometown high school. We probably wouldn't have ever known each other except that we both competed in high school speech. We were both in the Storytelling category, meaning we saw a lot of each other in the draw room, in the halls practicing, and at the awards ceremony. I knew lots of the other East Side kids in the draw categories, so we tended to see and hear a fair amount from each other. She was a few years younger than me, so we didn't graduate at the same time, and I never really learned where life would take her.

Flash forward to the facebook generation. Facebook has this marginally creepy function called "People You May Know" which suggests people for you to connect with based on your mutual friends and connections. Most of the time I don't know the person being suggested, but sometimes it's led to some awesome discoveries. To be honest, I'm not sure if I re-found Robin by this feature, or if I saw her posting on a mutual friend's wall (it's a small world, after all), but I basically messaged her and said, "...are you the Robin I was in speech with?" She immediately friended me, and we got to talking.

As it turns out, she was just leaving on a year overseas with her fairly-recently married husband who was going to telecommute his computer job while she learned, traveled, and gained life experience. Sound familiar? Yeah, I thought so, too. So I followed her blog, drooled over her awesome travel itinerary, and tried to give her encourage and support about the value of global interaction and the beauty of people and places. I had barely thought of her in 12 years, and yet I felt very close to her.

This summer, she and her husband were home briefly to trade out suitcases before they left to live in Hong Kong for a year. We tried terribly to get together for some kind of face-to-face - the first of its kind since we were teenagers - but alas, schedule and a massive migraine intervened. It was too bad. I would've loved to have seen if the new relationship based and formed in digital life would have translated to energizing and meaningful real life conversation. Instead, I'll continue to creep on her travel pictures on facebook and read her incredible thoughts on her blog. It feels a little stalkerish sometimes, but it will have to do.

Situation 3: Kara
I know Kara really well. She's a rural Red River Valley girl, and always feels more centered when she gets to go home to her family's farm for a visit. She is really obsessed with beauty and fashion, and is constantly trying new hair products or colors for her rapidly expanding collection of nail polish. If I needed advice on the right shade of red lipstick for my skin tone, she'd be my go-to gal. She really wants to be a writer, and has had articles in the Star Tribune and Vita.mn, as well as having written a style section for her university newspaper. She has an affinity for pop culture in general. She works as a self-described "shop girl" at a chain store in downtown Minneapolis. She's rocking some seriously platinum hair these days.

I have never met Kara. She does not know I exist. I could pick her out of a line-up, even have a conversation about her as if we were besties, but the closest we've ever been to each other is when I walked by her place of work.

Let me explain.

A long while ago, I was searching for something online. I cannot even remember what, exactly - something about fashion. I found the last article she'd written for her school's paper before her graduation, about what every girl needs to have in her closet and purse to be successful in the world. It was clever and informative. I instantly liked her. At the end of the article, she invited people to follow her on Twitter and follow along on her style blog, so I did. She's funny, has great beauty insight, and has a vaguely similar life story to me. So, I occasionally checked in on her blog and followed her Twitter feed. I was hooked.

In particular, her Twitter account tells me a lot about her. She writes about where she's going out for drinks, who she's seeing for supper that night, where and when she works, things people say to her in the Skyway, what song she's listening to, what she's feeling angsty about. In a weird way, it's somewhat similar to the kinds of stuff that I write about; however, her very revealing details have made me a bit more conscientious about the things I write about in my tweets. Nonetheless, over time, I have come to feel like I know her. Still, we have never ever met.

The place she works is connected in the Skyways of downtown, someplace I pretty much never am. I was, however, there last week with my girl JB (this will be discussed in upcoming Post #6) after the hottest baseball game known to humanity. As we walked through the blessedly air conditioned corporate hallways, I realized we were walking right past the place where she works. The first time we went past, I didn't see her. (The lack of platinum hair was a dead give-away.) I was glad, because it gave me time to reflect on the fact that trying to find someone you'd never met by staking out her place of work was actually pretty much stalking. However, on our walk back through, we walked past the store again. This time, she was there.

I was probably twenty feet away from her. I realized how much I knew about her, and how much I liked about her based on what I knew. I figured that it wouldn't take much to stick around and find out when she was done with work. I think she takes public transit, so following her home wouldn't take much. I could strike up a conversation on the way. We could be friends! She's so cute and funny, and our sense of humor is so similar. Maybe she could even help me class up a little. It would be awesome.

This, I suddenly realized, is what stalkers are made of. Just because all this information about her was out in the world didn't mean a) it's meant explicitly for me, b) tons of other people aren't also reading it, and c) it's even true. My edge of vague, harmless digital creeperdom had slid solidly onto the border of full-on real stalking.

Needless to say, I continued on past the store and promptly forgot about it. I do still follow her on Twitter, though. And I can't wait for her next blog post. But I know we're not friends. At least, not yet.

Programming Note

2011-07-21T17:34:00.000-05:00

Many people around the church refer to the summer as a "down time". If by "down" they mean "down in the trenches busting my butt", then they're absolutely right. It has been a crazy, insane summer full of weddings and funerals, family and friends, travels and travails, and heat and humidity. There's a lot going on that I don't just want to report on, but I actually want to reflect on. While I debate a few changes to the way I do blogging (don't worry, they'll still involve blogging - if anything, I'm hoping to work out a better way to do more of it!) I'd like to give you a little bit of a teaser. Here are the titles of the upcoming blog posts that I'm hoping to crank out within the next week. They are generally in chronological order:

You're No Campers, Pups
On Butt Glue, Mismatched Earrings, And The Privileged Status Of An Old Queen
Whither Weddings?
I Should Preach With A Jumbotron More Often
Itchy Feet

I might even have a few pictures to accompany a few of these. I realize that my blogging has been sporadic and ineffectual lately (those post will, for example, bring me to 10 total posts all year - as many as I produced in just the first two months of this blog's existence), but I refuse to resort to the "my life is busy" excuse. If my life is really so busy, then I should just have more to blog about. So, to the four of you still reading, stay tuned.

In the meantime, if you want a little foretaste of the feast to come from Future Post #4, check this out. Go to: http://www.elca.org/Growing-In-Faith/Ministry/Women-of-the-ELCA/Triennial-Convention-and-Gathering/Triennial-LIVE.aspx . Click on the first link in the video options on the scroll bar below the screen, the one labeled "Gathering Meeting Saturday Evening". Scroll to either the 58:21 mark to hear the gospel or 1:00:41 to hear me start preaching. That's the sermon I gave on Saturday night at closing worship for the Women of the ELCA Triennial Gathering. I was so nervous that I was sweating like a faucet, but on first glance, you don't seem to be able to tell. Hope you enjoy it!

On to cooking up more posts for you...

It's All Good (So You Should Vote For It!)

2011-07-05T17:14:00.002-05:00

A service announcement: I'd love for you you read the whole post, but the short version is that you should vote for my awesome church's awesome ministry! Voting closes in 10 short days! Go to:
http://www.livinglutheran.com/contest/augustana-prayer-shawl-ministry.html
You'll have to log in, but it's worth it. On to your regularly scheduled blog post...

I'm coming up on three years of ministry at this church this fall. In the parlance of the ELCA, that means I'm officially reaching the end of my First Call period. For some, their first call is a pretty difficult period of meshing pastoral identity with a sometimes turbulent congregational setting. Still others literally check off each day of their first call until their third year is legally up and they are allowed to move on to greener, healthier pastures. For most everyone, it's a period of extra supervision from the synod and further training from other sources.

For me, it's been three of the wildest, scariest, most affirming, most difficult years of my life. Unlike some of my colleagues, I have not been counting down the days until I'm legally permitted to move on from my first call an all its complicated connotations. And technically, I haven't reached the end of it. I still have two months until I hit the actual expiration date on the legalistic part of my first call. But the good news is that I'm planning on staying in my first call for a while. I like it here. I think they like me. And as much as it's uncomfortable for me to stay in one place for terribly long, I think I might stay in this place for a while longer.

I have many more reflections on this point, but I'm going to try this new thing where I don't try to pack too much work and too many thoughts into one post, because that pretty much guarantees that I never get around to writing it down. Instead, I want to focus on one specific good in this congregation and try to elicit a response from the nine of you who actually read this blog.

One of the things I love about this congregation is how very much it cares. It's perhaps the most deeply caring, personally involved congregation I've ever been a part of. One woman who isn't a member, but whose friends are, described this church as "a place where if you have a hangnail, they'll come visit you. And pray for you in church. And call you a week later to see how it's going. And start a support group for other people with hangnails so you can get through it together." An extreme example, but a pretty fair assessment. It's pretty easy to get loved within an inch of your life here.

They have this incredible prayer shawl ministry that started a few years ago. There are over 70 ladies (and they are all ladies) who knit or crochet shawls while praying for whoever receives them, never knowing who exactly it will go to or what their need is. Without fail, whenever someone goes into the hospital, or faces a life crisis, or just needs tangible support, we find the exact right prayer shawl to give to that person. Our Parish Nurse regularly refers to the powerful "Holy Spirit shivers" she gets when the right person is matched with the right shawl under the right circumstances. I know it sounds trivial - I mean, it's a just a blanket - but it's really not. It's actually really powerful.

A few members of our congregation put together a video about the ministry, and it's lovely. I invite you to do two things: first, watch it. Just go to this link. Then, after you've watched it, would you please vote for it? Just click on the red "vote for this video" button just above the video. I will confess that you have to sign in to do it, so you need to register - but the process takes about ten seconds, and doesn't require much more than a log-on name and an email address, so you can do it. If we get the most votes, we can get a $3,000 ministry grant that will do some incredible things for the work we do in our community. Won't you give us a little boost?

We have just over ten days, so spread the word: go to http://www.livinglutheran.com/contest/augustana-prayer-shawl-ministry.html , watch the video, and vote for us. Not only do you get to hear about a great, peaceful ministry in this awesome church that I get to work with, but you get to help us do more of the same work if we win. Share it with your friends. Spread the word. I hope you enjoy the video, because I certainly enjoy the ministry, and the people, and this place I'm in.

(Note: I've got a serious backlog of stuff from the past month, but I've, like, hardly been home. I swear I'll spend some time in July catching up. In the meantime, don't forget to come see me in Spokane!)

I Am A Pony, And I Am Proud

2011-06-01T14:44:00.002-05:00

I grew up in a rural town, and was the product of a small, consolidated school district. For most of my educational experience, I felt as if I perhaps had to apologize for this. It was as if somehow, the fact that my school was small and my classes limited in options made me less academically astute. This is clearly, patently untrue. Between me and my group of six closest female high school friends, there are seven college diplomas, three masters degrees, one PhD in process, and seven successful, well-adjusted, productive contributors to society. I have learned that in many ways, the success I have achieved in my life is due to the vast experiences I could have in a small town where I could be a part of everything, instead of having to specialize.

It is good to be reminded that no matter who you are or where you came from, you can be proud of the school that educated you and made you what you are.

The other day, my supervisor asked me if I had heard the television commercial about the science teacher from Oslo who was fighting cancer and still teaching. I put the pieces together, and realized he was talking about my mom's coworker, Alison. When I said this, he exclaimed that he thought he recognized the woman who started the commercial as my own mother. After a little hunting, I realized he was referring to this:

Yes, that's my mama raising her hand at the beginning. She's pretty much the best ever.

After I watched that video, I felt moved. Not only was that my school, the classroom I biffed chemistry in, teachers that taught and coached me, plus my own mama, I realized I was proud. I was proud that my little high school could inspire and motivate, teach and prepare, and be lifted up as an example of fine education in our state. While I've never had Ms. Geary as a teacher (she started after I graduated) I've heard of her from my mom, and she is so proud of her coworker that I feel like I can be proud of her, too. And then, I watched this:

And I can't lie, I full-on cried. I am proud. I am proud to see my mom right there, standing in front of my high school, similarly choked up by this woman's dedication to education. I am proud to hear my track coach, who regularly yelled at me to give it my all, be impressed by Alison's unwillingness to be stopped. I am proud to hear my Auntie Sharon, herself a cancer survivor, encouraging us all to not give up on our dreams. I am proud that I came from this little high school. I am proud that it taught me to be part of a community, no matter how complicated it is. I am proud that I got to try everything from one-act play to basketball without reproach or rebuke. I am proud that have a double-hyphenated school district name on my resume, because it testifies to the tenacity of my region. I am even proud, so help me, that our mascot is a wimpy pony.

Thank you, Alison, for being an inspiration. Thank you, WAOHS, for teaching and raising me into the woman I am today. Thank you to all my teachers for helping me, supporting me, and sending me out into the world. Thank you to my mom, for helping me value education in my life. Thank you. I am proud.

I Should Be Better At This

2011-05-25T21:18:00.000-05:00

Generally speaking, I'm pretty good with words. I like to write, and I'm not too bad at stringing words together meaningfully. In spite of my tendency towards four-letter words, I actually have a passing decent vocabulary. I regularly work with words, whether in a newsletter article or Sunday sermon. I even occasionally get called on to use words expertly, such as when I wrote prayers for synod assembly worship or led the devotion at the beginning of a House session last year. I enjoy writing, I have talent and education in its deployment, and I'm not afraid to be a nerd about it.

You'd think, therefore, that I'd be better at word-related games. You would be wrong. I have never enjoyed, nor have I ever been good at, crossword puzzles. Even word-finds are kind of dissatisfying for me. The worst of all is Scrabble. I am abysmally bad at Scrabble. I never played the game until later in my childhood, when I was spending the night with my long-distance best friend Annie. Her mom and she invited me to play Scrabble with them, and I thought, "Hey, I'm good with words! This will be fun!"

I was foolishly, horribly wrong. The two of them absolutely destroyed me in all respects. I even went for a second game, thinking that perhaps I just needed to learn the rules of engagement a bit better. I was wrong again. I am, it appears, irreparably bad at Scrabble.

Flash forward to the digital age of today. My girl JB traded her Blackberry for an iPhone, and started playing with all the great apps and toys that come along with the cult of Apple. She came across one game in particular called Words With Friends, and invited me to play it along with her. I should have immediately been suspicious when I discovered that it's basically just a generic version of the classic Scrabble at which I suck so righteously. But JB assured me that it's fun, and basically it's all about strategic usage of the double- and triple-letter score boxes, so I downloaded the game and started playing.

If Words Were Friends were football, JB would be the Patriots and I would be a rural, nine-man football team. She regularly, consistently, and thoroughly destroys me basically every time. We've played at least 10 games, and I have maybe won twice - and both times, I'm fairly sure she let me win just so I'll keep playing. In one game, I actually kept pace pretty effectively until she made two 107 point words nearly back-to-back, driving me to resign in a fit of frustration with only 10 tiles left. She's encouraging about the whole thing, but the truth cannot be denied: I am terrible at this, and every other, word game.

I thought that, perhaps, I just needed more practice... or possibly a less apt opponent. No offense to my dear husband, because he's pretty awesome and smart, but I thought I could probably beat him at this game (I was an English major, for pity's sake, and he's in computers) so I made him download it and play as well. I suspect you can guess where this is going: he demolishes me every single time. Since then, three other people have started playing with me as well (hello H, B, and J!) and while learning from my constant conquerors has improved my play a bit, I'm still regularly pwned. I am no good at word games. Words in general: yes. Words in a particular, competitive, strategic style: no. Heaven forbid I'm ever in charge and the future of humanity rests in word-based gaming, because we're all going to die in a fireball of horror.

If you'd like to feel good about yourself, you can find me on Words With Friends under my Twitter handle (my first and middle name in one word, with the middle name backwards). I'll play you, and you'll probably win. I may not be learning how to play Scrabble, but I sure am learning how to be more humble.

The End Is Near!

2011-05-19T12:09:00.000-05:00

The last time I blogged (was it already a month ago?) I wrote about how people with access to billboards tend to make my job difficult. Oddly enough, this is exactly what I'm about to talk about today. However, this one's got a twist: sometimes it's not just folks with access to billboards who make my job hard, but folks with access to too much money and too much time. I am talking, of course, about Harold Camping and his end time predictions for this coming Saturday, 21 May.

If you haven't heard about this yet, bless you. If you have, it's perhaps due to a billboard like this one, sponsored by Camping and his radio ministry, declaring that the end is indeed very near. If you'd like to read a little more about the details of this prediction and how this man has reached this conclusion - even though he's been wrong before - you can go to his site or another, more detailed explanation. I'm not really going to advocate it, though, because I'd hate for his hit counts to go through the roof on my account. (Shout out to all four of you reading!) I'll put it in brief: Camping has done some Biblical math, and believes that 21 May is the day of the rapture, to be followed by the imminent end of this world. To warn people and give them a chance to repent before the end, he's taken out multiple billboards across the US so people can prepare. There are also numerous other followers who have sold their worldly possessions and started driving campers across the country to meet people face-to-face and teach them about their impending doom.

Today, it got real for me and my job. I got a phone call this morning from a mother whose child is particularly worried and afraid of the end of the world, anxiously calling home from school to see if they can get to church sometime before Saturday evening. She herself is even a bit nervous and looking for support from her pastor to find some assurance in these difficult times. After fifteen minutes on the phone, she didn't seem very reassured, and wanted to know if her son could call me tomorrow and Saturday if he was feeling frightened.

Here's the kicker for me: they're Christian. They are people of faith, and have regularly demonstrated their trust in God through good times and bad. If the rapture is indeed coming (and as a Lutheran, I don't believe that such a thing will even happen - and my LCMS friends back me up!) they don't have anything to worry about. They'll escape the uber-spooky tribulation, and spend the rest of eternity partying with God. And frankly, even if they weren't Christian, they wouldn't have anything to worry about. I mean, if you don't believe in God, it's no use getting worried about the rapture led by a God who isn't real, right? If you were frightened, wouldn't that indicate believe that would drive one towards confession?

Confusing though it may be to be frightened about an event that may not even happen when one's fright indicates that one has nothing to be worried about in the first place, worried she was. Worried enough to make sure I'd be available by cell phone on Friday and Saturday. Worried enough to clarify for herself that there was nothing to worry about, when it was supposed to be her son who was worried. It led me to believe that, intentional or not, this is simply another fear game being played by someone who likes to feel powerful and wise beyond human capability.

The odds are pretty good that I'll still be in church on Sunday morning, because the odds are pretty good that Saturday will not be the end of the world. As clear as this man Camping says his Biblical math is, clearer still are the scriptures' words about the end. Most succinctly, Jesus' own words in Matthew 25:36 are:

But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.

And look, I realize that's prooftexting, and it's a very naughty way to half-heartedly disprove a ridiculously complex argument, but it's what I've got. The Bible is far more clear on our inability to accurately predict the end of the world than it is on some allusions to secret codes. And, if we employ Occam's razor, we can have some confidence that the least complicated, least novel assumption is likely the more correct one. Why create a complex, person-specific theory about the end of the world, when there are some pretty simple and global indicators that we'll never really know when it's coming?

I feel bad even talking about this whole ridiculous thing, because it feels a lot like giving credence to something that doesn't deserve it. But in this, I appear to be in good hands, as multiple major news outlets have given even more time and attention to this theory than I have. I suppose it was really only a matter of time until a parishioner asked me about it, and I hope I came across as truly caring and not condescending. Because at the end of the day, it's either the end or it's not. Does that really change anything? Does it have any real effect on what you believe, what you do, and who you love? Probably not.

As Jesus said, "Nothing is covered up that will not be uncovered, and nothing secret that will not become known. (Matthew 10:26) Or, in the gospel according to Yours Truly, "It's either true or it's not. But it's probably not. I guess we'll find out soon enough. In the meantime, quit freaking out."

You're Making My Job Hard, Folks

2011-04-21T14:24:00.000-05:00

I hate billboards. The only thing I hate more than billboards are religious, political, or overly-sentimental billboards. I don't hate those billboards because I'm opposed to being religious, political, or overly-sentimental; in fact, as many of you know very well, I am indeed all those things. What I hate about them is the assumption that your point of view is so convincing, so inarguable, that a person speeding by at 65 miles an hour on the way to work but trying to eat breakfast while calling their child to tell her she needs to pick up her little brother after school and just remembering that there's nothing planned for supper will see your religious, political, or overly-sentimental billboard and in the two seconds that said person had to read said billboard, the person's very heart, mind, and soul will be immediately transformed to fully agree with your pushy, incendiary, and poorly-formatted sign.

In other words, it's really presumptuous. Plus, cityscapes are crowded and dingy enough without campaign ads, pro-life propaganda, and attorney's phone numbers blasted everywhere in two-story-tall letters.

Anyway, my drive to work takes me down one very major section of urban interstate, and one choice section of state highway. Suffice it to say, I drive past a lot of billboards. There is one in particular that popped up at the end of last week that I could see as I drove into work in the morning. I assumed that it must have been in preparation for Easter, which will finally come this Sunday. The billboard reads, and I quote:

JESUS. He is the most amazingly devine man.

Jesus' name is in huge beige letters that look sort of crumpled, like they were cut out of giant old brown paper bags. The words below it are in small, black, unassuming font. It's not particularly well-designed, and the word choice is a bit stilted. Nowhere on the sign does it mention who paid for the billboard or what particular brand of Jesus is being advertised. I would have particularly appreciated a phone number, website, or email address, because if you have noticed by now, the fools couldn't even spell divine correctly. That's right, they spelled "divine" devine. Jesus might be amazing, but he apparently can't help you spell.

When my husband and I first noticed this, we erupted into hoots of laughter. Who pays for a huge billboard in the center of the city and doesn't even proofread it? Eventually, I started to despair. After all, my job mostly consists of either convincing people that Jesus is both divine and amazing or encouraging people to keep believing that Jesus is both divine and amazing. Sometimes, my work loses a little credibility with the well-intentioned folks who want to do the same, however dubious their methods. I'm sure whoever put the billboard up meant it to really touch peoples' lives, but it kinda makes my job hard. I have enough trouble convincing folks that rationality and faith can coexist without folks making awkward, misspelled signs promoting Jesus' devinity.

Apparently, I wasn't the only one who noticed the misspelling, because just this week the error was changed. The wording was still cheesy, the formatting still awkward, but at least divine was spelled correctly, which is a start. Maybe next time they'll not only spell-check, but find a phrase that better encompasses the heart of Christian faith. Might I perhaps suggest: "Jesus: He loves you even if you can't spell."

Homebody

2011-04-16T17:02:00.000-05:00

I was at a meeting at the synod office last week, getting to know the people that will be going together to the ELCA Churchwide Assembly coming up this August. I sat talking with a seminary colleague of mine. He's at a church not far from my house, but we don't get to see each other much, and we have a lot of people in common, so it was good to get a chance to catch up. At one point, he asked me what I had going on these days. "You've been on the road a lot lately, haven't you? You're quite the traveler. What trips have you got planned next?"

I had to admit to him, unfortunately, that I had almost no trips of enormous consequence planned. I will go home for my sister's wedding in June, I will head out west to preach for the Women of the ELCA Triennial Gathering in July, and I will lock myself in an air-conditioned convention hall for the aforementioned Churchwide Assembly in Florida in August. That's about it. And to be honest, my friend seemed a little disappointed that I had such limited adventures on my horizon. When I thought of it that way, I felt a little disappointed myself.

I do really love seeing new places. I especially love getting to travel to other countries because it offers a completely unique opportunity to not only experience a new culture but to gain perspective on your own culture. Admittedly, the same could be said for visiting the states in our own nation, and I do like getting out and experiencing my own country, but for some reason, my wanderlust kicks in especially high when I start thinking about other countries.

Truthfully, this might be a little unusual if you consider that I never left my country - I hardly left the Red River Valley - before I was 18. Yes, fine: my family took some pretty regular trips into Canada. But previous to becoming a legal voting member of my own nation, I had only visited North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana, Wisconsin, Illinois, and Louisiana. (I went to New Orleans twice in high school, so I probably also technically set foot in Iowa, Missouri, and Mississippi, but it's pretty negligible.) So six states, and the southernmost limit of a country that was closer to my house than my own state's capitol. Hardly a noteworthy list.

That changed when I was 18 and a recent high school graduate. Thanks to a first-place finish in the communications contest sponsored by 4-H and the Jewish Community Relations Council, I had a month to prepare for not only my first significant international experience, but my first time on a plane. Yes, I had never been on a plane before, and my first flight was going to take me to Tel Aviv. I had to rush order a passport, and thank my aunties in earnest for the luggage I got as a graduation gift. I was going to Israel. It was amazing, and it changed my life in so many ways. I think that somehow my experience in the Holy Land influenced my sense of call to ministry. I got a greater perspective on my position in the world. I also got the worst case of traveler's diarrhea I have ever experienced in my life. Most importantly, I somehow knew that it would not be my last time in another country.

Unfortunately, I didn't get another chance until nearly three years later. My undergrad had an abundance of overseas opportunities, whether May Seminars in the spring or whole semesters abroad. I should have spent part of my junior year living and studying in Crete with the honors program, but I turned it down to continue to sing in choir and try to pack in enough classes for a double major. Instead, I took a May Sem to Italy, France, and England led by a Lutheran pastor and a Catholic nun, and loved every second of it. I knew I would be back. I tried right after college by going on choir tour to Scandinavia, a place I've always wanted to go since I'm, like, from there way back. But alas, when you're on a choir tour you're on a very specific schedule, and so much of what I would have wanted to see and do was limited by traveling with about 70 other people whose most valuable assets were their healthy voices. Again, I promised myself I'd be back.

Then things started to pick up. At first, graduating from college, going to seminary, and the crazy diversion of pageants kept my passport at just seven stamps. Then, during the January term of my first year of seminary, I got an incredible opportunity to travel to Southeast Asia. Five new countries (six if you count Hong Kong, which was transitioning back into Chinese control at the time) added to my ever-increasing list, and an entirely new continent as well. It was my first time crossing the International Date Line. It was also my first time eating animals that I could not actively identify. It was awesome.

Then, another break. A brief hop into Mexico for a mission trip during my internship, and then... nothing. I started to get a little anxious, realizing my opportunities for international travel were getting pretty limited. I had always hoped to live overseas for some period of time, no matter how short, to get more immersed into a place that was not immediately my own. And then, out of nowhere, it happened: I was offered the chance to live overseas for a year on the Graduate Preaching Fellowship. On a whim, I chose Italy. Later, I had to adjust for England and Italy, which turned out to be an awesome choice. And then, I got to bring my husband of a mere two months along with me. It was amazing.

In only 13 years, I have traveled to 22 countries. (Canada, Mexico, Jamaica, Finland, Sweden, Norway, United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Switzerland, Italy, Greece, Spain, Israel, Tanzania, Japan, China, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, and New Zealand.) That's 23 countries if you count Hong Kong as separate from China, and it's 25 if you allow me to count Denmark and Holland, which I've been in each for a day but never been able to leave the airport. All but one of those countries were in the past decade. I've been to every continent but South America and Antarctica. In contrast, I've probably only been to just over half of the states in the Union. Still, my short list for upcoming travel includes a return to Thailand, New Zealand, and Israel, plus new excursions to India, Egypt (once things settle down there, of course), and Peru.

The truth is, those future trips are really going to have to wait for a while - maybe even a long while. For the time being, I'm going to be a bit of a homebody. Somewhere between the increasing responsibilities of adulthood, gainful employment, and family life, my opportunities to travel will probably decrease. I like it a lot, so I know it won't end, but the odds are good that fewer of my life experiences will have travel built in. I will have to seek travel out, and it will get harder to do. But maybe that's okay. Maybe with more time and life in-between my journeys, I will be even more appreciative of each new sight and experience. Maybe that's worth a stint as a homebody.

I Have No Clue What I'm Doing

2011-03-27T16:34:00.000-05:00

The rumors you've heard are true: I do not have any children. I get asked if I have a family often in my line of work, and I'm sometimes uncertain of how to answer the question. After all, I have plenty of family. I just don't have any kids of my own. Occasionally I'll get cheeky, and posit that I do indeed have children if you count the kinds with fur. (This was made particularly awkward when I was once judging a pageant, and in my judge's bio the emcee read that I had "three fun children" instead of the accurate "three fur children", which I'm certain made the pageant world curious about the hidden family I'd likely tucked away back in Vegas.) However, as much as I love my pets, I know that they are absolutely not the same as having children. I mean, I can lock my dogs in a cage while I'm at work all day. If I did that with kids, I'd go to jail.

I have absolutely, positively nothing against babies. I simply don't have any of my own. Other people's children vaguely terrify me; or, at least, they terrified me until people I knew well and loved much started having children. Suddenly, I was presented with the option of actually getting to know a little person on a more intimate basis. This couples nicely with the reality of the child not being your child, meaning you can always return the child to his or her parent if said child starts to scream or stink. In this forum, kids aren't so bad. I could probably get to like them.

In 2010, my husband and I became godparents to three incredible and beautiful little ones. Two of those godchildren are our nephews - my older sister's twin sons. We share godparent duties for both boys, while each one has a set of godparents of their own. They live in another time zone, so while we only get to see them sometimes, we love them long-distance all the time. Here at home, we have another goddaughter. She's the first child of friends of ours, and we see them all a lot. See, the two of them went to seminary with me, and the father is a best friend of my husband's from high school, and he's the one who set me and my husband up. Plus, their mutual best friend is married to his wife's sister, meaning that between six of us we have three seminary classmates, three high school classmates, and two sisters. (Still with me? Good.)

Our little goddaughter was born back in August, and while we see her pretty regularly, we only just realized that we'd never really been good godparents and whisked her away so her parents could have some quiet time. Plus, it's a good chance for her to get to know us better. I mean, she's going to have to get to know us as the house she can run away to when she's mad at her parents, right? So just yesterday, we had the little one over to our house for a few hours. She'd get to meet the dogs and cats, her parents would get a little break, and we'd get to figure out if you can operate a baby without an owner's manual.

Of course, as soon as her parents brought her in our house, she sobbed. We had to half-chase her parents out the door, assuring them we'd be alright whether she cried for five minutes or all night. Sure enough, after a while she calmed down. We fed her, played with her, read to her, and discovered that she absolutely loves my cat Pangur. She had just started to fuss again when her parents came back to get her. All in all, it was pretty successful. She didn't fall apart and neither did we.

As sort of an unintentional celebratory dinner for not ruining the baby, we made mussels. I've only ever had mussels in a restaurant, and they are always absolutely delicious. After a particularly tasty encounter last week, my resident culinary master picked up some mussels at Costco, found a recipe, and went to work. Pretty soon, the house smelled less like baby and more like seafood. We tore through a few pounds of mussels (hey, you have to crack open a lot of shells to get enough meat) and had a delicious meal, humbly congratulating ourselves on being able to not only care for a baby but cook an exemplary supper.

I could end the story here and give the indication that I know exactly what I'm doing. Most of you know me better than that. As per usual, I had no clue what on earth I was doing.

I woke up the next morning, went to church, and got a migraine. (Apparently, my brain's new game is to only misfire when I'm supposed to lead worship.) I caught it in time and put it back down with medication, but some of the side-effects were still there: disorientation, dizziness, and a bit of nausea. I was preaching, however, so I pushed through and stayed calm. By the end of the day, I still wasn't feeling on the top of my game, but at least my head wasn't throbbing. My husband and I had a little lunch and headed in different directions to run some errands. I made it home first.

I opened the door, and it smelled like rancid locker room vomit. More explicitly, it smelled of dog, seafood, and trash. That would be because the kitties got into the garbage as they are wont to do when it's got something even vaguely edible in it - in this case, the enormous stack of mussel shells. We try to remember to lock the doors down if there's something good in the garbage, but sometimes we forget. This time, we forgot epically. Today, the kitties got in the cabinet where the garbage is kept, tipped over the garbage onto the kitchen floor, and left the dogs to carry mussel shells all over the lower level of the house, trailing crunched up shell bits and day-old shellfish entrails everywhere. The carpets, their beds, and the kitchen floor were coated in a thick layer of shells and stank.

Remember how I'd felt off my game earlier? In particular, I was a bit nauseous and spinny? Nothing exacerbates that like shellfish and garbage strewn about your entire house, while the bright, early spring sun beats in the windows. Delicious.

I called my husband to inform him of the debacle and bring home some Febreeze. I then proceeded to wash the floor, vacuum the rugs, wash the dog beds, and pick shells off of every possible flat surface. I had planned on taking a nap. Apparently, that wasn't in the cards.

There might be a moral to this story. The moral could be something like, "Don't ever assume you have things under control, because that's exactly when you'll find yourself nauseous, on your knees, picking up half-eaten mussel shells." Or perhaps, "Holding a baby for two hours or training 60 pound mutts is not the same as making your house shellfish-disaster-proof." There's always, "You shouldn't be trusted with children when you can't even outsmart your cat." Or maybe, "It's right to be afraid of babies. And dogs. And cats. And really, pretty much everything, because it will totally ruin your day, whatever it is."

Or something like that. I don't really have time to think about it just now. I have to pick some more mussel bits out my carpet.

It Was Only A Matter Of Time

2011-03-11T13:25:00.000-06:00

Since I started writing here six and a half years ago (yes, I can hardly believe it's been that long, either) there've been a few constants. I tend to complain, for instance. I especially tend to complain about my abundance of physical ailments, and none has been more prevalent than my infernal headache situation. However, I've also frequently mentioned (almost every one of those six years, actually) my mixed feelings about Lent and Ash Wednesday in particular. It makes me feel vulnerable, human, exposed - and being in a parish as a pastor hasn't really changed that.

In fact, I was just getting ready to write a post about just this two days ago at about this time. I started the blog post about five different ways, unsure of how to introduce the subject or how to recognize that it would be only my second post all year. In the end, being overwhelmed won out and I said not a thing about it. I have, after all, been completely swamped since, well, about the day we left for Australia. Before that, really, since planning and packing ate up most of my time up 'til then. I have actually had to say no to a few opportunities that I would have loved to take (if you know me, you know how generally non-existent the word "no" is in my parlance) and even had to renege my involvement in another, even more fabulous thing. It's the first time I've said yes and then no to such a big thing probably since I dropped out of the musical my senior year of college.

At any rate, busy-ness got the best of me on Wednesday. We had already had the morning Ash Wednesday service, and I'd washed all the ash off my hands. We'd forgotten to ash ourselves that morning, so in an odd way, I was looking forward to being reminded that I was dust, and to dust I would return. It felt grounding, somehow, in the whirlwind of everything I had going on. In the midst of my regret over having to say no, having to drop out, having to admit my limitations, here was a reminder that it wasn't all about me and it never was. Better yet, our church sings the Holden Evening Prayer at the evening services during Lent, and just last year we started doing it on Ash Wednesday, too. (There had been previous arguments that doing so was not liturgically appropriate, which we've gotten over.) In a weird, calming way, I was actually looking forward to an Ash Wednesday service for probably the first time in my life.

Then an even weirder thing happened. I was cranking through some paperwork before confirmation students started arriving for Lenten mentoring, and I started to feel very... off. Disoriented. Confused and anxious, but not panicky. Filled with a sort of sense of... well, foreboding, maybe. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, so I tried to ignore it. I suspected it was maybe latent nerves about Ash Wednesday, and tried to calm myself by reminding myself that I'd just gotten through a very stressful few months and actually had a weekend to myself to enjoy very soon.

Within about an hour, it happened. A migraine slammed me like a hot ice pick digging into the soft part of my eye socket right next to the bridge of my nose. It came fast and hard. The best part? I did not have my arsenal with me.

Part of what's made my migraines blessedly manageable after they were diagnosed as part of a misleadingly specific-sounding chronic migraine disorder is my neurologist's commitment to finding the right combination of drugs that work for me. Since my headaches sometimes act a little different from each other, I typically have some mix of ibuprofen, tylenol, midrin, and maxalt at the ready. This time, I dug in my purse and realized with a sinking feeling that added to the previous sense of dread (something I've since learned is a premonitory symptom of a migraine, part of the prodrome phase that precedes actual pain; in other words, I should've seen it coming) that my well-stocked bottle of pharmaceuticals was in the computer bag that I'd stocked the previous weekend for the conference I was at for a position I had to turn down. In other words: I was up the proverbial crick without a paddle.

I took quick stock of my options. Unfortunately, as I typically come to realize after the fact, I wasn't thinking very clearly in the throes of the migraine. What I should've done is driven home before the photosensitivity kicked in, taken my handful of pills, told the church that I'd call in an hour to give an indication if I'd be ready for the evening service, and laid quietly in a dark room. Instead, I zipped to the pharmacy, bought a bottle of generic migraine relief pills (reasoning that it would be good to have in my desk at work anyway), foolishly went back to the church, informed the secretary that I was getting a migraine and would have to hide under my desk for a bit, took a few pills, and curled up in my blessedly ever-darkening office.

I lost an hour of my life under my desk. There are a few things that I remember: namely, a few symptoms that I've never had the privilege of experiencing before, like some serious shaking and chills. I also remember being terrified that someone would walk into my office and find me huddled under the desk. The very fact that I was doing so should've been an indicator that it was time to get home.

I ventured out of my office twice: once to go to the bathroom and once to "see how I was feeling". Both times I can only remember feeling like everything was awfully loud and bright and disorienting. One poor confirmation came to my office while I was upright with the lights off to ask me a question, and while she really wanted to talk, I could tell by the look in her eyes that something was pretty weird about Pastor Megan today.

At some point, the senior pastor checked in on me. I know I told him I'd be fine, but he apparently called my husband to come get me. As he later related the conversation to me, my husband said he'd call me directly and ask me if I wanted to be gotten, because as he put it to my boss, "You know how Megan is." (Read: stubborn as a mule.) I missed the call, the senior pastor checked back in on me, and told me he thought I should go home. I was finally able to admit that I did not think I could get home. At this point, he called my husband back to come get me and sent the parish nurse in to my office to keep an eye on me (in spite of my protests - I was pretty weak, but apparently my ability to protest is always strong).

My loving husband finally arrived. The nurse told me that Superman was here; I, in my delirium, said, "Who's that?" Once I had steeled myself as best I could, they strong-armed me out the door and into his waiting vehicle. Here I was, stumbly and pulsing in the eyeball, and do you know what my greatest concern was? I was worried that someone else from the congregation would see me. I don't know if it was pride or a desire to not freak them out, but it was perhaps easier than focusing on the fact that I had really dug myself into a hole.

I got home and got to bed, and proceeded to feel exceedingly uncomfortable. The head pain was starting to get under control, thanks to a fistful of drugs, but the rest of me hurt. My skin actually physically ached. It was like some poison was trying to fight its way out of me through every major bodily system. I sort of wished I'd just managed to puke, but that's never been my style. (I keep it classy.) Eventually, I slept.

The next morning felt a little like a really bad hangover mixed with the swine flu crossed with getting hit by a bus. I missed work. I mean, I needed a day off, but I didn't need it like this. As the day went on, I improved, and today I can tell you that aside from a few lingering headache aftershocks, I'm doing alright.

The best part of the story: the senior pastor called me yesterday morning to check on me after I'd called in dead. He asked how I was doing; I said I was better, but still pretty miserable. I apologized for being such a mess. (For as much as I hate crying, I sure get weepy when I get a migraine.) He wouldn't hear it. See, it was probably only a matter of time before I actually got a migraine right there at the church for everyone to see. For the past few years, I've managed to get them on off days, or make it home before they get bad, or keep them under control before they really rage. This was the first time that the people I work with most closely saw exactly what happens. For my boss, who is a very caring guy but has some thick layers of toughness, I think he thought I was exaggerating.

I have occasionally wished to, say, bleed from the eyeballs to drive home that this stupid, nebulous migraine thing is a real deal. My mom-in-law once assured me that bleeding wasn't necessary, since it's pretty clear that I look a wreck. I now also have corroboration from my boss. His exact words were, I believe: "You looked pretty terrible. It was like you were possessed."

An exorcism is something I have yet to try for migraine prevention and treatment. I asked if he'd be willing to try; he insisted he's never done it before and wouldn't be my best resource. At any rate, the Ash Wednesday service worked without me (imagine that!) and he was mostly just glad I was on the mend.

My migraines are fewer and further between, but not gone. I will have to learn to live with them. Ash Wednesday comes every year, and in spite of my discomfort, it is a vital part of our Christian faith life and I will learn to live with it. Embarrassing myself publicly for one reason or another is something I have never been able to avoid, so I might as well just learn to live with it. In each case, it's not like I won't ever have to do it again. I will. It is only a matter of time.

Real Life > Digital Life

2011-01-26T14:53:00.000-06:00

On my birthday, which was already more than a month ago, one of the best things that happened was receiving the multitude of birthday wishes coming to me via facebook from friends and acquaintances scattered around the world from very different places in my life. When I first joined facebook, it was right before my birthday. Imagine my surprise and delight when on my birthday, my wall was flooded with greetings from all my new digital friends. Imagine me being (only very slightly) less impressed when I discovered that facebook puts birthday information front and center for all facebook users. It has become one of my favorite things about facebook, because it allows for some really genuine good wishes to and from people from all sorts of places.

This year, I also tried to say thank you to every single person who wished me a happy birthday. This meant some pretty serious facebook stalking, sometimes greeting people who I haven't talked to in real life in years. But it became even more fun this way, as other facebook friends saw I'd written on the wall of someone they knew as well, and we all realized just how very small the world actually was. That realization of profound interconnectedness is another favorite thing about facebook.

What I mean to say is that I'm not becoming some kind of distant, technophobic Luddite when I say digital life is so much less incredible than real life. The past few months have been amazing for me, as I traveled to three new countries (only South America and Antarctica left on the continent list!) and met my dear twin nephews face-to-face for the first time. Sure, I'd seen my godsons on the family blog update. Sure, I'd read about Australia and seen pictures of Tanzania. But it was not the same as doing it in real life. As I've been having these experiences, I haven't been sharing about them here (or on facebook, for that matter) not because they weren't meaningful but because real life just keeps getting in the way.

I realize fully that our society has become increasingly dependent on digital means of communication, sometimes at the expense of actual communication. I know that the online exchange of information sometimes cheapens the topics at hand; for instance, I knew and saw a lot about my young nephews because of what I saw and heard of them online, but that sure doesn't mean I knew them. So I could try to argue that the reason I haven't been blogging lately is because it's hard for me to talk about these trips, experiences, and interactions on a paltry blog while still giving them the weight they deserve.

This, however, is not why I haven't been blogging. Really, my real life has just been getting in the way. I've seen it happen to several of my other friends who blog or have blogged. We got really into it when it became more accessible, seeing it as a great way to share information and vent frustrations. When our lives picked up speed with increased work demands, partners, families, houses, and more, blogging was one of the first commitment to get cut. I know that's what's happening with me. It's just hard to find a time to sit down and type, especially when the nature of the medium is such that you're not sure anyone's even reading.

But here's the thing: I like blogging. I kept a journal for many years as a kid, and blogging is kind of like journaling. (Except then, I didn't want anyone to read my journal, whereas now I quietly hope someone does.) I like being able to process and share in words, and I believe I'm fairly good at it. I like writing. I like stories. I like words. And a blog, at the core, is all those things.

So, digital friends, I apologize for my lack of diligence. My real life has distracted me from sharing with my digital life. But after nearly two months away, I realize I miss it. Therefore, consider me officially returned to the blogging world. I have a few stories to tell, and even though some of them are pretty old now, they're still good. I hope you're still willing to read them.

A Tiny Brag

2010-12-02T14:37:00.000-06:00

I've got so, so much to share with you all about our trip. I'm only just finally starting to sort through photos and hope to get some of them up here and on Facebook sometime soon. It was such a meaningful trip for me and my husband, and you all know that I can't get enough storytelling, so I will certainly share some of that with you.

But before I get to that, I would like to indulge in a tiny brag.

I preached the Sunday right after we got back from Down Under. That Flight of Insanity happened on the longest Monday of my life, I showed up to the staff meeting at the church on Tuesday morning, Wednesday was Thanksgiving Eve, Thursday Thanksgiving, Friday and Saturday a coma of recovery, and Sunday I preached. I wasn't really sure my head would be on straight, and sure enough, it wasn't one of my greatest sermons ever. I had a fine enough concept, I guess, but I really didn't pull it together like I'd hoped. Chalk it up to being mentally and emotionally in another time zone, I suppose.

Imagine my surprise this afternoon when I got an email from a writer and reporter at the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Here's what she said:

Hello, Pastor - My kids and I are new to the area and we attended your church last Sunday, our first visit. I thought I'd give you a heads-up that I ended up writing about your sermon and quoted from it in my Daily Juggle blog post. My posts are reprinted in the Sunday Life section of the Pioneer Press, too. The Daily Juggle is part of MinnMoms.com, the Pioneer Press' Web site for moms.

She then directed me to this link for her blog, which is exactly what she says it is: a blog for moms by one of the two biggest newspapers in the area. Imagine my surprise to read not only a very thoughtful post on Christmas giving for parents, but whole block quotes from my Sunday sermon. (Imagine likewise my chagrin when I realized I hadn't typed up my script to reflect what I actually said that morning before turning it in to get posted on the website - oh well.) Not only had this woman listened to my sermon, she listened hard enough that she kept thinking about it, hunted it down online, and shared it with others from a fairly large platform.

As pastors, we desperately hope that people will take at least one thing away from what we say in our sermons and find that it makes a difference in their daily lives. This woman did just that. And in a digital age, she was able to find my exact words that meant so much to her and send them on to innumerable others. I could comment on the curiosity of having your sermon quotes digitally available for just such situations (including ones where you're possibly taken completely out of context) but instead, I will see this as a positive. I'm honored that my words meant something to her, and that hopeful that her words will likewise change others.

And all that while jet lagged and preaching a sermon I'd written just the night before. Sometimes the Holy Spirit can do pretty amazing things.

I Think I'm Back... Mostly.

2010-11-24T14:51:00.000-06:00

As it turns out, Australia and New Zealand aren't particularly good about regular internet access. Either it doesn't exist, or it's ridiculously expensive, or it comes in the form of a public internet kiosk that is either A) out of order, B) occupied, or C) likely loaded with heaps of spyware. So, as you might have noticed, I haven't gotten to blog very much after that very first post. That just means I'll have to spend the next weeks regaling you with stories of our travels, which were totally flipping awesome.

But instead, let me begin by regaling you with the tale of us getting home from Down Under on what would be the longest Monday of my life in every sense of the word.

On Monday the 22nd (which was still Sunday the 21st State-side, but not to us just yet) we drove our behemoth of a campervan into the Christchurch airport to drop it off and catch our first of four flights that would take us home. I should note here that I do not recommend Britz for your campervan needs, because their check-out procedure is ridiculously lengthy, and our estimated half-hour for drop-off quickly became three times that. Therefore, we were already sweaty, stressed, and frustrated by the time we even got to checking in to our flight. We would be taking JetStar, the farm league airline for Qantas, the major Australian airline.

Quick sidebar: Qantas was quite possibly the finest airline I've ever flown, somewhere in the top three with El Al and Thai Airways. The planes were plush and sparkling clean. They had those back-of-seat movie screens that I totally love, loaded with tons of local and international entertainment options. They fed you on every single flight - including the threeish hour jumper flight between Cairns and Sydney. The flight attendants were polite and engaging. Imagine my surprise when, on our Sydney-Auckland flight (which was, unfortunately, doomed by late-arriving passengers and a poorly behaved kid who literally screamed the entire flight while punching his parents in the face repeatedly), the sassy Kiwi transplant next to us talked for nearly an hour about how much nicer Air New Zealand was than Qantas. While she copped to some Australia/New Zealand competition in the mix, her rave reviews got us thinking that if ANZ (which they pronounce "ahy ehn zed", which I find completely adorable) was really better than Qantas, we were going to have to give it a shot.

JetStar, on the other hand, is exactly what you'd expect from a shoddy American budget airline: sort of dirty, charmless, and completely devoid of any sort of free sustenance. They even charged you for drinks. They'd gotten us safely from Auckland to Queenstown, admittedly, but they sure weren't winning any friends. So, while we figured our Christchurch-Auckland connecting flight would be a little dire, we were completely unprepared for what actually happened.

Point of reference - our flights home were supposed to go like this (all times local, all dates Monday): 10:35 am Christchurch NZ -Auckland NZ. 3:10 pm Auckland NZ - Los Angeles, USA (arriving at 6:35 am). 11:05 am LA - Denver. 3:15 pm Denver - MSP (arriving at 6:11 pm). It's also worth noting that our flights to the States and within the States were on two separate bookings from two unrelated airlines, something we were forced to do for finances and scheduling concerns.

We checked into our completely full JetStar flight with plenty of time and headed to Gate 2 as instructed. As we sat waiting for our flight, I got sort of misty. I realized how much I'd liked our trip, and how much I really enjoyed the people and places in Australia and New Zealand. I'd even started daydreaming a life where the husband and I move to New Zealand and make a new life for ourselves surrounded by scenery and sheep. When he asked me what was wrong, I told my dear husband that I wasn't sure I wanted to leave. He assured me that I'd miss my family and my pets and my friends and my life, and that we could always come back sometime. I maintained that while he was technically right, I still didn't wanna go.

Unfortunately, my childish protests had quite the self-fulfilling prophecy to them.

At Gate 2, we were informed that our gate had changed to Gate 3. At Gate 3, moments before boarding, we were informed that our flight was now leaving from Gate 2. At Gate 2, immediately following boarding the plane, the pilot informed us that the plane-switching that had just occurred left him with a plane that had not been properly safety-checked, so he would have to hold us up for a while as he did that. An hour into a long series of grinding sounds and loud bangs, the pilot informed us he was having trouble completing the safety check correctly, and had to call out some engineers to help. About 45 minutes after that, he apologized for disappointing us, but had to inform us that the checks could not be completed and this flight was effectively cancelled. We could pick up our bags at the baggage carousel downstairs.

We'd been on the plane for longer than the flight to Auckland was supposed to take, and had gone absolutely nowhere. Our flight from Auckland for the States would be leaving in less than three hours. Our flight home from there was with another airline which had no obligation to honor our ticket, since we'd miss our plane because of another airline's issues, not their own. We were, in other words, totally effed.

The rinky-dink JetStar operation was completely unequipped to handle some 120+ surly passengers needing new flights, most of which had international connections. Among us were even 15-20 US military guys, fresh off more than a month's deployment in Antarctica, simply trying to get home before Thanksgiving. It was such an epic fail of management, as we were told to get in one line, then the other, then another entirely, then "those with connections to LAX" were told to leave the line altogether and just go sit in a pile of our own luggage next to the escalator. Hours past, and we not only learned nothing, but slowly and resentfully realized that we weren't getting home any time soon.

Amongst the Christchurch refugees were a few smaller tour groups that had gotten to know each other well. We fell in with a few of them, mostly to try to hear rumors about what was happening next. There was more gossip in that airport that day than in five junior high schools combined. I learned a few things: first, that the airline had no real obligation to do things like feed us or put us up in a hotel for stiffing us on a flight. (They did eventually concede to NZD $10 food vouchers, which in an airport might buy you a can of Coke.) Second, that when a rumor goes around that 30 people of the 50 or so heading on to Los Angeles would actually get a shot at that flight, and the airline has arbitrarily picked the lucky few, the names on that list are a hotter commodity than bargain laptops on Black Friday. Finally, that I am a cranky, emotional, irrational mess when my travel plans fall apart.

Eventually we learned that our flight would get a second shot at getting airborne at 3:10 - the time we were supposed to be leaving the country in the first place. However, their complete lack of staff and repeatedly breaking equipment meant that re-checking us back onto our flight was a torturous mess. About a half-hour after the flight was supposed to leave, we were back on the plane - except the plane wasn't leaving. Instead, it turns out that 20 or so folks from our flight had checked back in, gotten their bags on the plane, and then mysteriously disappeared. They weren't on the flight they'd been waiting all day to catch, and no one could quite figure out where they'd gone. So as they searched the terminal and literally walked down the aisle of the plane doing repeated headcounts, the hours continued to tick by. Once we'd again sat on the plane for longer than the flight is supposed to take, the plane pushed back from the gate. We all cheered.

When we got to Auckland, we tried to do battle with the airlines. Qantas had bounced us to a flight with Air New Zealand for our international flight, so at least that was taken care of. However, our State-side flights were still a mess. Qantas refused to help us, because their job was only to get us to Los Angeles, a job they might actually complete. Expedia, through whom we made the American bookings, said they could switch our flight... for $150 a person plus an additional $900 for last-minute booking costs. No, thank you. Our last-ditch option was to take my brother-in-law up on a possibility of a cheap standby flight courtesy of the airline he works for. Making no headway, we consoled ourselves in a few delicious New Zealand beers at the terminal and waited for our 11 pm ANZ flight to LAX.

First things first: our Kiwi airplane mate lied. The ANZ plane was dingy and worn. The flight attendants were actually a bit curt. There weren't even those little blower vents that each plane has, leaving me more stinky and damp than ever. The "fish pie" for supper was an indiscernible slop of mixed white things that were presumably edible. It had a lovely seat-back screen, but required a remote that worked half the time. The best thing about the flight is that we switched seats with a nice German family and I got to sit by the window, meaning I could prop myself up against it and try to pretend it was all a bad dream. And to make matters worse, this flight also left over an hour late so they could escort off a sick passenger (I'd blame it on the food, but we hadn't eaten their mangled platter just yet) and retrieve his baggage.

I would've kissed the ground when we landed in LAX, but Los Angeles has perhaps the worst, most crowded, least organized, most unhelpful airport in the history of modern humanity. (I'm certain I'm not overreacting, here, and that sleep deprivation and airport exhaustion did not color my opinion whatsoever.) After wandering the terminal for an hour, we learned we were in the wrong terminal. We took a bus to what was probably Guadalajara, and disembarked to try to do battle with our airline. We'd missed the first leg of our homeward journey already, but by a stroke of luck discovered that the second leg had been canceled. We truly hoped we'd strike gold in the form of a compassionate ticket agent.

We lucked out, and got the one I'd had my eye on (and not the one next to her, who was telling two of our other doomed plane-mates that he wasn't responsible for another airline's problems and they were just stuck in LA) and explained the plight to her. Without batting an eye, she started looking for other flights for us. When she discovered that her airline couldn't get us home any sooner than the next day, she started checking other airlines. She ended up switching us - for free - to a flight that would get us home non-stop by just after midnight.

It was the best news I'd heard all day.

We enjoyed a delicious Mexican supper to celebrate our presence back in the States, complete with a hoppy American beer. Our flight departed, only a half-hour behind schedule (but they had the courtesy to figure this out in advance, before we were trapped on-board), and by about 12:30 am on Tuesday, we landed back in frosty, friendly Minnesota. Our checked baggage even joined us. By my dazed estimation, we had spent 41 hours in airports and airplanes.

Today, roughly 36 hours after we returned home, I still don't know where I am or what's going on. The jet lag following a hop across the International Date line, especially headed east, is really a bugger. Nonetheless, I managed to put in a nearly 10-hour day yesterday, and I'll rack up at least eight hours today. With Thanksgiving tomorrow, my haze can easily be blamed on turkey instead of jet lag. Outside, the predicted wintery mix is mostly a solid white curtain - a bit disorienting, since I just left the Southern Hemisphere's springtime. In other words, I'm worse for wear, but I'm not down yet. And once this mental fog wears off, I'll remember how awesome our trip really was, and how no terrible airline experience can change that.

In the meantime, I think I'm going to go take a nap. Happy Thanksgiving, all. This year, I'm just thankful to be home.

I'm Just Passing Through On My Way To Australia

2010-11-03T04:22:00.000-05:00

The senior pastor at my church likes to quote a movie I've never seen called "Support Your Local Sheriff". Apparently, it's hilarious. As often happens when a family has seen a movie too much, his family has integrated quotes from the movie into their daily repertoire. On that I've gotten a lot regularly comes from the main character, who likes to remind people that he's "only passing through on my way to Australia" Considering how long I've been interested in going to Australia, I suppose I could say the same thing. And now, believe it or not, I'm here.

We mostly stumbled around yesterday disbelieving that we were in another country. That's probably because we crossed the International Date Line in the course of our journey, meaning that we will never know the date 1 November 2010. It will never exist to us. It probably also didn't help that we spent about 22 hours on a plane to get here, minus the layovers, and the 14 some hours straight from Los Angeles to Sydney is particularly brutal. But we made it, found our way to our hotel easily, and shot straight out to explore what we could.

Yesterday mostly involved Sydney Harbour. We sat on Mrs. Macquerie's Chair, explored the Royal Botanical Gardens, gawked at the Sydney Opera House, walked some more, and mostly got ourselves covered in blisters. (Wait, that was only me.) But it was so incredible. Guys, there are flying foxes here! They were all camped out in the gardens, hanging from trees like apples. I love bats, and I have always, always wanted to see flying foxes. And the harbor! It's such a beautiful thing, slicing right through the city. And the people! They are friendly, vaguely but pleasantly sarcastic, and speak with accents so endearing that we've already tried to cop a few of the phrases. Somewhere between the jet lag and the simultaneous feeling of familiarity and foreignness we have gotten ourselves completely turned around.

Today got even better. When we were trying to decide what we would do with our precious time Down Under, I declared that I needed to see a koala. And a kangaroo. We managed one better: we went to the Koala Park Sanctuary and petted both of them. You seriously get to go right up to koalas (with supervision, of course - those buggers are mean) and pet them, and you can go into a kangaroo enclosure and feed them. It is absolutely the coolest thing. It's so surreal to be able to pet animals that have only ever really existed in a sort of imaginary way.

In contrast, we went from watching wallabies and cuddling kangaroos to shopping in downtown Sydney. We braved crowds while wandering from sidewalk to arcade, with 'roo poo still on our boots. For supper, we settled in an Irish pub in Chinatown blasting American music. The contradictions may never cease.

Tomorrow it's off to see wine country, and the day after is a few days hiking in the Blue Mountains. The lady who sat next to me on the plane ride in, a Sydney local, warned me to not pick up any rocks or leave my shoes outside, because the deadly prehistoric spiders will hide there and bite me to death. Delightful. Hopefully the views will make up for it. In the meantime, I'll try to remember what day it is and enjoy the fact that, believe it or not, I'm actually here. I'm not on my way any more. I've arrived.

(PS - The timestamp function on this blog post says it's about 4:22 am on 3 November. As I write this, it's actually 16 hours later than that. Ah, Australia. I'm living in the future, here.)

Your House Is Haunted

2010-10-24T22:49:00.000-05:00

Almost four years ago, I spent my first Halloween alone in this house. The husband was working late, I think, so I was on my own just three days into our marriage. He'd promised that there would be no trick-or-treaters since he'd never had any before. The crowds of kids that slowly descended onto our front step said otherwise. I found myself frantically ripping apart our left-over wedding favors, which were filled with candy, and handing them out to the throngs of kids who practically beat down our door.

There was, however, one little kid who wouldn't come to the door. He hung back while his friends mobbed my treats, and he wouldn't come forward. When his dad finally goaded him into coming up to me, he didn't say "Trick or treat!" or "Happy Halloween!" or any of the normal things kids say when they come to your door. He only looked at me, terrified, and said, "Your house is haunted." It was a total "I see dead people" moment, so what could I say? I just said, "That's right! Happy Halloween!" and hoped I hadn't terrified the poor kid.

Since then, we've had occasional weird experiences. Cabinets open and close - but most of that's probably just Pangur. There are odd noises in the night - but this is an old house in a dodgy neighborhood. There have been moments when the cats stare at something in the corner of the room - but cats are weird like that. Nothing's really been completely unexplainable or out-of-the-ordinary.

But it's not like we don't play it up. We love Halloween in this house, so we tend to play up the spooky just in general. Even just Friday night, I was at a rehearsal dinner for a wedding I was doing. I found myself at a table talking about ghost stories and scary movies, and I mentioned in passing that our house was haunted. One young woman at the table stared at me with the same terrified eyes as that little trick-or-treater, so I ran with it. I told her about all the strange stuff that's happened (leaving out the explanations, of course) and watched her jaw slowly drop. When it was time to go, I said goodbye and said that it was time to get back to my haunted house. And when I got home, I slept just fine.

As if I have created a self-fulfilling prophecy, my loving husband turned to me last night and said, "You wanna see something spooky?" I thought he was just going to show me some horror movie clip or something, but instead, he got out our camera. See, we've got a front and back porch, and since the back porch faces the garage, we usually go in and out that door. We only ever go through the front door to get the mail, so there's one clear track through the dust of that unused room. The rest of the room is mostly undisturbed dust, unless I've gotten it in my head to clean the floor.

He showed me a picture he'd taken (it's just to the left, actually) of a footprint left in the dust of our front porch. It was off the beaten track, and therefore left clearly behind. The husband found it while making sure all the windows were secured for our upcoming trip. It was a fresh, small footprint. It looked exactly like a child's footprint. The problem is that there haven't been any kids that age in our house since June, and we're pretty sure that kid wasn't barefoot, and even if he was, why would he have left one single footprint in the middle of nowhere on the floor that has been perfectly preserved since?

I told him to show it to me, and I got down on my knees to stare at this tiny, perfect footprint. In case you're wondering, it's not my foot. We lined it up pretty carefully to make sure. Even the toes are all wrong; my toes, coming from a grown-up foot, are too well-spaced. It's a kid's footprint, and it's in the middle of nothing in our floor, and it goes nowhere. It might be worth noting that if someone was actually standing at said footprint, he or she would have been right in the line of sight of that kid years ago who was terrified of our haunted house.

There could be plenty of perfectly good, non-spooky explanations for this. We, however, have decided to be spooked. Apparently locked doors can't keep spooky ghost children out. Happy Halloween!

The Double-Edged Sword

2010-10-21T13:34:00.000-05:00

I've mentioned before that I have a strong belief that nothing - not even the best abilities, relationships, and events - is without its downside. While it sounds pretty pessimistic to say it like that, I really don't think it's a pessimistic belief. It's just true. The sooner I'm willing to realize that a good thing has a dark side, the sooner I'm able to understand myself, my emotions, and my life even better. I have been thinking about that this morning as I'm running around to various projects, taking advantage of a quiet office to get things in order before I flee the continent for three weeks. Here's what I've been thinking about:

The Good:

People. Working in a church has set me on the path with some incredible and inspirational people, both on the staff and in the wider congregation. If I'd never been plopped into this little corner of the Lutheran world, I would have never known them. I am richer for having these people in my life.
Life events. Because of who I am and what I do, I am an intimate part of the dearest life events for individuals and families. I visit them in the hospital, I meet their brand-new child, I baptize, I marry, I visit those who are alone, I walk with a family through sickness, death, and burial. It is an incredible, holy, humbling place to be.
Worship. Call me a church nerd, but as a kid I imagined what it would be like to sing the liturgy in church. I could not imagine how awesome it would be to lead a congregation in worship through word, prayer, and music. Now I get to do it every week. It's pretty sweet.
Experience. There are things I know about and get to be a part of that I never would have done without being a pastor. I'll get to go to Tanzania in January. I got to preach in front of thousands of people last fall - and will again this coming summer. (I still can't believe I'm alongside such an amazing group of women.) I have no idea what's next for me, but in my short time in the ministry, it's already been pretty amazing.

The Flip Side:

People. You'd think being active church members would inspire a sense of generosity, collaboration, and kindness. Unfortunately, people are human. When something so powerful and influential as religion is on the line, people can get bossy, judgmental, condemning, and downright rude. It's a good thing I've slowly developed a thick skin, or I'd be pretty beat up by now.
Life events. I always knew it would be hard to be in the center of a family argument, or at someone's bedside while she died, or watch illness steal a loved one. I didn't know how soul-numbing it got when you are part of it again and again. My "dying or newly dead" count can no longer be counted on one hand. And if one more crazy person leaps into my life, multiple personalities and all, I might just go nuts myself.
Worship. It's a funny joke, but nothing kills your enjoyment of worship like leading worship. It's not entirely true, of course, but after weeks upon weeks of trying your hardest to lead solid worship and preaching, you're pretty judgmental of others trying to do the same. You turn into a curmudgeon really fast.
Experience. There's a whole lot of stuff I never wanted to see, do, or learn about. The world is a messed-up, dirty, scary place. Sometimes, ignorance sounds like bliss.

Having said all that, I can still say with confidence that I like my job. I'm glad I do what I do. I believe I need to be aware of the good as well as the bad in my work, because if the negative ever starts to outnumber the positive - even when some of them are the same thing - I need to re-evaluate. It's true for any of us, really. Here's to your roses outnumbering their thorns.

ZPC VI: It Just Won't Die!

2010-10-19T21:59:00.001-05:00

It's that time of year again: time for me and my husband, along with a choice group of associates, to dress like zombies and attack Minneapolis's West Bank along with a few thousand of our closest friends. Two years ago we didn't know quite what we were getting into, last year we were ready but snowed out, and this year we were gonna hit it like pros. We invited a bunch of people over our to our house the day of for an assortment of activities, mostly centering around pizza, beer, zombie movies, and making ourselves look undead. We were ready.

There were a few complications, however. First of all, this is the first year that the crawl required an entry price. Previous years, you just shuffled and moaned along the sidewalk, starting en masse and then breaking down as people filtered off to various bars. If that bar had a cover charge, fine. If it was part of the crawl, it probably had some kind of cheap booze special. This year there was no opening push - just two sites at either end of the crawl where you could pick up your pre-paid $5 wristband, and then mosey along to one of 20 or so bars in the general vicinity. While this sounds unassuming, it really did make us nervous. Part of the joy of this thing is its seeming spontaneity, functioning as one step up from flash mob, drawing horror aficionados and party kids alike. With the wrist band it felt... corporate. The organizers swore that the fee would go to better organization and planning, something they've never been good at before anyway. So we were not feeling particularly positive at the beginning.

Fortunately, that feeling did not linger.

The day started with a group of folks who weren't planning on crawling with us, just joining us for food and fun. Those great friends rotated out to make room for MK, K8, and KD, who would be joining us for the tour. You might remember that MK joined us on our first ZPC, but K8 and KD were experiencing this for the first time. They all came equipped with excellent costumes - ninja, 80's dance queen, and lady in housecoat and curlers, respectively - and we donned our own. The husband wore the ever-popular and always-creepy surgeon's uniform, complete with bloody face mask. I decided to give Zombie Tourist a go; I thought I was being pretty creative, until I ran into a solid 10 others. Oh well, next year I'll think outside the box a bit more.

We got to the crawl just as it started, and as per usual, we had that fleeting feeling of, "We're not the only people showing up, are we?" Of course we weren't. It didn't take too long to realize that several thousand other freakshows decided that this would be a great way to spend a Saturday. Making things even more exciting was the fabulous weather: unlike last year's 30 degree freezer fest, this was a gorgeous 70 degree fall evening. We had been previously told that part of the purpose for wristbands was to count bodies and have a possible Guinness World Record on our hands. I still haven't heard the results of that, but based on how many people just kept piling in, I can only hope we at least got close.

What to say after this point? Eventually, the ZPC devolves into three things: drinking, ogling other outfits, and stopping traffic. Our mini-horde moved up the route and generally just gawked. MK spread some extra blood on a crossdressing schoolgirl who wasn't nearly gored enough. I practiced using our newish camera and tried to get shots of all my favorite zombies. KD managed to swipe a zombie crossing sign off of someone, and dutifully carried it everywhere. K8 and our lone male zombie were our wry soundtrack to every crazy, drunk, stupid, or half-hearted zombie along our path. It was very, very good indeed.

There was a Zombie Lady Gaga, a Zombie Quailman, a Zombie Dr. Frank-N-Furter, Zombie Santa's Elves, Zombie Star Fleet, Zombie Wayne and Garth, Zombie George Washington, Zombie Air Traffic Controller, Zombie Hooker, Zombie Flo From Progressive, and many, many Zombie Waldos. Of course, there were also the requisite high number of zombie brides and prom queens. Note to any of you who want to go in the future: don't bother with those costumes. Pretty much everyone comes in one of those. It seems that the zompocalypse hit proms and weddings inordinately hard.

I was taking a picture of two girls in prom dresses when I mentioned just this fact. They mentioned, rather wisely it seems, that the high amount of hormones likely emanating from either situation probably attracts the zombie hordes. This was the first and best explanation I'd ever heard for such a situation, and as I thought about it, one of the girls said, "Hey, didn't you do Matt's wedding last weekend?" As it turns out, she is the girlfriend of one of the wedding party, and she'd gotten lots of beautiful pictures of the happy couple with me in full-on pastor gear in the background. And here I stood in front of her, covered in fake blood and makeup, and she wasn't batting an eye. That makes the second time I've been found out as a pastor during the ZPC in spite of my makeup. Maybe I need to try a bit harder next time.

We knew we wouldn't be staying out late, partly because I work on Sunday mornings and partly because we all feel like we're starting to get a little old. By around 10 pm, we started to look towards wrapping things up. However, that seemed to be just when things were heating up for most folks. The place we'd picked up our wristbands, which was a generally well-attended spot when we started, now sported zombies six-deep outside. I couldn't even see inside to see how crowded it was inside. One of the main intersections of the crawl could no longer accommodate car traffic, because zombie traffic had taken over. It was time to pack up and head home. Tired, hot, and covered in melting, sticky makeup, we got back to my house, ripped off our respective latex wounds, and called it a night.

The next morning, while I lifted my hands and sang the Kyrie in church, I realized that my right hand was still stained sort of pink from the fake blood I smeared all over myself. It is a strange, silly, and delightful double life I live, and I can't wait to do it all again next year.

I Guess You Like Me

2010-10-11T16:17:00.000-05:00

I have been at this church for 770 days. That's 110 weeks, or just over two years - two years, one month, and 10 days, to be exact. Meanwhile, almost everyone else on the staff here has been around anywhere from about seven years to over 25. Needless to say, I have felt like a short-timer from the start. Add to that a strange compulsion among the congregation to assume that I wouldn't be here long and you've got me generally feeling like a worthwhile, but not very central, part of this congregation.

Saying it like that makes it sounds like I've been pouting in my corner office or something. I haven't. In fact, in a strange way, it's been comforting. I could always count on someone else getting asked to do something before me. I always have the excuse that I haven't been here long enough or haven't met someone yet. It's been sort of a security method in a job that can sometimes feel like it demands your entire heart, mind, soul, strength, and financial stability. However, it's not a very good way to get a feel for your job. Unless you're really doing it, how do you know if you're good at it or want to keep doing it? It's a weird sort of limbo to be in when you've been at a job for two years and aren't quite sure if you've been fully integrated.

I believe that started to change for me over the summer. Admittedly, it was by force: with the senior pastor on sabbatical from mid-April to the first of September, I was the only ordained person on staff. If you wanted a baby baptized, a couple married, or a family member buried, I was your only choice. To be fair, some folks have been choosing me anyway. I've done several weddings already, and some of them were by couples who actually requested me specifically, and not just because the senior pastor wasn't around. Baptisms were where I first really got going - I was hardly here two months before I did my first baptism. I think I get points for being the "young, fun pastor", no matter how awkward or misleading that might be, so for fun things like baptisms and weddings, I get called upon.

Funerals are another thing entirely. People don't want cute, energetic, fun, or sweet at a funeral - they want comfort. They want stability. They want a reminder of strength, authority, and calm. This usually comes from a senior pastor, or at least the pastor that's been around longest. I am not in any way offended by this. I've learned that funerals are actually a lot less draining time- and energy-wise than weddings, but the potential to cry in front of a congregation is quite high, so I'm alright with mitigating my risk in that department. Plus, why would I ever fault someone for their choice of minister in their family's time of loss? They are turning to the church, which is all I could ask.

Previous to and including this summer, the only funerals I ever did were when the senior pastor was gone. You might remember my funeralathon during my first summer here, marking the first funerals I'd ever done in my life - all while the senior pastor was on vacation. Since then, I've only done funerals on my own when he's been gone. There have been a few funerals where the family has requested both of us, or I've been invited by the senior pastor to co-officiate, but otherwise, I'm not the go-to funeral girl. This summer, there were a couple of notable funerals where the family made it known - sometimes rather inappropriately - that they wished the senior pastor had been around. While I respect the emotion behind it, it still sorta hurt. The implication, of course, was that I was only good enough because the other guy wasn't around.

I know I can't take that personally, and it's even more ridiculous to be offended by funeral designation. I'm not actually upset about it at all. It just makes what happened a couple of weeks ago even more interesting.

While the senior pastor's been back for over a month now, he hasn't really been around much. He's had a few health problems, coupled with the death of his father, so he's been in and out of hospitals, family crisis, and various kinds of recovery for much of last month. Fortunately, we'd all gotten so used to him not being around for the summer that we could focus on concern for his loss and illness as opposed to concern for how on earth we'd get our work done. That might have also been the case for the congregation. It's quite possible that they didn't really process when he was coming back and so weren't particularly thrown when he wasn't around.

At any rate, somewhere in-between all the conflicts the senior pastor was around for a while, and we had a couple of funerals that got backed up against each other. I was with one of the families as their matriarch was dying, and moved from that bedside to another woman's (although she lived a few more days). Since both women were long-time members with family involved in the congregation, I assumed the senior pastor would have both funerals. However, the first family - the one I stayed with as their mother died - had different plans. Without asking or confirming who would be around, they immediately moved to funeral planning with me. They wanted me to do their mother's funeral.

This was the first time that a family independently chose me to do their family member's funeral, even though I was not the only ordainified person around. They picked me because they wanted me there. Even though I've been at the bedsides of many people as they died - or was the last person with them before they passed - it's the first time a family has chosen me to be there for the funeral. In a strange way, it felt affirming. I was honored to be with them.

We've also had an intern around here for about a month and a half, which is really pretty wonderful. If you consider that I only started blogging because I was moving away for a year for my own internship, you realize just how important the internship experience is. Our intern is a wonderfully thoughtful, careful young man who is well-spoken and deeply caring. He's also officially the newest member of staff now - not me. It's strangely liberating to be not the newest, and referenced often by the one who is newest for advice and assistance. It's also good to have another pastoral-type on staff, meaning I no longer have to do hospital calls on my day off. This job just keeps getting better!

Finally, as we move from the sabbatical summer into just another year, it has been profoundly affirming to hear what members of the congregation have to say to me. Many of them have made a point to somehow tell me how much they appreciate my work, what a good job I did this summer, and how glad they are to have me here. While my Imposter Syndrome demands I can't really let those compliments sink in, I can nonetheless appreciate that it seems I'm becoming a more and more integral and utilized part of this wonderful staff.

It might just be that people in this place actually, truly like me. I might actually be sort of good at my job. I think I can handle that.

All God's Creatures Got A Place In The Choir

2010-10-03T12:41:00.001-05:00

I have two, much longer updates for you, that are very different in character. It's been a month now since the senior pastor has been back from sabbatical, for instance, and his return and multiple subsequent departures for varying reasons have been source of much reflection for me. Also, just yesterday my sister-in-law get married to a wonderful man, and I had the honor of performing their marriage. These are both things that have given me pause to think in many ways, and are both pretty awesome experiences in their own right.

However, I'm not going to write about that just now. I need to think on them both some more. Instead, I think it's important that I tell you that this morning in church, I communed a dog.

There's a woman in our congregation who has multiple health challenges, including some degenerative issues and very poor eyesight. Because of this, she has a service dog. I don't even know the dog's name, to be honest, because from the moment this woman and her co-working dog joined our church, everyone immediately accepted that this dog was not a pet, but a valued and hard-working animal. Even kids respectively smile at the dog and greet the woman. It's actually very cool.

So today, woman and dog approach the chancel to receive communion. I step towards the woman to commune her. When I place the wafer in her hand, a couple things worked against us. First, her poor eyesight kept her from seeing exactly where I put the wafer down; plus, she wears braces on her hands that kept her from feeling the wafer. Not noticing this, I moved away too quickly. I'm not even certain if she tipped her hand, or just bobbled the Body of Christ, or I didn't really get the wafer square in her hand in the first place. Before I knew it, I heard her gasp of dismay, and I saw she'd dropped the wafer.

It's happened before during communion, and I try not to get worked up about it. I pick it up, stash it in my pocket, apologize, and give the person a new wafer. Well, not this time. Before I knew it, the dog sniffed his way over to the wafer and licked it right up. All of us - except the dog's owner, who I don't even know saw what happened - just stood with our jaws open. He'd taken communion like an old pro. I had just unintentionally communed a dog.

I got some good-natured flack for it afterwards, as folks who saw commented that they didn't know if the dog had taken his first communion class just yet. I figured that we celebrate the gift of life with all of God's good creation, and that Christ can even be present in the work of a service dog. Liturgically and dogmatically, it's a bit suspect, but I'm not about to lose sleep over it. The Lord works in mysterious ways, I suppose.

Communing dogs: yet another thing I didn't learn in seminary.

Sorry, Folks.

2010-09-23T15:55:00.000-05:00

While I was working on a blog update (no, seriously, I was!) I was notified that I've managed to get my email hacked again. I've been working on upping the security and trimming some of the old emails out of that account ever since. So, if you got a delightful little email from me where I apparently couldn't have even been bothered to put in a subject, but did manage to offer you a link to "hotpills", I encourage you not to open it.

Computers stink. Except for when I use them to update you on my life and regale you with my witticisms as I likely will shortly, in which case computers are awesome.

Paws Up, Little Monster!

2010-09-07T22:02:00.000-05:00

My appreciation for Lady Gaga has been a slow burn over the past year or so. I think I only really realized that I might be into this crazy, freaky, walking performance art piece about a year ago during her infamous MTV VMA performance where she headbanged playing a baby grand and bled whilst hanging by one arm above the stage. (And yes, that dancer is wearing a white lace g-string as a mask.) So did the rest of America, however, so I can't exactly claim to have some kind of corner on the Gaga market. All I know is she's actually a remarkably talented songwriter, has a keen awareness of American pop culture, owns her wacky fashion, and could possibly be one of the great revolutionaries in modern pop music.

Oh, and I dressed as her for Halloween.

So when I found out that she was coming to my very own town, I knew I had to be there. You might remember that getting tickets was a labor of love in itself. Once the tickets arrived, they were hung proudly on our fridge. Then, I waited. With this summer being a slice of insanity all its own, the big date came faster than I could have imagined. Before I knew it, I was facing a crisis: what on earth would I wear to this show? People dress up for these shows - and I don't mean in cute dresses. I mean they dress up like it's one of Gaga's videos. They dress as her. They dress in outfits inspired by her. The dress in everything from leather to spikes to glitter to almost nothing. And if you think Minnesota is any different, think again: the Strib made a video and photo gallery dedicated to the fan outfits alone. And you'll notice, they're pretty intense.

I wasn't willing to resort to a perfunctory hair bow, but I wanted something a little less than a leather bra that shoots sparks. Fortunately, I found a pair of sunglasses just like the ones she wears at the end of the Paparazzi video, and a t-shirt with her profile from that same video. Together with a pair of heels, a short skirt, and a requisite pair of fishnets (not to mention the black lips to complete the look) I had a look that showed I'd been paying attention, but didn't guarantee I'd lose my job - seeing as the church council president was chaperoning her son and his friend to that same show. Gulp.

We arrived at the show, and for a brief second outside I was sure I'd gone overboard. When I saw the guy dressed in head-to-toe shiny spandex, I knew I was safe. Inside the venue, there was all sorts of insanity - girls with next-to-no clothes on, guys dressed like girls with next-to-no clothes on, and everything in-between. The best part was that there were tons of people dressed perfectly normally. For instance, my husband came along for the show, and he was just in a polo and jeans. There were people who looked a lot like my parents. There were 11-year-old kids, some in better-thought-out costumes than adults. There were wigs and glasses and high heels and lots and lots of skin. And it was awesome.

And the show hadn't even started yet.

Of course, then the show did start. Now, I haven't been to a ton of shows, but I know that one of the classic critiques of pop music concerts is that the celebrity artist doesn't even sing her own music or even try to dance. It's all dubbed vocals and professional dancers and heavy makeup. Now, those things are at least partially true in Gaga's case, but I think you'll find that she's clearly doing plenty of the heavy lifting herself:

You'll note that not only is she out-of-tune, she's also out-of-breath. Surprisingly, this did not upset me. The vast majority of the time, she was perfectly in-sync and on-pitch. The times that she wasn't just reminded me that she's actually doing this fully live, and she's actually pretty good at it. It was energizing, exciting, and truly real. It felt organic and intense. Judging by the rest of the crowd, they were just as into it as I was.

Things just kept getting more intense, too. She must have had at least 20 costume changes, and there were four distinct acts. The set changed with each act. While they were Gaga songs and it was clearly a pop concert, it also felt a bit like a Broadway show. It was a little contrived occasionally, but seeing as I was mostly there for the music, dancing, and spectacle, the pseudo-storyline was just an interesting addition, and not really a distraction.

Things mostly flew so fast that I was sure I'd forget them all. I opted to try to tweet certain high points at the risk of missing others whilst staring at my phone screen. To those of you who actually follow me on Twitter: apologies for Twitter-bombing you that night. To those of you who don't know what Twitter is: don't lose sleep. Let me see if I can annotate some of those tweets for you (most of them are quotes from Gaga herself):

"All you gotta do is follow the glitter way!" - The plotline of the show was sort of a Wizard of Oz concept, in which Gaga and her friends were trying to make it to the Monster Ball, the greatest party in the world, but kept getting lost. Apparently, the Glitter way is Gaga's Yellow Brick Road. Judging by the copious amounts of glitter on most concert-goers, it was also all roads that led to the venue. Maybe that was the point.

"I don't know if you heard, but I've got a pretty big dick." - Perhaps you've heard the rumor that Gaga is a hermaphrodite. Curiously, this only adds to her appeal. She's distinctly feminine while also being strangely androgynous, almost like a drag queen version of herself. She has never actually responded directly to these rumors, but was famously quoted as noting that the issue was "beneath" her. Ahem. At any rate, apparently she's decided to just run with the oddity of it all.

"You have made me brave, Little Monsters. Tonight, I will be brave for you. Betray your self doubt and free your spirit. Remember that you are a superstar, and you were born that way!" - These two statements reveal two things that fans find most entrancing about Gaga. First, her apparently all-encompassing love for her fans. (She calls them Little Monsters, and they've taken to calling her Mother Monster.) She regularly commends her fans as her inspiration, support, and encouragement. I know most celebrities do that, but she takes it to another level. She even calls a fan on their cell phone during each concert, talks with them during the show, and invites them to chat with her backstage afterward. She adores them, and they end up feeling like the superstars.

The second aspect is her embracing apparent freaks. Let's be honest: no one really feels like they fit in. Gaga taps into that and claims that she creates space for all the misfits to be themselves. She regularly said throughout the concert that the Monster Ball is a place for everyone to be their true selves, and reminded them that they are who they are because they were born that way. Somehow, it doesn't sound like pandering from her. While almost every report is that she wasn't much of an outcast as a kid, she realizes that everyone felt like one anyway. She preaches a very free love message where we all love each other for being exactly who we were born to be. I can't fault anyone for leaning heavy on love - I'm quite the lovemonger myself.

Playing something new that might not make it on the album: Living On The Radio. - This wasn't a quote; it's only an observation. Half-way through the show, it was just her sitting at her piano (which was, curiously, on fire) playing some of her ballads. One of them is my favorite Gaga song, "Speechless". Another was a song that she said she'd just written, probably wouldn't make it onto her new album, and that she'd probably get in trouble for playing. It was called "Living On The Radio", and it felt weird to see all the celebrity gossip and pop news outlets busting out after the show with "Gaga Debuts New Song In St. Paul!" Dude, I know. I was there.

"I'm quite certain that Jesus must love everybody. My religion is you, Little Monsters. Tonight, my religion is St Paul!" - As a good former Catholic schoolgirl, religious imagery and commentary often pops up for Gaga. She had a couple of short speeches (these two quotes are just lines that I managed to catch and cobble together) where she basically said that she had been accused of being "not very religious". She combated that by saying that her fans are her religion, that they are her source of inspiration. As a organized religion kind of girl, I can disagree with that heartily - but I know the fans ate it up.

Curiously, she also referenced Jesus quite a bit. At one point, she laid on the stage and, basically, prayed. She told Jesus that she was confused, because people tried to tell her that Jesus only liked people who looked a certain way, or acted a certain way, or loved certain people. She, however, was certain that Jesus must love everyone. For me, this statement was more profound. Claiming your fans as your religion is just to make them feel important. But preaching the inclusiveness of the gospel more succinctly than many churches? Well, that's something I can get onboard with.

As a side note, for a concert that leaned so heavily on messages of free love and free will, you'd think that things would've gotten pretty crazy. They did not. The crowd that left the concert that night was respectful, energized, almost reverent towards each other. Sure, they wanted to have a good time - but they wanted everyone to have a good time. No fights, no riots, no insanity - just happy, crazy kids soaking in the moment.

After a couple hours of non-stop rock, the show was over. The crowd filtered off into the street and could not stop talking about the awesomeness of the night. I tried to get a few more pictures - mostly of the fans. I mean, seriously, how could you not stop and admire their handiwork and commitment?

But before long, it was time to head home. I stripped off the heels, wiped off the black lipstick and nail polish, and slept hard, with visions of Gaga dancing in my head. I will confess that I did think about how to get tickets to night two of her stand. It was that awesome of a show. Of course, not everyone agrees with me. Two writers from the Star Tribute weren't exactly convinced - I think this guy liked it more than this guy - but whatever. Gaga's probably moving to a part in her career where she's so loved, so followed, and so hip that people will start not liking her just to not be part of the crowd. Ironic, considering she claims to not be part of the crowd and invites the crowd into her not-part-of-the-crowdness, or something.

Whatever. I'm on the bandwagon. Hello, my name's Megan, and I'm a Little Monster.

Stupid Girl

2010-09-02T12:07:00.000-05:00

Oh my gosh, you guys! So much has been going on in the past couple of weeks... the State Fair is in town, I'm no longer a solo pastor, we have an intern for the first time in decades, I'm going to be a godmother, and I went to a Lady Gaga concert. All things are amazing in very different and wonderful ways, and as I am always ready to do, I will just have to tell you the story.

But first, let me tell you a story of how I found out that my car is smarter than me.

I'm not a particularly technologically-minded girl. Sure, I can check the oil on my car or run the defrag on my computer, but that's about as far as I can go. I have come to rely on trustworthy professionals, or at least the advice and experience of either my husband or father. While I technically have no problem deferring to those who know more, I can't help but shake the feeling that this makes me a stupid girl. Don't get me wrong: I know I actually am smart, and there's plenty of things that I can do amazingly well. It's just that the things I'm not good at are so stereotypical for a girl to not know how to do, and I don't particularly love living into a stereotype, so I kind of resent all the situations that involve technology and wrenches that point out my weaknesses.

My car is the repository for most of this angst. Fortunately, my car is the responsibility of my church, since its lease and upkeep are the church's financial problem as per my contract. I am, therefore, completely content to hand my car over to a shop at the slightest sign of trouble. This doesn't mean that I don't usually feel completely out of my element about it, however. Case in point: on Tuesday, while the new intern was riding with me to text study, the check engine light came on.

My adrenaline immediately started pumping. I had just gotten my oil changed - could the shop have messed something up? It was 95 degrees out - could my car be overheating? One of the first cars I ever drove burst into a ball of flames on the Radium road - was that going to happen again? The intern, a man of almost eerily calm demeanor, affirmed that in spite of the check engine light, nothing seemed to be wrong with my car. I agreed, and proceeded to continue to quietly freak out behind the wheel.

I kept expecting it to turn off. It didn't. That evening, my husband and I decided to go out for dinner and I insisted he drive his car in case my car, like, began smoldering on the highway or something. By the next morning, I saw the ominous orange light flick on again, and I knew I had to take care of it.

So, I did the only thing I knew how to do: I called the dealership.

A woman answered the phone at the service department, which was both comforting and disconcerting. On the plus side, she would probably be able to speak to me in terms I would understand. On the negative side, she knew enough about cars to work in a service department, affirming that I could and should know more about cars than I do. At any rate, I told her that my check engine light was on and waited for the likely horrifying news that my car was turning into a lump of coal.

To my surprise, she asked me when I'd last filled my gas tank. Feeling every inch the dumb chick, I realized I couldn't remember exactly, but knew it had been recently. She informed me that I probably didn't seal the cap on the tank all the way down, until it clicks. This, apparently, can cause the check engine light to go off - and apparently it happens often enough with people that it was the very first thing she went to in my situation. I told her I usually do turn it all the way, since it says pretty clearly that you should do that on the gas cap (and we've had people get gas siphoned off their gas tanks in our driveway before). She told me I should check anyway - and if it wasn't the case, I could call back and make an appointment. She was so certain that it was the gas cap, however, that she even told me it takes several starts and stops of the engine before it registers that the gas cap is securely back on and the light switches off.

I could simply not believe that my check engine light was actually related to something so simple as a gas cap - and that was something so basic, so part of my car care repertoire, that it certainly couldn't be that. I grabbed my keys and marched out to the parking lot to prove that in this one case, I did indeed have a problem that I could never have remedied on my own.

Instead, I found the gas cap wiggling loosely around, clearly not securely screwed in. I then remembered the last time I filled with gas - on Sunday, when I was running between three different events and five different church-related emergencies and almost ran out of gas on the Interstate. Apparently, I'm not only a stupid girl - I'm also an absent-minded one. I screwed the gas cap in until it clicks, just like I swear I always do, and stomped off.

When I told my husband about it, he told me that it was dumb. Feeling every inch the dumb person, I agreed. He then clarified: it's dumb that the check engine light comes on when the gas cap is loose. "How about a "check gas cap" light instead of check engine light? Someone wasn't thinking."

He was right. And for a brief flash, that someone who wasn't thinking wasn't me. A small redemption, but redemption nonetheless.

And no, the check engine light still hasn't gone off. It's still winking at me from the dashboard, reminding me that I can't even be trusted to properly fill a tank with gas. Stupid car.

Canoe Death March

2010-08-20T17:42:00.000-05:00

This summer's catch has been trying to have fun on a small scale that keeps me generally within cell phone distance. My husband and I like to camp, however, and most places that involve canoes and tents do no permit for reliable cell service. Since we knew we couldn't embark upon our preferred week-long wilderness trek, we decided last weekend to do the next best thing: a lovely day trip down Wisconsin's Kinnickinnic River. It's a short, easily-traveled day's ride, and near enough to my in-law's summer place that we'd have rides and resources nearby. Perfect.

...or so we were led to believe. Unfortunately, we were very, very wrong.

We set off on Saturday, from just below the dam in River Falls. It was a far cry from the unspoiled wilderness of the BWCAW, with its mouldering couch cushions and bobbing beer bottles, but it was still perfect weather and an easily-paddled river. As we turned the corner, we entered a really lovely wide spot full of herons, geese, ducks, and gorgeous tree-covered bluffs. We fell right into our routine and soaked up the ideal day on the water.

However, as we rounded the bend, we realized we were in for some significant trouble. Namely: there is a second dam. Two faded signs indicated that we were close to a rather precipitous drop, and a quick survey of the neighboring area revealed no secure way to portage our canoe around it. In fact, after a turn around the entire area, we found that we had the fenced area of the hydroelectric dam to the one side and a dramatically steep bluff face to the other. However, we weren't really ready to call it quits on our trip, so my dear husband took the hit and hopped out the canoe to scout an alternate route.

In hindsight, we should have called it quits.

He came back after finding a deer path up a cleft in the rock face that led to a small gravel road that seemed to lead to a better access point. However, since we'd only planned day trip down a shallow river with no portages, we were in sandals. And while our canoe is less than 60 pounds, we don't typically have to haul it straight up a bluff. Not willing to give up, however, we gave it a go. We ended up with me at the front and him at the back, me dragging while using slippery mud and saplings for purchase and him pushing the canoe up and effectively pushing himself down. Halfway up, we encountered our first major hurdle: my rugged husband's rugged sandals snapped. The ankle strap completely disengaged, leaving him effectively shuffling up the mudslide with his Teva wedged on like a soccer slide sandal. This does not lend itself way to sherpa-ing the canoe up a rock face.

We eventually got the canoe up to more stable ground where my now-crippled husband could portage it properly on his shoulders. I was left to gather and carry our gear, which we had unwisely carried in bulky, ill-packed bags - because we weren't ever supposed to have to carry it. By the time we got our things up the hill and carried back down to the proper access point, we were wiped. It was time for lunch.

Recharged and willing to see this near-roadblock as a mere hurdle, we put back in to the river and started on our way. Almost immediately, we hit a patch of rapids. It was probably about a class II, but still more than I have ever experienced in my largely lake and wide river repertoire. It was quick and dicey, but fortunately my wise husband was at the stern and navigated us judiciously. It was a lot scarier than I'd imagined, but completing it was quite a rush.

"Well, there's your first rapids," the husband said with a smile. "I hope we don't have to do any more of that."

At this point, I should mention that we know the Kinni is a shallow, fast-moving river. However, we're pretty good paddlers and our canoe, while long, is rather shallow. There had been several inches of rain very recently, so while we figured the water would be moving even faster, we didn't figure that shallowness would be an issue. In other words, we thought there would be a few hang-ups, and we'd have to stay alert.

We had no idea.

At the next bend, there were more rapids. And then more. And then more still. And they were getting longer, and faster, and more irregular - much more along the line of a class III rapid. In other words, we were far, far out of our depth. Even at the slower, less choppy spots, we were whipping along so fast that we couldn't take our eyes off the water for a second. We came up on a young buck standing in the water, a beaver paddling along, multiple gorgeous herons, trout leaping out of the water, and some beautiful rock faces covered in moss and bubbling springs. I cannot, however prove these things to you, because by the time I reached for the camera we either passed the gorgeousness by or found ourselves in the midst of another bout of insane rapids.

We did get pretty good at shooting tight bends and rough rapids. We made some great calls when we had to pick right or left at a split second. Honestly, in spite of my lack of anything resembling experience, my husband's Eagle Scout canoe steering kept us safe. However, even he could not prevent us from running aground. At least three times, we hung the canoe up on rocks so sharp that I watched them rake ridges into the kevlar below me. A few times I was convinced we'd be bailing water the rest of the way in, but the canoe held. We even jumped one very short waterfall of about a foot or so drop. It was not as fun as it sounds.

Exhausted, we kept trying to find a place to pull up for a rest. However, the water moved so fast and the river changed so quickly that every time we tried to shove up to a sandbar we'd get rushed past or wedged into a rock or otherwise denied. We finally muscled our way up to a shadeless shore and laid flat, panting, listening to the rapids all around us. We had to admit to ourselves that this leisurely ride had turned into a terror. Our three-hour tour was just as ill-fated as that of the SS Minnow. There was nothing for it but to put back in and soldier our way through.

When we finally reached the bridge that marked the end of the debacle, we couldn't have been more overjoyed. We were, however, so exhausted that there was no celebration, no congratulating. There was just us, our busted sandals (because the entire sole of my Teva had ripped off by this point), and our heavily scratched-and-dented previously-almost-new canoe. We strapped it on the truck and headed back to the cabin.

I went to bed at 8:30 that night, and awoke 10 hours later to find myself not nearly as sore as I had thought I would be. That, along with the generally maintained structural integrity of our canoe, was the high point of the trip.

If you're considering a trip down the lower Kinnickinnic any time soon, don't. If you've got a kayak and rapids experience, maybe. Otherwise, you might be better off staying at the cabin with a beer in hand.

Game Of The Living Dead

2010-08-08T17:35:00.002-05:00

Perhaps you have noticed that I have a fascination with zombies. I have attended the Zombie Pub Crawl not once, but twice. I also like scary movies and certain aspects of the horror genre, generally, not to mention all things Halloween. I'm seriously counting the days 'til the next ZPC (just 62 days!). I don't really know when or how this all became a big deal to me. I think it was just the slow accumulation of stuff I found awesome.

Well, just two weeks ago, I got a delightful facebook invitation: the organizers of the yearly pub crawl were working with the St. Paul Saints to make a hopefully-yearly Game of the Living Dead event. The Saints are big on making baseball games a full-sensory experience, complete with on-field games and hard-working ushertainers. So the brainchild (...brains...) was to combine sort of a pre-ZPC event with the pre-existing Saints fun. I was immediately interested.

On that Friday, Chris came home from work and we immediately undeadened. At some point, he asked me, "So, this thing is really today, right?" While I assured him that it was, he had struck a chord with me. See, it's one thing to show up at a reliable year-to-year event with thousands of fools scheduled to arrive. It's another to show up at a family-friendly event looking like a zombie all on your lonesome. But we already applied our spirit gum and latex, so it was onwards and upwards. We bit the bullet (as zombies are wont to do) and headed to the stadium. As we searched for parking, we saw no one else in zombie attire. Everyone looked decidedly living. I was a bit sparing with my fake blood application, fearing that I would perhaps be the only one covered in gore.

We showed up to the supposed zombie section and found ourselves to be, well, the only zombies there. This is perhaps why one of the entertainment interns singled us out and asked if we wanted to sit in the Pure Romance suite. Why he wanted two people looking grotesquely undead to help a sexy times sales place to boost business, I'll never know. Better yet, the "suite" was basically us sitting on top of a scissor lift and looking through a pink billboard in centerfield. After a few innings, we done with that.

But upon our return to the main ballpark, we found a few more zombies. Thank goodness. Only a precious few were undeadened to the standard we typically see at the pub crawl, but at least we weren't the only ones encased in fake flesh. However, our persistence - and well-honed zombification technique - did get us many compliments. So we started to enjoy the game. As it turns out, it was a lot of fun in spite of our vast minority. People seemed to appreciate the commitment to the cause, all the on-field entertainment between innings had to do with zombies, the ushertainers slowly became zombies themselves, and those few zombies in the crowd started to get more daring. In fact, by the end of the night, a whole bachelor party had opted to get undeadened. Even zombies like to feel part of the horde, it seems.

The zombies around us were particularly interesting. Most of them didn't seem like they'd done much zombie-related events before. I'm not judging - it was mostly interesting to observe that most of the people who actually did come weren't regular ZPC attendees. In fact, the group of girls sitting behind us said they'd never been to the pub crawl. I could tell. One girl's idea of zombie makeup was a sort of goth kid black spiderwebbing under her eyes. Another actually had purple glittery makeup as part of her ensemble, which I fully admit came across as completely ridiculous even though another girl in their group swore that the purple glitter came in the zombie makeup kit. If that's the case, then kids and their sparkly vampires better back away from the zombie genre.

I realize that sounds completely elitist and judgmental, and that it's totally ridiculous to be protective of something so odd and grotesque as getting dolled up as a zombie. My only defense is that I think it's completely and totally awesome when people really do go full-on with the challenge of trying to become a zombie, because it's dedication to such a superfluous cause. Plus, it feels more like a scary movie reel when people actually look like zombies, and not like some Hot Topic version of a zombie.

By the end of the night, the Saints had won and the zombies had won over the crowd. Even with the poorly-zombied interlopers, the crowd was pretty hilarious. In fact, I was feeling so good about my zombifying that I tried to urge Chris to hit a bar with me and try to spook out others. For some reason, he seemed to think that was not necessarily a good thing. It perhaps has to do with the fact that the last time I was a zombie, one of my parishioners recognized me in an online magazine article. (Chris said I should probably put more makeup on next time.) So instead, we headed home, scrubbed off our makeup, and looked forward to October and further zombie fun. Don't knock it 'til you've tried it!

I Wish My Eyes Were Bleeding

2010-08-03T16:03:00.000-05:00

On Saturday, when I was in such raging pain that the bathroom light made me cry, I mentioned to my loving husband that I wished my eyes were bleeding so people could tell that there was something wrong with me. He pointed out to me that I should perhaps not wish to bleed from the eyes. Maybe the fact that I even said something to ridiculous was enough evidence that I'm not myself.

If you're unfamiliar with where I may be headed here, let me give you a primer on me and headaches: I've gotten them for ages. They started getting out of control about two years ago. I went for medical intervention about a year and a half ago, finally started getting some answers a bit later, and was eventually diagnosed with a chronic migraine disorder a year ago. It's been loads of fun. The preventative I take daily has made me fat and sleepy (although, to be fair, I'd already set myself down that road previous to the amitriptyline), and I've torn through four different abortive medications with varying success. It's not been much fun, and I wish it wasn't happening to me, but there are worse things in the world, and I'll deal.

I saw my neurologist this week. I knew exactly what she'd say to me before I even saw her, because it's kind of the same conversation we have every three months: I'm on the border of too many headaches, I should try a different abortive therapy, I need to stabilize my sleeping and eating habits, and more. Who knew headache prevention was so involved? But the last time I saw her she'd prescribed a new abortive,and considering how the last mega-drug she prescribed me made me feel like the worst kind of drunk, I had not yet tried the new stuff. I knew she'd inform me that I had to try it to see how it worked - and I knew she'd be right. And sure enough, she told me to try it.

So, on Thursday, I got a headache. However, it only started getting bad by the end of the workday. I had a family function to go to, but I didn't have to drive and could bail if I needed to... so I took her advice and took the drug. Believe it or not, a headache that was on its way to getting pretty dicey cleared right up. Miracle drug! Wonder of wonders! I was gonna take this drug for everything, if that's the way it works.

Flash forward to Saturday, when we're at my in-law's family river cabin. I'm singing the praises of this drug to my mom-in-law and feeling pretty good about things. We relax, read for a while, and I realize... I'm getting a headache. Very quickly, I realize that it's actually really bad. So I leap up, take my wonder drug, get some caffeine, and rest quietly while it takes effect.

I soon realize that it seems as if it will not be taking effect. Instead, supper time comes - and I beg off for a bit, saying I'll just rest a while. (To be fair, it was the husband who told me to do it - he knows me better than I know myself, I think.) It gets worse. Eventually, moving at all is an exquisitely painful event, which is too bad, because I drank a bunch of water and pop and the bathroom's outside. In the sunshine. Which also hurts. This medication can only be taken three times in one day, two hours apart, and only five total tablets each month.

By the end of the day, I'd taken all three doses.

It's been a while since I've had a headache this bad. And to make matters worse, I was with my family-in-law. I like them a lot, and I want them to think well of me, and suddenly devolving into a sputtering ball of self-pity didn't seem like a very endearing thing to do. Plus, I have this very real conviction that I'm probably faking. I mean, everyone else must think it. After all, you can't see a migraine. I can't even see a migraine, because I don't get what's known as a classic migraine: migraine with aura. Some people experience some pretty visceral symptoms as well, like vomiting - except I don't. I get potently nauseous, but nothing comes of it. At any rate, it's not something you can see happening. Hiding in a dark room? Crying? Total lack of energy? Hey, I did that all through my teens and early twenties, but that was just because I was moody and full of angst. Which, of course, I'm sure that people will continue to assume about me now.

So there I am, hiding in the back corner of the cabin, having drawn my husband away from family engagement to make sure I don't die or something, feeling miserable not only about hurting, but because I was certain that they'd think I was making it up. I believe it was somewhere around that point where I told my loving husband that I wished my eyes were bleeding or something, just so people would know that this was real. Wise as he is, he noted I should perhaps not wish for bleeding eyes, or bleeding anything. In hindsight, I know he's right.

The next day I still felt like trash. Still, I had to get up early and head into the church, staring into the sun with my classic headache hangover burning behind my eyeballs. I did my job passing well, collapsed into the car, and let Chris take me back to the river cabin, where I sheepishly faced my in-laws. My mother-in-law asked how I was feeling - I told her I was better. "Good," she said. "Because I probably shouldn't tell you this, but you looked absolutely awful yesterday."

Ah, vindication. And I didn't even have to bleed from the eyeballs.

Famazing!

2010-07-22T19:43:00.000-05:00

I can't say that I have a huge family, or that they're crazy or dysfunctional, or anything that makes a really interesting or impressive blog. I can only tell you the truth: we're not perfect, but we love each other. This past weekend was so packed full of family intensity that I'm totally alright with that.

It started on Thursday (yes, a week ago, it's been busy, deal with it) when I got a midday call from KB. She was scheduled to fly into town in a few hours to go to our cousin's wedding this weekend. I knew things would be interesting when she basically prefaced the conversation with: "So... have you heard anything... from anyone... about anything?" As it turns out, she'd just called Mom (who is currently out west with my older sister, greatly with child and carrying twins) who was at a doctor's appointment with our big sister, and when she called Mom all Mom said was, "I can't talk right now. The doctors are coming in. You need to find another ride to the airport." KB later gets a call from the church that she works at with my brother-in-law, and they asked her: "So... have you heard anything... from anyone... about anything?" Apparently, it was the question of the day.

As it turns out, my mom had tried to call my brother-in-law to tell them that KJ's blood pressure was too high and she was being sent to labor and delivery a week early to deliver those twin boys. But his phone didn't work, so they called a church and left a message. Before getting too freaked out, he tried to call KB and get some kind of answer - but she was just as in the dark as he was. So he headed out to the hospital in hopes of finding his wife, KB found herself another ride, and I was left in Minnesota completely confused and keyed up.

Not long after, I got the good news: two happy, healthy baby boys had been born to my big sister and her husband. Meanwhile, my little sister found her way to the airport... and in spite of having looked forward to seeing the boys just-born in the hospital, she found herself driving past the hospital on her way to the plane. It was disappointing, to say the least.

Meanwhile, Chris and I found ourselves on our way to a Twins game. Considering we'd gotten the tickets ages ago, it didn't seem too curious. However, on the night when my sister, a Minnesota girl originally, had given birth to her own twin boys, it seemed somehow right to be rolling up to a Twins game at the inaugural season in Target Field. As another mark that the fates had intersected, we discovered that I'd somehow been sent an extra ticket. No kidding. The ticket that I thought was a ticket receipt was actually a ticket. So I could get JB, my best baseball watching girl, seated next to me to freak out about the fact that we were unexpected aunties.

And no, the boys didn't have names at this point. They were still A and B. But mostly, I was just stoked that Mom and boys were healthy. And yes, I just said "stoked".

Anyway, the Twins were losing (thanks for playing along, stupid baseball) and KB's flight had landed, so Chris and I went to get her. The next day, Dad came in for the evening and between our two guests, we got our new kegerator some good practice.

As we sat out on the patio, enjoying some delicious curry and freshly-poured beer, Dad got a call from my bro-in-law. The boys had names! Baby A was now Zevon Thomas, and Baby B was now Guthrie Clayton. Zevon means "light of God" and is the last name of singer/songwriter Warren Zevon, and Guthrie means "a windy place" and is the last name of Woody Guthrie. Guthrie's middle name is my bro-in-law's middle name and his dad's middle name. Zevon's middle name is my dad's middle name and his dad's first name, a fact that deeply honored my dad and got me all choked up. Nicknames, you ask? The proud father claims that Zevon's name is so cool he doesn't need a nickname - but if you insist, you can call him Z. And since big sister Evie can't say Guthrie, we can call him Gus. These are good names.

Flying high off of happy babies with perfect names, we went head-first into my cousin's wedding. I was honored to be asked to sing, and with the shortness of Lutheran weddings, my two songs probably made up half the service. AJ and her beloved were clearly delighted, and looked so beautiful together. It is good when family can come together to celebrate the deep, comforting, supportive love between their loved one and someone who will love their loved one just as much.

And afterwards? Of course there was a party. Cousins, aunts, and uncles all gathered together for good food, good fun, and maybe just a few good drinks. The reception was decorated beautifully, and my immediate family and some cousins found ourselves at a table with very, very tall candles. Because we are who we are, we devised a game to see who could put out each candle by throwing the rose petals on the table or the wrappers from the delicious candy bar into the candles and putting them out in-air. (To the left you have an action shot of just such an attempt.) For totally juvenile reasons, it was totally awesome. Props to Kyle, Matt, and Steve for their stellar aim!

However, every wedding has to have something that goes wrong. It's usually minor, but it's usually interesting. I was in the bathroom, washing my hands and putting on my lipstick, and I stepped out to see that the reception was totally empty. No one was in the previously-hopping room. It was as if the Rapture had come and missed me - which made me pretty upset, because I thought I had that one in the bag. Fortunately, I turned to see that the hotel staff were all standing around. Since none of them thought to ask me what was going on and if I needed help, I asked them where everyone was.

"There's a tornado," the one lady said. "You have to go to the basement."

Well, thanks for being proactive about that announcement.

I went to the basement, saw that everyone was safe, and proceeded to slowly choke on my own claustrophobia. It put things in perspective when I saw the beautiful bride, sitting on a roll of carpet, looking pretty bummed. I told her not to feel bad - something always goes wrong at a wedding, and this story would trump everyone else's! This was not a very comforting answer, however, so I followed up with saying that everyone's fine, everyone's having fun (in spite of being in a dark, crowded basement) and there was nothing to worry about. This seemed to help. And sure enough, within minutes, we were all released to the reception hall to keep dancing and having a good time.

I had to leave early, however, because Saturday is my Sunday, and I was preaching in the morning. I was so wound up that I hardly slept anyway. Sunday morning came fast and hard, but my little sister got to see my church for the first time, my dad got to see drive-in worship for the first time, and I got to share worship with my family. Later that day we headed up to visit my aunt and uncle and hear about the damage the storm (there never actually was a tornado, but there sure was damage) did to their house. Wedding leftovers and good conversation were shared, and I left happy and exhausted.

Monday was another story. A migraine woke me up at 2:30 am. KB had to leave to catch her plane two hours later. A few hours after that, Dad left as well. And just an hour later, I was in a giant three-day stewardship conference for which I had zero attention span and to which I lost my entire week of work. That's how this whole week got away from me, and I'm still trying to process all the great stuff that happened over the weekend. It's what made the tedious week seem alright.

While more news is sure to come, I'll leave it there for now. I miss my family, want only good things for them, and wish they didn't all live so far away. Maybe some day we'll all be closer... or teleportation technology will finally be perfected. In the meantime: I love you all, and I'll see you soon!

Busted!

2010-07-15T13:08:00.000-05:00

This congregation is fortunate enough to be part of a larger group of churches throughout the immediate area that contribute to one central agency. As a larger, better-connected organization, it can actually do background work on people who request financial help and determine who actually needs support, and how much. For as often as this church opens its wallet and gives to someone who needs help, there are at least five other times that we re-direct someone to this other organization. When we can't vouch for someone's need, or when we're simply uncertain that we can provide the level of support someone needs, we send them over.

Since the group is supported by a network of churches, the organization itself works very hard at keeping its members connected. They'll let us know when someone from our church needs help, we tell them when we're sending someone over, and occasionally we'll confer with each other to corroborate a story. However, last month we got a completely different kind of communication from them. They wanted to warn us about a lady, we'll call her BS, who had been making the rounds asking for help. Her story was that she'd had a fire and needed money to stay in a hotel. She had no such fire and needed no such help. It's almost unheard of that we get sent this kind of warning, especially since this organization works really hard at helping almost anyone in some way, so we really took it to heart.

A month passed, and I never heard from or about BS again. Good thing. I deleted the email and moved on.

Today, I got a phone call passed to me. The lady on the other line was requesting help with food and gas. Alright, let's talk. I asked where she lived - in our immediate neighborhood. I asked if she belonged to this church - no, but she'd been to church here before. I asked what was wrong - she was caring for her son's six-month-old while he was in Iraq, and she hadn't gotten her first paycheck for her new job yet. Just as I was about to console her and examine her options, I realized I couldn't even call her by name. I apologized for not asking immediately, and asked her name. She told me.

It was such a familiar-sounding name, so I put her on hold while I tried to figure it out. Had I seen her on a worship attendance sheet? Was she a family member of someone I'd met? A search through my email revealed the truth: her name was BS. She was our faker, ready to make the rounds again with a new story. She hadn't even bothered to try to use a different name. Maybe she wasn't very bright, but she sure was persistent.

Instead of calling her out (which is exactly what I felt like doing), I got back on the line. I told her that I was passing her on to the organization that had warned us about her, and that they were very good at helping people who really needed it. Had she heard of them before? She replied with a flat voice and what sounded like an eye roll that she had. Did she need their number? Nope, she didn't. I wished her well, and she hung up on me.

I used the resources available to me and I avoided being accusatory and spiteful. Not bad for a day's work.

Mostly, it just baffles me. There are so many people in our community who truly do need support. Many of them struggle on their own, trying to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and not cause too much trouble. Meanwhile, there are people trying their lies on any good-hearted organization that they can find, namely community service agencies and churches. Seriously? Do you have that little self-respect? Trust me, I'm well-aware of the depths of greed and selfishness, but when I'm face-to-face with it on that level, I'm almost more sad than angry. That would be a pathetic way to go through life.

Okay, so maybe I didn't completely avoid being accusatory and spiteful. She probably deserves it.

Turned Around And Backwards

2010-07-08T20:34:00.000-05:00

It is as if life waited for this exact week to unleash a frenetic frenzy of frustration on my feeble self.

I knew that it would happen. In the 53 days since the senior pastor went on sabbatical, I found that life, while stressful, managed to balance. Certainly, life got busy, but it was all what I could manage. I should have known that that could not last. I should especially have known, given how simple and straight-forward last week was, that the shoe was totally gonna drop.

Of course, it waited until this week. This week, when there was a seminar that I was hand-picked to participate in and for which I was terribly excited. This is the week that I got another stomach bug, when the interim's father died, when another woman kept knocking down the door for money, when the parish nurse left for vacation, when I realized how far behind I'd gotten with everything else at work because it has actually turned into July, when it seemed much more workable to simply hide under my bed.

It's always amazing to me that somehow these moments when I'm desperately panicked, questioning, and running in fear are when I also manage to trip over some chunk of truth that knocks me on my can and forces me to reevaluate. Rarely does it take away my stress, but it at least helps me transcend the moment and get over myself. I wish God would choose times in my life when I wasn't so ridiculously overwhelmed to firehose me with some revelation, but I suppose beggars can't be choosers.

At this seminar, we talked about proclamation - preaching in such a way that people actually listen, actually think, actually apply the 50 minutes of their Sunday morning to the rest of their day, or week, or lives. Mostly, it served as more pressure to my already ocean trench level anxiety. But then, as part of the conversation, they played this video:

You might argue that Easter's not coming - on the church calendar, Christmas is actually closer. To you I say: you're missing the point. Sometimes things make more sense backwards than they do forwards. Sometimes things have to turn on their head to be correctly oriented. Sometimes things have to be pitch black for you to see the light. If I believe that God can give life to the dead, bring light from darkness, and create something out of nothing, then even the insanity of this week is not lost. God brought light to the world that was without form, and void - and God help me, maybe God can even do that to my world right now.

Maybe chaos isn't so bad. Maybe when things are finally turned around and backwards, you notice what's actually clear and correct. If you feel like it's dark right now, don't panic. Easter is coming.

The Future Is Now

2010-07-06T08:20:00.000-05:00

Sometimes I think to myself, "Hey, I'm still young yet. I mean, I'm only 30. My life is just beginning!" Sometimes I also think, "We are totally realizing all these dreams of the future. I mean, my phone is a computer! In my pocket!" And then I find this picture on a friend's blog this morning, and I realize that not only am I old, and not only are our dreams of the future totally unobtainable, but I'm already a day late in posting this time-travel time warp.

Maybe it's the intestinal bug talking, but this is really messing with my head this morning.

Grownup Decisions

2010-07-01T23:03:00.000-05:00

This past weekend, we invited a bunch of friends over to inaugurate our patio, which we actually had built last summer. It is truly an epically awesome patio. Anyway, we got food, drinks, decorations, and general coolness in place... only to have a freak storm hit the Cities, dumping several inches of rain, flooding highways, dropping giant hailstones, and generally keeping people from coming to our party. The few and proud turned out, and it was great to have them there, and we'll always remember the Patio Party That Didn't Quite Happen.

Thing is, we got a keg for the party. I haven't had a keg at a party since college, and it was strangely delightful. Sure, we had to pull it in from the patio in the pouring rain, and it managed to be crazy foamy, but there's something really satisfying about pouring your own beer from the tap. And it's a good thing, too, because the reduced crowd meant we had a lot of beer left over the next morning. Chris and I spent the day watching movies, doing housework, and trying to put a dent into the remaining beer. We did not succeed. We were left with a fair amount of leftover beer.

After that, we got talking about having a keg around. Chris isn't a huge beer drinker, but he does love really good beer. I can't argue with that. Plus, it's nice having freshly poured tap beer on hand. Chris crunched some numbers, and discovered a glass of your own home-poured keg beer costs half what a bottle of beer does. Suddenly, we got thinking: we should totally get a kegerator. I mean, my dear husband was indeed once a frat boy, but here we are, adults, trying to decide if a keg fridge would fit into our lives.

Today, he text messaged me that he'd found a ridiculously affordable one on craigslist. He even found out that a local liquor store stocks kegs of his new favorite kind of beer - New Belgium's 1554. We got talking, and realized we had to decide between being responsible, thoughtful adults, and crazy kids who love a great glass of beer.

Considering there is now a kegerator in my front porch, I guess you know the answer. Forget making responsible decisions. For now, I'll side with beer.

It's Not That Hard

2010-06-30T15:36:00.000-05:00

It is absolutely amazing how one little thing can absolutely trash your day.

As the reigning pastor around this church, a lot of things come across my desk that I might not ordinarily see. One part in particular that has been stressful for me are the nearly-overwhelming amount of people requesting financial help from the church. While I see many of these requests on a pretty regular basis, it gets a lot more complicated without the senior pastor here. He's been at the church for over 20 years, and he's much more aware of families, relationships, needs, and our past history of support. When he left for the summer, he gave me as much briefing as possible - including a few guidelines such as trying to limit direct financial assistance to members, and enforcing a one-time-only boundary - but there's no way he could give me full insight on who's been helped before, who needs continued support, when I should turn someone over to county agencies, that kind of thing. It's been... messy.

Today I had a guy come into our church asking for rent and grocery assistance. It took me a moment to figure out who he was, but when I did, I knew that we could and should help him. We sent him off later with a gift card for the grocery story, an armload of food from our food shelf, and a confirmation that we would send off the check.

While I was eating lunch, he called and left a message to tell me that he wanted some kind of confirmation that we were paying the check, since he and his girlfriend didn't want to be sitting around worrying about it all weekend. I totally understood - I would also want to know for certain that the person who said they'd be paying my rent was indeed going to pay the rent. Admittedly, when he was in my office, I said that I'd have to contact his apartment supervisor to get more information about it (to ascertain that he actually needed the money, partly, but also to find out who exactly to write the check to) so I wasn't really surprised that he wanted to double-check.

I called back to affirm that, yes, I'd written the check requested and rushed it, and it should be in the mail by the weekend. I did not get him; a woman answered. I asked for him, and the lady said he wasn't in, and then she said, "Hey, are you that girl from the church?"

Girl? Sweetie, I'm 30. And I'm a pastor. Don't you "girl from the church" me. But recognizing that this was probably the girlfriend, I confirmed that it was her name and informed her who I was by full name and title. And if you thought she got off on the wrong foot, I assure you, she didn't exactly switch feet. A rough transcription of our conversation follows, with me as M and her as G (for girlfriend):

G: Yeah, I was wondering if I could get some kind of receipt from you or something when you pay our rent.
M: Oh, sure. I was just calling to tell you that. [Boyfriend] called and said you needed to know for sure, so I thought I'd tell you that I put in the check request, the secretary will take care of it tomorrow, and it will get in the mail soon.
G: Right, but I want a receipt so I know you're doing what you say you are.
M: Um, okay. Yeah, I can write you a letter right now so you know that the check's coming.
G: No, I need, like, a receipt. So I know you paid. You know, since we're not paying it.
M: I know. If you need a letter, I can write you one right now.
G: No. I need to know that you're gonna do what you say you're gonna do. I mean, we need this paid. So, you gotta, like, get me a receipt.
M: ...I don't actually have a way of getting you an actual receipt.
G: Okay, but listen, I don't know that you're actually going to do this or anything, so you better send me something telling me you will.
M: Look, I already left messages with [apartment manager 1] and exchanged emails with [apartment manager 2]. They know that the check is coming from us. It's just going to take a few days for the check to get printed and mailed, but I can tell you that we are paying your rent this month.
G: No, you don't get it. You need to get me a receipt. Otherwise, how do I know you're gonna do this? You better send me something right now.
M: I'm not sure what you want me to do, here.
G: You better get me a receipt!

Side note: At this point, I am pissed. At no point has she expressed any gratitude of any kind for the fact that a church she don't attend is fronting almost $500 for rent in an apartment she shares with a man she's not married to. I don't need her to fall all over me, but even the briefest note of appreciation in her voice would have gone ages. Plus, she's accusing a pastor at a church of lying about covering her rent. Not that pastors are exempt from lying, but why would I lie about this? I'm doing her this favor, and she thinks I'm defrauding her. And better yet, this exchange went on for quite a while.

M: Okay, look. First of all, the word of a church that they will provide the money to pay your rent this month should be sufficient. I was simply calling to confirm that as you requested. I have no receipt to provide you, but once the check is cut tomorrow, I can get the check number and include it in a letter to you including the date the check was sent. I will inform your managers to contact you when they receive it. I will confirm to you when the check clears. Will that work for you?
G: You've just gotta get me a receipt. Is it so hard to do that?
M: All I can do is write you a letter saying that we are indeed paying your rent this month. Side note: you might notice that this is exactly what I'd offered at the beginning of this conversation.
G: Right. That shouldn't be too hard. You just gotta tell me that you're doing what you say you will.
M: Alright. I can do that. Please look for the letter.
G: I'll do that.

And she hangs up. She hangs up. Not only does she never have the slightest inkling that perhaps at some point she should express a glimmer of gratitude that I have even considered offering almost $500 to her on her boyfriend's behalf, but she has the gall to accuse me of trying to... what? Not give them the money that they didn't already have? Stringing them along, when they're already at the end of their rope? Being just some girl at a church, even though her boyfriend practically had to swallow the last remnant of his pride, by his own admission, just to show up and ask for some help? And then she ends the conversation without a thanks, without even an acknowledgment that I have wasted five minutes of my life on a run-around with her, just the remaining stink of smugness, entitlement, and superiority? That's a pretty classy move, lady.

I am not some kind of pseudo-martyr who gains self-worth from other peoples' neediness. I do not for a minute assume that I am so great and powerful that people ought to bow and cower in thankfulness at my feet. There are many, many things that I do in this job that go explicitly unthanked, and I'm extraordinarily okay with that - if I wasn't, there'd be no way I'd be doing this work. I don't do it for thanks. I do it because it is a blessing to serve God and my neighbor. I do it because I seem to have interests, abilities, and knowledge that lend myself to being good in this place, and I'm simply happy to be well-used. I do it because it needs doing. I do not do it for notches in my good-person belt, and I won't stop when the gratitude stops.

Somehow, this whole exchange made me potently angry. I mean, crying at my desk angry. Slamming the phone down and yelling so loud that the parish nurse came down the hall and helped talk me down angry. Why was it? It might have been because we were not only helping her, but we were helping her a lot - and she didn't even appear to appreciate it, as if she believed she deserved more than what we'd offered. It might have been because instead of being thankful, she was practically accusatory - when I was the one going out of my way to help her out. It might have been that, after a month and a half of needy people coming directly to me, I started to feel like no one addressed me unless they wanted something.

I'm not sure what the moral of this story is. Perhaps that it's not too hard to have your day ruined, but it's also not too hard to make someone's day. I suspect that if she'd even sounded the least bit grateful, even if she hadn't actually said thanks, that I would've been much more benevolent towards her cause (and the rest of my day, for that matter). Instead, I'm not only ticked, but if she ever needs anything again, I am exponentially less likely to be willing to help out.

Or perhaps the moral of this story is: it's not too hard to set off my righteous, holy fury. And when you do, you better hope it's not too hard to get out of my way.

Three Things I've Done, In Reverse Order (And A Few Things I'm About To Do)

2010-06-29T21:46:00.000-05:00

Miss Minnesota's Outstanding Teen and Miss Minnesota
This past February, for the first time in my life, I was asked to help produce a pageant. I've never done it before, and I can't choreograph a thing ever, so I was hesitant - but said yes. I had a lot of help on the choreography part, and it went otherwise well. Apparently it went so well that it was decided that I could handle something a little bigger: the Miss Minnesota's Outstanding Teen pageant. It's the "little sister" to the Miss Minnesota program, but that's the only place it's diminutive. It's just as competitive and serious as the big girls' pageant, and I wasn't about to mess it up.

Fortunately, seeing as I only had 24 hours to teach the girls everything (well, minus interviews, talent rehearsals, and sleeping, it was more like six hours) it didn't make sense to make things too complicated. So I didn't. Basic opening number, straightforward walking patterns, and a pragmatic attitude kept things moving closely. Although there was one wrench that I hadn't anticipated: stage moms. See, since all these contestants are 17 or younger, their parents are still very much a part of the picture... and a few of them are clearly living their hopes and dreams through their children. I loved all the girls, it was a few of the parents I had problems with.

But the show went off beautifully anyway, mostly because we had 12 talented contestants and a host of extremely helpful, smart, and energetic volunteers. However, after the 14 straight hours I logged in that auditorium, I was ready to head home.

That night was just the kick-off, however. The next three nights were Miss Minnesota - two nights of prelims, and one night of finals. With 20 contestants, this was the biggest group they had in a long time. I wasn't certain I really wanted to lose three nights of my life to the whole thing, but I was totally curious since I know fewer and fewer contestants every year. I wanted to see them all onstage. Now, having seen them all, I can say that I feel like talent is less of a consideration (I've never heard or seen more painful displays of talent, or lack thereof) and physical appearance is a bigger deal (I wish I couldn't count as many vertebrae as I did). If I'd been competing now, I wouldn't have stood a chance.

That said, the girl who is our newest Miss Minnesota is incredible. I've known her and her family for a while now, and I watched Kathryn work her way through the system. She's truly dedicated to her platform, she really believes in the Miss America Organization, she is astoundingly talented, and she's gorgeous. As a massive plus, I also can't count her vertebrae. I'm very glad she won, and am very sad I won't be going to see her compete at Miss America. (More on why in a sec.)

My parents came down, partly to visit, partly for the pageant, but mostly for my cousin's grad party. Both my dad and husband were asked why they'd allow themselves to get dragged to this pageant stuff, when there are better things to do with their time. They basically gave the same response: hot girls. Chris says there's no other time when he gets to ogle attractive women in swimsuits; Dad says he never gets more hugs from gorgeous young women than when he's at pageants (he's pretty popular). Hey, as long as I don't always have to go to these pageants alone, I'll take whatever I can get.

Our Savior's Lutheran 125th Anniversary
The weekend before the pageants, which made for an extremely busy week, I was back at home for my home church's 125th celebration. It is always so good to be home. Dad made his pizza, Mom made her chicken salad, I got to spend some time with my grandma and cousins, and I got to hang out a little with Rudyrudyrudy, the dog so nice we named him thrice. Mostly, it was just a great excuse to get home for a weekend during summer when it's hard to scratch out time away.

However, I also got the privilege of being asked to be the featured speaker at the afternoon program. I dutifully wrote up my speech and prepared to give it. Little did I know, I would be far from featured. See, if there's one thing I've learned, it's that you shouldn't give a pastor free reign for speaking and an open mic. We're just a group of folks too used to having people listen to us, and I think we think we're terribly fascinating. Therefore, the morning church service ran just over two hours, and the afternoon program right around three. By the time I actually got up to speak, my six or so prepared minutes seemed pretty pithy.

The unfortunately hot air problem aside, it was an incredible gathering. I got a picture with the pastor who baptized me. Dad and I both got pictures with our fourth grade teachers. (Hi, Carol!) I got a chance to talk to my confirmation mentor Millie's daughter. Incidentally, she's also a pastor - as is one other woman from OSL, making all the children of the congregation who had come back as pastors women. For some reason, that felt really good. Want to know what else felt good? A piece of Mrs. Duckstad cake after the program. It's not a party related to my church without her cake. Delicious.

It was really wonderful to be home, and I almost always forget how hard it is to leave. This time, my departure from almost a year ago was still pretty fresh in my mind. At least I didn't cry all the way to Ada - I only cried about as far as Crookston. Seeing as I was driving alone, it was sort of a safety issue. Next time I'll just be sure not to stay away for as long.

Jamaican Fun
A while back, my most favorite JB and I decided we needed to take a trip together. We didn't know where, and we didn't care, as long as it was relaxing and there was a beach. After some searching for cruises, the Caribbean, and the like, we settled on Jamaica. Seeing as it would fall right at the beginning of my pseudo-solo-pastordom, I knew things wouldn't be completely crazy just yet. I considered it a pre-vacation.

We almost didn't get to go. Perhaps you heard about the raging violence enveloping Kingston at the time. As we were getting ready to go, the news about it was swelling. We sat in the Miami airport, waiting for our flight, wondering if we should go or not. We eventually decided that since we'd be both flying into and staying on the other side of the island from the major violence, that we'd have a go.

We chose wisely. We safely landed, securely arrived at our resort, and never left its grounds. (This was partly due to a promise to my husband, who heard a story of someone who went to Jamaica, left their resort, and ended up dead.) Frankly, we did not need to worry about anything. Each morning we woke up as soon as the sun was too bright, grabbed a small breakfast from the buffet, and camped out on the gorgeous beach. After we got too hot and too hungry, we'd go get some buffet lunch. About this time, it usually dumped buckets of rain. We'd hang out a bit longer - read, get a drink, take a nap under the cabanas - then head back to clean up. We'd have supper, possibly stay out for the evening entertainment, and then go to bed.

In other words, it was not a bad life.

Curiously, the vast majority of our fellow resort-goers were British. It sort of made me feel like I was right back in Lewisham, and I missed it. These weren't your proper Londoners - these were the hiccupy East Enders with their guttural accents and prolific smoking. It felt homey, somehow. It actually added to the peacefulness of the resort.

But then, on our last full day there, these two Americans showed up. And to be fair, we also were two American women traveling together and sticking out like sore thumbs. But these two... it's like two characters from The Jersey Shore in thirty years. There it was, a restful and still morning, and these two jerks were yelling at each other from right next to each other, letting the whole place know that they were afraid of fish, or were going to sleep with that guy from back home, or wanted to switch to a suite. Suddenly, I was glad that I was getting ready to head home. There was no way I wanted to be lumped into the same American grouping as those two pains in the butt.

Even so, leaving was hard. JB and I were pretty sad to be returning to the real world, and both of us felt that sickness in our stomachs as we got closer and closer to home. We've since wondered to each other why were aren't still in Jamaica. Even with violence breaking out just miles away, it was a little corner of paradise.

The one sad thing about Jamaica (the only one, really) was my passport. I got my very first passport at 18 for my first flight and first overseas trip when I went to Israel. In my photo, I'm this fresh-faced, long-haired, bushy-eyebrowed teenager flying high after winning and all-expenses-paid trip. That passport took me on all my other travels, from my first time to Europe, to choir tour in Scandinavia, a breakneck tour of southeastern Europe, and all across our year abroad. However, once we returned to the States, I had to renew and get a new passport. It's all stiff and unstamped, and feels sterile and boring. Finally, thanks to my recent trips, I've at least got stamps from Mexico and Jamaica... but it still feels empty.

I can proudly say that it's all going to change. In just a few months, I'll be adding three new countries to my passport, and putting two more continents on my conquered list. In January, I'm going to Tanzania for about two weeks. My congregation has a strong relationship with its partner synod there, and it was decided that I needed to get out there. I'm so excited to see the places and meet the people that folks from my congregation talk about all the time. The only downside is that it's during Miss America, meaning that I not only won't be able to go, but I won't even be someplace where I can find out the results. It's honestly a bummer, but under the circumstances, I'll take Tanzania.

The other countries off my checklist will be Australia and New Zealand. Chris and I finally buckled down and decided it was time to make that trip happen. We just recently booked our flights and our scuba diving, and we're slowly chipping away at all the rest. We'll be gone for a good chunk of the fall. I'm so excited I can hardly think straight. I'm finally going to pet a koala!

Those two trips will keep me looking forward to the days and months to come, especially as church life remains hectic. In spite of the two funerals I've done in the past five days, things have been joyfully calm lately. I've even been able to come home right after work. I will enjoy this time, which is almost certainly a calm before the storm. Maybe it won't take me another ten days to tell you all about it.

Pageant Week 2010

2010-06-17T15:21:00.000-05:00

Some of you may know that I'm a former Miss Minnesota. (Or, as I prefer to roll my eyes and say, I'm an old queen.) This lends itself to a variety of weird and wonderful things, not to mention a whole group of incredible people that I would have never met had I not been introduced to the Miss America system. This illustrious week in June marks pageants for both Miss Minnesota and Miss Minnesota's Outstanding Teen, and it also marks a ridiculously long and crazy week for me.

I just got back from a wonderful trip home for my congregation's 125th anniversary on Monday night. Tuesday I spent the day trying to dig back out at work, and then I jetted off for the evening to teach an opening number routine to 12 wonderful young women. This is because I was the producer for the Miss Minnesota's Outstanding Teen (MMOT) pageant, and even though I cannot dance to save my life, part of my job is to procure and produce an opening number. It wasn't amazing, but it looked cute, and I could teach it to the girls in two hours - which is all the time I had on Tuesday night.

Yesterday meant over 14 hours straight in a community college theatre where I taught the contestants all the other show elements, coached them through their talent rehearsals, set lights and stage crew movements, tweaked the script, prepped the emcee, wiped the sweat off my neck, and screamed into a headset for the three hours of the show. Surprisingly, it all actually came together in the end. Thank goodness for those incredible young contestants and that unstoppable MMOT committee. At the end of the night, we had one gorgeous new titleholder, two incredible runners-up, and one very exhausted me.

Today I'm back at work, totally writer's blocked on both Sunday's sermon and the homily for Saturday's wedding. Tonight I'll dash off to the extreme southwest suburbs for night one of prelims for the Miss Minnesota pageant. Typically, I've sent off cards of flowers or anything to those few contestants I still know personally and want to support - but this week, Thursday came so fast. Between being gone Monday, producing Wednesday, and prelims coming a day earlier now that there's 20 contestants, I am suddenly a very irresponsible former. Guess I'll just have to slip good luck notes backstage!

Now and again I get bitter about the pageant system, but right around this time, I'm more optimistic than ever. All the contestants are at their absolute peak, finally tasting what they've spent months, or even years, preparing for. I see proud parents and committee members, unconditionally supportive of their girl. At this moment, right before the pageant begins, every girl truly is a winner. There may be favorites, but no one has won anything, and everyone's got exactly the same chance. The excitement is thick: what will be the most popular gown color? Whose kickboxing routine has paid off? Which talent drops your jaw to the floor? Who speaks more thoughtfully than those fake eyelashes first led you to believe? It sounds like I'm being facetious, but I'm not. Right now, at this expectation-laden juncture, I am never more positive about the system.

I have a serious case of pageant hangover most of the time, however. The next morning, when too much makeup has made my face break out, and my hair is plasticine with too much hairspray, and my feet ache from heels, and my voice is hoarse from hours of conversation, and even my cheeks are sore from too much smiling, and the girl who was my favorite was only first or second runner-up (it's like a curse: the contestant I like best usually only almost wins), and I've heard more negative gossip than positive... well, it's then that I get a little snarky. And yet, somehow, I find myself at each pageant week with a new dress, fresh toenail paint, and renewed excitement.

Is it a blessing or a curse? Probably a little of both. And if I've learned one thing about myself, it's that I wouldn't have it any other way.

At any rate, if you want to follow some of my pageant gossip, I'll be tweeting it. You can follow my Twitter or just look at the sidebar on my blog. Last year the pageant had a "no tweeting" rule at the pageant, and I believe I have decided to ignore it. After all, the 12 people who follow me will certainly be hanging on my every tweet.

Solo Pastor: Week Four

2010-06-09T12:50:00.000-05:00

So, yeah... is anyone even still there?

Clearly, I'm a terrible blogger lately. I mean, if you scroll down this page to the "blog archive" sidebar, you'll see that this is only the 19th post all year. I had more posts in the first four months of last year. Heck, I had 17 blog posts in April of 2007 - and that was just one month! Pastoral life really takes a dig out of my blog post time. It takes a dig out of a lot of my time, just in general. It's a strange, wild, hectic career (I know I don't have the corner on that market, trust me) and two years in, I'm still trying to figure out how exactly it all works out.

Things are particularly interesting this summer because, as I've alluded to, I'm technically solo. The senior pastor left a few weeks ago on sabbatical, and won't be back until September. There are over 2,000 people in this church, and I'm the only called and ordained staff member. Fortunately, we have someone hired in the interim part-time who's more than capable. This does not negate the fact that a lot of the work of this place - pastoral, business, or other - comes through me. I have never really had any interest in becoming a senior pastor, and I'm not even sure a solo pastor thing is right for me. With just a few weeks of that experience under my belt, I might be even more sure of that. I'm constantly worried if I missed a phone call, I'm juggling so many balls that they're almost all falling, and I feel like I'm mostly on damage control.

In other words, I'm very stressed.

Thankfully, my life isn't all-church, all-the-time. I did have an awesome trip two weeks ago, and maybe I'll actually get to that blog post about beach time in Jamaica. (Although it will mostly say: JB and I sat on the beach every day until it rained, and it was awesome.) I'm trying my hand at flowers again - I've already lost two pots worth to some strange disease, and the fabled flop basket looks mostly dead - but the vegetable gardening is going gangbusters. This weekend I'm headed home for my congregation's 125th anniversary, and I'm excited. There are other things in my life, but it's easy to forget that.

Fortunately, I have a pretty awesome husband. He's supportive and caring, but also calls me out when I need it. As an added plus, he's very handy and an excellent cook. Yesterday was his birthday, and I don't think I went half as far as I should have to show him how very special he is to me, and how he has changed my life for the good in so many ways.

Before I turn this post into a total gush-fest, I'll get to why I'm posting in the first place. One of my husband's greater talents is talking me out of panic mode and helping me either gain perspective on the situation or just make things so ridiculous that I can't but laugh at it. He's been fine-tuning that skill ever since we first met, when my primary sources of stress were things like seminary, CPE, and not going broke. As I was going through some emails today, I found one he sent me over three and a half years ago when I was trying to write a paper. It was only a few weeks before our wedding, I was stressed out, and he was trying to help... but mostly trying to make me smile.

The following is the paper he wrote for me for my Holy Spirit class at seminary, and it was so awesome that I almost turned it in. Instead, I present it here for your entertainment:

There once was a Holy Spirit.
It was translucent and stuff.
It would frolic in the autumness.
It would float down and dispense candy and cookies to the nice blue collar people.
(Not the white collar people because they're b__ches!)
It would get tired floating and have to rest at the local pub.
Then it would get a beer, but it couldn't drink it because people freaked when they saw the beer in the ghost because it was translucent.
But everyone like the HS, because the Holy Spirit was cool and wore shades, 'cause shades are cool (and not shades, aka evil spirits).
Oh, and if you ever got it angry, it would go Old Testament on your a__.

You see? That's why I love this guy.

In fact, I'm very fortunate to have a lot of great support systems. JB has been a rockstar with text message cheerleading. I have a great congregation who drops me notes and encouragement all the time. I have a family, both genetic and in-law, who love and support me like crazy. It is good to have these things to keep be grounded. Four weeks of solo pastorship down, 12 weeks to go. That's a quarter of the way there! C'mon Holy Spirit, don't fail me now...

Well, Kick Me In The Head, Why Don't You

2010-06-01T16:48:00.000-05:00

Today marks two weeks since I've been a solo pastor. Considering I left the country for five days of those two weeks and I'm still over-stressed and wiped out, I suspect this does not look good for the remainder of my summer.

You see, I never really realized how much the other pastor fielded. He's been here for over 20 years, so he knows a lot of people and a lot of situations. He can really keep a lot of balls in the air at one time with minimal effort. Now he's gone... and all that juggling has been passed to me. And I don't have very good coordination. I know full well that if I feel like I've got too much on my plate that I should pass some of it off to some other folks - after all, we've got an excellent staff and a few retired clergy in the congregation, so I really should be able to get some back-up. But the problem is that the things that take up my time are the things I can't pass off, namely, all those calls, emails, and visits from folks expecting a pastoral presence.

The week before I left (trust me, I'll post about the Overseas J/M Fun shortly) I worked for seven days straight through. I won't even tally the hours, because it's too depressing. This week I've already had a funeral (start the office pool on how many I'll have this summer, 'cause the funeral parade has begun), I have two premarital counseling sessions, and I have a wedding. And I'm preaching. And that's without the hospital visits, communion visits, and frequent pop-ups that I'm fielding. I'm working really hard not to feel inundated, but it's starting to get to me.

On top of that, I got my eyes checked this morning. It probably wasn't the best plan since I had to do a funeral right afterward, and officiating a service, giving a sermon, and comforting a family with distressingly dilated pupils was not the smartest thing I've ever done. But even more joyful was the news I got at the doctor: I have cataracts. In both eyes. They're pretty minimal at this point, but considering it's hit me at age 30, it's kind of distressing. If that doesn't set the tone for a fantastic week, I don't know what does. Honestly, at this point, I'm totally expecting the bottom to drop out... but I'm not even sure what that would look like. It's too terrifying.

So I suppose it's good that just a second ago, I received a reminder of how good this job can be. A woman called this afternoon and, without giving too much information away, she told me she was leaving soon to visit her son who is in prison out-of-state. She'd already bought the plane ticket when she learned that his recent behavior in prison had led to him being disciplined... including a block on all visitors. She was in a frenzy. She hadn't been able to see him yet, and she knew she needed to be with him through his tough time - plus, she couldn't get rid of the plane tickets. So we prayed. We prayed that God would work in her son and change his life. We prayed that those who worked at the prison would have their hearts softened so she could visit. We prayed that God would work in her to bring wisdom to her son. Oh, how we prayed. And then I wished her a safe trip, and I got off the phone.

While I was off visiting hospitals, she called back and left me a message. Not minutes after we'd prayed, the prison contacted her. They had changed their minds, and they would let her see her son for three days straight, almost the entire time she would be there. "We know God hears the prayers of the righteous," she said in the message, practically crying from joy. I am in awe. Praise God for answered prayers, and for reminders that sometimes, even when you're overwhelmed and frustrated, God does amazing things in spite of you. Color me humbled.

Cataracts or no, I'm going to have to work at seeing things differently. It's hard work, but it's good work, so I've got to take care of myself and do the best I can. God is good, all the time. Even when I'm a crabby, anxious mess.

No, No, I'm Fine.

2010-05-18T10:01:00.002-05:00

Believe it or not, I am not very good at complaining. Some of you will beg to differ, I'm certain, but I'm really not. Whining I can do. Pointless moaning about the injustices of the world, sure. Pouting when I haven't gotten my way, absolutely. But actual complaining? Truly pointing out when something isn't right and making sure it gets fixed, especially as it relates to my interactions with the world of consumerism? It's not my strong suit.

I'm not likely to tell a waiter that my order is incorrect, my meat is overdone, or that my beer tastes funny. If I buy a shirt with a hole in it, I'll probably either try to fix it myself or chalk it up to my own lack of observation instead of returning it. When I am suspicious that insurance has overcharged me, it takes all my willpower just to pick up the phone, and even then I'll probably cower when they answer. For some reason, I feel like if I've gotten the wrong thing or been treated unfairly, I probably deserved it.

I'm not sure why this is, to be honest. I'm not really the kind of person you could consider shy or retiring. I'm verbal to a fault. I was an over-confident child. I can be pretty blunt. But I'm not very good at complaining to someone when my complaint is justified. For some reason, this gets even worse when my complaint is with someone in the service industry; this is ironic when you consider that the service sector should consider dealing with complaints as part of their job, so I'm not exactly overstepping my bounds.

Case in point: for the second year in a row, I've joined some ladies from the staff at the church at a local greenhouse early in the spring for a garden party. Basically, you slap down some money for the privilege of planting your own giant hanging basket. They have tons of flowers and vines of all kinds, and the gardeners mill around to help you plan. It's a lot of fun, especially since you get to start thinking about spring when it's still so cold out. The best is that you plant the basket, but they hold it for a few months to water, fertilize, and protect until May when you get to pick it up.

I went to pick up my basket yesterday... and it was awful. It wasn't even a hot mess - it was a plain old regular mess. Now, as I've established, I don't exactly have a green thumb, but this can't even be blamed on me. The whole point of this garden party thing is that expert, professional gardeners can nurse your seedlings into a giant, breathtaking basket for you to pick up and proceed to neglect. This spindly thing was ridiculously leggy and wilted. The plants had gotten so overgrown that they were crushing themselves. When the greenhouse employee handed it to me, I just said, "...whoa." She mumbled something about satisfaction guaranteed and hustled me out the door.

When I got home with it, I hung it on its hook by the door and stared. I had never seen such a homely, absurd-looking thing. The greenhouse lady had whispered, "You could probably start pruning it back," so I got to work. After I pinched back an entire armload of overgrown flowers and it still looked like Robert Pattinson's hair, I stepped back. I sat down. I got very, very moody.

My dear husband asked if I was okay, and my potent crabbiness answered him in silence. He mentioned that the basket didn't really look as if I'd gotten my money's worth, and I agreed. He then suggested the unthinkable: maybe I should return it. Maybe I should take it back to the greenhouse, complain that they clearly didn't give it the proper care and attention that I'd expected, and demand either a replacement or my money back. Believe it or not, this only made me more cranky - because, of course, I should do exactly what he suggested. But this would mean a) admitting he's right, and b) complaining in an official capacity, rather than in the privacy of my own home. Item A isn't such a big deal. Item B really was.

After an evening of storming around the house (to be fair, I was cranky about several things, and this ugly flower pot was really only the icing on my crabby pants cake) I finally slept on it. I woke up with a new resolve: I did indeed need to complain. I was going to return my ugly flower debacle and get something that I wasn't ashamed of hanging in my yard.

I called as soon as the place opened. I explained that my garden party pot was a disaster, and I would like to exchange it. The expected run-around ensued: the front-desk lady said she wasn't sure it was possible, and if the plant was overgrown, I should probably just prune it. She bounced me to the lady at annuals, and she told me the same thing. When I persisted (I'd gone this far, I was gonna go all the way) she said she could have her manager call me back. I told her that I had to leave for work and needed an answer now. She put me on hold and, sure enough, I got the manager. I gave her the same story and got an immediate, "No problem. Actually, you can just keep your current basket, and I'll leave your name at the front desk so you can receive a replacement basket at no charge."

Wait, what? I could keep the mangy affront to nature and still get something that wasn't an eyesore? We chatted, and she assured me that I should just clip the ever-loving crap out of the current basket and see if it grew back in shape - and even if it didn't, I was still getting a free basket from them. She was perfectly pleasant about the whole thing. I got off the phone feeling... satisfied. It was a strange sensation. I promptly called my husband to tell him that he was right (as usual) and I'd gotten a replacement. Now I just need to go down the to greenhouse, hope the employees haven't blacklisted me, and claim my prize for speaking up.

I doubt that this small victory will turn me into a righteous champion of consumer justice. I'll probably just use this as an example of how I got what I wanted that one time, so I'll be fine. But nonetheless, for one brief moment, I feel vindicated. It's a good feeling.

Update as of 5:15 pm - I picked up my new basket a minute ago. I got a little hassle doing it, especially since the folks who helped me pick up my floral debacle were on shift again today. But they got it sorted out, and the woman who helped me even admitted that when she looked at my basket, she knew someone should have been pruning it back for ages. Admission of guilt! My new basket's not quite the right colors, but it's very pretty and significantly more healthy-looking than yesterday's stank basket. And on the trip, I exchanged a t-shirt that had a hole in it - even though it was my fault for not examining the shirt in the first place! Consumer satisfaction guilt-complex, I will overcome you yet!

Poor Monster, Redux

2010-05-11T21:58:00.000-05:00

If anyone owns a pet and claims to have a problem with shedding, poop, vomit, or stink, they are lying. If they really had a problem with those things, they wouldn't have a pet. No pet owner really likes the grossness of pet ownership, but deals with it because the pet makes up for the ick. So, understand that in telling this story, I am not complaining about owning a pet, merely bemoaning the occasional severity of the ick factor.

The short version: Lilly chews bones which give her rot gut, which apparently led to her crapping in her kennel at some point today, leading her to eat said rot gut poo at some point, leading her to have an upset stomach, eat some grass, and puke poop vomit and blades of grass across the dining room rug. If this is too much for you, leave now. Trust me, it's about to get really graphic up in here.

So, Lilly likes chew bones. Actually, Lilly likes to chew, plain and simple, and if we can get her going on a rawhide she's less likely to chew, say, everything else. Max pretends to like rawhides, but he only likes them because Lilly likes them and he enjoys stealing them from her and making her jealous. He's a good brother like that. Anyway, we have learned that we have to be a touch judicious with our chew bone distribution, because... well, chew bones seem to give Lilly really greasy, stinky farts. I'm talking farts of epic, world destruction proportions. The first time we smelled one, we had no idea what was going on - unlike Max, Lilly's farts are totally silent. Silent but deadly.

At any rate, the toots are like an early warning system: once you smell one, bone chewing time is over. From now on, I will heed that warning. What probably happened this time was that Lilly tore through her first bone before Max even touched his (they both get a bone at the same time, even if Max doesn't really like his, out of fairness) so she gobbled down hers and later got a hold of his. We did smell the Fart Warning last night, but there were no bones to take from her, so it meant nothing.

Today, I came home after work and the house stunk. I thought the garbage was full; I checked, and it was, but it didn't stink. The smell was pervasive, and familiar somehow. When I went to the pups' kennels to let them out, I discovered why: Lilly had poo'd in her kennel. And it was not pretty. It's been a long time since Lilly's had a kennel accident; she had a urinary tract infection a while back that left her peeing in her kennel a couple days, and when we first got her she peed straight-up on the rug, but she's never had an accident of the solid form. So, not only was this a ridiculously smelly accident, it was also a little curious. Based on the chew bone fart stink of it all, I'm guessing the bones made her guts sick and she just couldn't help herself. She had somehow managed to roll it all up in her kennel blanket, however, so at least it wasn't all over her.

The pups went outside - and stayed there a while, as I cleaned poo out of the kennel and washed her blanket. And it was stinky, slimy poo on top of it... so this was a bit of a task. Cleaning accomplished (and a serious Febreezing of the entire house as well), I let the pups back in. Lilly seemed off her game, but if I'd spent the day lying in my own crap, I think I would be too. At least that's what I figured.

No such luck. Chris came home and started making supper. As the dogs milled about, Lilly calmly walked to the most high-traffic piece of the dining room rug, and powerfully splashed a giant volume of liquid vom. I actually heard it make a sickening splashing sound against the rug. Since Chris was cooking, I wasn't about to let him get elbow deep in dog puke. I got the cleaner and the towels and got to it myself.

As I bent over it to start sopping up, I noticed two things. First, the very, very long blades of grass in her puke. Clearly, the long time they spent outside served her well to chow a serious amount of grass. Also, I clearly need to mow the lawn - something I won't get to 'til the weekend, with all the rain we've got right now. At any rate, the second thing I noticed was much more disturbing: the vomit smelled like her rancid chew bone farts, amplified by the general stench of dog barf. I can only explain this by assuming that she actually ate her own crap whilst biding time in her kennel, guaranteeing that she would spew from both ends.

I proceeded to gag.

At first Chris might have thought I was being dramatic. He came over to see what all the fuss was about - and quickly gagged when he smelled the fuss for himself. As I think about it, I'm hard-pressed to think of anything I've ever smelled that smells worse than Lilly's wet dog bone poop barf. And when I say it that way, I'm sure of it.

I scrubbed up the carpet as best I could, and I still swear I can see and smell lingering traces. Lilly has spent the rest of the evening confined to her (now clean, sparkling, and springtime fresh) kennel, until we're sure she's done pulling a Linda Blair. She seems pretty wrung out, which is incredible seeing as that time her entire face puffed up she barely missed a step. We skipped her supper and are keeping an eye on her. She's currently sleeping in full-on doughnut mode (nose tucked between her back legs in a perfect little puppy circle) and will hopefully rest well, get over her sickness, and be ready to face the morning poo- and vom-free.

I, meanwhile, will never get this smell out of my nostrils. For that matter, when I close my eyes, all I see is the pile of grass dripping in feces-scented vomit soaking through my dining room rug. Truly, I do not indeed have a problem with the mess - Lilly is a good, sweet dog and I'm so glad she's mine - but this was just a little extreme. So, if you'll excuse me, I'm about to Lysol myself and go to bed.

This Is Some Job

2010-05-10T18:20:00.000-05:00

I have recently considered ministry to be the last great hold-out of the "jack of all trades, master of none" situation. With a few exceptions, I can't really think of any other career that expects you to be so good at such a vast diversity of subjects. Any given day as a pastor would see you needing expertise, interest, or ability in the following: sociology; psychology; counseling; local, state, national, global, and religious history and current events; music; popular culture; Biblical, systematic, denominational, contemporary, and ancient theology; business; child development; human resources; public speaking; writing; politics; and more. And that doesn't even cover the practical skills like reading a map, making a power point, and deciding when to call 911. It can get pretty overwhelming. Over a month ago, I got a good taste of just how weird pastoral life can be.

You might remember last year when I ended up with pink hair, thanks to a bet with my confirmation students. Well, this year they had another go-round at humiliating me for a good cause. They chose the Make-A-Wish foundation for their beneficiary, which is a great organization that recently benefited a boy from our congregation. All that was left to choose was their reward - or rather, my chosen humiliation. After a long debate, they settled on a delightful choice: I would wear a chicken costume out on the street corner in front of the church, walking around and waving, with a sandwich board reading "honk if you love Jesus" around my neck. I could get behind this.

Believe it or not, the kids made their goal again. I even upped it after last year, but this time they didn't even need a last-minute donor to cover the gap. So, it was sealed. I borrowed the chicken suit from my sister-in-law's fiance' and I was good to go. The Wednesday after Easter, it was all going down.

Then things got a little more interesting. The day before my chicken suit adventure, I got a call from the Minnesota House of Representatives. Turns out one of their employees heard me preach at the Churchwide Assembly back in August, and he suggested me to serve as chaplain for a day at the MN House. Flattered and honored, I accepted the offer. When we set out to find a day, the lady who called realized that the very next day was open. As in, the day I would be in a chicken suit. But the times didn't interfere, so I agreed. I would primarily be called upon to offer the opening prayer at noon, just as the session opened. The prayer was to be non-denominational and free of any ideological entanglements. (In other words, no praying that they not cut health care.) I can handle that.

That day, I came to work in my best pastoral suit. I left for the Capitol building in plenty of time to park (in the special designated parking right in front of the steps!) and to try to avoid getting photographed in the midst of the very intense labor rally taking place in the rotunda. When it was time, I was photographed with the Speaker of the House (I had Girls State flashbacks to when I was the Speaker!) and met the man who suggested me. I spoke with the regular chaplain, who, for reasons I didn't really get, wasn't required to pray before this particular session. He was a really nice man, though, and we talked a lot about the challenge and gratification of being a chaplain in the House. I felt very smart and cultured as we walked through the House floor, greeting all sorts of movers and shakers.

I blasted back to the church to take care of a few last-minute things... like writing out my all-important chicken suit sandwich board. Just before 4:30, I suited up and headed out the door. And there I stood, at the corner of a rather busy intersection, right next to the bus stop and the surprising amount of crazy people nearby, politely requesting people to honk if they loved Jesus.

Lots of church folks drove past. It was pretty well-advertised, so I wasn't surprised when I saw plenty of familiar cars driving past, horns blaring and arms waving out the windows. But there were plenty of non-members letting their Jesus love be known. Semis, pick-ups, little cars, and even a couple of city buses gave me everything from friendly, Jesus-loving toots to blaring, Jesus really loving blasts. It was actually really fun. There was even a lady at the bus stop across the street who yelled, "I don't have a horn to honk, but I do love Jesus!"

Perhaps the best part was towards the very end. By this time, Chris had taken phone pictures and sent them to my entire family (thanks, honey) and many church kids had busted out camera phones (I'm pretty sure I landed on a few facebook pages) so I was well over myself. That made it all the more fun when my confirmation students joined me on the corner to chicken dance non-stop until it was time for confirmation. Honestly, I was flapping my wings so long that my sides were actually sore the next day. It was pretty sweet.

For those unable to come early, I left the chicken suit on during class time. I was blazing hot by the end, and smelled of sweat and mildewed chicken suit, but it was totally worth it. The kids were proud and the adults were amazed that I went through with it.

Just another thing they don't teach you in seminary: how to go from political formalities to chicken-suited ridiculousness. And I can complain all I want about how far-flung the job skills for a pastor are, but honestly, I think I might like it. I'm never bored, that's for sure. And I have always sort of liked contradictions. If there's a one-day contrast larger than political chaplain at noon and street corner crazy four hours later, I'm not sure I've done it. This is really some job I've got.

Facebook > Doctors; Or, How I Got (Informally) Diagnosed With Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo

2010-04-30T22:37:00.000-05:00

As you might remember from yesterday's post, I've been laid up with a serious case of the spins. In spite of the entirely unhelpful doctor's assurances that I'd be feeling better shortly, I indeed felt no such betterness. I spent the night nauseated, since any time I rolled over in my sleep I'd get hit with waves of dizziness so severe that they woke me up and nearly made me barf. Needless to say, I didn't sleep well. In the morning, I felt generally out of it - until I'd forget and look upwards, or drop my head back, and get hit with a wave of insanity.

It was getting pretty ridiculous. Interestingly enough, it got more ridiculous.

I'd posted in my facebook status that I was having trouble with dizziness. I had a few helpful suggestions that I probably had vertigo, should talk to a doctor, and couple probably take some kind of medication. All good things. But the coup de grâce came in the form of Kim. I know Kim because she's married to Chris's friend Joe, and both Joe and Kim helped nurture my love of roller derby. I had somehow forgotten that Kim is an audiologist, so I was pleased when she messaged me over facebook, expressed sympathy over my dizziness, and offered to help if she could.

She asked what my symptoms were - specifically, if the dizziness was constant or if it got worse when I, say, looked up or rolled over in bed. I was kind of amazed that she listed my two most pressing triggers, so I told her as much. She responded that I may - and she emphasized may - have something called BPPV, which is short for Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo. That is something I've never heard of, and what it actually is only gets weirder.

You can read the Mayo Clinic's description of BPPV (which is surprisingly readable) or you can go with my non-expert explanation. It'll be more funny. You see, your inner ear has lots of craziness in it. Namely, it has some curly-q canals and a spot with little crystals in it. Sometimes, the crystals can get loose from the place where they're supposed to be an end up in the canals. Since your inner ear determines your balance, and those little stones help in the process, when the crystals roll into your canals, you're going to get the vertigo. It is especially bad with certain movements like lying down or looking up since it rolls the crystals around in the super-sensitive canal part.

You can't make this stuff up, folks.

The best part is the test for it. Kim advised that I should do it with the husband around, because you typically need an observer. You sit on your bed so that when you lie back, your head hangs loose over the edge of the bed. Turn your head to one side so your chin is above a shoulder, and lie down flat. Two things can happen: you'll get crazy dizzy, and your eyes will start twitching wildly. (The twitching is called nystagmus.) If those things are true, it's probably BPPV.

I was too impatient for Chris to come home from work, so I did it. On the initial flop to the right side, I got so bloody dizzy that I thought I was really going to puke. As I laid there and waited for the spins to pass, I noticed that my eyeball did, indeed, feel spasm-y. I put my fingertips next to my eye and, sure enough, it felt like I was going through REM while wide awake. I did it again on the right side, and it was almost as bad. Strangely, when I did it all on the left side... nothing. No dizziness, no eye twitching, no nausea (well, other than the leftovers from the previous two tests), nothing. It was really eerie.

I reported this to my digital audiologist, and she confirmed that it sounded a lot like BPPV. Fortunately, the treatment is simple: the Epley Maneuver. If you'd prefer, you can watch the video that I watched (with Kim's blessing, of course) to learn it myself. Basically, you sit on your bed, lie back with a pillow under your back so your head flops lower than your body, turn your head slowly to one side, roll your body to that same side, tuck your nose down so it touches the bed, then slowly sit up with your chin tucked. Sound ridiculous? You're just trying to slide those crystals back to their rightful spot in your ear.

So I did it the first time. Crazy, sickening amounts of dizziness. I waited a few minutes and I did it again. Only the slightest twists and turns. One last time, and... it didn't make me feel dizzy. In fact, after I sat a while, I realized I actually felt a whole lot better. Who knew flopping around on my bed could stop me from flopping over dizzy?

Now I have to be careful for a while. No tipping or turning my head, so the crystals can safely re-imbed themselves. I'll have to sleep on a ramp of pillows to keep my head safely upright. I might have to perform the maneuver a few more times over several days to keep things in place. But ultimately, I should have a fix on my hands. All because I whined over facebook and a talented, knowledgeable person connected the dots. Kim, you are a queen among humans. I promise not to get you a pony.

Take that, Dr. Tool. I got a more accurate diagnosis over facebook. Ha!

You Spin Me Right Round, Baby

2010-04-29T21:10:00.002-05:00

I don't know what my story is, but I seem to be a magnet for unusual ailments. A strange, stabbing pain in the lower right side of my back was diagnosed as pleurisy. I'm a magnet for sinus infections. I manage to get awkward infections in equally awkward locations. My coffee-slinging gig brought on a wicked case of carpal tunnel. I gave myself headaches because I was too busy trying to not get headaches - and ended up with the be-all, end-all of migraines. Hey, I even manged to get the swine flu last fall. I don't know what my problem is, or why I seem to have such a non-operating immune system. I guess I'm just lucky like that.

Today, I added another odd and uncomfortable ailment to my list. Actually, I can't really add it to my list because I don't really know what it's called or if it's even what I've got. All I know is I've spent the day with the spins something awful.

This morning I was up particularly early to head to a pre-surgical visit. At my church, we do our best to see people in the hospital before they have surgery, to pray with them and support them. This means I'm often found at the hospital at 5 or 6 in the morning. This time, I really had to pull it together... because I was visiting the senior pastor - my boss - in advance of his heart procedure. So not only was I a little nervous about doing my job with my boss as the target, but I was a little nervous that my boss would survive. No big deal, though. He was in good spirits (and, FYI, came through the procedure brilliantly) and I got home not long after 6:30.

I pulled into the driveway and, still sitting in my car, took a big stretch. Immediately, the world took a big dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge. It whirled like it's never whirled before. After a solid 15 seconds of twirling, things slowed down and it left me panting. And nauseous.

I got into the house, chalking it up to a major headrush, but still didn't feel quite right. I felt groggy, dizzy, and clammy. I sat down for a minute, felt awful, and opted for lying down. Immediately, the world started to pitch again. Feeling miserable, I opted to go to bed for a few more minutes. This was clearly not a good option, because every time I closed my eyes I felt like I was on the frickin' Tilt-A-Whirl. I called in late to work and bought myself a few hours to assess the situation.

After those hours, I felt no better - but had appointments to keep. So, as soon as I showed up to the church, the parish nurse lectured me on how unsafe it was to drive when you're dizzy. And how I should get to a doctor. And the stern looks of the other office ladies, including one flat-out declaration that I looked "like sh_t", convinced me that it was probably true. True to form, I still kept my appointment, and staggered my confused behind into the doctor's office afterwards.

The appointment was very dissatisfying. I had to see a guy I don't usually see, and he was kind of a tool. I really hate the feeling of someone trying to shoo you out of the appointment without really listening. But he ruled out major neurological disorders (although he referenced my neurologist if things, I don't know, went south), didn't seem to believe it was some kind of fluid or nutrient imbalance, and seemed unconcerned that my blood pressure shot up when I went from prone to standing. Basically, he waved me off with the diagnosis of "some sort of inner ear infection or inflammation" that makes me feel dizzy.

He also, in a sort of jerktastic tone, informed me that considering my dizziness was "quite mild" that most people in my condition don't typically even make it to the doctor, and I'd probably be better by later in the day.

Well, he's not only a jerk, he's also a liar, 'cause I don't feel any better. And seriously? "Quite mild"? Next time you have to clutch the countertop just because you reached up for a water glass, let's talk about "quite mild". I suspect the punch to the face I wanted to give him would have actually turned out "quite mild" because, let's face it, it's tough to throw a punch when you can't exactly stand upright.

At any rate, I was encouraged - both by Dr. Tool and my parish nurse - to remain as still as possible in the position least aggravating for me. This has meant me sitting bolt upright on the couch, trying to quietly get writing work done in spite of my spinniness, for the past seven hours. It's been great. And I really don't have time for this, since I have a writing project due, a sermon to write, the Walk For Animals and a friend's wedding on Saturday, and did I mention that the senior pastor's in the hospital after a heart procedure? Yeah, I'm not exactly feeling positive about the whole situation.

I think the worst part of it (aside from constantly feeling like I'm about to face-plant into the coffee table) is that it is, quite literally, all in my head. I apparently can't ever come down with something people can actually observe, like a broken arm, or gangrene. I can only manage to get stuff that is painful or disruptive, but certainly not life-threatening, and not something anyone can actually face-to-face see. Basically, I always feel like a whiny hypochondriac. And now, I feel like a whiny hypochondriac with the spins who can't walk straight and would sort of probably feel better if I barfed.

Anyway, I'm supposed to give it a couple of days and see if it gets better. If not, I'm supposed to call back - presumably, so someone other than Dr. Tool can help me out. In the meantime, I'll just make sure to keep this couch cushion firmly in place, and try to avoid knocking out my front teeth. If I don't have the most glamorous, exciting life, I don't know who does.

Last Plea Of A Delinquent Blogger

2010-04-26T12:11:00.000-05:00

Friends, I know I'm not exactly on top of things with this whole blogging deal. I tend to go in fits and starts - a couple good posts, then I might as well have left the country. Heck, when I actually did leave the country back in 2007, I was a much better blogger than this. I mean, I have a post from a day three weeks ago that would be awesome, fun, and hilarious (all important for entertaining you, my dutiful blog reader) that I have still not managed to write. Never mind that said post includes me at the house of representatives and in a chicken suit in the same day (admittedly, not at the same time, although that would've been awesome) I still languish in non-blogging.

So, let's make a deal. You give to the Animal Humane Society's Walk For Animals, and I'll blog. In fact, every dollar given guarantees a May blog post. If I manage to score over $31, I'll roll it over into June. Or July. Or August. One dollar = a post a day until I run out. Please click on this link to go to my personal donation page. Click on "make a donation in my honor" to do just that. You might notice that I've already reached my personal donation goal. That's because Don, Brady, Glenn, Ann & Jeff, Katie & Matt, the Nygrens, and the Valentines are totally awesome. If you want to be awesome like them, you should contribute. My goal is to take our team to our $1,500 goal overall, meaning at this point, we still need another $225. If you're following on the math, that means you can also score 225 blog posts (that's almost a straight year blogging!) starting May 1.

Crazy? Maybe. But I'm also crazy-serious. Please just follow this link to my page, and make a donation. I promise the site is very secure and your credit card will not get jacked because of it. This last donation push can help the AHS provide X-rays for two injured animals. Help us make it happen!

I look forward to my non-stop blogging to thank you for your generosity.

Little Monster; Or, Another Post About Monsters

2010-04-10T11:13:00.000-05:00

I will shortly tell you about what I did on Wednesday, especially because it provided such a perfect example of the breathing contradiction that is my daily life. But right now, since my blood is still coursing with adrenaline, I have to tell you about what I just did.

You might know that I've become a bit of a Lady Gaga fan. It was sort of a slow build because at first, I only heard her songs on the radio. They were fun, but it took me a while to get into them. Then it started to really rally... I kept seeing pictures of her insane fashion, I watched her heavily visual videos, I heard her in interviews, and I started to realize that I might really, really like this character. I'm still not sure how much of her is an act and how much of her is for real, but I don't really care.

She came through the Cities last spring playing small venues, and at that time, I had no interest in seeing her. Why would I want to see a dance/pop artist who wasn't yet popular play a small, revealing venue? It wasn't until later that I realized what I'd missed. As it turns out, Gaga is an accomplished pianist and songwriter who was building quite a reputation for innovative versions of her own songs and intense theatricality. Slowly, I started to see her everywhere - every TV show, every gossip blog, every magazine - and I was totally reeled in.

I dressed as her for Halloween. I got the extended version of her album. I stayed up to watch shows where she was performing. I was being transformed into a Little Monster - the affectionately dark way that Gaga refers to her fans. So when I heard that her Monster Ball tour - the fully re-worked version of the tour she threw together when the Fame Kills tour with Kanye West fell through - was coming to the Cities, I about freaked.

I've been fans of other musical acts before - I've seen Dave Matthews more times than I can count, and I even flew to Dallas to see them once - but I actually don't go to a lot of concerts. They're expensive and usually on weeknights. Outside of DMB and Storyhill, I think I can count the number of concerts I've actually been to on one hand. But for some reason, I knew I had to make it to this show. Rumors of her really amping up the showmanship, rave reviews from every concert she'd ever done, and my slow burn of fandom meant I was going to get to that show.

However, while the date of the concert broke quickly, ticket sale times did not. It was just this past Tuesday when I got an email that presale had just happened. Due to my pastoral running-aroundness, I got the email about three hours too late. The only seats left where $175 a piece, and my dear husband (who is actually interested in seeing the spectacle first-hand) spoke wisdom in saying it was probably too much to spend. Instead, I spent the rest of the week trying to win tickets from the local radio station. I have racked up at least 200 calls on each cell phone (yes, I have two) trying to get through, and only even achieved a ring three times. (Otherwise, it's been busy signals all-around.)

This left us with buying tickets in general onsale. They would go onsale at 10 am Saturday morning, and given that her other shows had sold out in two minutes or less, we knew we had to be prepared. So at five minutes to ten, we were each seated at our respective computers, all four machines synced up to atomic time, ready to hit "submit" at the top of the hour.

Here's what's crazy: even though we had four computers ready to search for tickets, only one actually managed to get through. By the time the computer had located tickets, only bad ones were left - in other words, in the time it took the system to find everyone tickets, all the tickets had gotten snatched. Blood pounding in our ears, we were left with balcony seats in the back as our only choice. At least the two tickets still cost less than the $175 seats, but we were still shocked. Really? Tickets sold that fast? Within two minutes, the whole well-planned hunt was over.

As I look back at it, I kinda can't believe it. I have spent a lot of time, energy, and eventually money, just trying to go to a show. I mean, this is why I don't typically go to concerts. But somehow, I got totally sucked in and now have very expensive seats to what is sure to be a very late Monday night show. How did this even happen? Maybe she is part of a mind control group. Or maybe it's just a lot of fun to ride the wave of popular culture. Either way, this Little Monster is going to the Monster Ball!

Poor Monster!

2010-04-07T11:07:00.000-05:00

It seems that no matter what name you actually give a pet, the poor thing will end up with an entirely other name. After all, we tend to treat our pets a bit like people, so nicknames are pretty inevitable. In our own house, we have four fur children, and they've all acquired secondary titles - pejorative or otherwise. For instance, Pangur has unfortunately been labeled Pangur Fatty, or even just plain Fatty. To be fair, she's slimmed down significantly in recent months, but that's thanks to a strictly enforced diet and her tendency to tear around the house with desperation when she's hungry. I'm not mean - I'm just following the vet's orders. Anyway, it won't matter if Fatty gets trim again, she'll still be called Fatty.

Loki gets called Baby Loki, not because she's a baby any more (although it did start when she was just a helpless kitten rescued from the mean Vegas streets) but because she is whiny. I mean, massively whiny. She's probably part Siamese, so it should come as no surprise that her favorite pastime is to watch you and meow plaintively for no good reason. She is such a whiny baby! And so, Baby Loki.

The dogs have been around for less time, so I think they're a little less developed on their nicknames. Max, for instance, is saddled with the most popular dog name in America. You'd think we'd get him a better nickname, but we haven't. Most of the time, he's Max Puppy. He is occasionally Max Power (the man with the name you'd like to touch... but you mustn't touch!) but not nearly often enough.

Lilly, for some reason, is a different matter. I don't know how it happened or why, but she almost immediately started being Lilly Monster. Chris thinks it's because of the Avenue Q character Kate Monster, who is sweet, adorable, and a little sassy - just like Lilly. Kate Monster is also cute, in spite of also being a monster, which also applies to Lilly. But to be honest, I don't know how it happened. Sometimes Lilly is only called Monster, even while she's smiling at you and licking you silly.

The Monster had a bad day yesterday. Chris let her outside in the morning and she came back in with her eyes swelled almost shut. Within a few minutes, her left eye was only a slit and her left cheek and lip were swollen into a huge knot. Still, she was the typical Lilly Monster - happy, tail wagging, and overly energetic. We called the vet and they told us to give her 50 mg of benadryl to take down the swelling. It should've also knocked her flat (I know two benadryls would do that to me) but instead, she was just as perky as ever. After a half hour and still looking like Quasimodo, it was time to go in. Chris was a good dog dad and took Lilly in for a check-up where they pumped her full of steroids and advised us not to leave her alone. This meant Chris working from home all day, while Lilly's swelling slowly went down.

We still don't know why the poor Monster got all freakified - whether there was a pollen that puffed her up or something stung her or what - but we were still worried for her. It made me think of what my brother-in-law said when we first got her: "Why don't you guys just have a kid?" After all, staying home with a sick dog is a lot like staying home with a sick kid. But there are a few differences: namely, today Lilly is feeling better, so she's at home in her kennel. If you leave a kid at home in a kennel, you'll probably end up in prison. For now, I'll settle for silly pet nicknames and lots of shedding.

It's That Time Again!

2010-03-29T14:30:00.000-05:00

Well, we did it last year, and we're going to do it again. Together with a handful of friends, we made the team Faux Paws and raised some serious money for the Animal Humane Society. It was so much awesome that we decided to do it again! And seeing as I couldn't have done it last year without your help, it's time to ask that of you again this year.

Of course, there's even greater motivation to join in. First of all, last year's walk was an incredible experience. Lots of people, even more animals, all gathered together to support a great organization. Secondly, you might remember my little encounter with a darling stray cat this past fall. Trying to help her opened my eyes to how really difficult it is for animals to find safe, happy, healthy homes. And finally, one of our team members has a very personal reason to help care for animals... KD's beloved Hank, a very handsome and happy Boxer, is facing some serious health challenges. He is fortunate enough to be in a loving home with a dedicated owner - not every animal is.

I've never been too proud to beg, so: will you help out? My personal goal is $350, and my team's goal is $1,500. If our team can reach that goal, we could help provide medical supplies and medications for 41 spay or neuter surgeries and helps three dogs through the Adoption Preparation program to prepare shy or fearful dogs for adoption. What a gift! You can contribute by clicking on this link here: my donation page. Or, you can click on the picture on the top right hand corner of my blog. I really appreciate your help, and hope that you and your furry ones stay healthy and happy!

The Rack

2010-03-27T11:31:00.000-05:00

I couldn't tell you when my momma taught me how to separate my laundry and choose what gets machine dried. Now, to be fair, I'm not sure she actually taught me these things or if I just picked them up by watching and learning. Either way, she'd always been stellar at laundry (I don't think I ever had a white thing turn pink, or a big thing turn small) so I appreciated her ability and insight. At some point, she also taught me about appropriate usage of the drying rack. You know, for things you don't want to subject to the heat and beat-downs of a machine. Through college and seminary, I ported around a collapsible wire rack for these delicate things, and it wasn't until a few people moved me more than a few times that I learned that not everyone has or uses one.

I couldn't be bothered by it. Like my mother before me, I proudly used my drying rack and thus have bras that have survived for close to 10 years. (Too much information?) I'm not afraid to wash sweaters on my own. I even faced an entire year abroad with no drier at any point, and was not frazzled. I knew how to hang-dry things, and our clothes probably survived that year much better because of it. Bring it on, laundry - I'm a rock star.

Now that we've lived back in the States a while, we have a drier at our disposal. It used to be just my clothes that stayed out the drier, but recently that changed. A while back, my dear husband realized he was sick of too-short pants and shirts, so we went on a shopping spree for clothes that properly fit him. He came back with quite the pile of handsome shirts, sweaters, and jeans - and quite the handsome price tag to match. To protect our investment, I changed my laundry method for him and started washing his most valuable clothing items on delicate and hanging them out to dry.

It should be noted that my husband is much longer than I am. In fact, one of the first things I noticed after we got married was how much more quickly my laundry hamper filled now that someone over a foot taller than me was dropping his clothes in there. This applies to the air-drying situation as well. I need a whole lot more space to dry his jeans than I need for my tank tops.

But it gets weird, because somewhere along the journey, I lost my drying rack. My sturdy little white wire rack has been gone for years, and I somehow didn't even notice it. Maybe I just wasn't really doing as much drying as I thought and hadn't missed the darned thing. But now that I had multiple pairs of boy pants dangling everywhere in the house, I was really missing it. The final straw was perhaps when the ironing board pad went moldy from wet jeans draped across it one too many times. It was time to get a new rack.

I went to Target and searched for options, of which there were precious few. There was a large, expensive version of the wire rack I had once known... or there was a wood rack for less than $10 on clearance. Now, I'm well aware that wooden racks can leave unfortunate brown lines across the backs of things, so I made sure those dowels were coated - and they were. I was feeling proud of myself for such a thrifty purchase, and was ready for the next load of delicates.

Or so I thought, because I could not get that stupid, bloody rack together. The dowels would not stay in place. I'd snap in one to find another had popped out. I'd get one end in place at about the time the other end would fall off. I cannot think of the last time I cussed so hard. All I wanted to do was dry clothes somewhere other than the shower curtain rod - was that too much to ask? So I went to Plan B: superglue. I pasted each dowel in place, let the thing rest on its end, and gave it a full 24 hours to dry. This time I could set the rack up properly and it wouldn't implode. I had finally won.

Except, of course, that I hadn't. Just yesterday as I was loading down the rack with its inaugural load of clothes, I was proud to find that I could put almost an entire washer's worth of clothes on the rack. Or, I should say, I could for five minutes - because that's how long it took for the rack to self-destruct. Poles bent, sockets imploded, and wet clothes all over the dusty basement floor. There are not words of the amount of profanity coming out of my thwarted domestic goddess mouth.

Currently, said laundry is hanging from pipes in the basement while what remains of the rack is propped up against the washing machine with the last few pieces of laundry draped on top of it. It might be in pieces, but I'm still going to use it. The rack might have won the battle, but it hasn't won the war. Yes indeed, I'll teach that inanimate object a lesson. And then I'll go get a new wire rack.

Oh Boy, Oh Boy!

2010-03-17T09:16:00.003-05:00

My phone rang on the way to the church council meeting last night, and seeing it was my big sister, I thought I'd pick up and see what was going on. The following is the conversation as best I can remember it, after we exchanged pleasantries:

KJ: So, we had our ultrasound today.
Me: Oh, right!
KJ: We can learn all sorts of things from that, you know. Health, gender...
Me: I know! So, what did you find out?
KJ: Well, first of all, we're having a boy...
Me: Wow! That's great!
KJ: ...and another boy.
Me:...wait, what?
KJ: You heard me.

At this point, I proceeded to cuss and laugh a lot. It's pretty much the only response I could give at that stage. Boys! Twin boys! I couldn't even think straight.

I came rolling into the church council meeting with a stupid grin on my face and half out of breath. The senior pastor and another council member looked at me as I sat between them. "Sorry," I gasped, "I just got off the phone with my sister. She just found out she's having twin boys." They smiled and laughed and congratulated me. Then the council member turned to me and said, "Do twins run in your family?" It dawned at me that yes, they now did. She grinned. "Well, maybe this will buy you a little more time," she said. I don't care about buying time or not, I just can't imagine where I'd fit two growing babies. I'll settle for being a double-auntie first.

I fidgeted my way through the council meeting and called my big sis right back afterward. We talked, laughed, worried, and strategized. It's obvious that I'm going to have to get out there this summer somehow, even though I'll be the solo pastor until September 1. I didn't get to meet little Evie until she was a year old, and I don't want to do the same with her little brothers.

In the meantime, lots of prayers are in order for a healthy mom and healthy boys. Also for a sane family and positive adjustment. As I think of it, there's lots of things to be praying for. But right now, it's mostly prayers of joy and thanksgiving. Boy oh boy, there's going to be a pair of boys!

Oh, Yeah: Pageants

2010-03-11T11:01:00.004-06:00

One of the cool things I've gotten to do in the past couple months is get re-involved in some pageant life. While I'm old enough that there are almost no contestants still competing that were around when I was, there are still plenty of pageant-type people around who I love to see and spend time with. Plus, I feel like I gained a great deal by being involved in pageant life, and a little bit of volunteering here and there are my ways to give back.

I've already been a pageant judge a few times before, and it's something I really enjoy doing. I feel that I have a unique perspective on the competition since I was once a contestant and can bring an extra level of honesty to the system. I haven't been called on in that capacity lately, but I got the opportunity to do a few other things that gave me even more perspective on the program.

Late last year, I got a call from my lovely Coon Rapids ladies to help produce their local pageant. At the time, I was basically going to be assistant producer and learn the ropes in case I needed to step in full-time in the future. However, the previous producer had a new job in another state and learned she wasn't going to be able to produce. This meant I got bumped up to full-time right away. I have never, ever produced a pageant before - plus, as most of you probably know, I can't even dance. I was more than just a little nervous.

Fortunately, I have a few tricks up my sleeve. The biggest and best one was Kate, my friend and also a talented dancer and choreographer. (Plus a former pageant contestant herself.) She agreed to do the opening number, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Then I started thinking back to the eight pageants I competed in during my short-lived career, and realized there were a lot of things I could handle. Walking patterns? Staging? Music? With a little help, I could do that. Suddenly, I was starting to think I could actually do this.

Getting to rehearsals set me right back into the uncertain zone. As a contestant, you learn very quickly that your job is to hurry up and wait. You are told when to show up, where to go, how to walk, and more. While each stage of competition is yours alone, every bit surrounding those competitions are set up by someone else. This time, I was that someone else. It is surprisingly challenging to shepherd pageant girls, be efficient with time, make dramatic show choices, and still be perky and responsive.

During one rehearsal night, I didn't get home until long after Chris had gone to sleep. The next morning, I was up well before dawn for a parishioner's pre-surgical visit. When I came back home for breakfast, Chris seemed surprised to see me. Turns out since I'd been to bed after him and up before him, he thought I hadn't come home all night. So, okay, maybe my schedule was a little harried.

But when the night of the big show came, I was excited. I knew that each contestant was strong and would do an excellent job. I was thrilled to see everything come together into an entertaining and well-run show. I'm convinced that those things were mostly due to the talented contestants and the incredibly dedicated stage crew and pageant committee, not me. But at least I was a part of it, and that felt good.

A few weeks later, I was asked to emcee the sweeps pageants. It's a last-shot for contestants to get a chance to compete at Miss Minnesota. It basically entailed a half-day of work, so I was in. I've assisted in emceeing several pageants, and emceed a junior pageant before, but it was the first time that I was the solo mistress of ceremonies for a full-on official pageant. I was nervous. But I learned a few things: mostly, not to wear adorably cute high heels, because you'll be standing in them all night at the podium and your feet will not thank you.

I tried to keep things running smoothly, and I did biff a few things. But I got a lot of compliments on being a funny and well-spoken hostess for the night. As I think about it, I realize it's mostly because it's what I do every week. Much like a pageant, church services are generally scripted but with large portions of potential improvisation. You also have to be constantly on your feet for something to go wrong so you can cover for it. And if you can't be an eloquent preacher and worship leader, you sure aren't going to be very interesting during a pageant. So I officially have yet another place where those two weird places of my life intersect.

It makes me think about my level of pageant involvement. I love lots of the people involved, and really like giving back to an organization that helped me be who I am. But I am unfortunately rather short on time and money, which means I maybe can't do what I'd like to do. I'm also a little torn over what feels like an identity crisis in the Miss America Organization. Does that mean I should step in and help pull things together? Or should I cut my losses and wait for them to sort themselves out?

I don't know the answer to that, but I do know that I have an incredible circle of friends and almost-family who never would have been part of my life if I hadn't learned to walk in high heels and a swimsuit on stage. For that alone, I'll hang around a while.

I Spoke Too Soon

2010-03-03T09:19:00.003-06:00

A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that I was having a minor emotional crisis over my lack of emotionality in my job. The very fact that I was having an emotional response to my non-emotional response should have tipped me off to the fact that I actually had nothing to worry about.

This past Sunday, the senior pastor chose "In Christ Alone" as the hymn of the day. I never actually heard that song until I came to this church, and it's one of the only songs I've heard sung in each of our worship services - not to mention by a group of kids at the church and even on the Christian radio station. Every time I hear it, whether it's with a guitar or an organ, I like the song even more.

As we sang it at the first service, I started really hearing the lyrics... and sure enough, I started getting choked up. I sang the words, "And as he stands in victory, sin's curse has lost its grip on me" and couldn't get any further. I stopped, took a few deep breaths, and was caught up in the sound of the entire congregation singing these powerful words of faith. Even though I didn't totally turn into a puddle, I was glad that everyone had their nose in the lyrics and didn't see me welling up.

Or so I thought. At the next service, just as we were about to start singing, the senior pastor turned to me and said, "Think you can keep it together this time?" Busted. But his grin told me his tongue was in his cheek, and I shot back something sassy, and I did indeed keep it together for the second round. Okay, okay, I got a little choked up again. But I can handle that.

When I was a kid, hymns used to make me cry all the time. I am pretty sappy, and music in particular moves me. Many of the hymns that used to be deal breakers for me are now hymns that I can actually sing all the way through without losing it. That's a good thing - they're good hymns, I like singing them, and I think the congregation would start to worry about me if I was bawling every other Sunday. It's not that those songs have become routine, but that I have grown and changed and have a different set of responsibilities. And that is just fine.

I don't think I've ever been in one place, doing the same thing, for longer than about a year. Being in this job now for about a year and a half can make me a little nervous and hypersensitive, since I just haven't really done that before. I am probably overly worried about becoming stale or boring. However, this work is far from boring. There are a million jobs within my job, and it's good to know that when one starts to get easy, I can face another with more energy. And odds are, if something doesn't make me cry any more, I'll find another thing that does.

God is still very much at work, even when I'm confused about where and how and why. There's much to be discerned, even if I'm not going anywhere. And I'm just too much of a sap to just stop crying. And that is just fine.

Viva Cozumel!

2010-02-22T16:49:00.010-06:00

I'm laid up at home with a case of, um, cranky intestines. Given that it came on about six days after our return from Mexico, I'm reluctant to chalk it up to Montezuma's Revenge. But as I'm trying out being upright, not to mention a few saltines, I think it's as good a time as any to catch you up on our much-needed vacation.

Chris and I decided we hadn't seen much of each other lately, and we were both in need of some sunshine. Plus, we needed to use our scuba certifications (yeah, that was one of the things I didn't really get to mentioning about this past year - we took scuba lessons) so it was off to sunny Mexico. We read that Cozumel has some of the top diving in the world, so we bought our tickets and counted down the days. Just before we left, we learned that the weather would actually be fairly cool, windy, and rainy. Curses. But it was better than blizzards, so we bucked up and hopped the plane.

Getting there was a bit of a debacle, what with snow at every turn, but when we landed in Cozumel it was warm, partly sunny, and a welcome change of pace. We got to the hotel, wandered around, got some supper, and headed to bed early for our first day of diving in the morning.
We were both a little nervous, since it was our first dives outside of certification. We found ourselves on a boat with a group of well-seasoned divers, which made us perhaps more nervous. But more than that, we were excited. Plus, we had a very helpful and intense dive master that simultaneously pulled us together and encouraged us. So we bit down on our regulators and quite literally took the plunge.

I had this weird realization while I was underwater: scuba diving is something you do just to see stuff. Recreational diving as it stands mostly involves you putting yourself at risk for nitrogen narcosis, decompression sickness, lung over-expansion, not to mention plain-old drowning. You strap yourself down with all this equipment, dive into water, hope you don't run into a shark, and mostly just plan on seeing stuff. I don't know why this revelation was such a revelation to me, but it also helped me ease up on myself a bit - this wasn't a sport or competition, just a chance to see stuff. Well, cool, I can handle that.

And we did see stuff. Turtles, eels, rays, dolphins, sharks, barracuda, and tons and tons of different kinds of fish. Our first two dives were very different - one leisurely swim around Palancar Gardens, rich with plant and sea life, and one drive-by drift dive in El Cidro, where the current was so strong that we just tucked our legs in and watched the ocean bottom fly by. Our seasoned vets came to know us as pretty gung-ho newbies and took very good care of us. (Curtis the Canadian took a special shine to us, but I think he takes a shine to almost anyone.) Frankly, it was incredible.

There were only two small problems. The first was Chris's nose: after having some trouble equalizing under water, he came up with a nose bleed. Between salt water, dry tank air, and pressure changes, that's not unheard of - it was just a little unsettling. But my problem was more, uh, dramatic. To put it bluntly: I could not pee. Maybe it was the wetsuit making it feel like I had pants on. Maybe it was the pressure changes messing with my plumbing. Maybe it was just nerves. Nonetheless, whether at the surface or underwater, I could not get the job done. Especially considering that this has never really been a problem for me, I was especially frustrated. And when the waves got bad after our first dive and we couldn't do our surface interval on land... well, no toilet meant no relief.

On the ride back, I thought I was going to die. I mean really. I thought I was going to back up into my kidneys and explode my bladder. It was the most uncomfortable I'd ever been. When we finally made it to shore, I could hardly limp of the boat - and, of course, once I was on land, I could hardly get my wetsuit off fast enough. When I apologetically rejoined the group, having carried none of my own gear back, I thanked Curtis in particular for not making light of my uncomfortable personal situation. He paused thoughtfully and said, "No, I wouldn't do that. If there's one thing I've learned, it's don't f**k with a redhead."

I was actually flattered. So much so that I didn't have the heart to tell him it's not natural.

After food, a shower, and naps, we got back out for a bit of fun - but not too much. We had to get to bed early because we had more diving to do the next day... or so we thought. We woke up to a very windy, cloudy morning, and were worried we might not get out to dive. And we were right. Just as we were about to leave the room, the dive shop called - boats weren't being let out, so there would be no diving. We killed some time, but still no luck, so we decided to tourist for a day. After all, it's a beautiful little city with good food, lots of shopping, and an abundance of sunburned Americans falling off the cruise ships. So while were we disappointed to miss a day of diving, it felt good to see the sights a little.

But by evening, we were ready for something completely different: Carnaval. Cozumel is one of those places in the world that does up Mardi Gras right, complete with dances, parties, and parades. The first of those parades would be that very night. Like good parade-goers, we lined up on the side of the street and waited for the show to begin.

It was crazy. Far from the drunken spectacle of New Orleans, this parade saw themed floats full of all ages, including some kids who had completely sacked out. There were far more locals than tourists - helped by the absence of the cruise ships who come in only for the day, and were gone by parade time. Dancing, intense costumes, booming music, and more. It was really, really cool.

The main street that the parade is on is a two-lane with a center divider. The parade started down one lane, so we stood in the center median to watch. Imagine our surprise when the parade doubled back on itself, with half the parade on each side of the street. We were surrounded by competing bass lines, whirling dancers, and more than a healthy amount of diesel fumes. When one lane cleared, we made a break for it and headed back to our hotel.

The next morning, there was no disappointment. We got to the dive operation, met our fellow divers (who were nowhere near as friendly and fun as our first group) and got out to dive. This time we went down to almost 90 feet as we explored the Santa Rosa wall - a long shelf of coral with a huge drop-off at the side. It was a little eerie to float over the edge of total blackness. Plus, our dive master led us through a series of caves. If you know me, and know that I get the jibblies about small spaces, you might be able to do the math: underwater claustrophobia + cave claustrophobia = freaked out Megan. But folks, this is a huge notch for me, because I did not freak out. I handled it pretty well, I think. I even maintained pretty good buoyancy (for a novice) and didn't crack my tank on the coral. Go me!

This surface interval saw us able to put in at beach (and me able, thankfully, to use a bathroom) and some gorgeous sunshine. We were at Paradise Beach and, it being the weekend, you'd expect it to be packed. No such luck. See, the main town on Cozumel is San Miguel, and there are no beaches near it - only piers where the cruise ships and ferries put in. Further south on the island, or on the far eastern side, are the pretty beaches. However, these beaches only get busy when the cruise ships are in town, and Sunday is not a cruise ship day. That beach was dead quiet. It was like the rapture had come and missed us 'cause we were three atmospheres deep.

We had our last dive of the trip, and the rest of our group called it a bit of a bust. Really? I'm so new to this stuff that any time I can see coral, fish, heck, even the sandy bottom of the ocean at the tip of my nose, I think it's a pretty sweet deal indeed. I even did a much better job of controlling my air. I was feeling pretty good indeed.

Then we came up top - and Chris's nose was bleeding again, but this time wouldn't stop. We were back to town before he had it under control. On top of that, he'd had equalizing trouble again and was feeling like he was maybe coming down with a cold. So, that sealed it: it really would be our last dive of the trip.

That night was more parade, more craziness, and more being really tired. It might have been Valentines Day, but we weren't really in the mood for love. We were in the mood for sleep. So after some more time in the plaza with the locals and a bite to eat, we were back to bed.

The next day took some thought... we had a day to kill, but had already had a day to kill. And I had not yet had a beach day, so... we opted for the beach. The catch was that a taxi was about $40 round-trip to get to and from the beach. A much cheaper, albeit much more dangerous option, was to rent a scooter. Considering we'd already cheated death underwater a few times, we went for it. Effectively, we hopped on a hair drier with a couple of wheels, strapped on helmets, and hoped for the best. Fortunately Chris was driving.

It was about the best way to end our trip. The sun was actually out (unlike much of the week, unfortunately), the beer was cold, the sand was white, and I was not yet back at work. All was very, very good. And then, when we successfully made it back, returned our scooter, and got cleaned up... it rained. No, poured. We could hardly get out to snag some supper until we got pretty flippin' drenched. So we stopped at the convenience store for some cervezas, watched Mexican MTV, and went to bed.

The next day was a long day of flights... marked especially by one freaky episode. Remember Chris's bloody nose and stuffiness? Well, when we reached altitude on our first connecting flight, they returned - with a vengeance. He couldn't stop the nosebleed, his head hurt like crazy, his eyes were watering, and honestly? I thought he was dying. I had visions of yelling, "Is anyone a doctor?" while my husband stroked out before my eyes. Was it the bends? Was he having an aneurysm? I was quietly freaking out. When the plane landed, he'd gotten the pain and bleeding under control and called the nurse line. Of course, it was the easier answer: he was really dry and congested, and the reduction in air pressure had set him off. But man... I really went to that worst case pretty quickly. I'm happy to have us both home safely.

We've talked about going back to Cozumel, doing more diving, all that stuff. For now, life is moving at top-speed for both of us at work. Well, at least I was - until a little something-something bit me in the butt. Back to sipping fluids and nibbling saltines, while I dream of dancing with fishes and relaxing on the beach.

Mental & Emotional Convergence

2010-02-17T13:58:00.004-06:00

Yesterday, I spent about 12 hours in and out of airports. The day before that, I was sitting on Paradise Beach in Cozumel, drinking Sol and recalling the four amazing scuba dives that my dear husband and I had finished, after having watched the Carnaval parade the night before. Today, I am sitting at my desk, looking at multiple feet of snow out the window, wearing black and marked with a cross of ashes on my forehead.

Sometimes my life gets a little weird.

I have unfortunately not been blogging much lately, and it is not for lack of things to blog about. I had two conferences (one invited, one required) that were nigh-on life-changing. I was the solo pastor for two-and-a-half weeks and only had to do two funerals. I even produced a pageant, for pity's sake, and it was awesome. I got really, really tired. And, as you may have inferred from my first paragraph, I went on vacation last week. I needed it.

But today is Ash Wednesday. (I have previously documented my mixed, mostly troubling, and occasionally totally absent, responses to this church event.) Most people give things up for Lent, and I'm no exception - there was a year in college when I gave up, like, everything for Lent. I've mostly fallen out of that tradition, because I think I broke it for myself. But this year, I think it's time to take things on. At work, the whole office is taking on a sort of healthy living challenge that I think I can get behind. Personally, I have a helluva lot of processing to do, and I am definitely a verbal processor. I think I will take on actually flipping updating this blog for Lent. With any luck, it will stick - just as any good, healthy discipline should.

So, I'll tell you about our lovely trip a bit later. Perhaps I'll reflect on the oddity of being on the other side of pageant life. Maybe I'll even tell you about those crazy conferences and all their emotional processing. For now: Ash Wednesday.

It's the start of my second Lent as an official ordained pastor in this church. The good news: I think I finally know what's going on, and it feels right. The bad news: it's become routine.

There things about being a pastor that have always been meaningful and right for me. While I am uber-emotional, it seems appropriate to be so heavily empathetic at certain times, places, and even church seasons. I have always had mixed feelings about Ash Wednesday because of its reminders of mortality, sinfulness, and brokenness - as one might imagine, it makes me feel sorta depressed. But shouldn't it? Shouldn't I respond to the emotional weight of the day, and the life-saving sacrifice that this season leads up to? Shouldn't I be moved deeply, and be reminded of my own humanity?

But today, it didn't really happen. I kinda just read Psalm 51, smudged some crosses on some folks, and went into the Fellowship Hall for lunch, which was delicious. There will be worship again tonight, and I feel mostly neutral about it - we're singing Holden Evening Prayer, which I love, but mostly I know it will be a long service tonight and I'm kinda tired. It's a strange feeling. I know my head isn't really in the game thanks to last night's many flights and the previous week of vacation, so I could just chalk it up to that.

But what if it's not that? What if I'm actually becoming less sensitive to certain parts of my faith (and personality, for that matter) because of the work I do? Is that a good thing, or a bad thing? Should I be glad that I'm settling into the demands of the work I do without being buffeted by constant emotional processing? Or should I be alarmed that I'm no longer emotionally connected to the depths of the work I do?

I don't really have an answer to that, and it's just another thing on the pile of stuff I need to process. Part of my frustration is the realization that discernment doesn't ever end, for pity's sake. Never mind that I'm finally doing the work I spent over eight years training to do - now I have to be hyper-aware of that work and constantly trying to stay in front of what's next for me. Overwhelming.

Or, possibly... exciting. What a frightfully static world this would be if you landed in your job and just sorta stayed there. Part of the adventure and growth of college and seminary was the process of learning what you were good at, what you liked, where you could be called - and going for it. Maybe it's a dramatic short-change of God's work to blithely assume that once you figure out a job, you've figured out all jobs. Perhaps I should be relieved that God's not done with me yet. Maybe even this odd sense of stasis (after not even two years in one place, for heaven's sake) is a waystation as I continue to figure out what I'm called to do now in this place, and later in other places. That I can live with.

And for that, I deserve a round of applause. This is deep stuff for a girl who was drinking margaritas in the rain less than 36 hours ago. Welcome back, blogfans. It's going to get interesting.

Let's Wind This Up: 100% Of A Make-Up Saga

2010-01-18T16:20:00.003-06:00

My last two topics to blog about, which were supposed to count for 20% each separately, will just have to be combined into one last push, because 1) this is taking too long, and 2) I've got other things to start blogging about. Plus, this last 40% of the make-up saga actually kinda fits together, so it's not such a bad thing. Let's wind this thing up, shall we?

It's probably no secret that my job has some ridiculous ups and downs. I get to baptize babies. I get to visit people in the psych ward. I get to celebrate milestones of the church year. I get to work 3-5 nights a week. I get to do what I love. I get to do a ton of stuff I don't. Mostly, I'm constantly amazed at how much I can know I'm doing exactly what I'm supposed to be doing, and wish I was doing anything but.

Case in point: nearly a month ago now, I went to visit a new mom and baby in the hospital. They're a newer family in the church, so I really did want to see the new little family and let them know we wanted to celebrate with them. When I showed up it was just mom, and she apologized that her husband was gone (he'd left to feed the cat). Just as I was about to pray for her and leave, her little one was wheeled into his room with his bassinet.

He was not even 24 hours old. He had a gigantic head full of hair. He was a peanut - but a pretty big one. He was adorable. His momma had barely held him for 30 seconds when she looked at me and said, "You wanna hold him?" New parents are notoriously greedy for baby-holding time, and here she was perfectly willing to just hand him off. He would officially be the newest baby I've ever held. Of course I said yes.

We sat for the next half hour or so, just chatting about names, families, and church life. The whole time, this little guy was just totally content to let me hold him. Every so often he'd open his milky eyes and stare at me calmly, as if he were thinking, "Lady, you're not my mom, but you'll do for now." It was amazing. It was one of those moments where all I could think was, "I actually get paid to do this?"

The very next morning was a very different story. See, I haven't been to the dentist in a while (like, almost three years) and I knew I needed to do something about that. It sealed the deal when Chris and I were out to eat a week or so previous and I bit into a sandwich pickle and totally killed my back molar. Like, it felt like I'd chipped my tooth on a pickle. A pickle! So I figured it was time to bite the bullet (although not with that sore tooth) and go see a dentist. Fortunately, I'd gotten a good suggestion - and it was a member of the congregation, no less.

Earlier in the month I went for my first check-up, and confirmed that I had indeed chipped my tooth on a pickle. Everyone from the doctor to the hygienist to the receptionist paused and said, "...on a pickle?" when I told them what I'd done. It was a tooth with a spot of decay that needed drilling anyway, so patching up the little split would be no sweat.

This brings me back to the morning after I held the adorable baby. I had to go in for my tooth cleaning and fixing, and I was a little nervous. Unfortunately, the morning started out poorly when the hygienist gave me several lectures: flossing, proper brushing technique, regular dentist appointments, and so on. Ah, guilt: the least-best motivator. With this in my head, I switched over to the next room and prepared myself for the drilling.

I honestly can't remember the last time I had serious dental work done. When I went to the dentist last time (you know, three years ago) I had two tiny spots of decay that they drilled out without novocaine and just filled with sealant. Previous to that? I couldn't tell you. So when the dentist gave me a local painkiller to numb the pain of the actual painkiller that quickly left me with no feeling in my cheek, lip, tongue, and chin. And then there's the pleasure of having your jaw wedged open so a large, mechanical device can be shoved all the way in. I also particularly enjoy the feeling of pressure when a drill smashes through your tooth, knowing it should hurt, and figuring it will later.

The procedure itself actually took almost no time, so I popped out of the chair to thank the dentist. I then realized that I actually couldn't talk, because half my face was numb. I slurred and drooled my way through the conversation - at which point the dentist casually mentioned that I might not want anything chewable for lunch, since I might accidentally eat part of my tongue.

Well, that's just great.

And this brings me to what would have been the second half of half of this last 40%. (Still with me? Good.) Because I went back to work with half a mouth, and not long after got word that I had to go to a dying man's bedside. I wasn't technically on call, but I was the only one around, and the family sounded panicked, so me and my numb mouth hauled out.

Here's the best part: this family is crazy. I don't mean, like, dysfunctional family crazy. I mean, like, possible meth addicts crazy. They had been the in the office a few days before, and I could smell them before I could see them. They refused to leave. The one looked to have never eaten. The other pastor washed his hands after talking to them. It was not a very comfortable situation.

When I rush to the place the dying man is, I see these family members standing outside his room. That's weird, considering how frantic they sounded on the phone - why would they leave his bedside? But they see me and just start talking non-stop about stuff that makes no sense. They're spouting out intersections, laughing about not being able to say the other pastor's name, and other things that I truly, honestly can't make out. To be fair, only half of my mouth worked, so I was pretty content to just let them talk. But it didn't change the fact that I was supposed to be helping them through the death of their loved one.

Finally, a nurse's aide came out of the man's room and said, "He's all cleaned up. I'm sorry for your loss." I paused. I looked at the family members and said, "I'm sorry, has he passed?" They replied, almost snippy, "Well, of course. Do you think we would just be standing out here otherwise?"

I probably drooled a little bit, because my jaw dropped, and I couldn't feel it anyway.

I walked into the man's room with them, and for the first time in my life, I realized I was looking at a body under a white sheet. I have been around plenty of dead people, even some people who died in my presence. But never have I walked in a room and seen a body actually under a bleached white sheet. I turned to the family and asked what they wanted - service? prayer? nothing? They wanted a little service, please. I asked them if they wanted me to, uh, remove the sheet. They insisted that I did.

Adding to the list of things I've done for the first time, I pulled a white sheet down off a dead body. And it was not particularly pretty.

I slurred my way through a brief service, and was awkwardly hugged by the family as thanks. I was happy to help, but the sheer, overwhelming weirdness of the entire situation - from sheet to slurring - really gave me the jibblies.

So that's how I went from holding the newest baby I've ever held to pulling a sheet off a dead body with a novocained mouth. And that is also how I finally summed up my catch-up series. Whew.