Say It All

SOMEONE has been on the computer because the curser was HUGE, the font size was 163 instead of 12. Who could have done that? It is like when Faith manages to touch two keys on the keyboard and I spend an hour trying to undo what changes she had made to my settings. Or when James picks up the remote and is suddenly recording some dragon show that I never knew existed and then Jeff comes home and looks at the recorded shows and wonders why he never knew his wife was a fantasy loving geek.

Anyway.

I am sort of sad to say that this Labor Day weekend is not very fun so far. We’ve gone to church, taken naps, I mopped the floor, did some laundry . . . oh my goodness I have to just stop right there. I am envisioning myself reading this years down the road thinking, “why on earth did you sit there typing the most boring list of stuff ever?” although to be truthful, church was really not at all boring. It never is with two small children. It almost seems laughable to think that one can expect their children to respect the quiet holiness of the sanctuary and to be reverent and understand the importance of it all. James would have fallen asleep on my lap but we forgot his pacifier and so right when the sermon began he began his loud and whiny grunting. I took him out to the lobby and saw the doors were open so I stood outside for a couple of minutes swaying back and forth and catching snippets of sound. He finally fell asleep on my shoulder and I stayed out there for a couple minutes more, both to assure he was really asleep and to just enjoy it. It seemed special all of the sudden to just stand outside the church even and breathe in the fresh air and feel the unusual brush of my long dress against my bare legs. When I walked back in we stepped by several other parents with their babies on their shoulders all looking at James and I a little enviously, I thought. “Mine is asleep,” I smiled to them. “You can come back out and take ours!” they grinned back.

We had a full house in our tiny country church this week. We had a guest speaker, well known in our church system, and I believe it was also friends and family day. I sometimes pray to be able to receive the message and I think I did.

The reason why I think I did is this: A year ago, two years ago, well, probably my whole life I never would have written this down. There are many people who don’t believe in what I do, who get turned off immediately by someone who not only has beliefs but states them openly. I didn’t want to turn off people, I didn’t want to stand out and be different.

I believe in God. I have faith. My faith gets stronger every day. I am not worried about turning people away. I worry more about not speaking up about what I believe. It’s a courage I never thought I would have. I would have just buried the fact that I went to church, I would have written about the laundry instead. I would have cared more about being well written or humorous or thought provoking instead of just being honest.

It’s more than just freeing. It’s peace.

And so I am able to write about it, yes church is part of my life. This week in the life of Jenny featuring children, housework, money woes, martial harmony and discord, the death of a garden, and God.