Unholiest of the holy

Long before I fell in love with the study of the human body and enlisted myself in an all-consuming nursing school program, I worked in retail and attended school at a small Christian university where being an English student was a natural and easy-going path. The social scene for me was not as effortless though. I was often comforted with sanctimonious expressions of, "We were praying for you at our discipleship meeting today." Ok. Thanks. Chapel was a requirement at this school, and since there wasn't a dress code students would turn up in their class room casual outfits. Girls would frequently be adorned in their crude pajama pants with "PINK" scrolled across their bottoms, so it was a surprise to me when one day I was stopped a block away from the chapel by a less than pleased R.A. who believed her duties extended beyond the confines of the dorm she presided over:

R.A.: (with concerned, I've-been-praying-for-you face) Are you going to chapel?
me: (very confused face) It appears I am. Why?
R.A.: (shaking her head and pointing assertively at my get-up) You can't wear that.
me: (looking down to evaluate my Rolling Stones t-shirt, denim shorts, and cowboy boots and pointing back at myself) This?
R.A.: That. You cannot wear that in The House of The Lord.
me: (amused) ok....

I turned around and headed to work instead. I loved my job at Betsey Johnson (recently the store closed after becoming bankrupt....I guess the financial equivalent to what a few of my school chums thought I was morally.) Every month I could pick any free dress I wanted and any damaged items were also free, so my closet grew rapidly. It was a perfect college job.

Fast forward to present day Life-of-me: a wife, mom, and student trying to be a thousand things at once. Fancy dresses don't really make the list of important things anymore though, so one day I decided to Ebay them. So far I have streamlined my closet and earned about $600! More closet space, more money! Win-Win! In the process I also discovered a few hidden gems that I just couldn't imagine why I had stopped wearing! So, excitedly I threw on one such dress (an above the knee embroidered black lace one with a sheer hem) and headed to church with an elderly lady that I take every Sunday. We go to a breathtaking Catholic church with a very refined parish. I am not used to the customs of Catholics, but I think this sums up some of the physical demands on any given Sunday:

enter church, dip hand in Holy water, cross yourself, walk to pew, kneel/bow, sit, kneel, sit, stand, kneel, sit, stand, sit, kneel, sit, stand, shake hands with neighbors, kneel again, sit while parishioners receive communion, kneel when they get back, sit, kneel, stand, exit pew, kneel/bow, leave church and cross yourself on the way out the door

This particular Sunday I drank a lot of coffee. So, I had to make an exit to the ladies room because my post-baby-bladder was sending threatening messages to my brain. I exited the pew, bowed awkwardly because this is something I am not accustomed to and hurried along the way to the back of the church noting that the faces I encountered along the way all shared the same look of quiet revulsion. When I reached the ladies room I saw a full length mirror and decided to see what could be the matter..... I suppose when I bowed, I must have mooned about half of the congregation sitting behind me. In The House Of The Lord. It came back to me why I stopped wearing this dress: sheer hem too short to be considered decent. I thought, "Well Holy Ish, this is going to be an uncomfortable walk back to the pew." I did though and kneeled piously as I could, bowing only at my neck and not at my waist. When it came time to shake hands with my neighbors I gave my best I'm REALLY sorry face to the woman behind me who answered with a snide look. Understandable.

So perhaps the R.A. so many years ago wasn't too far off her mark. She may have been mothering me in some way that was as natural to her as denim, t-shirts, and cowboy boots are to me.

Hiatuses and Processionals

After being supremely lazy and feeling slightly awkward at the thought of droning on about myself to an absent audience, I have decided to bring my blogging hiatus to a close. The last semester of school pried me completely away from any ability to blog in order to keep my head above med/surg water. And summer forced me into the world (or should I say ocean) of Statistics where I again narrowly escaped. Enough of that though.
#1. I have decided to write a book. I hope all three of you reading will hold me accountable to this. It has been a dream of mine for a long time. Ideas stack up in my head and never find their way to paper. I think it's time. I feel more motivated than ever to make it happen.
#2. My championing Laziness has yet again won out on the blogging front, and instead of creating a blog all on my own I asked my Dad to do the work for me....
I approached my Dear Ol' Dad about writing out one of my favorite stories that I had only heard for the first time a few years ago (2 at the most). This story makes me smile any time I think of it because it is truly funny. I have to stress that, and you will see why. So, my father, never missing a moment to create a greater moral....never ignoring an opportunity to parent, has lovingly retold a story that I love. Please enjoy.

First, some  background.  When I was seven years old, our family and another family were returning from the movies one night, all of us piled into our car.  We were driving back home through the streets of downtown Birmingham.  My father was driving as five different conversations competed in the backround.  He stopped at a traffic light.  Then the light turned green. But he hesitated; he had noticed another car was running their red light.  Not so fortunate were the two men in the lane next to us.  They rolled into the intersection where a speeding car slammed into their front right fender.  We all watched as the force of the collision spun the hapless mens' car into a pinwheel.  So strong was the spinning of their car that their passenger door flew open, and the passenger was hanging outside the door, clinging as long as he could.  When both cars skidded to a stop, my father pulled our car to the curb, and ran across the street to stop the light-running car from escaping.  As the driver rolled down her window, alcohol vapor billowed out.  The lady was stunned, but was also so drunk that her speech was slurred.  Anyway, as a seven year old kid, I was so struck by the quick action of one driver, my father, that I determined I would never be clobbered by a light runner.  It seemed like a simple enough pledge: never run a red light, and always check before moving on green.  That pledge has actually saved me a couple of times since.

And now to the main story.  A high school friend, Bobby, and his family were returning home from downtown Birmingham when a drunk light runner rammed their car.  Bobby and his father were seriously injured.  Bobby's father was released from the hospital a few days later.  Bobby would be on indefinite life support, but would never regain his mind.  His poor family made the agonizing decision to pull his plug, and Bobby died quickly.  Many friends and family, including my family, attended his funeral.  After the service, we all formed a procession to the cemetary.  Motorcycle police provided escort.  I was in my car alone. 

I watched as one motorcycle escort stopped traffic for us, and then bolted off to the front of the funeral procession.  Suddenly, the light before me turned red.  I know, I was in a funeral procession, and I had the right-of-way.  But I reacted involuntarily, just as I had programmed myself to, and I stopped.  The procession in front of me faded away.  Routine traffic swallowed them up, even as I watched.  When the light finally turned green, I sped frantically to rejoin the procession, but I failed.  And I didn't know exactly where the cemetary was.  It was on the side of town we rarely visited.  I decided that I was just one of many, and that no one would notice my absence, so I turned into a hamburger joint to get a hamburger.  That's when I saw the tail of the funeral procession in my rear view mirror.  Despite my speeding, they had kept up with me, and now they were turning with me into the hamburger stand!  Again, I made a snap decision.  I sped through the drive-thru, and back into traffic, the rest of the procession in hot pursuit.  I guess I got lucky and eventually found the cemetary, the last cars in the procession still with me.  We drove so fast that we arrived at the cemetary at the same time as the front of the procession.  We weren't behind them, though - we met them head on.  As Bobby's poor mother exited the family limousine, she noticed us driving up to the lead car.  She looked very puzzled, but then joined her family who had kept walking up to the graveside.  

No one said a word to me, and I guess my own family never knew what had happened. Just one of those bad decisions you make for the right reason, I guess.  I can recall a few other bad-decisions-for-the-right-reason that I have made since then.

Love,

Daddy