Journey

(Source)

Growing up, I saw that stained glass window above on many a Sunday. I still remember it fondly, the last time I saw it was upon an Easter Sunday some few years ago. After I had retired from the Air Force, but before The Missus Herself and I had had a "come to Jesus" meeting. The end result of that meeting being Your Humble Scribe returning to the fold as it were.

For the love of my life had a need, an itch which needed scratching, a burr under her saddle. She had been away from her native land (not counting a month long visit in 1995, nor a week long visit in 1998 to bury her Dad) for  some 18 years. On top of that, as we were preparing to leave Germany and come back to the United States, retiring from the only life we'd ever known together, her mother passed away.

Both deaths were unexpected. My father-in-law lived long enough for The Missus Herself and the progeny to get to Korea, lived long enough for his daughter, my wife, to be with him as he crossed the boundary between this existence and the next. Having experienced that myself some years later, I understand the trauma and the pain involved in that. They stayed in Korea long enough to see her Dad buried, then they came home to Germany where I had had to stay to make preparations for The Naviguesser to get back to the U.S. to start college.

But when her Mom died, there was no closure, her Mom passed very quickly of a cerebral aneurysm. There one moment, almost literally gone the next. She had a phone call from her sister (I think, might have been one of her brothers) to inform her. I asked if she wanted to go to Korea for the funeral, the Air Force would have paid for the flight, both ways, but she decided that she needed to stay in Germany. We were packing to leave, Lord knows what a hash I might have made of that, and she realized that there was nothing she could do.

So one day, she was out driving around our new stomping grounds here in Little Rhody and she found this stone church on the town common (we still have those in some New England towns) and she decided to stop. She sat on the front steps of that church for quite awhile, later she told me that "it just felt right, felt like home."

When I got home from work that afternoon, she informed me that we would be going to church that Sunday. I spluttered and protested but, as always, she won the contest. We've been attending services there now going on 18 years. We became members back in '03. Surprised me that I so readily acceded to that, but when I think about things, which happens now and again, she has usually (always?) been right. I tend to be a contrarian at times, just because I can. She knows that.

All that being said, it's been a long trip from when I was a young lad, being asked if I would like to join the church. I was puzzled, what did they mean by "join." Well, there were classes one must take, certain dogmas one should espouse, and...

"Nope, sorry. That's not for me."

Parents were a bit miffed, I was a teenager, so it was a no go. Church was in my wake, it would be many years before I returned. I attended divine services perhaps thrice in the Air Force. Once in Basic Training (had no choice for that first Sunday in Basic). Once while in tech school, a couple of us volunteered to go hear a general speak. It was that or mop and wax floors that Sunday. Turns out the general was speaking at a church. Unexpected but it turned out pretty well. It was interesting and there were no mops or buffers to be seen.

The second time was in Belgium, it was cold, there was this interesting little Belgian church, it was Christmas and there were little kids singing inside. We went in and sat quietly, it was one of the most intense Christmas experiences I've ever had.

So three times in the space of nearly thirty years. I half expected the ceiling to cave in when I returned (kicking and screaming in a figurative sense), but the wife was insistent and I had no choice really. She needed it, so I went. It was good for her, probably good for me as well.

But I grow restless again.

I feel the dogma  creeping in, the idea that the Bible is all there is, nothing new in 2,000 years. Really? God speaks but does anyone listen in these times?

It doesn't feel like it.

Formulaic preaching, no matter how passionate, leaves me cold.

But I remember that stained glass window and how much that image conveys to me. How much it means to me, all that has gone before and all that is yet to be. I hunger.

I must needs be patient.

All will be revealed.

In time.

It's been a long journey, but it isn't over yet.