Opening Exercises: my girls stretched on hard chairs, schooled hands still seeking their phones; leaders whispered, heads together, in the back; we settled into our common rhythms\u00e2\u20ac\u201devery week the same. Toward the end I gave an announcement, passing along information I had recently received. We broke for classes. And a woman I love and admire made an offhand comment\u00e2\u20ac\u201dto herself, walking away, unaware of my location\u00e2\u20ac\u201dthat immediately, unexpectedly, cut.<\/p>\n
I grew hot, and my ears rushed, and my eyes pushed against rising tears. I told the Laurels to start without me and held the baby close as I hurried down the hall, head bowed, past the primary, past the library, past brotherly greetings, and into the mother’s lounge where I shut the door and turned off the lights and then I held the baby even closer. <\/p>\n
The feelings of self-doubt, the recognition of my own inadequacy, the unlooked for guilt\u00e2\u20ac\u201dtheir intensity surprised me as much as their very presence. I thought I left this long ago. The baby slept against my shoulder in the darkened room; she did not mind the tears. <\/p>\n
I grew up. I pulled myself together. I wiped away mascara. And I went back to class where I stood with the baby in the back, swaying.<\/p>\n
I think what caught my attention and what catches it still is how odd it all was. As a rule, I do not cry over comments made by other women. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not worth it. And this woman, my friend, would certainly be horrified if she knew\u00e2\u20ac\u201dI know her well enough to realize there was no malice behind her words, or even simple dislike. So why did I feel like a Laurel again myself, and why the unwanted tears?<\/p>\n
(Church ends; an hour passes.)<\/p>\n
Visiting Teaching: I tucked myself into familiar cushions and conversations and, after a while, my hand slid down to feel for slick paper\u00e2\u20ac\u201devery month the same. Toward the end I looked down:<\/p>\n
Perhaps the greatest charity comes when we are kind to each other, when we don’t judge or categorize someone else, when we simply give each other the benefit of the doubt or remain quiet. Charity is accepting someone’s differences, weaknesses, and shortcomings; having patience with someone who has let us down; or resisting the impulse to become offended\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6. Charity is refusing to take advantage of another’s weakness and being willing to forgive someone who has hurt us. Charity is expecting the best of each other.<\/i><\/p>\n
I shared this with my friend as we visited. I still need charity. I need it in my life and I need others to have it in theirs so they can live with me and I with them. I still need it now, now even more than ten years ago when I was still only half-awake to the world and to God. The pure love of Christ\u00e2\u20ac\u201dChrist\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s pure love and loving Christ in purity\u00e2\u20ac\u201dI thought about that as I said goodbye to my friend after an hour and she hugged me and told me she loved me and I knew that she meant it and the words she had spoken earlier at the church, the words she did not know I heard and that sent me running, those words are fading as I write. I cannot recall them now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Opening Exercises: my girls stretched on hard chairs, schooled hands still seeking their phones; leaders whispered, heads together, in the back; we settled into our common rhythms\u00e2\u20ac\u201devery week the same.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":94,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3459","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-corn"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/94"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3459"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3459\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}