1 February
New month, new design! Didn't Iko do a swell job?
Of course, usually it's every two months, but I split the last two months between two similar designs. This one's up 'till April, though!
Yesterday there was no sleeping in for me, because it was the day selected for my to go to church with Cynthia, Katie and Bonnie! Molly stayed at home with Fran, due to an upset tummy, so it was just us four off to the Presbyterian church in North Bergen.
Did I tell the story about the music yet? I think I remember telling it several times, but I don't know if I wrote it down. Ah well, just quickly, Cynthia is trying to choose a church in the area with a good youth program for Katie, and because she's one of those bizarre non-discriminating Protestants, the denomination is negotiable.
There's an Episcopalian church practically around the corner, which is most convenient, but they are not musical--no choir, the congregation barely sings at all--which Cynthia finds somewhat horrifying, and there's the Presbyterian church that's a half hour drive away, but the music is so important to the church that, due to a need for male voices, the minister runs round to the choir loft to sing during the hymns! I think that's really sweet.
I completely understand how music is so important to Cynthia, because it is for me as well. St. Jane Francis, one of my churches at home, used to have the greatest folk mass, that I always insisted going to that one from early high school on. It was a trio, Karen and Ken and Tom, and they were wonderful and wrote really great music, and they retired a few years ago after playing for something like 20 years (I think they were barely 20 when they started), and while I was at home I decided to go to mass to see the new group.
BLECH!!!
They were so horrible, and so bad, and so awful that I could not restrain myself from making really obnoxious faces every time a note of music rang out. Or plunked out. Whatever. Anyway, also since the last time I had been there, they had re-arranged the church so that the pews were in two sections facing each other with the altar in the middle. Kind of "Mass in the round". Anyway, afterwards I was telling Mom about the faces I was making, and she said "At least we were in the front row so that no-one could see you!"
"Yeah, except for the entire other half of the congregation in the facing pews staring right at me and my rolling eyes!"
Anyway, I've been going to this church most of my life, and I will never go back because the music sucks so much, so I understand Cynthia's need for a congregation that is musical.
So, we went to church early so that Katie could have Sunday school, and we went to the adult discussion group, which wasn't anything like as horrible as it sounds, then was the actual mass. Or service. Whatever.
It was less a mass, for me, than sort of watching the minister stand around chatting. Plus, there were no kneelers, the Lord's Prayer was just plain wrong (okay, it was just one word different, but still!), and there was no Communion at all! What is the point of mass without Communion?
Cynthia understood my culture shock, of course, and described my feelings nicely when she said "You thought that was more like a board meeting than a mass, didn't you?" But the singing was, in fact, very good, which was why I was there.
Today's horoscope:
Small problems in the home can be solved by a practical focus. Be willing to help those you love.
One year ago today:
And I finally decided to retire the little at work guys. They have served me well, but the joke has gotten really old.
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Last Updated Mon 1 February 08:37:09 1999