craziness at church...

I think that we have finally settled in at our new church, at least enough that I can finally write a little something about all the madness that happens during those magical hours from 10:30 to 12:30 on Sundays when God shows up, the music is spectacular -- I don't know anywhere else that you can get a full choir, a massive pipe organ, and a trumpet many Sundays, and a peculiar brand of mischievousness descends on our two little madmen who a) can't read to follow along with the service, but b) we still don't want them screaming their bloody little heads off. Yeah, it's a recipe for disaster. Just saying. If you don't think it is, look into the eyes of the Queen and Elijah in this picture and then imagine them causing all sorts of trouble-- not hard to do, is it :) ?

With that in mind, here's three things that I'm still nervous about-- one of which already came true: First, I want to point out that we're still not used to the whole burning of incense. This fact was driven home one morning about a month ago now when we showed up and walked into church and as we did, my brain went, "Hmmm.... something smells funny!" but I didn't think any more of it until Elijah yelled, "Where's the fire?" and pointed with great intensity at the smoke billowing from the front of the church. Yours truly, being a total lightweight when it comes to smoke, then spent most of the morning hacking up a lung-- look, there's a reason I've never taken up smoking, all right?

The other point about the incense that Rachel and I are mildly worried about (in the sense that we REALLY want to see it happen) is that the head incense guy (a very sweet man by the name of Michael) is very, very good with the incense pot-- he spins it this way and that twirling smoke gently into the faces of the priests as he walks up the aisle, almost the way I always imagined Gandalf blowing smoke rings in The Hobbit. But... we're convinced that one day a child will come blithely wandering into the aisle ahead of him and clang! out like a light. We're not taking bets on this, but we do try and keep Judah away from wherever the incense happens to be... he's kinda the cute, slightly oblivious type.

Secondly, another of the things we learned over the course of time was that when you approach the altar, you need to 'acknowledge' it. In one sense, this is a very beautiful and thought-provoking concept. The holy King of all Creation wants to come down and fellowship with you and has made his dwelling for that moment in the altar of worship... pretty cool to think about. In practicality, however, exactly what does one do to acknowledge the altar? The first time I had a reading to do on the altar, I was terrified. I watched what everyone else who did the readings up front did for weeks, but there was no real set pattern. One gentleman bowed deeply (I wasn't sure that I could bend that low), another woman almost curtseyed as she came to it. I settled for a somewhat awkward stop, drop and roll (actually, I just stopped for a one-count) and then continued forward. Until someone explains to me exactly what's supposed to happen, this low-church convert is going to try a sensei-bow next time... we'll see how it goes.

Finally, the thing that I am really most terrified of is ten minutes with the LJ without anything to distract him. As you may or may not have read, the last time we went on a SATURDAY, for heaven's sake, the boys terrorized me while our friend's one-year-old sat placidly by, not making a peep. I don't know what kind of drugs they gave him, but I want some for the LJ. This Sunday, he was a gentleman upon his return from the nursery, where he spends most of the service, all the way through Communion, where he receives a blessing from the priest, but then we had ten minutes of beautiful organ music to sit through. I love the sound of the pipe organ blasting out sonatas. Elijah-- not so much. I looked over at one point and he had somehow made it all the way down the aisle and was half-snuggling with the very surprised gentleman there. Upon us finally corraling him, he came back and appeared to be happily playing with his little magnetic Nativity set. He smiled, held up the little donkey, and looked at me with a playful grin. "Aw, Elijah!" I thought. "I think he might be understanding the Christmas story." Then he looked up to the rafters and in one quick motion, let the donkey fly. I don't know if you have ever seen the end of any overdramatized sports movie where time stops and the ball/ puck / player hovers, suspended in the moment, but that's exactly what happened here. I think that I was cringing well before the donkey landed with a soft thud next to a distinguished science professor TWO rows in front of us. It stuck the landing. He looked a little surprised, but was quite gracious when I slunk forward to reclaim it. In other news, the entire three rows around where we were sitting was almost howling with laughter. I guess there's no telling what will land on you when you sit near us in church... but I don't think we're ever going to let him play with anything heavy.