We were in church that Sunday morning. One of our teenage daughters was in an ugly mood. I don’t think we had any idea what had caused her mood, nor did I particularly care. We’d had a hectic morning getting everyone up and ready for church. Shortly after we sat down in church I could see that she was upset about something. But by then I was worn out enough that I probably just rolled my eyes about it.
With eight teenagers in the house, getting everyone up and ready, and explaining that yes, we really were going to church today, was becoming more of a struggle than it often feels like it’s worth. I was irritated by this. We have always gone to church. But lately, all of a sudden, it has become a major discussion every Sunday morning. A test of wills. Are we really going? Yes, we’re really going. Just like we’ve gone your entire life.
Our daughter who was in the mood was on my left. Our 15-year-old son Ben was sitting to my right. The service was just beginning when he leaned forward to look past me at his sister. Then he whispered to me, a little too loudly, “What’s wrong with her?”
Annoyed, I whispered back, “Who cares?”
He looked again at his sister, then back at me, and sat back in his seat. Satisfied that yes, she really was in a bad mood, and no, he wasn’t going to find out any details about it until later.
At that point, 16-year-old Anna, who was sitting directly in front of me, turned around and whispered sarcastically, “Nice one, Mom. That was way too loud.”
As is often the case, I wasn’t particularly interested in any feedback at that moment. She turned back around in her seat, and it wasn’t until after the service that I found out the rest of the story, when with eyes rolling, and dripping sarcasm, she mimicked my earlier comment to Ben.
“So then Mom says, ‘Who cares?’” she said loudly, bobbing her head from side to side, arms lifted in a dramatic shrug.
So it turned out that while our family was still in the throes of just trying to get everybody to church that morning, the rest of the congregation had been at the beginning of the liturgy in that moment. They were at the part where the pastor says, “…God sent His most high Son, Jesus, to die for us…” That was the moment. That was what was happening around me, in the service. That was what I should have been focused on, instead of focusing on my teenager’s ugly mood. That was the exact second in time when I responded dismissively to Ben’s question of concern over his sister who was in a foul mood.
In music they call it a mashup. When you take two separate pieces of music and play them together, overlapping them. Sometimes the result is really pretty cool.
My experience in church was not so cool. My mashup was a little more, well, unfortunate. My Sunday morning mashup went something like this:
Pastor: “…God sent His most high Son, Jesus, to die for us…”
Ruth: “Who cares?”
No one in the congregation asked me about it after church. No one expressed concern over how I was doing. Or even just shook my hand and held on for a second longer than normal. Our family, all 12 of us who were there that morning, got a good laugh out of it later when Anna regaled us over and over again with the full story of how things went down. How my timing, my mashup, was really just unfortunate.
But then I guess I deserved that. For not paying attention to what was actually important. For being more focused on my teenaged daughter’s foul mood, and how annoying I found it, than on the reason why I was there in the first place. For getting distracted, and not watching my timing. Because it really is all about the timing.
penniesonmypath 