I Love This Rain....

...I really DO!

It makes me think of the Pacific Northwest. And also a little of Chesapeake's thunderstorms....

Yesterday we went to Church after missing two weeks - and I held on just enough to understand the Sermon (although THIS time, I was not as familiar with the passage: Mark 7:1-7 & 14-? I had to look it up afterwards - but I loved the interpretation from the Pulpit: Honor God Intentionally and On Purpose. The Pastor shared stories from his own life (my favorite part!) about times when he has realized his external behavior gave a pious impression, but internally he was a different man; and looking in the mirror, he realized that he was, in fact, a Pharisee himself....... I could relate to that ;-))

We were invited for lunch by a very kind family from the Church. A family of kind-hearted people who served us wonderful Mittagessen and then Cakes and Coffee. FIVE HOURS of kindness, in fact.

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Remember how in May and June, I said that I could feel "it" building inside me.....the enormity of what I was about to do in moving overseas.....and how I just needed a good cry, but wasn't sure how to tap it? Friends laughed with me and agreed that it would come at the unlikliest of moments: a comment from the bagger at Farm Fresh or while mailing something at the Post Office. I thought that surely I would un-freeze and let it flow while I said my goodbyes that last week in VA, but I held it together pretty well.

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This sweet German family, while asking sincere questions about what it was like to leave my Church at home, and leave my friends & family at home, had no idea what they had gotten themselves into: FLOOD. Utter flood. At one point, they were both in tears, too (but that may have been sympathetic, from watching someone weep in front of them ;-))

How do I follow THAT?

Enter Eliza, who (while playing outside) had ignored the inceasingly urgent signals from her bladder. She called to me - in distress - from the bathroom; for she had only made it to within two feet of the toilet and had wet herself -- all over their large bathroom rug.

This very kind family assured me that the rug needed laundering anyway.

Hmmmmm......

My judgment was therefore compromised when I agreed to go home just to change clothes and then continue on to the SECOND party to which we had been invited: Mexican Fiesta at Mobileholmes' house. I should have known better, for while the food was delicious, Ian and Lars got into a fist fight on their trampoline -- with other children next to them.

If I had had Ruby Slippers at 7:30 p.m., I would have clicked my heels and gone straight home....I felt like a field that had been plowed :-( -- let's just say there was no danger that I would have the false pride of a Pharisee on THAT day. I'm usually such a sucker for an Object Lesson - but this one made me want the Ruby Slippers; even ones several sizes too small - I would have crammed my feet inside and clicked wildly.

Today I made my children stay inside their individual rooms: solitary confinement. Eliza was grumpy enough this morning to warrant her own time-out.

And then it rained here, with big gray clouds and showers from heavy to light. And I loved it -- the rainy day is the perfect day to recover and hide a little from the world. It reminded me of home and I drank extra coffee, just because. I really do love the rain.

I'm still thinking about the Ruby Slippers, though. ;-)