Looking at horse auctions in church and dead silence eventually overtook me and I looked up to find Sam staring at me. He made a curt reminder to put phones and devices away, that we might be the better for it if we were engaged and in the moment more instead of virtually parking our brains.
Yes, Dad.
Loch nudges me hard and holds out his hand. I surrender my phone and sigh, settling back to listen to the pre-pre-pre advent service in which we are reminded to find the spirit early and hold on to it tightly in the midst of a psychological war to appeal to our consumerist, excessive sides. A reminder to exist within our means but fully explore them with God in mind.
A real hell of a fundy sermon for Sam this morning, who is still kind of losing it here. I'm not sure if it's relief because Matt is gone or sheer panic because..well, he's gone. Every time I try to talk to Sam he flips the conversation around and tries to make it all about me and we get nowhere.
Batman leans in toward my right ear and asks What kind of church this is again?
Roman Catholic, I say while staring straight ahead. Loch stifles a huge laugh on my left and PJ kicks our feet under the pew from behind. If I start giggling now we'll all be goners and Sam will be even more weird so instead in my mind I formulate a plan on how I'm going to spend the afternoon once lunch is cleaned up. New Jake invited me to go for one final ride on the Sunbeam before he takes it apart and stores it for winter but instead I think I'll take the other bottle of Laphroaig and lie on the garage floor and talk to ghosts for the rest of the day.
I bend my head forward and look down toward the end of the pew on the right and there's Caleb looking back. He shakes his head once to the side to indicate No, you won't and I slouch down further in my seat and try and focus on Sam, who's now heading into Baptist territory. He likes to make everyone comfortable (even people who aren't even held hostage by him today, people out in the rain) and so he takes his own advice to explore all aspects of the Christian faith, whether we want to join him or not. Choose your own adventure, he says to warm laughter.
I pick Lochan's pocket and he grins as I go back to looking at horse auctions. It's better than listening to patchwork religion, frankly. I think Sam's pinwheeling for answers and it's so obvious it's rather painful to watch today.
