A funeral hangs by a thread. Or, the Seinfeld version of a solemn occasion.

    When the service ended, I walked through the church doors and down the front steps, and there stood Samuel (not his real name), waiting for mourners to pass. Samuel is an attractive, fifty-ish guy who sometimes drops in on our Sunday sermons. He is a friend, but technically, he is a member of the congregation, or used to be. Like so many others, he became restless and moved to a different pew in a different church.

    If this had been a normal day and not a solemn one, I would have jokingly asked Samuel, "How's business?" But on this day, I refrained and greeted him with understated fare, ignoring my urge to say something clever about his line of work. This time, I let it slide, for understandable reasons. 

Never trust a mountain to keep a secret

    On the way to a family reunion in North Carolina, I diverted to Colfax to pick up some riders. (By the way, if you are not from Colfax, you are likely misprouncing it. Locals say Call-fax, not Cole-fax.)

    I arrived at my niece's house and was soon on the road again with eight-months-pregnant Layne riding shotgun and her young son in the back seat. Layne and I live in different states and have few chances for face-to-face interactions, so we planned to take full advantage of this jaunt from her house to the top of a mountain.

    The dialogue from that day is gone like the wind, but I imagine that as soon as I put the car in drive, we dove into something akin to transforming our marriages into perfect ones, strategizing relationships at work, or figuring out God, once and for all. I do remember that as the wheels of my car rolled over I-40, the wheels of our minds were turning just as fast. We lost ourselves in deep conversation, and we would soon find out we were lost in more ways than one.

From Chaos to Connection

 

    My niece announced on social media that she wrote and published a book. When I read the post, I reacted with quiet jealously. I coiled inside myself like nine-year-old me when my friend stepped onto the school bus wearing the prettiest dress I had ever seen -- clumps of purple grapes and green leaves splashed against an off-white fabric.

    I am not proud of those reactions. For now, I will skip over the childhood longings and move on to my niece's exciting, shattering news. Before my readers flail me with a big stick, please know that I congratulated Lori, and that I created my own social media post touting her accomplishment, so my friends could see. 

    Nevertheless, I felt a twinge of despair, and this is why: