Good morning, gentle readers. This morning has answered two crucial questions: 1) did the good folks at Typepad auto-renew my blog service even though the site has been inactive for oh-so long? Yes they did. 2) am I capable to letting Profound Journey Dialog things lie fallow on my desk and take the morning off? Yes I am. Hence the latte in my hand and my fingers on the keyboard.
I wanted to share just a bit about my struggle at the new job. This is a little embarrassing, but I've been surprised by the amount of pastoral-type care and concern that I've been called upon to deliver. Embarrassing, I say, because my employer is a church after all. Yet I think I had this illusion that I would be able to come in for my 15 hours, whip several educational programs into shape and remain untouched emotionally. I haven't been able to whip much of anything into shape and I've been bombarded with caretaking.
Confession time: I'm not all that good at caretaking. If there are any FHUMC Stephen Ministers reading, this isnot news to you. The language of specifically Christian caretaking has never come easy to me. Do you know the kind of phrases and conversations to which I'm referring? WHY is it that I can type 'to which' and it seems natural, but the personal prayers-and-blessings talk is so difficult?
"You've been in my prayers."
"Thank you for sharing the story of your grief."
"I'm here if you need someone."
I had the thought this weekend that maybe I haven't had enough heartache. I'm simply extraordinarily lucky or blessed or whatever, which is certainly true. Maybe. But this weekend I did happily observe myself rising to the occasion. Perhaps caregiving and the phraseology that accompanies it is like abdominal muscles. You just have to exercise them. During our weekend retreat called Profound Journey Dialog I did okay. There were 3 different women there who shared their emotional and spiritual pain in different ways. I'm guarding confidentiality here, so I can't express the most poignant details, but one woman had such an obvious 'tell' that she was in pain, it was difficult to speak with her without doing something.
The good news is... the 'something' I most wanted to do was to comfort her, not to escape from her pain. Thanks be to God.