Churched

From a young age, the boys eschewed Sunday school. They thought the other children were undisciplined and that the teachers were disorganized. We didn’t push it, and as long as they were well-mannered, they were welcome to sit with us.

When we moved to Sugar Land from Scotland, and when the time was right, I looked up the Sunday schedule at the nearest Episcopal church. We arrived a little before the service in order to settle in and get a sense of the ambience.

The aisles divided the sanctuary into quadrants and, after a quick scan, the four of us decided on a pew near the front on the left side. We trooped in that direction. The ceilings were high and they had modern sound equipment—big screens mounted at the front and an elevated stage for the musicians.

As the minutes passed, more and more people came in until there was not a vacant seat. David, Curtis, Sam, and I were sandwiched in the center of the fourth pew. The service started normally—a song, a joyful prayer, and then the readings.

Unbeknownst to us, however, was that this service with its impressive crowd represented the reopening of the church, which had been closed for several weeks. The reason for the closure became clear when the priest took the pulpit.

“What you, as a church, have gone through is nothing short of tragic.”

This is the way he began. He went on to say that he knew that the parishioners were bewildered and that their hearts were aching because sin had crept into their place of communal holiness. Then he transitioned into an explanation of temptation, which morphed naturally enough into a definition of sin. And then he moved into the weakness of the flesh, telling how everybody lusts—what?

The boys were eight and ten at the time. They blinked at the word “lust.” David and I exchanged questioning looks.  

“Is it more sinful for a priest to commit adultery than for one of you to do the same?” The priest raised an inquisitive brow, then continued, “More heartrending, perhaps, but we’ve already established that we all sin.”

The man talked about the pitfalls of rampant lust for forty-five minutes. And then he spent another fifteen speaking about mercy and forgiveness and healing.  

What I surmised was that this congregation’s priest had had an affair with one of the staff members. Both were married. Both had children. The priest gave up his calling. The woman’s marriage ended in divorce.

Heartrending indeed. And salacious.

In the beginning Sam and Curtis were patient, but after the first half hour, Curtis became censorious. As far as he knew, it was an unbreakable rule that sermons should last no longer than twenty minutes. Also, this was church and church was supposed to be about kindness and doing the right thing, and that guy oughtn’t to have been preaching about sex when there were kids present.

The boys began to fidget. David and I, too, were becoming antsy. We’d been sitting there for an hour and a half and we hadn’t even had communion yet. And with this many people, that could take another half hour. Our little foursome was very tense.

It was time for the offering. Oh dear. This would also take a long time.

When the brass plate came and I passed it to Curtis, he fumbled it. Money and checks went everywhere. And Curtis, mortified, began scrambling around, attempting to pick it all up. But no, I wasn’t having it. I took the plate from my son and handed it over to his father, who passed it on.

Then I stood and signaled my three beloveds, also, to stand; and, bumping against strangers’ knees, we stepped from the pew and moved quickly toward the exit while all eyes followed our progress. This had been a surreal and absurd experience. I was pressing my lips together to keep the laughter from escaping. But alas, sometimes laughter will not be quelled. A giggle became a cackle; then David released a hoot. We were all guffawing loudly as we pushed the doors open and escaped into the sunshine.

For those who haven’t heard, my novel Old Buildings in North Texas was on the Staff Picks shelf of Belgravia Books in London a while back—a very impressive literary book store. Yay me!

Pickleball Drama

We have a couple of sessions a week where a plethora of pickleballers show up and the courts are hopping. There’s no organizer and no plan, which is stressful for me as I do well in a disciplined environment and implode when chaos rules. But I like to play pickleball, so I escape the disarray by focusing on the ball and keeping score, and by playing tunes in my head—show tunes, classical, the top forty for the last fifty years—all stored to be pulled up at any time.

There seems to be an accepted way for women to conduct themselves on the court—women only; men would never behave this way. When someone makes a particularly spectacular shot, arms are thrown in the air and everyone cheers volubly. Joyful shrieks and gambols are involved. When a serve slips by the recipient, the person who lets the ball get past her calls out, “Good serve!” And I think—well, not really, it was just an ordinary serve that you for some reason couldn’t return. Also, every error is relived, sometimes clownishly reenacted, and praised. “Good idea,” a player will say to her partner when a dink hits the net instead of going over; or, “Great effort,” when the ball goes out. Everything on the court is about kindness, encouragement, and enthusiasm. All this baseless exultation is difficult for me to emulate because I’m not a giddy person.

Many of us have similar skill levels, though the tennis players are noticeably better; and occasionally someone shows up who has yet to learn the rules. When another player is extremely superior there’s not just one pickle, but pickle after pickle, which is disheartening. And when a beginner who must be instructed between every play joins us, that, too, is difficult to tolerate. Sadly, sometimes the extreme abilities override the songs in my head and I grumble, wanting everything to be the way I want it to be. That makes me the Trump of the pickleball court.

As you can imagine, in this setting many personalities are involved. In a game last week my partner and I were playing horribly. Every serve was met with an error—net balls, balls out of bounds, serves missed. As our opposing server racked up point after point, I commented to my partner that we were giving points away. The server on the other team, quite peeved, said, “Hey. I’m in the zone and I’m working hard here.” Though it was true that we were handing them the game and I’d heard others say the same thing, in retrospect I could see how it could be considered rude. And she seemed angry about it, so after the match I approached her intending to apologize, and was met with a look of hatred so evil that it gave me chills. “Whoa,” I said, abruptly stepping back. I was so shaken that I gathered my gear and went home. I had nightmares that night.

Another incident that left me shaken was when another player’s dog bit me. It’s not my business that she brings her cute little shiatzu to the court for two hours when the temperature’s already in the high nineties and is going to get hotter. While she prepared the dog’s area—setting out his water and hooking his leash to the fence—she let him run free. As I was passing through, on my way to the courts, the dog jumped up and latched on to my finger, teeth digging in and his whole little body hanging before he fell away. Startled, I gave an “Ow.” Then, in an understandably agitated state, I called to the woman, “Hey, your dog bit me.” By the time I put my racket, visor, and water on a bench, blood was pooling in my palm. Trying to keep it from dripping all over the court, I headed toward the pro shop to beg a band-aide. Meanwhile, the woman had gathered her and her dog’s things and was also aiming toward the exit. Ten feet in front of me, her shoulders were rigid and her fury was palpable. “You don’t need to leave,” I told her. “I’m not mad. I understand dogs.” I also understand that her dog shouldn’t be there, had no desire to be there, and that her bringing him was an act of cruelty. She ignored me, continuing in her forward movement.

If my dog had bitten someone I would have at least called afterward to make sure she was okay. Hell, I’d have sent flowers. But what she did instead is quit coming. 

“Did she stop coming because her dog bit me?” I asked one of the other women.

“She thinks you’re a negative force.”

The biting dog woman is popular amongst the other women and now, because of me, she no longer comes. And I am a negative force. It’s a topsy-turvy world.

So my way of handling things with these two enemies I have inadvertently made is to wait until the last minute to put my name on the roster. And if the woman who gave me the evil look has signed up, or if the woman with the dog has signed up, I don’t go to pickleball that day.

Honest to God, it’s junior high all over again.

The Woman in Front of Me

The people who have early flights from Iceland are dropped off at the airport, and those of us who will depart later are loaded on to a bus for a final excursion. First stop, the Viking Museum, where we’re to spend forty-five minutes. Though I’m certain it’ll be boring, it turns out that there’s one thing kind of cool about it, which is that a longship is suspended from the ceiling. Access is on the second floor, so I go on up, clamber into it, and spend a delightful five minutes fantasizing that I’m a conquering Viking. To my surprise, no one else seems interested in exploring the boat.

As I’m walking down the stairs, I meet a woman ascending.

“The ship’s kind of fun,” I tell her.

“Oh honey,” she responds. “It’s scrawny compared to the one I saw in Norway.”

Her tone is uppity. She’s doing that thing tourists do where they show off how much they’ve traveled, and prattle on about what they saw in which country. David and I learned long ago not to enter into these competitions—the same way we learned not to discuss our brilliant children with the parents of other kids. Other people simply can’t top us, and there’s no joy in pointing it out.

When we return to the bus we’re told that we’ll be traveling ninety minutes to see a geyser. A few people behind me moan. We’ve seen plenty of geysers. This is the second day of a miserable cold for me, and as soon as the engine roars to life I shut my eyes, planning to catch a nap. But the woman in front of me starts sharing her thoughts with her husband. I admire the way she talks, low-pitched and slow as syrup—Alabama is my guess.

“Home tonight,” she says. Then again, “Home tonight. I want my bed. Oh, I want my bed. And then tomorrow I’ve got to get groceries and pick up Baby from Barkingham Palace. Groceries and Baby. Barkingham Palace. I signed her up for a bath and she’ll be soft and clean. This was a good trip. Oh, the food was so good. That’s what I look forward to when we take a cruise—the good food.”

Throughout this there is no response from the husband. She continues.

“And then day after tomorrow I’ve got that dental appointment. For a cleaning. A cleaning. I hope I get that other gal this time. She was nice. The last one was harsh with the floss. Harsh. I need to call Millie May about that book. Oh, that book. She wants to recommend it for our book group but I don’t know if it’s too controversial. There’s so much political turmoil these days. So much political turmoil.”

She’s incessant. She drones on as I lean my head against the window and fall asleep. She’s still talking when, an hour later, we roll to a stop.

It looks like David also had a snooze. As he’s coming awake, I lean toward him and ask in a whisper—Have you been listening to this woman? His response: I’ve been trying not to.

Some people get off to go look at yet another eruption, and some stay put. I elect to remain, as does the couple in front.

“You need to get off and go to the restroom,” the woman tells her husband, who obediently rises, dons his coat, and shuffles toward the exit. Then, though he’s gone, she continues her monologue.

“Where is it?” she asks as she lifts herself taller so she can view her husband as he walks away. “Where’s the men’s? There it is. A line. Oh, a long line. Get in the line! Go ahead! Okay, he’s in line. All these buses. All these buses. No wonder there’re so many in the line. I don’t know about that book Minnie May suggested. Maybe I’ll talk to Carla about. Has Carla read it? I don’t know. I don’t know. What’s he doing? He’s getting out of the line! No. Get back in line! He’s coming back.”

Pretty soon he appears in the doorway and makes his way back to his seat, but she won’t let him claim it.

“What are you doing? Why did you get out of line? You need to go to the restroom. Oh, you need to go. Go. Get back in the line.”

With a shrug, he turns away. Once again, she watches him leave, then keeps watch.

“Good. That’s good. Get in the line.”

Later, as we’re heading back to Reykjavik, we pass a grocery store with a dancing pig on the front. The woman says, “Dancing pig. Dancing pig.”

At the airport, as we’re waiting to hand over our baggage, I give her repetitive way of speaking a try.

“Icelandair,” I say, then again, “Icelandair.” Then, “American Airlines. American Airlines.”

The repetition is bizarrely comforting and, even more bizarrely, addicting.

“Stop it,” I say. “Stop it.”

In our cabin on one of the dressy evenings.

Another one of the many beautiful faces of Iceland.

The Iceland Tour

There’s a reason why tourists flock. There are some places in the world that are so breathtaking, so humbling, that they simply must be experienced. Iceland is one of those places. There is no landscape your eyes light upon that is not stunning. Volcanos, old and new, in the distance—majestic, ominous. Massive lava chunks dragged downward by glaciers—dogged gravitas. A mossy vale with trickling brooks—fairy knoll. Pounding rivers—deafening percussion; steam floating from fissures—affable ghosts.

Magma flowing, molten; cooling, drying, scored by ever downward drifting mountains of ice. Tectonic plates crashing, disparate angles rising, faces forming—craggy noses, ancient jowls, vexed brows. What is today may be gone tomorrow. Dynamic Iceland.

Yesterday in Reykjovik we were wearing short sleeves, but today, hiking the five-mile perimeter of Grimsey Island, we wear layers that come on and go off and come back on depending on whether we’re trudging up or picking our way down. It’s forty-five degrees, wind at forty miles an hour. Nesting on the cliffs, thousands of puffins rise high and drop low, go out and come back. They really are cute birds, with their orange-red curved beaks. Their small wings flap frantically, likewise making me frantic—Come on little birds! You can make it! At some point we wander into the arctic circle, which is no colder than it was five steps ago.  

Iceland is all about volcanos, one of which erupted upon our arrival. In our various buses we zig-zag all around the thing, always keeping it at a distance, with each local guide telling us how impressed we should be by the tiny puff of white floating peacefully above a faraway mountaintop.

Iceland is an environmentally conscientious country. Its citizens eschew plastic in all its forms and prefer electric cars; and a large portion of their energy is harvested from their unique geothermal resources, about which they are smug: they are able to do that which no other country can—function efficiently.

As we cross the country and the guides pour information into brains that’re numb from receiving too much knowledge—and also, what we really care about is what we will have for dinner, for the chef on the boat is truly gifted—they tell us that the main industry in Iceland is agriculture. Hah. The massive vehicles rolling up to every mildly notable volcanic peak, crater, and geyser clearly tell us that the most profitable industry in this country is tourism.

We arrive at another island, Heimaey, which is known for a volcano that erupted here in 1973; I recall that the thick ash it belched out caused all the airports in Europe to close. On the whole island, only one person died, whom, it was widely assumed, had been passed out drunk. The islanders excavated one of the destroyed homes and built a small museum around it. We’re dropped off there and told to spend an hour learning about volcanos—and I think how I’d rather pluck every hair from my head than contemplate volcanos for sixty minutes. Later, our guide, a cocky twenty-two-year-old, climbs a cliff and swings around on a rope, demonstrating the locally popular skill of robbing nests; later he will sing us a rather romantic Icelandic song. He tells a story of the 1973 evacuation—people woken from their beds in the dark of night, the elderly taken out on a plane, only to find that they’d all been pulled from their blankets and led out in such a hurry that they didn’t have time to get their dentures. So a helpful policeman was tasked with fetching all the false teeth, which he dropped in a bag and sent along. The notion of how they straightened that out is amusing and we all chuckle.

For our next excursion, we hike to a lovely waterfall, a place for taking pictures. Halfway back the swift wind blows rain straight at our faces. We put our heads down, shiver, and hurry. Luckily, I wore the rain pants I purchased especially for this purpose. For hiking in Iceland rain gear and hiking boots are a necessity. Simply do not go there without these things. An umbrella? Useless. It’ll explode inside out in two seconds.

On the way back to the boat we stop by an artic fox refuge, where two rescued foxes huddle in their shelter, staying out of the icy wind. The attendant tells us that these animals represent the only wild mammals on the island—and in the next breath, she tells us that the foxes eat mice—and I think hmm.

We take a bath in a hot spring, which feels good and which David says smells like poisonous gas. The others in the group don’t want to hear about poison or gas. When we get back on the bus we’re all warm and relaxed and our skin feels new.

A few facts: Our small ship is owned by a French company, Ponant; the senior staff is French with the occasional German thrown in; servers and cleaners are mostly well-trained Philippinos. There are a hundred and forty-eight passengers and a hundred and fifteen crew members. The name of our ship is Le Ballot. Like any sensible person, I pronounce it the way it looks. Not so, the captain, who in a nasally worshipful tone, pronounces it Loobaloo. Cracks me up every time.

The touring company that has pulled us all together here is Tauck, pronounced Towk, which is owned and operated by the Tauck family out of Wilton, Connecticut. Every passenger on board is here with this company. It’s my understanding that Tauck doesn’t always exclusively occupy an entire vessel, but this is our second cruise with Tauck and that’s been the case both times. Tauck’s guides are charming and sincere in their desire to please, and, from my conversations with them, think that to achieve guide status in this company is to reach the pinnacle of their profession.

I highly recommend the Iceland experience; and if you haven’t thought about taking a Tauck tour, I advise you to consider it. If you’re going to do a thing, why not do it in the best way possible?  

The two walls mark the clash between the Northern American tectonic plate and the Eurasian tectonic plate. The crevices were quite deep in some places and it was really cool to walk around in there.

Halfway back from this waterfall the wind and rain pounded us.

Beautiful pictures everywhere you look.