Home-y

I have been to a Friends Meeting four(!) times up north and I like it. It's a different group of folks than the one I mentioned here. The first hour is unprogrammed and then there is a coffee hour and then another hour of education or discussion. I even went to a potluck for the 18-35 yr olds for the IL yearly meeting.* As I am at the top of that age range I felt like I needed to be responsible and bring a main dish which was a good thing. Lots of sides. It was really good to meet and have more meaningful conversations with younger folks. Some of the younger ones had clearly all grown up together and it made me think of the friends that I have because of camp and yearly meeting. It made me smile even if I was a bit of an outsider.

I have felt very comfortable at this meeting. (Beyond the regular queries of whether I am related to another person in the meeting who happens to share my surname. "No, not all people with the same last name are related." It's just kind of telling as far as diversity goes. Not very many non-white folks in the mix.) Not everyone there thinks the way I do. Not everyone there is a Christian. But that's OK. I know that God is at work. I love the wisdom that is shared. I remember in Kansas there there were a couple of older (75+) folks that would, each week, share something that they had learned or been shown. And these people exist in this meeting as well. I don't have to seek them out for their nuggets of wisdom or insight. I get a weekly dose of it because the space has been created for them to share it. How much of what people should share goes unsaid because there isn't a space for it?

People have been very welcoming. Always happy to have a chat during coffee hour. I suppose that's what it's there for. A lady gave me a hard time two weeks ago telling me that I needed to make myself a name tag. She had seen me there two weeks in a row. So I did.

I have a name tag. At a church.


*I don't know exactly how to explain yearly meeting... It's how Friends churches organize themselves. Sometimes yearly meetings cover several states like the one I grew up in (Kansas, OK, TX) or just the one. Also they have different religious and political views. Again, the one I grew up in was very evangelical, less political, Christian. It doesn't seem to follow that the IL Yearly Meeting is any of those things. Ah the joy of being a Quaker.

Thrifting Thursday - aminals

Avon made some excellent perfume bottles. I'm assuming these are both Avon. I didn't check but I think it's a safe thing to say. We have a wee dog and owl.


They serve no purpose, I just like them.

I also have second-hand (or third) cats. I often wonder what their lives were like before they came home with me. Actually, I know the folks that had Leo before me. But Lilly, she's just the sweetest thing with her back-laying, purring, sassy cat-ness. How could they send her to the pound? Her records when I got her indicated that when she was initially dropped off she might have been pregnant, was under-weight, and had some eye infection. But perhaps she was meant to be mine and it just took her some time to make it to her real home.

Anyways, gratuitous cat photos here. Leo is trying to chill on my lap and Lilly is clearly fucking with him. His tail was twitching so enticingly. I suppose that's how it goes with siblings.

Going away and coming back again

A lot of time with three fun boys and talking with their mom and dad. We worry about our families. We wish we had more time together. We wonder about what the next steps will be.

I tried to persuade the oldest boy to come back to Chicago with me. He thought I should move there.

I took my time driving home. I stopped for thrift stores or nice barns. I watched vultures circling and tried not to end up in the ditch. Farmers were working in the fields getting them ready for crops.

My heart went pitterpatter when the Chicago skyline came into view. It really is beautiful. Maybe it's not time to leave yet.

Everything could be different

Before I went to see The Brother, the work week was pretty craptacular. And not just for me. There was shouting at meetings where I wasn't present. There was treatment like gum on the bottom of shoe. There was plenty of ugliness going around. Those of us that left for a bit during spring break were pretty happy to get away for a while.

And then a dear friend sent me a job posting. It was a job posting somewhere that I would have never thought I would work. But it was still in the education area and was interesting enough to think "Huh. Maybe." Another city. Another experience. But friends nearby.

So I applied. Recommendations were requested and given. I investigated school possibilities, cost of living, all of that good stuff. But I had enough questions about the position and organization that I was a bit unsettled. Today I heard a bit more about the wage for the job, wage not salary. I can take a pay hit. I realize that living almost anywhere else costs less than living in my dear Chicago. But it would be too much of a hit. So I asked to be removed from consideration for the job.

It was certainly an interesting exercise.