I was involved in a discussion about religion at work recently (always a good idea) and someone said, “I’ve met better people at the local bar than I’ve ever met at church.”  I almost asked him if he grew up in the same town I did.  These days, I’m a member of a church teeming with quality people.  As in, I’d enjoy hanging out with them at the local bar.  In my life, though, not all of my favorites have a working relationship with Jesus.  One day, I’d love to introduce them to him because I like them both so much and I just know they’d get along.  In the meantime, I’m enjoying their company.

Last weekend, the BF and I took the 7:47 am train from Grand Central to Poughkeepsie to attend the funeral of my brother-in-law’s aunt.  The sister of my Yankee Mom.  On the way, I thought about the earrings I’d given her in the Christmas swap this year (tucked into a picture of Tom Cruise) and how unfair it was that she barely got to wear them.  How unfair it is that she’ll never meet her grandchildren.  And yet in the heat of a crowded-to-standing-room-only church on Saturday, with The Sis (slight baby bump intact) on one side of me and the BF on the other, I realized that we’ll all be facing goodbyes at some point.  And they will all seem unfair.  This is what we get for loving people.

Before I write myself into jumping off the Brooklyn Bridge, let me get to the flip side of love.  The good stuff.  All my life, I’ve been surrounded by people who both believe in me and put up with me–equally daunting challenges.  I think about how I told my parents, when I was seventeen, that I wanted to switch high schools my senior year. They looked at what I’d be giving up: valedictorian status on the one hand, daily threat of death by gang violence on the other.  Then they cashed in some bonds and re-enrolled me across town.  Cut to ten years later, when I knew that my wandering instinct was not going anywhere and I told them it was leading me to New York. They showed up to pack the U-Haul and The Mom rode beside me for a thousand miles, then said goodbye and headed to LaGuardia with tears in her eyes.  The Dad grew accustomed to opening his loan ledger around April 15 each year, even though his doctor daughter was thirty by now and really should be able to pay her own bills (he may have mentioned so).

Which brings me to that Yankee Mom and Dad, and the relationships I would not have today had The Mom and Dad not shown up to pack me up and ship me north. For the past five years, I’ve had a second family an hour outside the city who welcome me with open arms whenever I hop on the train and show up at their doorstep.  They are the kind of people, unlike me, to whom warmth and acceptance come naturally. They think I’m great, which has always baffled me (at one point I actually asked The Sis, “Why do they like me so much?”.  Her reply:  “I have no idea.”) But they laugh at my jokes, buy me champagne, make me cookies, and let me put my feet on the coffee table as I burrow underneath their blankets.  And they were my biggest cheerleaders when I met the BF and then Brought Him Home to them, where they accepted him, dirty socks on the counter included, just because I said he was okay.  Then the Yankee Mom asked when we were going to give her some grandchildren.

What a gift it is to be believed in.  No wonder God counts it as righteousness.  A few weeks ago, AC sat across the table from me at California Pizza Kitchen (our favorite restaurant, duh) and, with the finesse of a corporate CEO, outlined a strategy for me to make my writing project more than a file on my computer.  She followed up with an email full of links and names and it was clear that she wouldn’t leave me alone until I had followed through on believing in myself as much as she believes in me. Kind of like my soon-to-be brother and sister-in-law, who recently purchased me a website where I can display my words on my own terms because they like this little blog.  What?! Talk about humbling.  Not to mention this year’s New Favorite People Awards.

After the memorial service we all went back to the house and hung out in the backyard, exchanging memories and just being together in the spring sun.  Less than a year ago, we were all in the same place celebrating the Yankee Cousin’s wedding.  As we drove away this visit, the Yankee Brother said that at one point he looked around at everyone and was just really happy, forgetting for a second why we were all there.  Because these are the same people we mark any important event with, be it celebration or loss.  There is a thin line between the two in terms of attendance. The people who believe always manage to show up.

Today I am thinking of resurrections and messes. Because yesterday, we celebrated the former and today, I am a picture of the latter.

Sitting on my fire escape just a few minutes ago (a.k.a. my daily communion with nature) I watched as multiple cars tried, one after the other, to fit into a parking spot along the curb.  The spot was inches too short for each car, and watching their struggle from above made me wonder if this is how God feels most of the time, eyeing us as we flounder around life then pick a spot to land that doesn’t fit us at all when he already has an empty lot waiting around the corner that suits us perfectly.  Instead of consulting him, we hem and haw, preen and peck, forward and reverse, bang and bump our way into realizing we don’t know what the hell we’re doing.  Maybe we catch a glimpse of him smiling and we whine, “What’s so funny?” and start to think that he’s leveled his magnifying glass at us once more, just aching to fry us good, when really we’re the ones who are making life so tough.  But that smile is in no part laughter at our expense, rather it is the same look he gave to the rich young ruler who defended himself with examples of how clean he had kept his life.  He looked at him and loved him.  Because even though Jesus knew what would happen next–that the young man would walk away from him rather than walk away from his own money–he loved the kid.  So much for keeping life clean, though.

Yesterday I listened to beautiful music accompanied by eternal truth and the predominant thought in my mind was, Please don’t let me start choking on my own snot.  The coughing has not let up–yet–and until it does I am reduced to dirty tissues, gagging, wheezing, and general unhealth and unprettiness.  I’m too tired to even try: try sounding like some creature other than a goat; try covering the sounds of hacking up phlegm in the bathroom; try being anything other than wrecked and helpless.

The Good News I believe, that whole “resurrection” caveat to Christianity that makes it different from anything else out there, is that God can do a whole lot more with my messes than my attempts to appear clean.  My perfectionism got me good grades in school but in walking with him, it’s nothing more than a liability to fully embracing grace.  Not to mention a waste of time and effort.  All the imperfections I try to hide or fix are raw material in his hands, and with them he can use me in ways he can’t use anyone else.  Just like everyone else.  Yesterday the BF and his parents and I saw Wicked and I was reminded once again why it doesn’t always pay to be the prom queen.  My various forms of green skin have a reason.

The Resurrection is slightly more than an excuse to hide eggs.  It only changes everything.  Any event that can turn death from an end to an intermission is worth thinking about.  Not to mention sickness, failure, loss–they all look different if he really did come back.  I’m not a fan of trite phrases, but this one has some merit: It will all turn out for good in the end.  If it’s not good, then it’s not the end. Hey, it’s better than everything happens for a reason.  The Sis and I have been laughingly lobbing that one at each other the past few days as I gasp for air and she hates her job.  Which doesn’t take away from the fact that everything DOES happen for a reason, but the statement implies that the only missing step between us and happiness is finding that reason.  And sometimes that’s just none of our damn business right now.  There is someone who has a complete view of things, and he is at the parking lot around the corner saving you a spot–your spot–if you’d like to meet him.  He may not tell The Sis why her job sucks so horribly right now, or tell me why I have to fight a battle for possession of my lungs, or tell my Yankee fam why cancer had to claim one of their best.  But what he does say, with the Resurrection, is that none of that is the end of the story.  There is, now, always a yet.  The stone will be rolled away, the water will be turned into wine (thank God, I am so missing my nightly glass of red), and everything sad will come untrue.  An empty tomb says so.

This morning my lungs were my alarm clock, hacking violently against my ribcage in an exercise they’ve been perfecting the past couple of days.  I waited for the spasm to end.  It didn’t.  I sat up, hoping that would help. It didn’t.  Finally I gave in and headed to the bathroom to expel whatever my respiratory system had diagnosed as foreign material.  Then I climbed back into bed, feeling quite sorry for myself on such a lovely spring morning.

A few minutes later, the phone rang and I saw my brother-in-law’s name on the caller ID.  “It’s bad news, isn’t it?” was my greeting and he answered in the affirmative.  The world lost a wonderful woman this morning when his aunt passed away after a long battle with the big C.  She possessed the sort of elegance that allowed her to make statements like, “That Tom Cruise is such an asshole,” and still sound as if she were conversing over tea with the Queen of England.  And she laughed at my jokes, even the crude ones, which always endears me to a person.  I heard of her battle in spurts over the phone and email, so my separation kept my coward ass from having to feel it deeply.  But this morning, when the news came as I had just finished asking God for a relief from my own temporary discomfort, I felt humility pretty deeply.

This latest illness of mine has banished me to my shoebox apartment at a time when spring is finally threatening to stay, the BF’s parents are in town, and the river would be a glorious place for a run.  Thankfully I have The Roommate, whose sense of rebellion mirrors mine: we toyed with the idea of sitting in a movie theater all day while the sun blazed outside, then settled for a trip to Rite Aid to stock up on Easter candy.  Now she’s playing Justin Bieber songs just to piss me off.  Thankfully I also have the fire escape, where if I squint my eyes just so, the cherry blossoms will appear to be a cloud that I am resting upon and Anne Lamott’s words are my company.  Along with the riff raff of 29th Street, which included a man pacing the block while screaming on his phone, “You never LISTEN TO ME!  Why won’t you just LISTEN TO ME!” and a dude who looked like Jacob in New Moon pre-haircut, forty years later.  And then there was the reflection of the lights bouncing off apartment windows and hitting the black asphalt, reminding me of all the light to come in the next couple of seasons…which I will not be experiencing just from my fire escape. Even if today, I don’t have the lung capacity to walk or run the city like it deserves for its good behavior.  This is a day of loss and sickness, but it is a season of open tombs and new life.  You can’t have one without the other.

Now excuse me while I hack up a piece of lung.  Then I have to help the Roommate don her Mad Hatter costume.  Some brokers are coming by to look at our apartment with potential renters.

“I cannot go to school today,” said little Peggy Ann McKay.

Why are sick days so much more fun when you’re a kid?  I remember my devotion to finding creative ways to stay home from school.  Pushing the toothbrush into the Gag Zone so I would throw up a little; sticking the thermometer under a lamp when The Mom and Dad weren’t looking. And on the rare days these tricks worked, I was rewarded with Saltines, Ginger Ale, TV, and a caregiver at my beck and call.

Damn rain-soaked pants.  This morning I went to the NYU nurse’s office to get two things: cough drops, and assurance that I am not a victim of 2010 Swine Flu.  I got two things: cough drops, and a command to go home.  I just got sent home from work.  Hell yeah, I texted The Sis, The Roommate, and The BF.  Now it’s six hours later and I am bored out of my mind.  Plus, I don’t remember sickness hurting so much when I was a kid.  Back then, all I could think about was what my sick day got me out of: teachers, dodgeball, schoolwork.  Now all I can think about is what being sick keeps me from getting to do: run, talk normally, feel like a human being.

The Sis got a big laugh out of my voice when she called.  I sound like a cross between Marlee Matlin and a donkey.  She humored me with an email recounting her shopping trip this morning:

What’s with people writing checks?  I mean, I do not understand how I have this uncanny knack at getting behind people in line writing a check at the store.  Even the express lane, where Publix clearly has a sign, “No checks, please.”  I stand there and watch these people slowly write out the check, then enter the amount in their register, then ever so slowly and carefully, tear the check out of the checkbook.  I mean, it takes so much longer!  I know I’m not the world’s most patient person by a long shot, but seriously.  I just want to say to these people, “Ever hear of a debit card, asshole?”

Seriously.  And though normally I would totally sympathize, now I’m just jealous that she feels well enough to go to the store.  Meanwhile, I’m sitting here with an appetite for only Gatorade and Peeps, and it turns out there is nothing but trash on TV during the day! And WHERE IS MY CAREGIVER??!!

There is so much I need to get done that I just don’t have the energy to tackle.  “I am not good at being sick,” I told the BF last night.  I loathe any situation that reminds me of my weakness, my inability to control everything around me.  There is a bathroom to be cleaned, an apartment to be packed, a manuscript to be finished, and–finally–beautiful weather to be enjoyed.  And I’m not up for any of it.  I finally worked up the energy to tackle one thing on the to-do list: grab my Bible and pick verses to be read at the wedding.  Enter Caregiver.  In a beautiful symmetry, plunging into those pages reminded me of the morning of my engagement, when I had a feeling and knew that such a day could only be started in one way.  So I let all my favorite words sink in, and though my joints still ache and I’m feeling a wave of Peep Nausea, I know I’m taken care of. Especially when the BF texted to let me know that he would cook dinner tonight. Now I just have to convince him that love means carrying me down three flights of stairs…

I have to laugh when I pick a category for each blog entry and end up checking the box beside “I Heart NY.”  Because so many of my blogs lately, though centering around my life in this city, are about my frustration with it.  The BF and I have gotten into a habit of sending each other a one-word text when things here are rough: Atlanta. Sometimes we elaborate: This weather blows. Atlanta. My boss just told me the presentation is due by 5 pm.  Atlanta. If one more parent shows up late and gives me attitude about not seeing her child, I’m going to…Atlanta.

The nasty weather has been the inspiration for most of those texts lately.  Thank God and my Yankee Mom for the sunflower umbrella.  It has truly gotten the hell beaten out of it over the past few months.  As have I, I sometimes feel. Like this morning, when I arrived at the office after a thirty-minute walk through a rain and wind tunnel otherwise known as Second Avenue.  Usually Tuesdays are a patient-free zone–such is the charm of my working life here in New York.  But wouldn’t you know, the day I decided to say, “Screw it, I’m not dressing nicely to sit in front of a computer,” and proceeded to put on my ripped jeans and oops-it-shrunk-in-the-wash green knit shirt (hello boobs, when did you get here?) is the day I roll up to that computer and find a full schedule.  As I read that schedule, wavering between screaming and crying, my sopping-wet jeans dripped on the carpet and my hair floated around my head in a frizz fro.  Naturally, I had not brought any shoes other than my rubber boots.  Seriously?!

So I scrapped my plans to run in Central Park and catch up on Us Weekly and prayed instead.  It went a little something like this: “God, seriously?  This weather is absolutely horrible.  And I hate everything right now.  So you’re going to have to show me, very clearly, that you are bigger than what’s going on outside and the schedule in front of me.  And just to get a head start, the rest of the week looks even worse with all the public schools being on Spring Break and so many kids likely to show up at NYU that it will be a total cluster.  So, like I said, be bigger. Than all of it.  Amen.”

Then I set about finding reinforcements: reading KA’s blog (which reminded me that we are approaching Good Friday and a couple thousand years ago, Jesus had a much worse week than I did); asking for AC’s recommendation on some pre-Easter devotions.  And then I waited for Him to show up.

My first patient was accompanied by one of those rarities in New York: a totally down-to-earth mother.  She noticed my ring and got genuinely excited for me, asking about plans and reminding me to enjoy it.  (Thanks, God.)  The Chinese food I ordered for lunch came an hour late and with a fortune cookie that told me I have “a quiet and unobtrusive nature.”  (You know me better than that. I’ll keep waiting.) The Sis called on my way to the gym, laughing about how funny Ellen Degeneres is. Then she called back two minutes later to inform me that she had a confession. When Ellen was dancing around in the audience, The Sis noticed one dude sitting still while everyone around him was standing and having fun.  “And I just thought, how rude!  You can’t even bother getting up?  Then I realized he was in a wheelchair.”  I told her the same thing happened to me at church the other night when the woman in front of me didn’t stand for the hymn and I silently judged her until I saw the huge walking cane in front of her.  “Sometimes I think God loves us into being better people by showing us what assholes we are right now,” I told The Sis.  (Yep. You’re even bigger than my bad words and questionable theology.)  Then I had a voicemail from The Mom who was calling to let me know that she, dad, and Fred all love me.  Fred is my parents’ dog.  (You again, minus the creepy dog.)  Add to all that the Facebook comments and other general hilarity provided by the people in my circle.  (You, You, You, You…)

When I let go of being a slave to my own agenda, it’s amazing how everything can go “wrong” and I still have a good day.  As if God isn’t bigger than a spring storm and wet jeans.  Next challenge: God versus pneumonia.

The highlights of the past weekend for the BF and me were a Redeemer-sponsored premarital seminar and the movie Hot Tub Time Machine.  And that, I believe, tells you all you need to know about our relationship.

But in the interest of extending the length of this post, allow me to elaborate.  Saturday morning we headed out at the insane hour of 8:30 (which I’m sure will one day look like sleeping in) across town to the church offices, where the seminar was held.  Just north of 36th Street on Broadway, Redeemer sits in that delightful (read: not delightful) area of town called Herald Square. Otherwise seen on all of your televisions in November as the endpoint of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.  We headed past the windows of that landmark store, grasping our Dunkin’ Donuts coffee and munchkins in the frigid air left by the robbery of last weekend’s spring.  After amiably discussing the weather for the duration of the fifteen-minute walk (“THIS IS BULLSHIT!”…”IS THIS WIND SUPPOSED TO BE AN EFFING JOKE?  I HATE EVERYTHING!”), we looked to our left and saw that Macy’s had not acquiesced to spring’s disappearance. Filling six huge picture windows were gardens of various flowers, each with a voiced-over narration.  For once we were running early, so we took our time to watch and listen. When we arrived at the fourth window and its spectacular explosion of hydrangeas, I excitedly reminded the BF that this would be the dominant flower at our wedding, and he gamely (and wisely) pretended to share my excitement.  Then he fed me a munchkin and we headed inside to the seminar.

There are plenty more enjoyable ways to spend six hours of a Saturday than sitting in a lecture room talking about all the issues you’ll face as a married couple.  But walking outside in frigid temperatures is not one, so we had that working in our favor.  Also, we didn’t have to interact with anyone besides each other, and the BF and I appreciated this since we are not big fans of strangers (we have a hard enough time keeping in touch with the people we do know).  The lecturer opened with the line, “If I can break you up today, then that’s what I hope to do.”  The BF and I grinned at each other, eyes wide as we thought the same thing: This is gonna get raw!  Bring it!  Make somebody CRY! (Caffeine can only keep you awake so long.) But there turned out to be laughter rather than tears, and for the next few hours we heard some plainly-delivered truth on the reality of spending your life with someone and just how messy that can get.  There were a few exercises that we were assigned to spread out and tackle on our own.  One of them involved rating your partner’s ten best characteristics, which took me about fifteen seconds.  When the BF shared his list with me, I alternated between feeling joyfully flattered and profoundly humbled. I mean, every girl likes to hear that her beloved thinks she has a nice ass.  But he also referred to my honesty (funny, others have always called it bitchiness) and the fact that I don’t take myself too seriously.  If you had known me five years ago…I thought, giving God a mental high-five over this blessing he keeps giving me, a man who rounds out my rough edges and brings out the best of who I am, of who I want to be. Not to mention his nice ass.

Then on Sunday morning we hit the half-price matinee for a viewing of this year’s instant classic, the aptly and spoiler-alertly-titled Hot Tub Time Machine.  (When the Sis later asked what it was about, I asked if she was joking and referred her back to the title.  We’re not talking hidden meanings and subtle nuances here.)  For the next two hours, we appreciated a lack of hidden meanings and subtle nuances.  And we laughed.  Really laughed.

And then we ended the weekend with our usual last stop, Tim Keller and his consistent wisdom delivered on 69th and Park at Hunter College.  This week Jesus showed up in a big way for me as Tim talked on my favorite passage in the Bible (Luke 4:16-20) and its parallel passage in Isaiah 61:1-2.  The Old Testament verses are a prophecy; the New Testament verses recount how Jesus showed up at the temple, read that prophecy, sat down (!), and basically said, “Yeah, those verses you just heard?  They’re talking about ME.”  Except he left out the part about vengeance, because he already had plans to cover that for us himself.  AWESOME.

Then on the subway, the BF and I were doing our usual talking and laughing thing when He showed up again.  A girl slid past us to get off the train and said as she went by, “I just want you two to know that you’re adorable.”  And she wasn’t even being sarcastic!  We laughed and my face turned bright red with embarrassed pleasure. I thought about all the times I’d seen adorable couples on the train and the reaction I’d had was more of the silent I hate you, why don’t you go jump on the third rail? variety.  And now, I’m part of an Us. A nice-assed, adorable Us. AWESOME.

(Note: The author of this post wishes to acknowledge that the above could come off as obnoxious bragging, but she would like to assure you that’s not the intent.  After waiting thirty years for a man like this, then waiting one more for him to become her best friend before they became an Adorable Couple, she takes great pleasure in telling their story.  Some of you know what she’s talking about with your own partner; others are still waiting.  But be careful not to assume that just because it hasn’t happened yet means it won’t.  Or that it will look like what you expected when it does.  Then you’d be like the jerks who heard Jesus talking in the temple and discredited him because he didn’t act like one of them.  None of us have any business using What Is to dictate What Can Be.)

The Sis and I were in the same sorority in college.  It happened to be the sorority The Mom was in thirty years ago at the same school.  (And by “happened to be,” I mean, “she would have been devastated if we chose another one.”  No pressure.)  At the end of each school year, the girls would all vote to give out awards to chapter members.  Mostly funny stuff, and rarely accurate (my senior year I was voted Most Likely to Get Married First–ha ha.  No really–ha), but my junior/her sophomore year, the nail was hit on the head when The Sis and I tied for Most Sarcastic.

Times haven’t changed much.  Sarcasm is still our chief operational mode and translates into a shared sense of humor and unintelligible-to-outsiders shorthand language.  But today, I’m finding little to be sarcastic about.  Other emotions are taking the helm, because today we know that my sister is incubating a healthy, 70%-likely little girl in her oven.

“Look at this,” a coworker said to me today, pointing to an article in the Post about an eighty-seven and eighty-four-year-old pair of sisters in Connecticut who haven’t spoken for five years. Apparently, several years ago they decided to begin splitting all their frequently-earned casino winnings down the middle.  Somewhere along the way they had a disagreement and reneged on the contract.  Then the older sister won $500,000 at Foxwoods and the little sister decided she wanted back in.  Five years later, they are sitting in a state court talking to each other through a judge.

Have I mentioned how thankful I am for my sister?  And for the fact that we know, without ever having to say it, that no amount of money would do that to us?

I’m working steadily on that other writing project I mentioned, and I’m in the middle of a section on love: what I used to think it looked like, how I was wrong, all the different types of it, how I ended up falling in it.  It’s impossible to cover all that in words that are worthy of the subject matter.  Then again, a few years ago running a mile was impossible for me, so what do I know?  I’m writing anyway, and today–here–I’m writing about how amazing it is to have a sister whose oven is occupied by yet another person for me to love.  Another person with whom I can share the dialect of sarcasm.  At the end of the day, every family is dysfunctional in its own special way.  But if you can learn to move beyond dollar signs and past mistakes, there’s always something to laugh about.  Unless you’d rather sit alone in front of a slot machine in a Connecticut casino when you’re eighty-seven.  Yeah, that sounds really fun.  (See what I did there?  TOTES SARC!)