The Sunday Night Blues Club

What is it about Sundays that makes the day start off so great, with so much possibility, and then end with such a feeling of dread? Apparently I'm not alone. One recent study found that more than 75% of the people who responded feel it too. Are you one of them?

I can see how Sundays might hold a certain amount of stress and anxiety for people who hate their job and the idea of returning to it on Monday morning. I happen to really enjoy the work I get to do, so it's not that for me.

There's just something unsettling about Sunday night.

I think some of it has to do with my Sunday experiences from childhood.

Some Sundays were spent with my entire family, gathering for a big meal after church. We'd eat til our bellies were full and then the adults would nap or talk while the kids played. These Sundays didn't fill me with any sort of dread, except that I hated for all the fun to come to an end.

Then there were other Sundays on the weekends I spent with my biological dad. Most of the time, we'd spend Sunday lunch and some of the afternoon with my great grandma, which I enjoyed a lot. But when our visit came to an end, I knew it was only a matter of time before he took me back home, and back to my regular life.

Don't get me wrong...my regular life was good. But sometimes it was tough to try and straddle the fence between both worlds. It was almost like I saw myself as two different people...playing two different parts.

I think that's the toughest thing about divorce. As a kid, you want to feel a certain level of security from your surroundings and part of that comes from having all the people you love most gathered together, interacting. As strange as it sounds, I think it has to do with this feeling that there is strength in numbers. That there are enough people around who love you and won't let anything bad happen to you. Isn't that what family is all about?

Of course this isn't always possible.

I worried a lot as a kid. About a host of different things. Bizarre things. Things you probably wouldn't believe even if I told you.

For example, when I was really little, some teacher in a church Sunday school class told us that one day Jesus would come back to earth to save everyone. And she told us that he'd be riding on a majestic white horse. What's more, he'd be bringing an army of horses with him and when he snatched up all the Christians into the sky, we'd each ride on our own horse back to Heaven.

I don't know about you, but the thought of this scared the $hi# out of me. I had ridden horses before with my grandpa, but not by myself. I didn't even know how to ride a horse by myself across a pasture, let alone ACROSS THE SKY.

So naturally I added this to the top of my list of things to worry about, and spent lots of time and energy being concerned about it.

In many ways, my propensity to worry has helped me get where I am in life. It has driven me to do more, to be better, to achieve things. But I don't always get to enjoy these achievements as much as I'd like because it can feel like I'm always worried about the next thing.

And thus, here I sit, on a Sunday night, feeling those little persistent worries creep in.

I have no idea why I'm sharing any of this malarky. For real. But I guess I was thinking that maybe if someone else out there feels this way, you might realize you aren't alone.

So how do you combat these feelings? I'm sure there are plenty of solutions. I have no idea what might work for you. Here's what helps me:

- Marry a funny guy. Or girl. Or if you opt not to be married, at least choose a partner who can make you laugh. It goes a long way in helping me with feelings of anxiety and the blues.

- Adopt a shelter pet. Or two. My dogs make a huge difference contributing to my feelings of peace and calm. Even the dearly departed ones.

- Find a spiritual community. Maybe this is a church. Or a group of other like-minded folks. It helps to be part of something where you're united in the common good.

- Consider getting some counseling. If you have issues to work through (and don't we all?), having someone to talk to really helps.

If you stumbled on this post, and anything I've written resonates with you, I hope you feel a little bit less alone. And I hope you don't spend any of your precious energy worrying about silly stuff like I have. I mean, here I am, thirty years later, and I still haven't had the chance to ride my sky horse.

Church - Who Needs It

For my husband and I, Sundays are usually pretty laid back. We wake up leisurely and have coffee, then breakfast. Sometimes we watch CBS Sunday Morning like I did with my grandparents on weekends spent with them during my childhood (of course, it's not the same without Charles Kuralt). Occasionally, I use Sundays to get caught up on work or other projects.

When we moved into our house, we were blessed with some free furniture that exceeded our living room's capacity, so we've turned our small one-car garage into a sitting room of sorts. I sit out there from time to time with the garage door open, working on the computer or reading a good book.

I was doing just that Sunday morning. My husband had poured me a fresh cup of coffee and I had settled in for some leisurely Pinterest browsing while he ran an errand. Imagine my surprise when a member of the church across the street came up the driveway with an invitation to their monthly potluck lunch. He said his church holds a potluck one Sunday each month and today was it. Would we like to come and eat with them?

We've been invited to eat with them before, when we first moved into our house. We were still unpacking and had plans later that day so we politely declined. Today though, I couldn't think of any excuse not to go. I was wearing sweats and my hair was in a ponytail, so I quickly ran into the house to change and freshen up.

The church is one I consider to be a more traditional denomination and I figured the ladies probably wore skirts. I didn't want to make a bad first impression, especially when I was only showing up to eat. So I threw on a maxi dress and pulled my hair into a bun.

Walking across the street toward the church, I thought to myself "What am I doing?" It's a little nerve-wracking to visit a new church for the first time, especially a small congregation where you can't really get lost in the crowd. Will they think I'm weird? Will they think I'm only here for the free food? Will they wonder why we haven't visited before now? All these questions were running through my head.

Both my husband and I grew up attending church regularly. My family was Baptist and his, Methodist. The Sundays of my childhood were mostly the same...early mornings, getting dressed up in our finest and heading to the big Baptist church downtown. First, there would be Sunday school, taught by older folks who had memorized the scriptures frontwards and backwards. We'd read from our lessons and put our offering nickels and pennies into the small envelope for Lottie Moon and Annie Armstrong.

Then we'd head to big church, with the adults. I'd sit quietly, drawing pictures on the back of the bulletin as long as my dad couldn't see. After my younger brother had aged out of the church nursery, he came to big church too. My mom placated him with plastic baggies filled with snacks. I always felt so jealous of the snacks but I was older and could be expected to sit quietly through the service, even if I didn't understand most of what it was about.

After church, my parents, brother and I would head to my great-grandparents' house out in the country for a big meal with the rest of our family. The kids would change into our play clothes and spend the afternoon running around the yard, while the adults napped or gossiped, catching up on what was going in each other's lives.

Since my husband and I have been married, we've never attended church together other than when we visit my parents and go with them. We've talked about visiting various churches in town, and yet somehow Sunday rolls around and we never do. I guess I figured when the time was right, it would happen. We believe in God and talk freely about our faith. But I've never really thought that being in a church building was completely necessary.

Sunday, visiting the small church across the road, I got a taste of what we've been missing. It wasn't a fancy lunch served on fine china. But I filled up my Styrofoam plate more than once. The congregation was small, with probably not more than 25 or 30 people in attendance. When I arrived, the women were in the church's galley kitchen preparing the food, and they genuinely welcomed me, asking questions and making introductions to make me feel like I was part of the group.

When the last covered dish atop the long plastic folding table had been uncovered, the members gathered to form a line. One began to sing and everyone joined in, a song of blessing over the food and the fellowship.

Praise God, from whom all blessings flow;
Praise him, all creatures here below;
Praise him above, ye heavenly host;
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen.


Growing up, I always loved singing the Doxology at our big Baptist church. All those voices joined together, reverberating off the walls in the massive, soaring sanctuary...it was like I knew God could really hear us.

But Sunday, in that small room with those kind, unassuming faces smiling at me, I felt community. My eyes teared up, and I thought to myself "This is what belonging feels like."

The conversation over lunch wasn't about doctrine or church politics, but instead turned to things like how one church member had taken up bike riding as a way to get rid of his knee pain. We covered the gamut from troubled kids (a couple members were teachers and shared some war stories of their experiences) as well as how many of the ladies of the church are apparently smitten with Korean dramas, including a show called Coffee Prince (which I was told might be too much for me to start my K drama education).

Church is not about committees or whether you have a rock and roll band or just an out-of-tune piano. It's not about whether you have the Ten Commandments painted on the wall, or if you worship in a grand sanctuary where the light streams in through brilliant stained glass windows.

It's about people. And coming together. Finding a connection that trumps all our differences and disagreements. Sometimes the ones who feel like they don't need church can benefit from it most. That was me Sunday.

Back at home, my once hot cup of coffee was right where I left it, although it was cold. But I didn't care. My heart was full.

Why I'd Make a Terrible Baptist Missionary

I ran across these vintage postcards on a website I like to visit and they took me back to my childhood growing up in a big baptist church in Tennessee. Each Sunday, my family would deck out in our finest and go to our respective classes for Sunday School before the main church service. 

I loved Sunday School because it was a lot of like regular school and I was kind of a nerd who loved that sort of thing. Since our church was pretty big, there were enough kids to divide us up into all-girls, all-boys and co-ed classes for each age group. 

I usually preferred the all girls class and was often the teacher's pet. One of my favorite Sunday School teachers was an elderly man named Mr. Dunn who let me read the lesson and each accompanying scripture verse every week. He said I had a nice, clear reading voice and I'm sure the rest of the kids in the class gave a collective groan even though I ate it up. 

Down the hall from my Sunday School class was a big supply closet where all the teachers' books and curriculum materials were kept. In that closet were stacks and stacks of postcards with little messages and cute images on them. These cards were meant to be sent to other kids that we might know to invite them to come to church. 

I guess you could say that a regular part of my Sunday School experience was outreach. Baptists are all about going out into the world and preaching the gospel to all people, and I guess that included the people in our community who might want to receive weekly post cards inviting them to church.

My Sunday School teacher had a big list that contained names and addresses of kids who had visited our church up to that point and each week, we'd spend some time dividing up the list and sending each person a card. Which I guess is a nice thing to do. Our teacher would give us each a stamp for our assigned card and when they were ready to mail, I'd take them down the stairs and outside to the big blue mailbox in the parking lot of the post office next door (I told you I was the teacher's pet).

Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.

Except I knew most of the kids on the list from school. And many of them had only visited one time because they spent the night with another kid from my church or some other situation like that. I knew in my heart that they probably weren't going to visit again with any intentions of joining our church. So in many ways, I felt like sending these cards was a big waste of a stamp.

Then I got the bright idea that I could make this whole situation work for me. 

You see, my grandparents lived in Knoxville which was about a hundred miles away. 

And back then (before cell phones and computers), calling long distance was a big deal. And even though I liked writing them letters, we never seemed to have stamps at our house. So often, I'd write more letters than I could ever send. 

What can I say....I saw my opportunity and I seized it. I began sending my Sunday School outreach postcards to them. Every week, I'd write as small as humanly possible to fit as much about the latest and greatest happenings in my life on that little card. Then I'd stick my free stamp on it and send it off to my grandparents. 

My teacher never knew (or at least I don't think he did). And honestly, I didn't even feel bad about it. I figured it was better to send card to someone who actually wanted to get it than to someone who was just going to throw it away. I wonder if my grandparents ever thought it was odd that I invited them to Sunday School about 20 some odd times.

And that is why I'd be a terrible Baptist missionary.