Anglican Summer

Tomorrow we are heading off to Middle School Camp Houston, which will be held somewhere around Livingston, TX. Curt is the camp speaker and I am the camp speaker's son's chaperone. Since this camp is for our old church, we will get to be with some dear friends for five days. It should be really fun.

I just went to Target and spent way too much money on everything we needed for camp. I got my spf 50 sunblock, the obligatory camp one piece swimsuit, and a flotation device for The Mister. I was severely tempted by those gradual self tanning lotions by Jergens and Oil of Olay. However, I'm bringing pale back and if I really believe I'm enough without a tan, I have to stay true to my conviction! Plus, Curt was with me and those lotions were $6 as opposed to $3.

Please allow me to share one of my tanning mishaps with you all. Three years ago Curt and I spent five months serving at a church in northeast England. Half way through our time there I was going to fly home and be in my dear college roommate Mel's wedding. When May rolled around, I started getting very anxious about getting a tan. Something about the very real pale-blueness of the majority of people in England frightened me. I was terrified of facing my friends without some brown in my skin. Now in this part of England the summer highs only reached into the 70s. So on a particularly warm and cloudless day in May, I took the opportunity to soak up the rays.

We were living in a vicarage (parsonage) inside an Anglican church. It was just a little flat above the church offices. We had a nice courtyard outside our front door that had a four foot brick wall around it. So I took some blankets and my laptop down into the courtyard to do my work. I was not idiotic enough to wear my bathing suit, but I did wear some athletic shorts and a spaghetti strap tank top. There I was typing away, doing my work, soaking up the sun, minding my own business, when I started hearing some quiet voices. Well, that must just be some people walking by. I bet they didn't even notice me. Fifteen minutes pass. More voices. Hmmmmm. What is going on? It was the middle of a weekday and nothing should have been going on at the church. I stood up - a stupid American girl with pieces of grass stuck to her skin, ponytail awry, big sunglasses on, not wearing a whole lot, pretty much looking homeless. And what did I see on the other side of the wall but a group of about thirty adults in dark suits and dresses waiting to enter the church. Oh wait, it gets better. Then I turned to my side and directly on the other side of the wall, not five steps away from me, was a black hearse.

How long? How long, O Lord, had those people been standing there? Had that hearse been parked there? How loud had poor Aunt Penny screamed when they opened the casket and saw the body of that poor soul in mid roll from idiot girl sunbathing in the church courtyard in front of all the funeral guests?

*Edited to add: Wouldn't you know, for about a minute I accidentally posted this on my other blog, thinking it was THIS blog. I nearly died! It will probably still show up on some people's bloglines or whatever they use. Well, they'll know more about me than they wanted to!