Bart the Belfry Bat

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In the town of Normal, Pennsylvania, there’s a little church at the corner of Wilson and Elm. Like most churches, this one has a bell tower, though instead of a bell it contains speakers that broadcast a recording of bells. Recently the tower has acquired some new residents – a family of bats. And Bart is the most curious bat in this family.

Bart isn’t his real name of course. He has a bat name. But bats communicate at a pitch too high for people to hear which makes their names difficult to transcribe. So let’s just call him Bart.

When Bart awoke on the first night in his new home, he decided to check out the neighborhood. He skimmed along the eaves of the church, snapping up the occasional passing mosquito for breakfast.

He spotted a small glowing red light and headed over to investigate. It was Walter Tibble, the church’s organist, who had stepped outside to have a cigarette. Smoking was a vice Walter had picked up in college and never shaken. Not that he’d really tried all that hard. Walter was now forty-eight, tall and thin. He wandered around the lawn as he smoked, enjoying the solitude and quiet.

And then the automatic sprinklers came on.

Walter muttered, “gosh darn it” under his breath – cursing was not one of his vices – and scurried for the door, tossing his cigarette into the scraggly bushes growing along the wall. He knew it annoyed Pastor O’Donnell to find his butts there, but Walter didn’t care. He’d suggested they get one of those trashcans with an ash receptacle on top, but O’Donnell refused saying it might encourage others to smoke and, the pastor always had to add, smoking was a filthy habit. Walter decided if O’Donnell was going to be that way he could just deal with butts in his bushes.

Bart didn’t understand any of this, of course. Very few bats take up smoking. But Bart’s curiosity compelled him to follow Roger through the door and into the church.

Roger went down a hall into a room blazing with light. Being a bat, Bart didn’t much care for light so he broke off to explore on his own. But a few minutes later Bart’s sharp bat hearing picked up a lovely harmony coming from the bright room. He doubled back to check it out.

The music Bart heard was the choir at their regular Wednesday night rehearsal in the choir room. Bart flew through the door, gliding around the ceiling in gentle arcs in time to the music. After a couple of verses a plump woman spotted him and began making a noise that was louder and in a different key than the others. This was Missy Moore who was not a fan of bats.

Bart decided he wasn’t a fan of hers either. Not only was she ruining the lovely music, her screeching hurt his sensitive ears. And it seemed to Bart that the rest of the choir was just as annoyed at Missy’s harsh wail since they all stopped singing and began dashing chaotically around the room. It didn’t appear that the harmonious tunes were going to resume any time soon so Bart figured he might as well move on.

He found his way to the social hall, which was pleasantly big and shadowy. After exploring a bit he stopped for a rest in the rafters. He had seen all kinds of interesting things but he would need to focus on finding more food pretty soon. He was getting quite hungry.

Suddenly the lights came on, nearly blinding Bart. Del Winslow, a heavyset man in a choir robe, entered carrying a broom and looked around. Bart didn’t know what Del was up to and didn’t really care. He flew into the adjacent kitchen to get out of the light.

There Bart made a discovery that pleased his grumbling stomach. Someone had left a piece of cake on the counter during coffee hour the previous Sunday. Now of course bats don’t eat cake, but they do eat flies. The abandoned cake had attracted a whole swarm of those. What a nice housewarming gift, thought Bart as he enjoyed the insect buffet.

The door to the kitchen burst open and the light went on. Bart instinctively flew up to the ceiling. Del Winslow stomped in with his broom. Del spotted Bart and swung the broom at him. Bart darted away, indignant. This was hardly welcoming behavior!

Bart bobbed around the ceiling staying just out of reach of the flailing broom. Then one of Del’s swings struck the overhead light, knocking the plastic cover off and shattering the bulb. The room went dark again. Bart settled on the counter as Del made a hasty exit. That explained it, Bart thought. The big man wasn’t after Bart at all; he just hated the light too.

Bart finished off the last few flies who hadn’t beat it to safety in the commotion then decided he’d better go back outside where the hunting was better. He flew out into the social hall and saw Del seated on a couch catching his breath. Bart was careful to stay up near the ceiling where Del wouldn’t notice him. He was not quite sure what to make of the man just yet.

A couple of the windows were cracked open so Bart used one of them to make his exit. As he flew out, though, he smelled something funny. There was smoke rising from the bushes near the front door. Bart went to investigate.

It seemed Walter’s cigarette had landed on a dried leaf that was caught in the bush and ignited it. The small flame had grown hot enough to spread to some of the green leaves around it. Bart didn’t quite understand what fire was but he could feel the heat and his instincts told him it wasn’t good. Only he didn’t really know what to do about it.

Then he got an idea. Maybe the big man inside could take care of it.

Bart flew back in the window and buzzed Del’s head. It certainly got Del’s attention. Del leaped to his feet and chased after Bart who flew back out the window.

However Del didn’t follow. He simply closed the window and walked back toward the choir room. So Bart flew in through a different window and did a couple of loops around Del’s head. Del chased Bart back to the second window where Bart made his escape again. This time, though, Del paused before closing the window. He smelled something.

Del came out the front door to investigate and saw the small fire in the bush. He yelped and quickly beat the flames out with the broom. Then he cupped his hands and caught water from the sprinklers to thoroughly douse the bush. Once he was certain everything was out, he looked up into the night sky and said, “Thank you, bat. You might have just saved the church.”

Bart was perched on the roof above him and would have told Del he was quite welcome except of course Bart couldn’t speak English.

Del went back inside. A few moments later the music resumed in the choir room, drifting softly out to where Bart was gliding above the spray of the sprinklers hunting his food. He began bobbing back and forth in time to the music.

This was going to be a pretty good home, Bart thought.

Baby Fever

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In the town of Normal, Pennsylvania, there’s a little church at the corner of Wilson and Elm. Recently, the primary topic of idle discussion around the church was newlywed Carrie Winslow’s pregnancy.

Carrie hadn’t intended for the news of her impending breeding to be public knowledge quite yet – she had only just discovered the fact herself – but her mother, Karen, found out during coffee hour one Sunday due to a morning sickness incident and became so excited she blurted it out to the entire congregation.

Del Winslow, Carrie’s father, was happy for his daughter, but that happiness was mixed with some frustration. Carrie and her husband Carlos had both lost their jobs when their company went bankrupt and were living with Del and Karen. The situation was supposed to be temporary, however the introduction of an infant into the equation threatened to change that.

The Friday evening after the news went public, Del walked in on Karen showing Carrie pastel colored paint samples. When he inquired what they were for, Karen said she figured they would turn Del’s den into a nursery when the baby came. When Del protested that she might have asked him about the idea first, Karen scoffed and responded, “All you ever do in there is sleep anyway.”

Yes, the temporary living arrangements were sounding a little less temporary than Del would have preferred.

Del was still sulking Sunday morning when the family arrived at church. Del was in the choir so he went to the choir room to warm up. Missy Moore greeted him as he entered with a cheery, “Good morning, Grandpa Winslow!”

Up until that moment Del’s mind had been primarily occupied by the steadily growing population of his household and the consequent loss of peace, quiet and the one room where he could nap undisturbed. Though of course he knew Carrie’s pregnancy meant he was going to be a grandparent, nobody had yet used the word “grandpa” out loud. It made him feel… what was the term…?

Old.

The fact that his own father had been younger than he was now when Carrie was born did not in any way ease the sensation of decrepitude. Of course once Del had time to adjust to the concept and certainly by the time the baby was born he would be thrilled with his new title. But that was all in the future. On this Sunday, Missy’s offhand and well-meant comment set in motion a series of events that would bring both physical and mental pain to Del.

It was perhaps this distraction that caused Del to come in at the wrong moment on one of the hymns during the service. It was an embarrassing mistake, uncharacteristic of Del. After the song ended, Celia Simmons looked back and whispered, “the mind is the first thing to go, Sweetie.”

Given Del’s current mental state he did not find the implications humorous. By the time coffee hour rolled around he was in a downright grumpy mood.

Meanwhile, Carrie was having her own issues with being the center of attention. It seemed everyone had advice on being pregnant and was anxious to convey it to her. The advice was often contradictory, sometimes slightly disgusting and once in a while completely terrifying. Not to mention that Carrie was finding it tougher to adapt to life without caffeine than to the idea she was going to be a mother. She missed the jolt of energy her daily double lattes provided.

There was no quick escape that morning for either Carrie or Del, because Del and Karen’s Bible study group was hosting coffee hour that week, which meant they had to help clean up. And since Carrie and Carlos rode with them, the younger couple had to stick around as well.

As coffee hour wound down, Del went to move the giant coffee urn to the kitchen. The enormous contraption was made of steel and dated from the 50’s.

“That’s still pretty full,” Ralph Billings said, “hang on and I’ll give you a hand.”

“I’ve got it,” Del said peevishly. He hoisted the urn up. Ralph was right; it must have weighed over forty pounds. But Del was determined to handle the chore himself. He headed toward the kitchen trying to keep his expression nonchalant.

But as he moved across the room, the urn seemed to grow heavier with every step. His shoulders moaned. His arms screamed. His fingers whined. He began to feel the urn slipping out of his grip. He moved faster, trying to reach the kitchen before he dropped the whole shebang, waddling with his knees bowed out as the urn slid down between his legs.

He reached the kitchen and summoned up a last burst of energy to hoist the urn onto the counter.

It didn’t move. Del’s back had seized up. It was all he could do to lower the urn to the floor.

Missy Moore poked her head in. “Are you okay?”

Hunched into the shape of a question mark, Del knew the jig was up. “My back…” he hissed.

Missy ran over and began massaging his lower back. Her fingers digging into his flesh was more painful than throwing it out in the first place. But after a few moments the muscles loosened and he could stand upright.

“Let’s get you out to the couch,” Missy said as she easily lifted the coffee urn onto the counter.

Missy took Del’s arm and led him back into the social hall. When Ralph spotted them he came rushing over to find out what happened.

“He threw his back out,” Missy said.

“Oh no,” Ralph said. “You just sit here and rest. We’ll finish cleaning up.”

Del slumped on the couch and watched the others working for a bit. He felt silly and embarrassed. Finally, when nobody was looking he slipped out the back door.

Del discovered Carrie sitting on the back steps with a morose expression. “What’s wrong, Sweetie?” he asked.

“I just needed to be alone for awhile,” she said. “Everybody keeps telling me all this stuff I have to do before the baby comes and what books to read and about natural child birth and drugs and how I need something called a Doula… I just don’t know if I’m ready for all this.”

“Forget them,” Del said. “You’re going to be a great parent.”

“Not as good as you and Mom.”

“Nonsense. You’ve always handled everything that’s been thrown at you with ease. Ever since you were a little girl.” Del sat down beside her.

“I remember when you were four I took you to the mall. I stopped to look at a telescope in a store window and next thing I knew you were gone. I looked everywhere for you, completely panicked. And then I found you sitting by the fountain lecturing a teenage boy who had tossed a gum wrapper on the ground about the evils of littering. That kid was terrified. I was terrified. And you weren’t scared at all.”

“That’s what you thought,” she said. “I remember that day. I figured I’d never see you again and I was going to have to live in the mall. That’s why I got so mad at that boy. He was messing up my new home.”

Del laughed. Carrie leaned her head on his shoulder. “You know, Daddy, I really wasn’t thrilled with the idea of moving back in with my parents at my age. But it will be nice to have you and mom around when the baby comes.”

Del put his arm around her and gave her a squeeze. He was surprised to discover he was starting to warm up to this whole grandpa idea.

Ian Part II: The Communion Disaster

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In the town of Normal, Pennsylvania, there’s a little church at the corner of Wilson and Elm. At five minutes before the start of service, choir director Shane Reed was seated in his place to the right side of the chancel behind organist Walter Tibble. Seated nearby were Senior Pastor Henry O’Donnell and the new Associate Pastor, Michelle Tellum.

Shane snuck a glance at Michelle every few seconds. Michelle was a pretty 28 year-old blonde with long eyelashes. She was wearing a liturgical robe because it was Communion Sunday and on her feet she had shiny, strappy black sandals with a low heel. Shane, 33 years old and divorced, found the look terribly sexy, which in turn made him feel guilty given where they were.

Michelle, meanwhile, was mentally preparing for her first time assisting with Communion in the little church. It was a simple process, really, but she found that the more serious ceremonies made her overly nervous. Periodically she would look out at the pews as the congregation filled them. One of those looks caused her churning stomach to do a back flip.

A dashingly handsome young man named Ian had just entered the church. Ian was not a regular congregant. Rather, Michelle had met him a few days before while on a hospital visit. They had flirted and Michelle felt a chemistry between them… until Ian discovered she was a pastor. Michelle found her job often defused chemical reactions between her and members of the opposite sex.

The real question was what was Ian doing slipping into the back pew this particular morning?

It seemed unlikely that he was looking for a new church and by pure coincidence showed up at hers. But it seemed equally unlikely that he was there specifically to see her considering how awkwardly their prior meeting had ended. She regretted not spending more time on her hair that morning, but was grateful she was wearing the stylish new sandals she’d bought at the mall the previous week.

Michelle made it through the bulk of the service trying and mostly failing not to look directly at Ian. Then Pastor O’Donnell finished his sermon and it was time for Communion.

Michelle was to serve the bread, which had been cut into small chunks and placed in a gold plated Communion bowl. She took the bowl from the altar and walked toward the front of the chancel where Pastor O’Donnell would bless it. She hoped Ian could see her fancy shoes from the back of the church.

Then those shoes played a nasty trick on her. The toe of the left one somehow managed to catch on the carpet, causing her to stumble. The entire congregation gasped as Michelle plunged forward. The Communion bowl flew from her hands, hit the ground, and scatted pieces of bread halfway up the aisle. Michelle landed flat on her stomach, banging her nose painfully on the floor.

Pastor O’Donnell and Shane ran to her aid. “Are you all right? Your nose is bleeding,” O’Donnell said. Shane retrieved a tissue and they tore off pieces to jam in her nostrils. Though her nose throbbed, the only serious damage was to Michelle’s dignity.

“Communion’s ruined!” she moaned quietly.

“Nonsense,” Pastor O’Donnell said, resting a comforting hand on her shoulder. He knew how she felt. He’d had a similar accident in one of his prior appointments; only his involved the Communion cup and the replacement of the carpet in the Sanctuary. “We just need to get more bread.”

“I’ll do it,” Shane said, and hustled out of the church. Pastor O’Donnell helped Michelle back to her seat and then told the congregation they’d be changing the order of service and doing the final hymn before Communion. As everyone began singing, Michelle slumped behind the pulpit where Ian couldn’t see her.

Shane went to the closest place to get bread at 11:15 a.m. on a Sunday morning – the liquor store two blocks away. The only bread they had were hot dog buns, which Shane thought was odd since they didn’t seem to have any hot dogs for sale. He grabbed two bags and went to the counter, trying to ignore the customers staring at his choir robe.

That’s when he discovered he’d left his wallet in his jacket back in the choir room. He looked around at the handful of people who were purchasing alcohol on a Sunday morning. They did not look particularly friendly but he was desperate.

“Would anybody be willing to contribute a dollar or two so a church can do Communion?” he asked.

The customers shuffled and avoided his eyes. “Just take it,” the cashier grumbled behind him. “You’re making everyone uncomfortable.”

“I’ll bring the money this afternoon,” he promised and ran out of the store.

After service, Shane found Michelle skulking in a corner at the back of the Social Hall during coffee hour. “How’s your nose?” he asked.

“Okay,” Michelle said, her voice flat due to the tissue still jammed up her nostrils.

Shane noticed that she kept glancing nervously at the milling crowd. “Don’t worry,” he told her. “Everyone will have forgotten about your little tumble by next week.”

Michelle doubted that, but she was actually looking at Ian. She figured he would have bolted as soon as he could but somehow there he was on the other side of the room, sipping a cup of bad coffee as Missy Moore chatted away at him. Missy made it a point to greet all newcomers and find out everything she could about them in the interest of being welcoming. Somehow they always ended up learning more about her than the other way around.

Michelle was debating whether to go rescue Ian from Missy’s inquisition or find somewhere to hide until he left when she realized Shane had just asked her a question. “What was that?” she said.

“Would you like a cup of coffee?”

“Oh, yeah. Sure.”

Shane went to the coffee table and Michelle took the opportunity to visit the ladies’ room to clean herself up. She removed the tissue from her nose, fixed her hair and touched up her make-up. When she emerged, she discovered Ian coming straight toward her. She froze. There was no avoiding him now.

“Hi,” he said. “I was just looking for the restroom.”

“Right there,” Michelle said, nodding toward the men’s room.

“Actually, I was just looking for an excuse to get away from that rather enthusiastic woman I was talking to.”

“Ah.”

“I didn’t realize services in your church were so entertaining,” Ian continued. “I’ll definitely have to come back.”

Michelle blushed, but mustered up the courage to seize the opening. “Why did you come today?” she asked.

“You left so fast when we met I didn’t get a chance to ask for your phone number,” he said. “But it was pretty easy to figure out which church was yours on the Internet. The church website could use some work, by the way.”

“I’ll look into that,” she promised.

“Anyway, can I buy you lunch?”

“Sure,” Michelle beamed.

“First you might want to…” he gestured to her nose.

She touched it with a finger and discovered it was bleeding again. “Right,” she said and went back into the bathroom.

Around the corner Shane stood with two cups of coffee. He’d heard the whole exchange. He dumped one of the cups in a nearby trashcan and quietly slipped away. It was no big deal. He needed to go back to the liquor store and pay for the hot dog buns anyway.

Ian Part I: The Hospital Disaster

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In the town of Normal, Pennsylvania, there’s a little church at the corner of Wilson and Elm. Recently, Michelle Tellum joined the church as the Associate Pastor reporting to Senior Pastor Henry O’Donnell. Michelle was an excellent young pastor – energetic, organized, a good mediator and problem solver. Perhaps most important, she had the ability to listen to endless debate about such controversial topics as the color of the new carpet or the type font in the bulletin without resorting to unseemly violence.

Michelle was also a young woman. A young single woman. And she was very concerned about the prospect of becoming a middle aged single woman. Michelle loved being a pastor, but she also wanted to be a wife and mother some day.

She had several things working on her behalf in this regard. First, she was quite pretty. Second, she was surprisingly hip for a clergy person. She knew all the hot new bands and liked romantic comedy and horror movies. She dressed stylishly, although she was careful not to be seen wearing anything that could be considered scandalous by members of her congregation. She was also an avid water skier. Working against her were the conclusions men tended to jump to when told her profession, and the fact that she could be terribly clumsy. Which explains the embarrassing conditions under which she met Ian.

It all happened because Michelle was late to her first hospital visit. Seventy year-old Henrietta Miggins, a lifelong congregant at the little church, was having minor surgery. Pastor O’Donnell, church secretary Tammy Billings, and Michelle were going to visit her in the recovery room that afternoon to cheer her up. Michelle thought that should be interesting since in the month she’d been at the little church she’d yet to see Henrietta appear in any way cheerful.

However Michelle had to meet the others at the hospital because she was forced to spend the morning waiting for the cable installer at her new apartment. The cable company had given her a helpful four-hour window and the installer arrived only an hour after that window. Perhaps that sounds unlikely, but the Normal cable company has much better customer service than most.

Complicating matters, Michelle had never been to the hospital before and, much to her embarrassment, her sense of direction was laughably bad and got worse when she hurried. Despite the modest size and general grid layout of Normal, Michelle made several wrong turns and arrived fifteen minutes after she had agreed to meet the others.

Michelle screeched into the first available parking spot she saw. She hopped out of the car, slammed the door, and clicked the “lock” button on her key fob all in one motion. She started for the hospital entrance, but was pulled up short. Her sudden stop caused her to drop her keys, which bounced under the adjacent car, a red SUV.

Michelle looked back to see what had stopped her and discovered she’d slammed the hem of her skirt in the car door. Which was now locked. She gave the skirt an experimental tug but it was stuck fast. She kneeled down to retrieve her keys and found they were a tantalizing six inches out of her reach.

At first she laughed at the ridiculousness of her predicament. She lay prone on the asphalt, stretching and twisting, all to no avail. Then she let out a string of decidedly un-ladylike and un-pastor like profanity. After which a voice said, “what seems to be the problem?”

Michelle quickly climbed to her feet, her face flushing crimson. The owner of the voice was a handsome young man in his mid-twenties. He wore casually hip clothes and a bandage on his wrist. His hair was tousled in a sexy way that some men spend too much time in front of a mirror trying to achieve. Michelle simultaneously felt her heart skip a beat and her face flush even more.

“I dropped my keys,” she said, “and, well, I’m kind of stuck. Do you think you could get them for me?”

“I imagine I could,” the good-looking gentleman said with a twinkle in his eye, “but I like to know the names of distressed damsels before I rescue them.”

“Michelle,” she said.

“Ian,” he told her and offered his bandaged hand. She shook it gently but he still cringed.

“What happened?” Michelle asked.

“Sprained my wrist while I was getting a kitten out of a tree for a little girl.”

“Really?” Michelle’s heart skipped another beat. Good thing I’m at a hospital, she thought.

“No,” he admitted. “Actually I tripped on the curb while going to get a bagel this morning. I just thought the kitten story might impress you. Hold on.”

He disappeared around the other side of the red SUV. Michelle took advantage of those few seconds to fix her hair in the rearview mirror of her car.

Ian popped back up and returned her keys. Michelle unlocked the door and freed her skirt. She was horrified to discover that it was badly stained with grease.

“Oh no!” she moaned, examining the damage.

“You can’t go in there like that,” Ian said sympathetically. “Guess you better take it off.”

“Ha, ha,” she said and shot him a nasty look. But her heart was doing the Macarena.

Just then Tammy Billings bustled up. “There you are Pastor Michelle.”

On the word “pastor” Ian glanced at her sharply. Michelle knew what that glance meant. The disheveled-in-a-sexy-way young man would not be asking for her phone number.

Tammy gave Ian the once over. “Who’s this?” she asked.

“Ian Wells,” he said, offering her his injured hand and grimacing again when she took it.

“He was helping me out of a little… predicament,” Michelle explained.

“Oh,” Tammy said. “Well, we’d better get in there. Everyone’s waiting for you. Mr. Wells, it was nice to meet you. We’d love to see you at church on Sunday.”

“Pleasure meeting both of you,” Ian replied.

“Thanks for your help,” Michelle said. She followed Tammy into the hospital with one last glance back at Ian, whom she assumed she’d never see again except perhaps for an awkward chance encounter in a coffee shop. She would soon be proven wrong… though not about the awkward part.

To be continued…

A Not So Empty Nest

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In the town of Normal, Pennsylvania, there’s a little church at the corner of Wilson and Elm.   Every Sunday choir member Del Winslow and his wife Karen who teaches the “Guppies” pre-school Sunday school class are among the first people to arrive.  Del is a stickler about punctuality.  Which is why choir director Shane Reed was surprised when Del bustled in five minutes late to the pre-service choir warm-ups, flushed and sweating.

After the choir had run through their vocal exercises and practiced the day’s hymns, they relaxed in the choir room waiting for service to start.  Shane noticed Del looked a little stressed and asked if everything was all right.

“Carrie and Carlos are staying with us,” Del told him.  “Carrie was never the easiest person to get out of bed and with four people trying to use two bathrooms, well, we’ve been running late all morning.”  

Carrie was Del’s thirty-one year-old daughter and Carlos Lopez was her new husband.  They lived in Cincinnati but Shane had met them when they were married at the little church six weeks earlier. 

“Still, it must be nice to have them for a visit,” Shane said.  “And so soon after the last one.”

“I love when Carrie visits.  Unfortunately this isn’t just a visit,” Del explained.  “Carrie and Carlos worked for the same company.  It went bankrupt while they were on their honeymoon.  They’d spent all their savings on the wedding and honeymoon so they came back to no jobs and no money.  They’re staying with us until they get back on their feet.”

As Del was talking to Shane, Karen was relating the same story to church secretary Tammy Billings in the Sunday school room.

“That must be inconvenient,” Tammy said.

“Not at all!” Karen replied.  “The house is so full of life.  It’s wonderful.”

Back in the choir room Del told Shane, “My workshop and den are filled with boxes of their junk.  I have nowhere to go for a little peace and quiet.  It’s getting kind of tiresome.”

While down in the classroom Karen told Tammy, “since Del won’t let them pay rent they’ve been helping out around the house.  They painted the garage door which I’ve been trying to get Del to do for a year.”

And Del was telling Shane, “Now my garage door is purple!  I’m going to have to repaint it as soon as they’re gone.  And Karen won’t even let me charge them rent because ‘they’re family.’”

 “Carlos even made dinner last night!” Karen enthused.  “He’s a wonderful cook.”

“I still have heartburn,” Del said.

While all this was going on Carrie and Carlos were waiting in the sanctuary.  Carrie had dozed off.  She didn’t like getting up early on the weekends. 

Pastor Michelle Tellum, the new young associate pastor who had married them, came over to say hello.  After hearing the explanation of how they had ended up back in Normal, Michelle said, “It must be tough living with your parents again.”

“My Dad’s not so bad,” Carrie replied with a yawn.  “He leaves us alone most of the time.  But my Mom keeps popping into our room unannounced and always wants to know where we’re going and stuff.  It’s like she doesn’t recognize that I’m an adult now!”

An hour and a half later Del, Karen, Carrie and Carlos reunited in the social hall for coffee hour.  They munched on cookies with Shane and Tammy. 

“So, I understand you’ll be with us for a while,” Shane said to the younger couple.

“Just until they can find new jobs,” Del interjected.  “And they’re both quite talented so I have faith that if they make the effort they’ll be employed again in no time.”

“What kind of work are you looking for,” Tammy asked.

“Actually,” Carlos said, “I was thinking I might take the opportunity to go back to school and get my MBA.”

“What,” Del exclaimed.  This was the first he had heard of that plan.

“They have a program at the college here in Normal,” Carrie said.  “And I’m sure they’ll take me back at the restaurant where I used to work while he’s in school.”

“You’re going to try to support both of you on a waitress salary?” Del asked.

“It’ll be a struggle but it’ll be worth it in the long run,” Carrie said.

“And you can live with us to save money!” Karen exclaimed.

Shane glanced over at Del.  His eyes bulged out and his teeth were clenched tightly together as if to hold back any comments he might later regret.  The enamel barrier seemed to work.

Suddenly Carrie dropped a half eaten cookie back on to the paper plate she was holding.  She looked pale and unsteady.  “Excuse me,” she mumbled and shoved the plate into Carlos’s hands before dashing off toward the restrooms.

“She doesn’t look so good,” Karen said.  “I better go see if she’s okay.”

“No, wait…” Carlos said, but Karen was already bustling off toward the bathroom.  Carlos trailed after her.

“Well,” Shane said.

“Well,” agreed Tammy.

“There is no way they are moving in with us for two years while he goes back to school,” Del said evenly.  “I liked being an empty nester.”

Then Karen burst out of the bathroom and announced loudly to the whole social hall:  “I’m going to be a grandmother!”

The color drained from Del’s face.  Apparently his carefree empty-nester days were about to be a thing of the past.

The Great Bingo Controversy

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In the town of Normal, Pennsylvania, there’s a little church at the corner of Wilson and Elm.   One afternoon Pastor Henry O’Donnell was in his office taking a break from writing his sermon with a game of computer solitaire when church secretary Tammy Billings poked her head in.  “The Little Old Ladies are here to see you,” Tammy said.

O’Donnell sighed.  The “Little Old Ladies” was a nickname for three of the older congregants:  Henrietta Miggins, Betsy Davis and Celia Simmons.  Like many dangerous, predatory creatures, they looked deceptively cute and cuddly and often travelled in a pack.  When one of them dropped by his office during the week it usually meant he would soon be developing a stubborn headache.  When all three dropped by… well, maybe he could go home early today.

The three women marched in and arranged themselves in chairs across from the pastor.  “What can I do for you ladies?” O’Donnell asked, fingering the aspirin bottle he kept in his top desk drawer.

“We’d like the church to start a weekly bingo game on Tuesday nights,” Henrietta said.

That didn’t sound so bad, O’Donnell thought.  But he had enough experience with the Little Old Ladies to know that there could be hidden dangers to their request.  “Don’t you usually play bingo at the senior center on Tuesday nights?”

“Not anymore,” Henrietta sniffed.  “The director there is an incompetent.  We need somewhere else to play.”

“We couldn’t offer cash prizes,” O’Donnell pointed out.

“That’s okay,” Betsy said.  “It’s more of a social activity.  The senior center just gives away little gift baskets.”

“Usually filled with donated items nobody wanted,” Henrietta sniffed.

“It could be a fundraiser,” Celia chimed in.  “We could ask for donations to finally get the new robes the choir should have had last year.”

“Let me look into it,” the pastor said. 

After the Little Old Ladies left, O’Donnell went out to Tammy’s desk.  He knew she volunteered at the senior center so he asked her to make a friendly call to the director – the one Henrietta had called an incompetent.

“They were banned from the game,” Tammy reported when she got off the phone.  “There was an incident over cookies.  Apparently the center decided to buy a different brand to cut costs and Henrietta wasn’t satisfied with the quality.”

“And for that they banned her?”

“Apparently it was the way she expressed her dissatisfaction.”

“I can imagine,” O’Donnell said.  “What do you think?”

“I know the Little Old Ladies are a handful, but bingo might be fun,” Tammy said.  “If you want, I’ll organize it.”

“Thank you,” Henry said with a smile.  It looked like he wouldn’t need his aspirin today after all.

A few days later Tammy interrupted Henry in the midst of another game of computer solitaire.  “Missy Moore wants to talk to you,” she said.

Missy was a rotund, cheerful woman in her mid-forties.  Normally you couldn’t remove the smile from her face with a pickaxe, but today she was scowling as she slammed a flyer announcing the bingo game down on Pastor O’Donnell’s desk. 

“What’s the meaning of this,” she demanded.

“Um, well, bingo is a game with cards with numbers on them…” O’Donnell began.

“I know what bingo is.  It’s gambling!” Missy shouted.  She pulled a stack of papers from her purse and began quoting statistics on the damage gambling addiction does to people and society.

O’Donnell felt the familiar tightening in his skull that meant he’d be needing his bottle of aspirin.  He spent the next forty-two minutes trying to convince Missy that a church bingo fundraiser with token prizes was not really gambling while she tried to convince him he was throwing open the church doors to the Devil himself.   It seemed Missy had an aunt who spent a large portion of her social security checks in bingo halls.  It was kind of a hot button issue for her.

In the end they reached a compromise.  Missy could pass out anti-gambling literature at the door to the bingo game as long as she was polite about it.

On the night of the first game Pastor O’Donnell arrived early and planted himself in an out-of-the-way location with a good view of the front door.  Missy Moore also arrived early armed with a stack of pamphlets she’d secured from an anti-gambling association.  O’Donnell was pleased to observe that she kept her promise to be polite.

Tammy had prepared the social hall nicely using a semi-professional bingo kit she’d ordered from a party supply store that included packets of disposable playing sheets and a large tumbling cage filled with lettered and numbered ping pong balls.  She’d also set up a nice refreshment table and made sure to include the brand of cookies Henrietta liked.

The game turned out to be a bigger draw than Pastor O’Donnell had expected.  In addition to the Little Old Ladies and their ilk, it drew many of the younger families, including Kevin and Jill Boyer and their two little girls, four-year-old Mary and two-year-old Susie.

The Boyers signed in and Tammy handed them their playing sheets and ink daubers – plastic containers of ink with little sponges on the end for marking the sheets.   Mary grabbed her dauber eagerly and tested it by stamping a mark on the back of her sister’s dress.  Jill quickly disarmed Mary and handed the dauber back to Tammy.  “The girls can use colored pencils to mark their sheets,” Jill said, ignoring Mary’s protests.

When everyone was settled, Tammy began the game.  She had drawn only four numbers when a cascade of piano music rang out through the building.  Moments later a piercing soprano voice joined in.

“What in the world is that?” O’Donnell said.

“Missy Moore booked the choir room to practice her special music selection for church on Sunday,” Tammy told him.

“And you didn’t anticipate a problem with that?”

“I didn’t realize her selection would be so…boisterous.  Besides, do you want to tell her she can’t practice a song for worship because it’ll interfere with our bingo game?”

“Good point.  Carry on.”

Tammy drew the next ball and announced the number, “B-17.”   And at that very moment Missy hit a particularly piercing high note.

“What?” Celia yelled from the back, “I can’t hear you.”

O’Donnell headed to the choir room where he found Missy and choir director Shane Reed hard at work.  “Do you mind if I close the door?” O’Donnell asked.

“As long as you don’t mind if I open it again once you leave,” Missy replied.

O’Donnell looked at Shane who just shrugged as if to say there was no way he was getting in the middle of this.

Then O’Donnell noticed a portable amplification system gathering dust in the corner.  “Okay,” he said, “I’ll just borrow this then.”  He grabbed it and dashed away before Missy realized what he was doing.

In his absence, the bingo players had converged on the refreshment table.  O’Donnell put the amplification system on the adjacent card table Tammy was using and crawled in between the two tables to plug it in.  Unfortunately, O’Donnell was a larger man without the best coordination, and his shoulder inadvertently banged into the refreshment table.  The blow caused the coffee urn to tip over and send a tide of hot coffee toward the gathered crowd.

Fortunately the congregation proved more coordinated than their pastor and everyone managed to scramble out of the way of the spill.  However, Mary Boyer took advantage of the resulting chaos to acquire one of the ink daubers she had been so unfairly denied.  This exponentially multiplied the chaos as Jill and Kevin chased Mary around the room, pursued by little Susie who loved a good game of chase.

Thirty-seven minutes later Mary was disarmed, everyone was settled back in place and the bingo game resumed.  The good news was the amplifier made it easy for all the players to hear Tammy over Missy’s rehearsal.  Which proved a moot victory a few minutes later when Missy wrapped up the rehearsal and went home.

The bingo game ended a little before 10 p.m.  By 11 p.m. the Little Old Ladies had finished enumerating their complaints about the evening to Pastor O’Donnell.  After they left, O’Donnell surveyed the scene in the social hall.  The floor was littered with coffee stained bingo cards and anti-gambling pamphlets.  The refreshment table would need a thorough scrubbing.  And Mary had artfully decorated two thirds of the north wall with colored ink blotches. 

He turned to Tammy who was tallying up the contents of the donation basket.  “How’d we do?”

“We raised sixty-seven dollars toward the choir robes,” she told him.  “Of course the refreshments and prizes cost forty-five dollars.  Factor in $272 for the bingo kit and we’ll need quite a few more games before we break even.”

O’Donnell rubbed his aching head.  The next day he arranged to finance the refreshments for the senior center’s bingo games – including the cookies Henrietta liked – in return for them lifting the ban on the Little Old Ladies.  It just seemed financially prudent.

Pastor Michelle's First Sermon

Hear the story read by the author.

In the town of Normal, Pennsylvania, there’s a little church at the corner of Wilson and Elm. The church recently brought on a new, pretty, twenty-eight year-old associate pastor named Michelle Tellum. The senior pastor, Henry O’Donnell, decided to have her deliver the sermon on her second Sunday at the church. “This is no job for cowards,” he told her. “It’s best to just jump in, even if you’re not perfect.”

Perfection aside, this was Michelle’s very first appointment and she was determined to make a good impression. So she spent every spare moment during that week writing, rewriting, and practicing her sermon.

This was also the church’s first associate pastor, so they needed to create an office for her. The room they chose for that purpose had previously served as what was euphemistically referred to as the “Auxiliary Supply Closet” for the Sunday school classes. The auxiliary supplies stored therein were mostly broken toys and dried out paint.

Head usher and all-around handy man Ralph Billing helped Jose the custodian relocate the auxiliary supplies to the trash and bring in an old desk. “Welcome to your new office,” he told Michelle proudly as he opened the door with a flourish.

Michelle managed to fake a suitably grateful expression as she examined the room. It resembled a prison cell more than a pastoral work place. The two men helped her unpack the few boxes of personal items she’d brought with her. They quickly discovered a problem. There were no power outlets.

Fortunately there was a built-in overhead light since the single, small, dirty window up near the ceiling only let in a hint of natural sunlight. Unfortunately Michelle’s computer was not a laptop. So Ralph strung an extension cord from a nearby classroom into the office so she could plug it in. “It’s only a temporary solution,” he assured her. “I’ll install an outlet for you likety split.”

That sounded dangerous to Michelle, but Ralph assured her he knew what he was doing and Pastor O’Donnell backed him. So Michelle set about trying to concentrate on writing her sermon while Ralph noisily sliced into the dry wall.

After an hour of banging and ripping and grunting Ralph had made a neat square hole in the wall and Michelle had finished two sentences of her sermon. Ralph informed her that he needed to go shut off the breaker before he installed the outlet box.

“Fine,” Michelle mumbled as she wrestled with an unusually rebellious metaphor. Ralph sauntered out and three minutes later both the light and Michelle’s computer went dark.

“What did you do!” Michelle cried when Ralph returned.

“Gee, I didn’t realize the extension cord was plugged into the same circuit,” Ralph said.

“I had just figured out the perfect opening to my sermon,” Michelle moaned.

“Sorry. I’ll go plug it into a different outlet.”

A few minutes later Michelle’s computer was up and running again and Ralph was back at work using a flashlight for illumination. With a little effort Michelle was able to recreate the opening of her sermon fairly accurately. After that she got in a groove, and soon she had several paragraphs typed out.

“I need to run to the hardware store for a part,” Ralph informed her. Michelle nodded absently.

A second later Michelle heard a thud and a grunt from the hall and her computer screen went dark again.

“No!” she wailed. She’d been on such a roll she’d neglected to save her work.

She stomped out prepared to give Ralph a piece of her mind. She stopped short when she discovered him sprawled out face down on the floor. He had tripped over the extension cord.

“Are you alright?” she asked.

“I think I threw my back out,” he said.

Michelle helped him gingerly to his feet and out to his car. She wanted to take him to the hospital but Ralph assured her he’d be fine with a little rest and some ibuprofen. A few hours later Pastor O’Donnell poked his head into Michelle’s office.

“It’s dark in here. Why do you have the light off?” he asked.

“Ralph turned off the breaker while he was working on the outlet,” she told him. “I didn’t know if it was safe to turn it back on before he was finished.”

“Oh,” O’Donnell replied. “Well, I just heard from him. He’s probably going to be laid up all week.”

“Can we bring in an electrician to finish this,” Michelle asked.

“I think Ralph might be kind of insulted,” O’Donnell said. “He likes to do things himself. And he’s quite handy. Can you manage for a week without an outlet?”

Michelle sighed. She didn’t want to cause problems so soon into her first appointment. “Okay,” she told him.

“Good,” O’Donnell smiled. On his way out of the office he tripped on the extension cord, but managed to catch himself before he fell. Michelle, however, lost another half hour of work.

After Michelle had located some duct tape and strung the extension cord across the ceiling to prevent any more unexpected power outages, she returned to writing, slowed down only slightly by her obsessive need to now save her document after every sentence.

When Sunday rolled around, Ralph had recovered enough to attend church. He saw Pastor O’Donnell in the parking lot.

“I never got to ask you what you thought of our new associate pastor,” O’Donnell said,

“She seems nice, but maybe a little uptight and kind of jumpy,” Ralph told him.

“Hm. I hope she gets through her sermon okay. Maybe I pushed her into it a little soon. She’s still pretty wet behind the ears.”

As it turned out Michelle delivered her sermon beautifully and even got seven laughs from the congregation. O’Donnell counted.

Afterward she asked him how she’d done.

“Not too bad for your first time,” O’Donnell told her. “You’ll get better with practice. I’ll give you a few pointers later on if you like.”

Then he went to his office to start working on his sermon for the following Sunday. He needed to be sure he’d get at least eight laughs no matter how much overtime it took.