Monday of Lent 1. I was only 10 minutes late for church in Rock Springs yesterday. I was jarred awake at 6 a.m. by my alarm on my cell phone. Usually I wake up before the alarm but I was deep down in dreamland. I have been trying to overcome the tail end of my coughing crud. By 7:30 I was in my Subaru driving out of Lander for my journey over South Pass. web cam here Yesterday was warm and sunny and no wind - very unusual for the top of the Continental Divide this time of year. Just past the top my left rear tire blew out. I pulled over and got out that tiny thing that passes for a jack and started to work. My father would not let me learn to drive when I was 15 unless I showed him I could change a tire. So there I am by the side of the road in clericals and a wool skirt. No traffic, no cell service. As I was beginning to raise the tire off the ground, an angel in the wilderness named Dan (who grew up on a ranch and currently manages an oil rig) and his wife stopped to help - I must have looked pathetic - in my skirt with y grey hair! Soon I was on my way - with time to spare. I discovered the only place to get a tire changed on Sunday is Wal Mart - so with the help of a parishioner I took my car in to get in line (6 hour wait at that point). Scurrying into church at 10:40 I had chaos of the mind as we processed. People said they did not feel the chaos so I must not have been projecting it outwardly. Dan found his way into my sermon (see LENT 1) and so it goes.
Interestingly after church, those who followed the episco-drama (and there aren't very many who even know what you mean when you say Anglican Communion), said to me - "Please don't make us go back (before inclusion of gays and lesbians, and Bp Robinson's consecration). We studied, we prayed, we decided - some left - but we are here and we want to keep our church open and loving. There are plenty of other churches for those who don't want to be this way - for us there is only the Episcopal Church."
This is not some radical, revissssssionist group - just a normal Wyoming Church in the midst of a population boom due to our insatiable need for gasoline.
My day ended after lunch with a friend, gathering my car from the Wal Mart and driving home - arrived about 6 p.m. and then led our EfM Online group with an occasional peep at the Oscars.