Sept. 22, 2021 It’s a whole day of hearing and saying what would normally seem like crazy sentences. “Can you help me carry this coffin? Nanny needs it.” “Hand me that ribcage, please!” “We need to move the electric chair to get to the outhouse.” “What’s going to be easier: carrying the 12-foot skeleton through the intersection or having dad move it with the tractor?” Long-time readers of this column may have guessed it, but Saturday was my family’s annual Halloween decorating day. Every September, my mother designates a day for what we refer to as “the build,” and my sisters and their families, and my family and I descend upon my parents’ home in Bombay to install the majority of a really large Halloween display (it’s actually two separate scenes; there’s one on each side of their home). My parents also go all out for Christmas, and we have a similar build day in late November or early December, but the Halloween build is bigger and more labor intensive. While these decorating days are generally fun times with family, those weird sentences we get to say during them are probably my favorite part. It would be very difficult to keep track of the number of times someone says some variation of, “there’s something you don’t hear every day,” or “I don’t think other grandmothers ask their grandchildren to… (carry their skeletons, add blood to their guillotine, dig a very shallow grave).” At least to me, it’s the uncommon sentences and uncommon conversations that typically stand out as meaningful in my memory. That’s true of Halloween build day, and it’s true of life in general. Thinking back over the last few months, there are a number of conversations I’ve had with friends, family, a beloved mentor and trusted advisors/professionals that stand out in my memory. These conversations stand out because they weren’t typical, especially in this secular society. They’re conversations in which these people in my life have uttered phrases like, “have you taken it to prayer?” or “don’t forget that God is with you, helping you through this,” “is this God’s will or yours?” or “can I pray with you about that?” As Christians, we’re called to share God’s love with the people around us. We don’t have to do it in huge ways. We can do it with simple, uncommon sentences – sentences that have the power to resonate with those that hear them. And there’s nothing crazy about that. |
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