About twenty years ago I began my longest stint working at the church where we raised our son. I had previously worked briefly n the Children’s Day Out program, as the newsletter editor, and as part time Youth Minister. After a three year break to return to school for my teaching certificate, I went back to work at the church as full time Children and Youth Minister. That job shifted after a year to Communications and Youth Minister.

Looking back, I remember my time in that position fondly. So many memories of mission trips, weeklong summer camps, mystery trips, Confirmation classes, retreats, lock-ins and special events. Sunday afternoon Youth was a mixture of Bible Study, all sort of games, and general hang out time. One of our primary sponsors was a photographer, so I have tons of pictures capturing the moments.

Of course, not all of the experiences are joyful. Being a Youth Minister is hard work and comes with a lot of judgment. Everyone has an opinion about how to attract Youth to the church and feel free to share their opinions. Preteens and teenagers can be fickle and are at the mercy of their parents to get to the church. There were many Sundays where it was just my son and one other student with four sponsors. I tried to remember that number did not matter, but it could be discouraging.

Over ten years have passed since my last Youth event. Most of the students that we shared those years with I only see on social media or catch a reference from their parents or grandparents. Last week, I was getting my haircut by one of my favorite former students’ mom. She mentioned his age and I was startled to realize he is closing in on thirty years old. In my memory, he is always sixteen.

We have two choices when faced with memories from our past. We can focus on the good times, or we can dwell on the bad. I have done both during the ten years since I left paid church ministry. The highlights have been glamorized and made better than they were. In an attempt to brush over the low points, I suppressed them until they roared back to the forefront at inopportune times. The pandemic gave me the opportunity to step away from the building of that church and the community. Now all I have are memories captured in time.

When Shannan Martin writes about community, I can feel the crunch of leaves and see the cloud filled skies as she walk in her neighborhood. I have been reading her newest book Start With Hello as part of my morning devotion time. Today she described her experiences accompanying her children to and from school when they were elementary age. After some time driving them the short distance, she made the choice to make the trip by foot no matter what the weather conditions. Martin tells about the people she would see as they also made the same journey.

I was immediately transported back to when my son was in elementary school and we lived nearby. I usually drove him to school and picked him up in the afternoons. We did not live very far from the school, but had to cross a busy street to get to the school building and Oklahoma is very much oriented around vehicles. As with most elementary schools, there was a specific pick up process that involved long lines snaking through the parking lot and onto the main road. In an effort to circumvent the pick up line, several of the other moms and I would park in front of the school and wait in the lobby together. Often we were finishing up some type of volunteer project and stayed to visit as we waited. A type of support group developed in those moments as we gathered. We touched base about what our children were experiencing in their classrooms and sports. We discussed our own feelings about parenthood and life.

One afternoon the school counselor judged us to be helicopter parents and we were insulted by her labeling. Our kids were good kids and leaders in the school. How dare she take our presence to mean that we were overly involved in our children’s lives! Looking back, she was probably not totally wrong in her assessment, but the kids all turned out ok and are fully functioning adults. What she did not know was that we were not there to rescue our children, but to get some much needed support from other moms. This was before the days of the internet where affinity groups are at our fingertips. Most of us had stepped back from fulfilling careers to support our children and spouses. Those fifteen to thirty minutes were balm to our souls.

A few weeks ago I found our that one of those moms recently passed away. After the kids moved on to middle school, I lost touch with her. She divorced and had many struggles. I think about how much I enjoyed our conversations and am sad that I did not try to forge a more sustainable friendship with her. I miss those days of parenting side by side with my son’s friends parents. People will tell you how fast childhood passes as it relates to being a parent. What they do not tell you is how relationships change during those times as well.

There is a popular meme that discusses the difference between buying books and reading books. The idea is that these are two different hobbies and it hits close to home. As much as I read, I still have hundreds of books on my shelves and on my Kindle waiting to be read. Since discovering the Libby app that is connected to our local library, I now limit my “real” book purchasing to books that I feel I will want to share with others.

As a result of my book purchasing pattern, I choose books to read based on my mood at the time, not in order of when they were purchased. One of the books I have been reading in the morning with my coffee deals with rituals surrounding grief. Released this Fall, the book features personal accounts of the author’s experiences with grief in relationship with these rituals. On Sunday, I felt the urge to add another book to my morning reading. I dug a book out of the piles that was published at the beginning of the pandemic in April of 2020. This book is a first person account of tragedy and healing and has engrossed me from the first page.

Both of the authors are female and both of them are proficient writers. However, the first book feels more like a textbook where the other one feels like a revelation of her soul. I am left to wonder how one book can resonate so deeply with me where the other one is surface level. Part of the difference is the structure of each book, but that is not the entire explanation. I look forward to seeing how these books work together to teach me something about my faith, my writing, and my life journey.