Saint Matthew's

After my past 5 days, I hoped my week would start of different.

It did – in a humorous way.

My day started off with a friend calling me at 6:30am to complain about a member of his congregation who flipped him off yesterday. Yes, a member of my friend’s congregation, following an argument they had over — of all things — Christmas lights on the church Christmas tree (she wanted to continue with the traditional white, he wanted multi-colored this year), she got into her car and as she passed him in the parking lot, extended her middle finger at her pastor.

I didn’t want to laugh, but it was 6:30 in the morning, so I let it roar. My buddy wasn’t happy with me for laughing at his “dire” situation.

See, in life, there are places where you pick fights and others where you do not, especially in a church.  Christmas lights on the church Christmas tree does not fall into the “fight” category. Plus, there is this little thing in a Lutheran Church where the congregation makes certain decisions. Christmas lights on a Christmas tree does not fall into the pastoral duty category. You leave it up to the people who have put up the Christmas tree for years to make these decisions. A pastor has other things to worry about than white bulbs on a Christmas tree.

At the conclusion of my morning wake-me-up call, I head over to church for Morning Prayer and then out to breakfast, the one non-church related item on my Monday routine. Following breakfast, I go into the parking lot and woman is standing outside of her car yelling into her cell phone. I should have just gotten into my car and left. But, Anthony decides to ask what was wrong.

The woman said that her car didn’t start and when she got out of her car to check the battery, she somehow locked her keys in her car.

The woman called her husband who, since he is at work some 20 miles away, can’t come to help out his wife. She starts crying that she’ll be late for work and her husband hangs up on her. And then I come into her little drama and she explains her entire life story.

She married a guy who didn’t love her, and to prove it – he will not leave work IN MANHATTAN to drive back to New Milford, New Jersey to help her out. Oh, he takes the bus and a train, but it doesn’t matter. He doesn’t love her enough to come help her.

Her husband once was arrested for disorderly conduct when he got drunk at Giants Stadium. But that was before they were married and were even dating. And, oh yeah, she was arrested, too, at the same game for smacking a drunk guy in the face after he put his hands on her bottom.

And then my favorite little story about this couple — she claims that her husband secretly wants to bed her mother.

Ah, what a great Monday morning!

To put a nice cherry on top of this Monday morning sundae of delight: I check her car doors – they are open. She locked her door when she got out of her car to check the car battery, but not the others.

And the car started right up.

Gotta love it!!

It is going to be a busy Monday on my end.

I am playing “Mr. Pick Up” — first, at JFK, then second, at Newark Penn Station.

One, I am picking up a friend returning home from a little vacation out in Las Vegas. Two, a friend is coming in from Indiana (northwest, near Chicago) and is spending a few days in town.

And before I do that, I have to figure out my checkbook, get gas, clean up, and somehow get dry. Ugh. I am still feeling damp from Saturday’s soaking R.E.M. concert at Jones Beach. One good thing, however — my feet don’t look like prunes anymore.

With more thunderstorms expected today, I guess feeling completely dry is out of the question.