An Unlikely Date

Today I felt like I just rolled out of bed and said, "Surprise me God. I dare you!"

Because there is just no way I could have seen or even made up today's happenings in my head. It was just a little crazy. But all kinds of good!

I was excited to go to mass today! I mean I usually am, however I hadn't been to Holy Name the past two weeks because of being out of town. And needless to say I was just really ready to come back to my home parish and celebrate mass with my people and with Father Mike. : ) I ended up sitting with Katie today. I met Katie a couple of weeks ago at Theotokos, a women's group that our parish just started up. Which speaking of, I still need to blog about that at some point..... haha But anyway it was good to sit with someone I actually converse with outside of mass. I am really looking forward to getting to know Katie more. She is one of the teachers at the grade school here and is in charge of the cyo activities. This week she is coming over for dinner and to watch the best show ever, Gilmore Girls, on Wednesday night with Emily and I.  It should be good times!

But anyway, Katie and I were chatting after mass about me helping with cyo nights and this old man comes up to us. He was going about 90 miles a minute about taking us to lunch, he asked me if I was a school teacher. I said yes. He said, "Well I have just enought money for the two of you, see you at the college." And then he walks off. Katie kind of smiles at me and says, "Well do you have lunch plans?" I didn't realize this guy was serious. But apparently he was. So Katie and I drive to the college cafeteria. And I am laughing because we are eating lunch in kind of like the twilight zone, a college cafeteria and I realize that when this guy asked if I was a school teacher, he actually meant was I THE school teacher. As in the new school teacher at Holy Name. Whoopsie.

But anyway, I made sure to let Dean, as is his name, know this as soon as I could. And it just got weirder. He had actually been employed by Ark City, Winfield, Dexter, and at some point Holy Name schools. Maybe even Sacred Heart in Ark City. So we had plenty to talk about. Dean has many "hobbies". He has cattle, grows a garden and he is ONE of the only beekeepers in Cowley County.

I say ONE because I happen to know the other one: Mr. Harvey. Oh Dean, had so much to say about Mr. Harvey. Mr. Harvey is kind of similar to Dean, in the fact that they both have huge gardens full of tomatoes and they both have a passion for honeybees. And don't get either of them started on how much we need honeybees to pollinate our crops and vegetable gardens. : )

But the best part of our conversation was when he found out I was the FFA advisor. Because apparently somehow Mr. Harvey gave him some tomatoes that we had started for him in our greenhouse. And the thing about these tomatoes is that they somehow got mislabeled. So his seven rows of tomato plants were actually seven rows of cherry tomato plants. And this man had just bought me lunch! : )

He was definitely quite the character to listen to. Plus, about halfway through lunch, a friend of his, Brent, showed up and chatted with us too. I learned a lot about these two men at lunch. Mostly nothing important. I did learn that Dean's wife is in the veterans home and has Alzheimers. She doesn't know her last name but she is one of the most mobile and active people at the home. I learned that Dean just likes people. I saw him approach a whole table of asian students and chat with them for a good 5 minutes. When he left them, their faces looked exactly the same way I am sure mine looked after being asked to lunch. I am really glad Katie and I could have lunch with Dean and Brent.

Then later that night I was going to go to the cyo adoration they were having. At Holy Name we have adoration on Monday at 8am through Tuesday at 8 am. So this was out of the normal hours. I was excited because I figured this would be an awesome way to start my week but also to get started working more with the high schoolers at Holy Name. I even brought my normal adoration things to do. However, I was pleasantly surprised with evening prayer, and doing the exposition and benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. Complete with incense and awkward singing. : ) It was another first time experience for me.....I had actually never witnessed them put the Host in the monstrance. At least I don't think.....definitely not from 2 rows back! : ) But I do think I remember some of what we did from the Catholic Family Conference. All I know, is that I hope that cyo does this more often and that I have most certaintly had a very fulfilling Sunday.

I must also say this: I loved every single reading today in mass....and Father's homily. I just felt like I got so much learning and reflecting accomplished today. Hopefully, I can find time to blog about those three readings and my thought process some time this week. So thankful for such a blessed day!