things that are Stressing Me Out today...

Alternate Title:
"You Know Things are Bad When You Consider Your Upcoming Knee Replacement Surgery A Vacation..."

1. Hometown Days- Our quaint little town's yearly celebration of the wheat harvest. It's pretty fun- a weekend full of events all over our little town including a parade, lots of free food, fireworks, a town dance, yadda yadda yadda. Our church is having to deal with the county over the erection of the same tent that we've erected the past four years except this time it's on our new property- and having to jump through all kinds of ridiculous hoops and pay ridiculous sums of money to make said county happy. (For instance, we have to have EXIT signs on an open-sided tent- and that's not even one of the dumb ones.) Maybe my husband should wear a sign that says "Pastor" just to make sure people aren't confused. Top that off with two weeks of services under a tent in 90* weather, an extra "Night of Worship" service, and a catered meal and you get stress.
2. Having my husband misquoted in the local paper (circulation 7,000)- Did I mention he's the school board president? And a reporter came to their last meeting and grossly misquoted him, making him look like a total arrogant jerk (which he is NOT). We did not initially respond to the paper to correct the mistake because we were hoping this wouldn't be a big deal and that it would blow over with nothing said about it- and we certainly didn't want to call attention to it if it wasn't necessary. Since our passivity, two letters of complaint against my husband have been written to the school superintendent, who is responding to them individually and defending him- telling them what was really said and in what context. Then this week's paper hosted a lovely Letter to the Editor based upon the original mis-quote, making my husband look even jerkier and calling even more attention to the matter. So now we must respond. And respond in a way that doesn't set off a firestorm of letters to the editor back and forth (which people love in our little town). The pressure of writing a perfect letter to END this that will be read by thousands of people looking for juicy gossip. The pressure of people believing what was written and thinking that attitude represents our church. Dealing with the Mama Bear that has risen up in me that wants to protect my husband and my family in the most vocal of ways- which my husband assures me is not the right way to handle this. Grr.
3. My youngest son- He made a mistake so horrible that it has hurt the whole family. It has hurt us- his parents. He has probably lost the trust, respect and friendship of his cousin because of his actions. He hurt his grandparents, his aunts and uncles. He was a follower- participating in a joke that he had no idea of the ripples it would cause and how far out they would go. We are so angry at him, and ashamed and disappointed, and embarrassed. Of course we still love him... we can just barely stand to look at him at this point. He's doing hard labor at our house right now, and he doesn't know this yet, but he's shoveling out horse and dog kennell stalls all day tomorrow (it's good to have friends with large animals). Then on to another day of hard labor at our house. And we aren't through yet. He's losing his facebook, his myspace, and his texting for a year. He's writing a letter to ask for forgiveness to his cousin, who he hurt so deeply. He's writing a letter of apology to his cousin's parents- his aunt and uncle. It is gonna suck to be him. This hurts because my son is NOT a mean kid. But apparently he's a follower- and he is going to learn the consequences of his actions.

Will you pray for us? My husband and me? Our stress right now is so high and we need to stay on the same team... so far, so good. But I'm feeling overwhelmed and like Charlie Brown's cloud is hanging over our heads and raining directly on us. It has been a rough month. I'll be glad when it's August. sigh.