God Saves Broken Woman, Delivery Guy Saves Broken Man

Okay this is going to get confusing so get out your playbill for reference and hold on, it has been a very crazy weekend!.
I have been so freaking sick - coughing up my body weight (big number ,don’t ask) in phlegm and so depressed because I cannot let go of any pathetic injustice I have encountered ever, that my mental health has seriously been in question. I am asked to watch my grandson, George, who as we all know is my favorite 10 year old on the planet, Friday night. And since I have not even had the intestinal fortitude to get a shower lately, I really was not sure I was going to be able to be the Meemaw I want to be. But Dad picked him up (note - dad also thinks he is the greatest 10 year old ever, so he was sitting by the phone for the ‘go ‘ signal and the feeling is mutual, ever since Dad made a fart machine and hilarity ensued) and when I came home from work I was greeted with the biggest smiles ever and, of course, fart noises. We went to the skate park and we talked while watching this agile bundle of energy leap around the concrete. I actually heard myself being negative and heard myself dwelling on ridiculous petty self absorbed nonsense All the while I watched this boy, this obviously African American 10 year old, marching himself up to total tattooed skating young men, and asking for help, for direction, for lessons. Not one refused him, not one. They showed him tricks and encouraged him. I just shut my mouth and watched. How brave, I thought, he did not look like he fit in, but he did, he amazed me.
Within an hour of getting home we were blasted with intense phone calls. There was a message from Iraq that did not sound good. The strain in our soldiers voice was so evident that I immediately called his wife. What had him so upset? She did not want to say, but she did not know what to say. Seems that Butterfly has rekindled a relationship with her boyfriend Coney Island ( he has this nickname by dad because he belongs in a freak show - tattoo sleeves and piercings and a raging habit of smoking heroin). Now he is out of state, because of legal issues we think, and she was in rehab to get through the drug withdrawal and to get over her adiction to him. Our soldier had seen it on line, on My Space, and flipped the heck out because he loves his sister and he is so far away and she will not answer his calls. His wife is totally upset, because we had all explained to Butterfly that she needs to watch what she posts on line, because it makes him freak the heck out when he reads that she is doing idiotic things. (note, I personally have not seen her since this lecture, nor have we seen her long enough to give her the gifts Dad bought her when we were with the soldier in April). I wanted to scream. We are within weeks now, the soldier has to keep his head in the game and not be worrying about the antics of his sisters. Then I find out Bo Peep has placed lovely pictures on My Space of herself drinking from a beer bong and getting ‘wasted’. What a great thing to put out there for her brother to see, not to mention the rest of the world. I felt so sick, so angry, so embarrassed. And I am told, the computer is down, and we have lost contact with our soldier. So he is there, dwelling on this chaos, in the war zone.
I was wallowing in my anger when Tank arrived home with his own dilemma. His most resent lady friend has a sister that is an exotic dancer. Not a huge deal considering we are not unfamiliar with the dancer community but a fact that he was made aware of early in the relationship. Having a friend that was recently removed from his girlfriends apartment and slightly in need of female companionship, Tank and he had headed off to the strip club. And yes, as it turns out to the very place that his lady friend’s sister happens to be employed. In his defense, he told the young lady he was going to a club, and she did not let him know which club her sister was at. But in her defense, it was probably too embarrassing to really talk about. She claims he should have recognized her from a picture, which is a head shot and he claims he did not recognize her face. (Hmm, he probably did not look at her face ) Oh my god, I can’t believe my son. I am not sure that he and I should have had this conversation. I wallow in my lack of parental skills. Deciding that perhaps I need to bake something and find myself staring at my cookbook which was published by a local church about a million years ago. Using my trusty lap top , I found them, and thought maybe when my daughter in law is up here next month, maybe she would go with me. It would be nice to do together and she had always went as a child and misses it.
I wake up unbelievably early (Thank you, stupid dogs) and just decided to treat myself to God treatment. I really do not know why, but I got dressed and left my sleeping family and went to a church I found in a cook book - alone. I cannot begin to tell you how absolutely comfortable I felt. And I - with a voice that sounds like a cat in heat- but who loves to sing, sang my little heart out (the woman behind me said to her husband - why so much singing today?) - I smiled. I loved it. Then the sermon was about letting go and forgiving. (Hmm, coincidence?) It was sort of like a full soul massage. I felt great and refreshed. I needed it. I got it.
I am all happy and smiles when I return, which of course had to be short lived because my husband is absolutely sure I was ‘meeting’ someone for breakfast. Yeah, that’s it, I am having an affair because all my past relationships have worked out so famously that I long to enter another. Priceless I tell you, but it really did not bother me that bad, I just thought it was ridiculous and an effort to give him a reason to feel self pity. I was buzzing around pretty much all day. He was getting buzzed up all day. (Note, he was invited people over all day that I do not like, so that he could show me that he was in charge. Between my boss ‘showing’ me she is in charge and him, I have really felt very out of control) But this day, I felt great. I am not going to be a zealot or anything, and I have no desire to plaster my car with Jesus fish. I do not feel like cloking my cube at work with God posters, and God calendars, and crosses, like my boss. (note, this is the same married boss that is huddled up with her married boss, giggling and hugging, HMMM) One dose does not a cure make, I just needed to know I was okay, and it did the job. Maybe I needed to hear the lesson and get a chance to sing where dogs would not start howling. Then the evening came.
“Mom, I just had to help a guy.” Tank bellowed into the phone. “I came up on the accident, no one was reacting. I thought he was dead, mom, his jaw was gone. There was blood everywhere. I could barely find a pulse.” He was delivering a pizza and then he had to be there, for this man that was hit and slipping away. He shouted orders, got people helping, and assisted the ambulance when it arrived. But most importantly, he held the hand of someone who was leaving his life behind. He kept him calm and alive. The paramedics told him if the guy made it, it was because of him. Then we had to hang up because he was at the delivery spot (I can just hear the 911 calls “this guy just got hit, but the pizza guy has got it under control”, “the pizza guy told me to call and tell you the guy is going into shock” and the next house “hey, our pizza is cold what is the matter with your delivery guy” “our pizza box has blood on it, do we have to pay?”)
Tank swears he will never get on a motorcycle again after seeing this. Which is a huge relief for me, to be honest. He realized exactly what a great policeman he would make, which made him go in and work on getting some more applications. And all the sudden, the soldier appeared on line again! They had fixed the computer and are up and running again! Angel said, ‘what exactly did you pray for, Mom? Can I put a request in?” It may not be a miracle, but I will take it as a sign. A sign that there are so many things bigger than ourselves. And that God really must not care how you sound when singing; He just wants to hear the song.