I was at the beach with Gatito and A over the weekend. On my way back from dipping Gatito’s toes in the water, we paused to watch some kids digging in the sand. I started talking to the mom, who was entertaining a baby exactly Gatito’s age, and she invited us to sit down and play for a bit. She very kindly offered us some food, which I politely declined.
Things were going okay, but she gave me pause when she announced that the only reason they were not in church was that her husband was traveling and she couldn’t manage all three kids on her own. My own excuse for not being in church, of course, is that I am a godless heathen. Not to mention a Jewish godless heathen.
Then Gatito kind of pawed at my shirt and she asked if I am nursing him and I laughed and said no, I’d only done that for a month. She, it turns out, had nursed #1 till he was three, #2 till she was 18 months and only stopped then because #3 was born. (If you think about this, it means she has been nursing nonstop for over five years!)
Then she asked if I worked before Gatito was born and I said that I still work! She, naturally, quit her job when her first baby was born and is not planning to go back because she is planning to home school.
I honestly and truly do not judge any of her choices, but given this trifecta of major differences in approach to life, I just didn’t forsee our relationship going much farther than a pleasant conversation at the beach. I sensed that she was about to ask me to join her church group though*, and so I beat a hasty retreat back to our own blanket and A.
* I have developed a finely tuned sensitivity to this sort of thing, as I seem to be a magnet for such invitations, perhaps because I am always eager to meet new people and make new friends. Every time I think someone is being really nice and friendly, the next thing I know, I’m being invited to bible study.
I’m having a group over next week, want to join? heh
Actually, I love being Jewish, it’s a great excuse if you want to use it that way. It got me out of church when I was at summer camp one year, a free uninterrupted hour on the trampolines.
Yeah, Lala, until they ask if you’re familiar with Jews for Jesus. I kid you not.
oh, nothing like that premonition that you are about to be hit-on for jesus. i have my doubts about jesus generally, but if he was/is real, from what i’ve read he would not be too excited to have mrs marathon feeding sacks in his camp. and honestly, why is it always people that give me the creeps that are out hustling for christ? there must be something to that. i wish i had a good solution for you; as a gentile, i feel slightly responsible.
Yeah, J actually asked me if I would consider Jews for Jesus as a compromise when we were trying to figure out what religion to raise our children (children…plural…hahahaha!). And yet I still married him, and have remained so for 7+ years so far. And we are raising our child Jewish. Well, I am…J doesn’t really have much to do in the religious aspect of P’s life.
That said, does being Jewish mean you’re automatically a magnet for people asking you about church? ‘Cause I get it all the time. Do gentiles get that also?
Hah! I had a lady ask me a couple of weeks ago if I wanted to be her backup on the local Republican Committee. I kid you not. Had to break it to her that I’m really a sort of hawkish liberal …. She was quite disappointed.
Oh, I am a magnet for those invitations also. I think I’d have a much more active social life if my Catholicism wasn’t lapsed.
My husband’s business partner is an evangelical christian, and so are some of their employees. It can be daunting to go to dinner with them when they are in town–casual wear includes t-shirts taht say “A blood donor died for me” and a non-ironically worn “Honk if you love JC”.
I’m not Jewish, and can talk a good line on JC, but I’m of the radical methodist type, so once the conversion s**t gets going, I quietly freak out. My Jewish husband has managed to get the employees to not talk about how he’ll be let into the ‘temple’, eventhough his people will have ushered in the anti-christ.. OY!