first mass

Mass today was beautiful. I mean, it almost always is, I have the joy of attending mass in a beautiful building with a wonderful priest and many people I have come to love.

I went in early to practice the cantor piece, then out to see some people in the parish hall. (Since it’s August, I didn’t “dress out” in the choir dress) and one lady asked me what was up with the scarf. I paused and tried quickly to think of something true and short to say, and then she was like “Are you planning on leaving us? Going back to the MidEast?” And I caved and just went with “no, I’m not” a few other people said it looked nice, but no one asked then.

And then it was The Peace. One of the kids… no, one of the young ladies came up to me and was all “What’s with the babushka scarf?” in the happy way young people do, and I froze. There were people like everywhere and all the commotion! and I was all “It’s just a scarf!” and I felt a little guilty. But then I got back to my pew and I was like “dana! Really? You just had your sins absolved and you LIED! It wasn’t even five minutes! How are you going to take communion now? There’s not a second absolution.” So, okay, well you can’t do anything about it right now. Take communion and after the service grab her.

So after the service, I stopped her and said something like “During the peace, you asked me a very valid question and I didn’t give you a very good answer. Basically I’ve decided to cover my head, for now. Not all the time, but especially when I pray, and maybe other times as well, because I feel that this is something God wants me to do.” Simple, and true.

As an added bonus, I actually said the last part of that. Out loud. To another person. It’s normally hard for me even to think about “I feel that this is something God wants me to do.”  And I didn’t get the hebbyjeeby “I hate ultraprotestant code talk” feeling I normally get when people talk about personal convictions and God.

And as I was leaving one other woman asked me about it. My response was “I’ve decided to cover my head” and that was that.

As an aside: I did a pretty amazing job on the cator piece, if I do say so myself!