When Jesus Twiddles His Thumbs

Included in the All Women Blog­ging Car­ni­val at Absolute Leigh

Today, in con­junc­tion with Blog Your Bless­ings Sun­day, it is my priv­i­lege to present this won­der­ful arti­cle from one of the Internet’s most pop­u­lar and pro­lific blog­gers, the Queen of All Memes and Founder of the Peace Globe Move­ment. When I read this hilar­i­ous but poignant arti­cle on her site, Mimi Writes, I imme­di­ately e-mailed her and asked if she would share it here as a Guest Author. Luck­ily, she gra­ciously agreed.

When Jesus Twid­dles His Thumbs

By Mimi Lenox

Note: The first part of this story about the social func­tion is totally true and hap­pened a few years ago. The Flash For­ward sec­tion is an adden­dum and reflec­tion. I really don’t talk to pic­tures on the wall. Ahem …

He was drunk.

In the Pres­by­ter­ian Church no less. You know the one. Swanky, ele­gant, rich old-money-in-the-middle-of-town-prestigious-kinda-church. And in the sacred base­ment that night?

Speed-dating. Round tables. Too much per­fume. And a perky lit­tle woman with an annoy­ing bell. I was game. After all, what could go wrong in a church?

Here are the rules: There are twelve white linened tables with burn­ing can­dles and refresh­ments. You choose one and sit down. Male across from female. When the bell rings, you’re off! Intro­duc­tions and more sweaty palms. I so hate that. The bell rings again and you rotate to the next wait­ing gen­tle­man caller.

You only have 8-minutes to make a “con­nec­tion” with some­one or go down in flames. It’s time to hit the high­lights. The (con­ver­sa­tion in my head) is worth the price of admis­sion but rarely what I say. Almost.
“What is your name?” (Mimi Queen of Memes)
“What do you do?” (Write a blog and sing songs)
“Have you lived here long?” (If you don’t like them you lie and say you’re from Tas­ma­nia) I was usu­ally exotic.
“How long have you been sin­gle?” (A lot longer than 8 min­utes … )
“What are you look­ing for?” (a sane man. Is that too much to ask?!) always end­ing with the inevitable …
“If you’re a real Queen, where is your crown?“
Next!

And then Prince Charm­ing showed up.

Slur­ring his words in the Pres­by­ter­ian Church. All over the fancy fur­ni­ture. Falling down into the cush­ioned chair in front of me. Bat­ting his intox­i­cated wis­dom in my face.
“Come here often?” asked drunkie Dan.
“Do I smell …” (no, Mims, don’t go there. Remem­ber where you are. God will get him … )

I stared.
He swayed.
“Where are you from?” he stut­tered.
“Some­where south of here,” I glared, think­ing … (Yep. South is where you’re goin’. buster. Waaaay south. Where it’s hot and humid all year round.)

And then he asked the unthink­able. The unimag­in­able. The unblog­gable. As God as my wit­ness — “Do you know where the adult toy store is? Is it near where you live?”

*#!!*$. That’s what I thought too.

I wanted to crawl under the rock on the wall.

I looked around.
Am I in a bar some­where? Isn’t this the per­vert night­mare my mother warned me about? How safe am I any­where if this kind of inter­ac­tion can take place in the bow­els of sanc­ti­mo­nial tradition?

Where is that damn timer bell??! Four min­utes to go and I’m stuck with this. I glared and tried to hold my breath. Waiter? Waiter??!! I need another man. Please, some­body, bring me another man.

Even in the roman­tic slow burn between us, he thought he was in con­trol. Until he stood up. Jumped up when the bell rang.
And lit­er­ally slammed into the next for­tu­nate woman with his vodka-stained jacked that looked like it came from a mor­tu­ary. And he was still attached.

What am I doing here? I’m only halfway through the tables. I can’t walk out now. I paid good money for this game. I’ve met exactly six men who are as wrong for me as any man in the world could be.

An elec­tri­cian turned nov­el­ist (whose bulb did not burn, trust me) DING! a podi­a­trist, DING! a sixty-year-old man with a retired for­tune and a lisp (how did he get in this group?) Oh yeah, … the for­tune. DING! … an attrac­tive man in his early for­ties with too many baby chil­dren obvi­ously in search of a vir­tu­ous woman DING! to raise them and randy Dan. I’ve had more fun at baby showers.

Is this a sign from God?

I looked at the pic­ture of Jesus on the wall.
He was not amused either.

He did not spring from the frame and help me. “Ask and ye shall receive” did not work that day, my friends. And even worse, He was look­ing the other way.

See?

I don’t blame Him.

So I prayed. God, get me out of here before I curse in the church. I’m gonna explode if I have to smile for 8-more min­utes.
Then I saw him.…Tall, dark, hand­some and smelling good. No leaded or unleaded odors. Italian-stitched suit and dark wavy hair. Per­fect. Puu­u­fect!! I’m sorry, God, I’m sorry! I’ll never doubt Your wis­dom again. I knew it was right to seek love in the church basement!

“Pssst! Mimi!” Over here!
I looked up. Every­one was engaged in polite con­ver­sa­tion. Who was that?
Oh.

“Not now, Lord. I’m busy. Don’t you see Mr. Won­der­ful there?“
“But Mimi … I think you should know that … ”

One table left. It was my turn with the hot­tie. (Sorry, Lord.) I fluffed. I primped. I sprayed mint. I looked up. Smil­ing. Ready.
And doomed. It was Dan.

And he was still drunk.

Mr. Per­fect was head­ing out the door with a red-headed beauty on his arm before the game was through which left an empty table in the rota­tion. Pad­dling back­wards was dear Danny who stood directly under the pic­ture of Jesus before he lit­er­ally fell into my life again. Did you see that, Lord? It’s almost as if some­one pushed him on me. Again. Are You pay­ing A.T.T.E.N.T.I.O.N. ?

Light­bulbs flashed, phone num­bers exchanged, giddy guf­faws, glasses clank­ing in tipsy toasts soaked in pher­e­mones — and Mimi sat with a man dipped in com­mu­nion wine. I was a mani­a­cal mess. The only one in the room who was calm was Jesus, still pray­ing, and still twid­dling His thumbs.

I gath­ered what was left of my pride and walked to my car. I could have sworn I heard a mur­mur of prayer from above as I passed by the pic­ture … “No, Father. Unfor­tu­nately, she was not wear­ing her pen­cil skirt but I have other things to dis­cuss with her … ”

I kicked off my shoes and car­ried them through the dark­ness, threw them in my car and started the engine; turn­ing over a new leaf for good mea­sure. N.O. M.O.R.E. S.I.N.G.L.E.S. F.U.N.C.T.I.O.N.S. Period.

I was in no mood for a con­ver­sa­tion with the Almighty.

He had other plans.

FLASHBACK:
Do you remem­ber when you were eight-years-old and you fell off your bike and scraped your knee?
“Yes, Lord.“
“What did I tell you then, Mimi?“
“Well … once I stopped cry­ing I hit my brother for push­ing me.“
“AFTER that.“
“You said, ‘You shouldn’t hit your brother.’ Right?“
“Wrong.“
“I should have hit my brother?“
“Actu­ally, I saw him give you a nudge on the back of the bike, but you were busy admir­ing the scenery and the road­side hon­ey­suck­les. So when he lunged for­ward to push the seat of your bike, you fell in the gravel and tum­bled into the ditch.“
“Ahh … I remem­ber now, Lord. “
“And what did I say, Mimi? “
“Well … I’m think­ing. I had this over­whelm­ing … strange urge to hug him. Right after I socked him.“
“Right. But what you didn’t know is that he never touched your bike that day. He was just try­ing to get your atten­tion. He reached out to grab your hair. And you fell.“
“Right. He made me fall! I should have smacked him. He deserved it.“
“No, Mimi. You couldn’t see then and you don’t see now.”

“You just told me, Lord, that he was respon­si­ble for my fall.“
“And he was, Mimi. He was …

Because he was behind you and he saw the car — the one that would have hit you had you not teetered and rose with a bloody knee and a blush­ing brother to face.”

FLASH FORWARD

“Do you remem­ber what hap­pened in the park­ing lot after the speed-dating party?”

“Yes. Vividly. Noth­ing. Noth­ing hap­pened. Zilch. No date. No date. No date. No guy.”

“You were sup­posed to be with the drunk man.”

“In the park­ing lot??! The per­vert man? The … the … you don’t mean him??”

“You didn’t lis­ten to Me when I tried to get your atten­tion. There was no mis­take in the table rotation.”

“But he embar­rassed me. Every­where I turned, he was there. And You did nothing!”

“Aww … now you get it. Exactly.”

“I get it alright. I get that I’m all alone all the way home.

I get that I am alone now.

And then with a sar­cas­tic smack, “Maybe if I’d rid­den my bike to church tonight I wouldn’t be in this mess? Maybe I should have decked the drunk man??! What?! I’m not good with para­bles you know. Just spill it, Lord. I’m tired and I wanna go home.”

Jesus is not amused.

“Mimi. Some­times I allow things to hap­pen while you learn to dodge. I knew he would hang around long enough to keep you from intro­duc­ing your­self to a dis­as­ter down the road.

“He didn’t pre­vent you from find­ing Mr. Right.”

“He didn’t?”

“No. He pre­vented you from find­ing Mr. Wrong.”

Jesus is exhausted.

God is laughing.

I am crying.

I reached into the back­seat and found my purse, the one I’d flung threw the win­dow in dis­gust. I wanted this con­ver­sa­tion to end. It was time to say good­nite. I know when I’m right. And this time I’m right. I wish he would just climb back into the pic­ture and try to save the red­head. She prob­a­bly needs Him about now. I had more impor­tant things to do than argue with God.

“Good­nite, Mimi. I’m sorry you’ve had such a bad night…Mimi?”

The twid­dling has resumed.

“What are you doing, dear? …Mimi?”

“Call­ing my lit­tle brother.”

God is smiling.

“And please. One more word of advice.

Save us all a lot of time and can­cel the Match.com subscription.”

Dial­ing.

Orig­i­nally pub­lished at Mimi Writes.

Tech­no­rati Tags: Blog Your Bless­ings Sun­day, Guest Blog­gers

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