The ministers of the Vicarage have definitely been running the Earth this Memorial Day weekend. I cannot speak for Brenda and Amanda, but I think I shirked my responsibility to watch the sky these last few days. That is never a good thing.

Friday began with grocery shopping and then a day of admin work at the church. I got a bit carried away with accomplishing tasks. It felt good to be making headway on paperwork (one of the banes of my existence). I was doing so well I kept putting prayer off until it was too late.

Brenda and I had a 4 P.M. engagement with friends from church to go see Shakespeare.

It was a great night out in Worcester! Thanks Ken and Betty, Brenda and I had such a good time!

By the time we pulled into the Vicarage I was ready to just collapse into bed. I did and then proceeded to sleep through my alarm which was set to give me time to pray before Amanda and I had to hit the softball fields in Baldwinville MA for Cornerstone’s annual softball tourney.

My job at the tournament was to call “Play Ball!” For each game, to keep time and then call end of game. Then I had to collect all the score sheets and fill out the master round-robin double-elimination chart so everyone could see where they stood in the ranks.

Amanda’s job was to stamp the hands of everyone as they got their free ice cream from the concession truck.

She got a pretty good sun burn during her two hours of duty, even though she was reapplying sun block every 30 minutes.

While we were having a blast at the softball tournament Brenda was driving to Onset MA for the first of three services and a picnic she was attending with The Bridge Onset and The Bridge Carver.

By the time Amanda and I got home from the softball tournament it was time to walk the dogs and answer all mom’s questions about the family’s coming and going. She was pretty confused about where everyone was and why they had gone.

After supper and walking the dogs for their final time, I was so tired I again just plopped in bed. I awoke at 3:30 A.M. and realized I was not just physically tired. I was spiritually depleted and in deep need of spiritual refreshment. I jumped into 2 and 1/2 hours of prayer which I needed just to get my head on straight before church. Running the Earth can be fun for a time but when it is not coupled with watching the sky it can cause some real internal issues which take time to work through (at least for me by Sunday morning my attitude was pretty bad).

After a few hours of preparatory prayer I was ready to lead worship at Cornerstone. After service Amanda and I paid a visit to one of our parishioners in the hospital. Then we went home so Amanda could finish packing for her trip to South Carolina.

I dropped her at Logan airport this morning at 2 A.M.. She is off on the next adventure!