Am I going over to the dark side?

Last weekend, when I was at HOT, I was standing next to their current half-time assistant minister (who is my primary competition for the full-time version of her job... awkward!), having just introduced myself, when someone came up to her and complimented her haircut. Then they said, "Now you look ten years old instead of twelve! But a cute ten!" It was horrifying.

Here's the thing, though: it was a really bad haircut. She did look ten years old.

I say this having also seen this woman celebrate the early liturgy at HOT. She is whatever the opposite of charismatic is, at least on the altar. I have the pleasure of going to a lot of church services, and hearing a lot of people preside at the Eucharist, and believe me, all priests are not created alike. This was one of the things that led to me telling the pastor of HOT that I wasn't going to recreate the quiet-young-lady-priest dynamic.

The rector re-told me that story, and ended it by saying, "I mean, people just don't say things like that to me. I'm a big personality." And he also said a thing or two about how HOT, being all old and stuff, can still be pretty sexist.

Thing is, people don't say that type of stuff to me, either. Sometimes they tell me they like my shoes or my sweater, but that's about it. I asked my kids and their sponsors how old they thought I was, and the agree-upon age was 29. At the time, I was confused about how to take that -- should I be insulted that they thought I was a full 3 years older than I had just turned? Or complimented that they thought of me as a real adult? (Oh man, I also went on a youth group retreat where I was asked multiple times whose mom I was. I would have had to start in middle school to have birthed one of the kids on the bus. That one just made me laugh.)

There's a lot in there that I can't control. My hair is already going gray, which I'm sure makes some people up their estimates. I have really dry skin which is only going to get more wrinkly as I get into my thirties.

But there are some things I can control. When I go to work I dress the part; I put on heels and serious person clothes. I tell my hairdresser to make me look professional. I do not allow her to give me a pixie cut, because I am aware it would make me look like a 10 year old boy (or, with all those grays, like a round of "Older lesbian or Midwestern lady?"). I anticipate wearing a clerical collar more than strictly necessary for a few months when I am first ordained and in a new place, to help establish my authority. Quiet Young Lady Priest didn't seem to be doing any of this damage control.

Point being, am I joining the dark side? Is being honest with myself about my opinion of the interim assistant's haircut some form of victim-blaming? Are my slightly uncomfortable shoes (girl has to be able to run after the youth group in those heels, yo, they're not stilettos) just another form of internalized kyriarchical self-hate?

God, her shoes were so, so ugly. She had a baby in December, but honestly.

Greetings and Salutations!

I begin with a declaration: I have not left my apartment today. I haven't even made it out of sweatpants, although I did change out of my pajamas around 4pm, when I took a shower. It is in the 30's outside, and I just can't be asked to leave the house.

It's been an intense few days, and I am only now really beginning to feel like I've recovered from my spring break. Here's an all-too-brief recap of what went down:

I loved Richmond. I think I liked it even better in retrospect, after having a chance to digest the experience. As you read previously, I was rather charmed with the town itself. Very pretty! Mildly racist! (As soon as you point out the Civil War guys on statues, people ask you if you saw the Arthur Ashe statue. I did not walk far enough north to find the Arthur Ashe statue; all I saw were white guys on horses.) Also the church I interviewed at, St. Ed's for the purposes of this blog, is incredibly active, well-resourced, and generally fun. The head pastor guy there is a total goofball, which appeals to me. They're looking for someone to run their missions programs, which I can totally do. I left really feeling like I could work there. Moving to Richmond would be scary and isolated at first, but it is full of hipsters and fun stuff.

I had a better time at the second church in Philadelphia. This church is way old, and we'll call it Holy Old Trinity (or, HOT). HOT is in center city, and is now adapting to the fun, arty community around. Having recently rennovated their parish hall (churches as old at HOT basically have to have a second building, because their worship spaces, by reason of age and zoning, end up being bathroom-free impossible-to-add-on-to stand-alones), they now have a little theater up in there. They also recently hired a guy from my school's music program, who is trained in African drumming and world music, so things are about to get fun up in their choir loft.

I also had a good time with the rector there. I would be following another full-time assistant, who left in the middle of last summer to head her own church. Everyone says very lovely things about her, but they include words like "quiet" and "introspective." I have already developed a good enough relationship with the rector at HOT to be like, "You know that's not me, right? I am also a big personality." To which the rector said "I know; that's one of the things that I like about out."

What it seems to come down to is this: what kind of me do I want to be? Do I want to be middle-class and buttoned-up at St. Ed's? I could fit in there as a scrubbed-clean version of myself. Or do I want to be funky and... theater-y at HOT? I think to many people who are not me this is a pretty easy question. I don't seem like someone who wants to wear a suit to work, do I? But... maybe I am.

In either case, no one has actually offered me a job yet, so this may all be premature.

Finally, the Diocese of Chicago came through with a job they want me to apply for. In Barrington, Illinois. Where is Barrington, you might ask, if you were me about a week ago? Effing far away from everything, is the answer to that question. It sounds like it could be a good job, but do I really want to move to Barrington? How politely can I tell my bishop that I don't really want to apply to the one job he wants me to apply to? Do I still want to apply to this job, just because I'm scared no one else will hire me?

This fear/anxiety combo is exhausting. Someone just needs to man up and hire me. (THEY'RE ALL WHITE MEN, I CAN SAY THAT.) Someone else needs to write four move papers and take a huge final before they can go to Cape Cod. That second person is me. The first one ... who knows.

On Tuesday, I go down to Dunn Loring, VA, which is allegedly a 25-minute Metro ride from downtown DC, to do what I hope is my last travel interview. By then I hope I will be able to come up with a goofy and barely plausible code name for that parish.

Interview Roadtrip Part 1

Ah! Two posts in one night! Do not attempt to contain your excitement.

Yesterday I did my first second-round job interview (I'm not counting the Skype interview with someone's search committee, because it was 25 minutes and seemed sort of perfunctory). Let's call it the church of St. Dorf's-in-the-Burbs. Except it's technically within Philadelphia city limits. St. Dorf's was built in the late 1800's as part of a planned vacation community for some Philly elites. I'm told that it's become less of a richie-rich enclave these days. I had a lovely time chatting with the lay people of the parish; the priest is a great guy who I would be able to learn a lot from. It's a parish that needs to do some rebuild work, although it seems to have the motivation and the resources to do just that.

Still ... I guess my overall feeling is a pretty resounding "meh." Which is sort of immensely disheartening. What if this is the only offer I get? I think I could work there, but do I really want to? What did the dream I had the night before -- the one with the goat -- MEAN?!?

Tonight, I'm in Richmond, VA, where I interview tomorrow with another large church headed by some straight white guy. Let's call this one St. Ed's. I know very little about St. Ed's, except that it is a big, thriving parish which is looking for someone to run its young adults and outreach ministries. I never really wanted to consider Virginia, but after a highly respected Berkeley grad told me how much she enjoyed coming down here after graduation I decided to entertain the idea. So, having never been to Richmond before in my life, I drove down today and have been installed at the Doubletree on St. Ed's dime. (Side note: this is the crappiest Doubletree I've ever seen!)

Buried lead: Richmond is about 5,000x more adorable than I expected. The residential architecture is spectacular, entirely charming, and very well-kept for the most part. I have also been heartened by the presence of many and sundry hipsters. (I remember this one time I was on a bus in Chicago with a bunch of people in suits, and when a dude with multiple tatt00s and stretched-out earlobes got on, I thought to myself, "Thank God, someone normal." Apparently Richmond is the third-most tattooed city in America. I do not know what that means; I just read it in an newspaper ad.) I went on a four-hour "walk" that included a very long ramble through the college campus (Virginia Commonwealth U), hipster neighborhood ("The Fan"), an hour in an aggressively hip coffee shop, and a trip to a vegetarian restaurant where I had some incredible grilled tofu (no, really!) and a good glass of wine served by a really adorable girl (all for less than twenty bucks, tip included). So, if nothing else, I can definitely live in Richmond. There's a local art museum, and a ton of bars with shows in them almost every night of the week. I would probably actually become a lot more culturally aware living here. If nothing else, I now know it's a lovely place to visit for a quiet get-away.

Although there are a whole lot of statues of Confederate guys on horses around here. I won't pretend that doesn't slightly creep me out. (Also, has anything happened here since then? Did any of their cultural heroes drive rather than ride? All signs seem to point to no.)

From here, I'm going back up to Philly to spend the weekend with yet another church. In time, I'll come up with a code name for that one too. The Skype interview resulted in a call-back to a DC-area church, which I'm pretty excited about as well. There, I would run a kid's Christian ed program -- which on paper doesn't seem like my thing, I'll admit, but I think what they need is someone to do volunteer management and administrate the crap out of their church school, and THAT is my thing.

English Reflections

Well. England was a thing that happened last week. If you're a friend of mine on Facebook, you've already seen the best of my photos. If not, I'm impressed at your finding and reading of this blog. It was ... interesting. Group travel is not my favorite thing in the world: having to get through an airport with 20+ other people is one of my metaphors for hell. This trip, frankly, involved a spot more drinking than I was expecting or was comfortable with. I mean, once in the week we were there, of course, but I could not gather the motivation for going out to drink multiple nights in a row with people I'm not entirely comfortable with. I also can't really do that stuff anymore without thinking about the people who are left out of that equation. Enough folks in seminary are in recovery of one form or another, and centering so much of the social life of the trip around drinking felt exclusionary in the worst way.

I did, however, get to see my brother, which was a real treat! We had a good visit, just for a day, and he got to come with me on our "cathedral climb", where we climbed to the top of the "Bell Harry" tower. Here's a photo or two:
The flat parts of the roof here are where the "firewatchers" stood to throw the incindiary bombs off during the blitz.
This is the close where the cathedral clergy all life. To the far right is the dean's house, to the left of that is where the pastoral canon (who is the only ordained woman on staff) lives. The other buildings are other things.
The sky was just fantastically beautiful.

So I thought a lot about why it was that this part of the trip was, hands down, my absolute favorite. I think what it reflects is my desire for more personal time, both with the people on the trip (I really did have a good time, one-on-one with all the folks I was with), and with the building. Canterbury used to be a center for religious tourism -- people wanted to come to the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket -- and now it's just kind of a center for tourism. I didn't find much of our time at the cathedral to be very spiritual, but hearing the dean explain the way the tower was constructed, and seeing the care with which the building was build and remodeled over the past millenium was where I really connected.

One Down, Four to Go?

Well, I finally did what I'd been talking about for a week or me: I withdrew myself from the cathedral curacy search I was in. I decided to bail after I realized what a really good interview for a church job could be. The two priest I spoke with in Philadelphia got me really excited about what they do and what I could do, and both of them struck me as people I wanted to be mentored to and learn with. I would also be entrusted with more responsibility in either of these jobs. I ended up with four second-round interviews from Philly and other places on the east coast, which seems like a lot.

Then we got here, and I remembered how I don't really like worship in a cathedral. It is weird and alien to me. My goal in life is to never have to wear a surplice. (For one, I once almost passed out in one in a hot summer in Pennsylvania.) Also, if I could go without owning a tippet, that'd be great. I'll put my girl scout badges on something else. (Obviously there are some cathedrals that are a lot more low-key than this one we're at, but still.)

It feels really, really nerve-wracking to be withdrawing from a search for a job I know I could and would do well. I have a sense of great scarcity -- what if this was the only job I end up getting?? And I just said "thanks but no"?!? It's pretty scary.

But ... I do feel like I've done the right thing. Had I been called to go out to the Midwestern Cathedral for another round of interviewing, I really wouldn't have known how to fit it into my schedule. (BTW, these people were my first first-round interview, and STILL haven't even told us who they want to come back for another round.) And both my spiritual director and supervisor were puzzled that I was applying for a job like this that would really limit what I got to do. In the end, I feel a little lighter having shed this particular bundle of worry.

Phew!

We're Here!

Well, here we are. We arrived in Canterbury yesterday morning, after the overnight flight from Newark, and two bus trips. (Later we will get on a train, to complete the trifecta.) We were all tired, some of us a little grouchy, and didn't do much yesterday. I have many thoughts, none of them much organized:

It's pretty interesting to be on this trip with roughly the same group of folk with who I entered seminary three long years ago. In the airport and on the bus on the way here, I kept looking around at them and wondering, who the hell are these people? I mostly like them -- or rather, I like most of them most of the time -- but I'm struck at the fact that the majority of my closest seminary friends are not in this group. Actually, I don't feel like much of an insider in this group at all. I like the people individually, but as a group they don't particularly strike me as trustworthy or safe. I skipped the traditional trip to the pub yesterday in favor of a nice walk with a good friend. We got rained on. I felt morose.

My roommate, Ally (and some other of our fellow travelers), and I were on the El Salvador trip our first year, and it's interesting to me to contrast the two trips. We are here at essentially the center of the Anglican Communion, and El Salvador is very much on the periphery. The Episcopal Diocese of El Sal doesn't even really have a cathedral at all; the San Salvador Roman Catholic Cathedral is huge (but not as big as the Anglican cathedral I'm looking at right now! Good grief, it's huge!), and in its crypt is the grave of Archbishop Oscar Romero.

I walked around the crypt after service today looking at all the old dead white guys and little side chapels, and thinking of how much more intense the pilgrimage aspect of that crypt in San Salvador was for me. People still bring prayer cards and flowers to drop on Romero's tomb; in Canterbury people bring their cameras to snap photos. All the donation boxes welcome money in Euros, pounds, dollars and yen.

Last night we went to a service of Evensong. It was a nice concert, but didn't feel too much like a worship service. The only real participant were the male clergy and all-male choir (men and boys). The congregation sang one hymn at the end. I left feeling disheartened. It was more or less a collection of the things I don't like about church presented as liturgy, and it felt as if we had come all this way to observe and celebrate a dying form of spirituality.

This morning, we went to the principle Sunday communion service, which was much better. I don't know if it was the presence of female clergy (a canon, who presided) and verger (they spell it virger! how weird!), the increased congregational involvement, or the little kids who came in at the communion (they were very cute) ... but the whole thing felt much more alive. Also the sermon (by a white man, no less) was actually great.

Last night we also went to a concert too. It was pleasant, but not great (it was the local college's departmental concert). For me the most interesting thing was that it was held in the same space as the two liturgies we attended. It strikes me that what I find most interesting about tradition is when it's adapted to the actual needs of the gathered. Evensong felt forced and artificial, but it was essentially the same service as was created when the first prayer book came out, with a few of the words changed. The Eucharist service today was from Common Worship, published in 2000; it felt more lively and more inclusive.

Likewise, what I find most remarkable about this cathedral isn't the way it was constructed (I've seen better/prettier/nicer/bigger, to be honest), but in how it has been adapted again and again for new generations to use. I'm less interested in seeing its original foundations than in talking to someone about how they retrofitted it for electricity, and do they heat it now or do they just let people's body heat do its thing? In the nave, the big public space at the front of the building, they've put out a very modern-looking set of chairs, and there's a really simply (but gorgeously) constructed lectern standing opposite a gigantic (gorgeously carved) pulpit that must be two stories tall. It might be my favorite part.

One of the churches I'm applying to in Philadelphia turns 316 this year. They've been having Sunday services since 1695. They also have recently opened up an art gallery in their parish hall and held a nine-day festival of fringe-y dance and music there and in the sanctuary. To me, that's much more interesting -- and much more holy -- than bringing tradition out to put it on parade once a day.

Thing is, I really do love historical architecture and all that. I am quite looking forward to finding the local history museum and walking around it. I might take a historical boat tour with my brother (he'll be here in two days!!). In other words, I guess what I'm saying is that I've worked in a couple of museums before... but I don't want to work in one next year.