the fate of the world...rested in my hands

when i was a child, my parents would dress us up in our sunday bests and load us into our pick up truck to go to church. i remember being squished inside, probably in the middle of august, with the windows rolled up so mom's curls would blow away... we were a family of six. in a pick up built for three.

Dad would drive, natch, and one of us four kids would cram inside as close as possible without actually sitting in his lap. Mom would be jammed in next to the door with the baby on her lap cuz he was the smallest.

whoever was the most lollygaggingest child would end up being forced to smoosh themselves down in the foot compartment of the passenger side, frozen in a mid crouch - half sitting half standing, in the midst of four other pairs of legs. Their unlucky head just poking up over the dashboard.

We would drive this way the few miles it was to the Church way up on the hill. One time we drove past a man hitch hiking - holding a sign with his destination.... when he saw our sardine can truck, he put down his sign and laughed and gave my dad a big wave while shaking his head. i remember dad laughing at that.

when we arrived, mom would open the door and we would subsequently tumble out, bit by bit, not unlike some crazy Mormon clown car.

We would be late, as we often were, and we would sheepishly creep in during the Opening Hymn and sit, as quietly as possible (which isn't very quiet at all with four kids) in the middle pew, second row from the back.

Once everyone was settled, mom and dad both listened intently leaving us four kids to look around us to see which of our friends were in church, or play quietly with a contraband dinky car if they were lucky enough to have snuck it in inside their navy corduroys.

Littlest Brother Willy Billy McNilly was the only one allowed to have distractions, as he was the baby. He had a diaper bag full of books and small toys, and the obligatory plastic bag of cheerios. Us, being the older children, we supposed to be old enough to be able to sit quietly for a WHOLE HOUR!

Luckily for us, we were inventive and found ways to keep ourselves occupied - which first meant securing a pen from either Dad's suit pocket, or from the depths of mom's giant purse.

The only caveat was - we had to time it out juuuuust right. We could never expect to get anything from mom or dad until after the sacrament had been passed. (similar to communion, i'm told, each Sunday the congregation is offered a piece of bread and a sip of water - where you make a covenant with the lord to live by Christ's example for the next week) after the bread and water were passed, the 'talks' would start.

Mormons are big on public speaking. Each week the sermons or 'talks' are given by the regular joes of the church.

they could go on forever.

this was the time for doodling and drawing funny pictures.

but sometimes, there were no pens available and we had to sit quietly for the duration. I know first hand what the saying a Month of Sundays feels like.

our chapel had very high ceilings, and hanging from the ceilings at varying intervals were big ceiling fans that were always running, even in winter.

I used to lean back on the hard pew and stare at the ceiling - at the hypnotic spinning of those ceiling fans. i could focus or unfocus at will, and by the power of my imagination, i would imagine that i was on the roof of the church holding on for dear life so as to not fall into the death fans below...

or, if i looked at them just right, it would seem as if the fans were slowly lowering themselves down on me....which would often cause the sensation of vertigo and leave we feeling all wonky inside.

but the worst scenario was when i stared at them long enough i would be able to see them shaking.... i know now that most fans shake on account of the fact that there are moving pieces and speed et cetera, but at one point, i remember being so concerned that the fans were slowly shaking themselves from the ceiling and if i didn't watch them vigilantly one would fall off and land on some poor unsuspecting latter day saint.

it became somewhat of an obsession for me, and even when we were able to obtain a pen or a pencil, i would still keep my eye on those crazy ceiling fans.

This weekend, B-rad said out of nowhere... "hey, i wonder if this ceiling fan works". we've lived in this house for 10 months now and it was the first time either of us had even acknowledged that we owned a ceiling fan. the bulk of the summer we used our central air to keep cool.

however, now that the temperatures are dropping and fall is here... sometimes all we need to cool the house is a little air movement.

so b-rad climbed up on a chair and wiped off the 10 months of accumulated dust (gross, i know, but like i said, we hardly even knew it was there) and after a few seconds we had air moving around our kitchen.

i don't get ceiling fans, i have never been able to figure out how to use them... one pully knob is for on/off/speed and the other is for direction, and the other is for the light.... but they all look exactly the same, and for whatever reason - b-rad knows exactly which one is which and what they do.

and i think, why can't they make the pully knobs different colours? or different lengths of pullyness??

anyway, so.

we had the fan running and i was busying myself in the kitchen, when out of the corner of my eye i saw the fan shaking and i thought - "Oh Good Lord! it's gonna fall!!" and when i whipped my head around to stare the fan down.... the many many hours of staring the church fans came flooding back to me. i don't know exactly when i stopped staring at ceiling fans, but it's back.

maybe it's kinda like someone who blocks a traumatic event for years and then one day out of the blue they see a toy rattle and suddenly remember the time they fell in the well with the rattle snakes.

okay, i'm not saying that these church fans were traumatizing, but i was a little kid! i was SURE that the fate of the fans rested solely on me gluing them to the roof with my eyes. That's a pretty heavy task for a little kid to be in charge of. a big responsibility for a seven year old.

anyway,

when b-rad wasn't looking, i climbed up on the chair myself, and just pulled a little bit on the fan to see if it was securely fastened.

you'll be happy to know....it is

and i can rest soundly.

except...wait,...what is that toy rattle doing there?? OH GOD, it's all coming back to me!...