YOU KNOW WHERE YOU STAND

It usually doesn’t take a rocket scientist or even a five-year-old to help you understand just where you stand in someone else’s life, let alone your own. For example: for the past several years I have been supplying on Sundays at a church in Ohio (whose name and location will not be given to protect the guilty). Arlena usually accompanies me. But on the Sundays she plays hooky, as she calls it, when I enter the parish hall carrying my vestments and Arlena is not to be seen, I am greeted by, “Where’s your wife?” and not by, “It’s good to see you!”

Then on the Sundays she is with me, while I am vesting and preparing for the service, she is talking with those gathered in the hall sharing a pre-Eucharist cup of coffee and conversation. On the way home after church, she asks what I learned. My usual response is, “nothing”. Then she proceeds to tell me what she learned about what is going on everyone else’s lives. And I thought I was the one who should be in on the news! Then to really put icing on the cake, a holiday card came in the mail from one of the parishioners addressed to “Mr. and Mrs. Arlena Pugliese”. I know where I stand.

But I am not alone. The other day our youngest daughter, Tracy, went to her son Carter’s pre-school to pick him up early. He wasn’t ready to go home but she insisted. When he asked her why he had to leave, she said, “Because I’m he boss!” To which Carter replied, “No you’re not. Dad’s the boss.” Tracy knows how I feel.

Humility is great for the soul and we all need a good dose of it on occasion. Thankfully, most of the time when we get hit over the head with it, we can simply smile knowing that there was no intent to harm or hurt. It is what it is. The people in that little church simply love my wife and I know they love me too. It’s mutual which is why we love being with them when they need my priestly services and Arlena’s loving ear. And my guess is that Carter was just giving his mom a silly shot in the ribs with his response.

Sometimes, of course, we need a real shot in the ribs, one that hurts, because we need to be taken down a peg. Our pride has gotten in the way, separated us from others, whether we realized it or not or even intended it to be that way. But someone or something had to or we would have done even more damage to our relationship with another or others. The sad part is that sometimes that jab in the ribs came too late. The damage was done and the break was not reparable.

It’s easy to get a big head. Our egos love to be assuaged and the more often the better. There is nothing wrong with being complimented for a job well done or an action that is truly loving and unselfish. But all that needs to be kept in perspective, that being that the gifts others in appreciate in us have been given to us to be used in love and service for them and not simply a boost to our pride. It’s always good to be reminded on occasion by people who love us just where we stand.