New Year, New fears...

So, Christmas went well. The husband and I took vacation the week before/of Christmas and were able to spend it with our families. Christmas was thrifty this year. Without me pulling in any income, and since student loans that used to keep us afloat are no longer coming in, we've been tight in the wallet. I am about to enter repayment of my loans and it's going to be a hefty chunk of the little income we've got coming in. Basically, we won't be able to eat.
I've been tempted to file bankruptcy to get rid of my other debts, or try to settle them somehow, but my credit is so good... I may not have a choice, though.
If I could find a damn job, this wouldn't be an issue.... but we live in a town now where there are no jobs beyond nursing, and the average income is 25k a year (which is what my husband brings in alone). If I could make about a grand a month after taxes, I'd be in a great spot. But, that means I would have to find a job that pays me about $375 a week or at least $10-11 per hour. Do jobs like that exist around here? Not really. I can probably pull off about $8 an hour if I want to flip burgers at McDonalds.
With an art degree, I may as well have figured before we moved here that I wouldn't be able to find any employment. Sports take a higher spot than art ever will here. What the Hell was I thinking? I can't survive in a small town, I need to be where the art scene is. It means more competition, but it means a chance at a job. There's no chance for me to become employed doing something in my field here.
I've gone as low as to apply for minimum wage positions working at Staples and Walgreens. Degrees don't mean much of anything anymore, do they?
Why did I have to graduate at the worst possible time since 1985? Why did our country become so royally screwed in the past 10 years?
If Obama really wants to help this country, he should wipe out all student loan debt taken out before 2010. Imagine how much extra money recent graduates will have to spend.

I'm ranting. I'm upset. More than anything I'm upset at myself for not seeing this coming, or for having the mindset that I would get a good job and the loan payments wouldn't be that bad. STUPID.
I didn't expect to move out here into the country, but my poor husband couldn't find a job where we were. Now I can't where we are. It's a never-ending cycle of BS. We could leave, but not without hurting his reputation in the church sector. I've even tried looking for jobs an hour or an hour and a half away and haven't found a thing worth it. It's been 6 months. We have no friends, I can't find a job, and we're stuck here, at least for another 6 months. How MISERABLE.

I need a million dollar idea... or a miracle... or an inheritance... or just a freaking job. I'm willing to work if anyone was willing to hire me.


The best part? Tonight is the New Years Eve party for the youth, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to work hard only to have a bunch of them skip out, or not even show, and it's going to annoy the crap out of me.

Two can be as bad as one, it's the loneliest number since the number one.

Everyone keeps saying "give it time" "it's only been a few months"... do you have ANY idea what it's like to not have a SINGLE friend in town, and no job or kids, for months? It totally sucks. I've watched TV. Cleaned. Done crafts. Painted. Slept. Wrote. Job hunted. Haven't gone out for much in the way of photography because it's been too hot, but that's about to change - it's 36 degrees right now. Eventually I'm going to run out of things to do to keep me busy, and I'm going to need someone other than my husband to hang out with.

And even though I've read it from about 50 other pastor's wives on my support site, and read it in countless websites, that it's not me... it's still hard to accept. People talk to me, and that's something... although I get nervous every time I talk that it's going to end up as a gossipy game of telephone, or end up with an actual game of telephone and I'll have to listen to the pastor tell me people called and complained.

I'm a pastor's wife. And I'm not alone in the problems that certain people want to blame on my behavior or my actions. According to the Global Pastor's Wives Association:

1) 84% of pastor's wives say they don't feel prepared for the position they are put into.

2) 80% say they feel unaccepted and unappreciated by the church/congregation.

3) One of the most popular subjects among pastor's wives is... (take a guess here)... LONELINESS. Despite the fact that pastor's wives are surrounded by people, they feel isolated and rarely have many friends. After all, a pastor's wife can hardly discuss marital woes or any tribulations with her husband's flock, and colleagues or other friends outside the life of ministry don't get life inside it.

I've had people tell me "You CHOSE to be in this position". No. I didn't. I didn't CHOOSE to love him. I didn't CHOOSE for him to feel called into ministry. It happened, and I was thrown into it. And I'm trying to deal with it. 

My family members all have advice for me, or reasons for the problems I'm having. Mostly, they have blamed me. I've been nothing but nice and all smiles to everyone in church. My Aunt even had the audacity to tell me that it was my fault I had no friends because I was angry and critical and offered up little hurtful tidbits all the time... this came after I told her a store had XXL's for her, but that if I could fit in a medium, she should be able to as well... She got really hurt after that (despite the fact we're the same size), and figured I just talked like that to everyone. I act a LOT differently around, say, my mother or cousin than I do people I see in church every week.

I know my family means well, but they have NO IDEA what it's like to be married to a pastor. My family isn't terribly religious. They have  barely spent time in a church to begin with. If you barely know what it's like to be a regular or involved church member, how can you even speculate being MARRIED to the church?

We're the only species of wife that is referred to with a context - and a heavy one at that. You don't hear someone introduce you as "The plumber's wife" or the "Doctor's wife". No. But as a pastor's wife, you are either introduced as one entity with your husband, or you're introduced as the "pastor's wife". I'm the "youth pastor's wife". I've actually been introduced that way. "Oh, this is the youth pastor's wife." It was horrifying. You're "expected to be a holy breed" - and don't give me credit for that quote, it was actually in an article I read. People expect you to be every unconscious desire to them. They expect perfection. They expect what they WANT you to be, not what you are. I'll refer to #2. And it's not just the pastor's wives being sensitive, because most times (and as I've already learned) if you do or say or don't do something someone wants you to, you're the victim of the telephone complaint tree. 

The problem with being a pastor's wife is that you're expected to be just as knowledgable and mature in your faith as your husband. You're expected basically to be an extension of him. You're expected by NON-perfect Christians to BE a perfect Christian. You're expected to never get angry, never curse, never find a dirty joke funny.... Do doctor's wives have to know how to diagnose a disease? No. Do people expect mechanics' wives to know how to change the fuel pump on a 86' Ford? No. But as a pastor's wife, you should know the Bible like you were born with it, and should be a living breathing example of the "perfect Christian". Now, it's not totally wrong for people to expect you to be a good Christian - after all, you're married to a man who tells other people how to BE good Christians. BUT, where it gets messy is the fact that despite the Bible, not only are you held to almost impossible standards of perfection that only Jesus can have, but your expectations change with each and every member of the church. It might not sound like a big deal to be expected to be a good Christian, but my definition of "good Christian" is a lot different than hers, his, theirs, and yours.

Some pastors’ wives aren’t called to be pastors’ wives but wives of men who are pastors.

This Old House

Despite the fact that when we moved here the house was in shambles and I worked for a month to get it to a livable state, I love having the parsonage.

We wouldn't be able to afford to live on his salary without it. 

It's not often that people in our position get offered a parsonage. There are blessings and curses about it. Blessings include tax free "pay", free lawn care, and a short skip over to work every day that saves in gas.

I consider every power bill they pay, every water bill, and every month's equivalent of rent we don't have to pay as part of his salary. And since we don't technically see the money, we don't pay taxes on it. It's lovely. For so long we lived in an apartment, paid high rent, and got to hear our neighbors abusing their children on a daily basis. It wasn't something I wanted to do any more and it's a blessing my closest neighbors are 3 houses down.

Curses include living in not the best area of town, the age of the house and things often breaking, and something we are lucky to have not experienced yet - church members popping by unexpectedly or asking for access to the church randomly. I had big fears that would happen a lot. Has only happened once in months. :)

Last night my husband about overflowed the bathroom toilet. Since the house is so old, the plumbing is original. The main pipe that takes away waste water was made out of terra cotta - clay. Well, there's this gorgeous old tree outside next to the house, where the roots have decided to grow through the pipes, crack them, break them, and clog them up. We knew this a day after we moved in, when we backed sewage up into our tub, sink and toilet after running the washer. They dug out the roots and, despite the plumber telling the church contractor it needed to be replaced, he pushed it off, waiting until the pipe was absolutely destroyed. Unfortunately, this happened at 9 pm at night, and any time we went to the bathroom we had to go through the church parking lot to the church. I really don't like that instead of fixing something they knew was broken, they pushed it off until we were inconvenienced with it, especially at night. Honestly, I don't want to be anywhere outside of my locked doors past 10 pm around here. If it's broke, why wait to fix it?

So this morning I have 2 men coming in and out of the house, running the tub, flushing the toilet and replacing the pipe. And, despite the fact that last night I held it until I couldn't any more, and peed in my toilet, I love that I don't have to pay for them to fix my plumbing. :)

"The Widow's Pew"

There's a name for the people who like to cause trouble. The people in the church who seem to look for fault, imperfection and weakness. In our church, where the median age is probably 60, they call it the Widow's Pew.
Every Sunday, the 2nd pew is lined in a row with cute little old ladies with white hair and pant suits. They seem so innocent and nice... They've probably gone to this church since they were my age, if not younger.
I heard some of the younger people, the 45-55 year olds (yes, this is our "younger people") talking about the Widow's Pew...
They said that basically they were all widows and the women are the ones in church that complain every step of the way. They're the pastor's worst nightmare. The ones that become outraged at every little thing, that despise change, and that like to nitpick. I don't know who they are exactly, just that I should probably steer clear of them. Apparently once your husband dies you've got nothing better to do than sit in quiet judgment of everyone else and call Pastor on Monday morning about stupid crap. Yes, crap.
They had brought a particular story up, about how the little children (who receive communion first) were drinking more than one mini-shot of juice, or eating a few of the crackers (honestly I don't know why ANYONE would want more than one of those disgusting crackers)... the Widows had seen this TRAVESTY and they actually got the pastor to make clear to the children not to eat more than one cracker or drink more than one juice. Well, they went on to say that a few of the Widows had stayed late one day and saw a male church member drinking the left over juice from the little mini-shots and had a FIT about it. I immediately wondered if the Widows have seen me doing it yet, I have been doing it every communion Sunday since we came here... but, the church serves those little crackers... the worst things ever to happen to communion. I eat the little cracker and try to wash it down with the juice, but it's never enough. Those crackers are like cement when they hit your saliva. Every communion Sunday I'm always leaving the church picking the Jesus out of my teeth.
Our first communion Sunday that we were here, I stayed late to help clean up. I came to find that the communion committee people were just taking all the leftover crackers and putting them in a Ziploc bag for "next time" and taking all the juice that was left untouched and pouring it in a bucket that would be sent down the sink drain. So, that Sunday I decided to have a few extra shots of Jesus juice, in attempts to wash down that nasty cracker. A few people who were there late cleaning up had made cracks about how I shouldn't be so sinful through the month and I wouldn't need so much juice. My husband always laughs and tries to pull me away from the altar, but if it's just going to go to waste, why is it so bad that I drink it? Isn't pouring Jesus' blood down the drain a little worse?

I *should* be a Republican...

When the church found out that I wasn't exactly conservative, they weren't exactly happy. I'm kind of a strange anomaly... I support gay rights. I support gay marriage. I support choice. GOD gave us the ultimate choice. Taking away the choice because it's "un-Christian" is modifying God's plan. Give a woman the choice, her only judge will be God. God gave us free will, to choose Him. If he took away the free will, we would be his lemmings. Our love wouldn't be true. 


If you think about it, Jesus was the ultimate liberal. When he came to be known, there were religious structures in place that he openly defied. He supported the "lame" and the poor. He forgave prostitutes, adulterers, sinners. He even liberated women. He was lover of everyone, even His enemies.


Read the Bible. You'll see it.
Conservatives constantly are aligned with Christians. They support the "Christian agenda"... it almost sounds like the religious right don't even see how much like the Pharisees they have become - the same group that Jesus called hypocrites! 


What we need to get out of all of this is that we, as children of God, need to show God's love to EVERYONE. People who harm us, being who don't harm us, gay, straight, black, orange, every single person regardless of who they are need God.
Being gay doesn't stop someone from loving God. 


I hear constantly about how people have fallen away from God... most of the time after the've come out as gay, or support the liberal agenda. They are disowned sometimes. Is the the way Jesus would treat them? No. It's not.


People don't understand, no, they don't know HOW it is to love everyone. They don't know how to forgive. It's the hardest thing we have to do as Christians. God tells us to live a life like this, try to be more like Jesus, and it's probably the most difficult thing for us to do.


What I don't understand, is with a man like Jesus, from God Himself (the same God who inspired Leviticus) who was so Liberal, that Christians so commonly align themselves with conservatives who want to take away equality from all people. How is this Christian?

Nightmare on Church Street

When I married my husband, I married the “student” version of him. I knew that eventually I would have to deal with him being a youth pastor, but in the moments prior to our marriage, he was working part time and going to classes. The first year of our marriage, he taught 5th grade at a private school, and I finished up my degree. What I did, or said, or acted like, wasn’t really the concern of anyone but myself. No one paid attention to me, or expected anything of me. Life was as it always had been for me: I do what I want. I realized very quickly that after Jeff got his first ministry job, what I did and said were very far from what I wanted.


It was hard to transition at first, to being the wife of a clergy member. I had to change many mannerisms and behaviors. People expect a certain poise and class from the wife of a pastor, even though everyone told me the expectations are slightly different for a youth pastor’s wife. Wrong. They’re about the same.


I didn’t have a mentor, or anyone to talk to about it, or help me transition a little more smoothly. I was on my own.


I think it was particularly difficult for me because not only had I literally just graduated college and had to figure out life after COMP 101, but I had also moved 250 miles from everything I knew, AND became “the pastor’s wife”. It was more than just a slight change, it was a complete overhaul of just about everything I had known for a quarter of a century.


We moved from a very large city in Florida to, what I consider, a small town in Georgia - to them it’s considered a metropolitan area. The main criteria for that classification was the existence of a Wal-Mart within city limits. The first week we were here a delivery man asked why we would move from Florida to here, and laughed that the only thing to do in town was go to that Wal-Mart. He wasn’t lying.

I'm Blue and I'm in need of a Guide...

Beyond the Bible, there really isn’t a guide to life. Our parents can only go so far before we’re on our own - most of the time by our own choice. Our friends get a little closer, but  advice can only be heard if we want to hear it. The only guide we have we tend to write ourselves as we age. But some things, we feel like we need the help or the guidance so that we don’t fail, or so that life isn’t completely screwed up.

Most of the time the Bible isn’t even necessarily a guide more than it’s a list of phrases that offer comfort to many. Many times, it’s simply a way to answer the unanswerable questions in life, like “What happens after I die?” and “Why am I here?”. Science offers reasons as to why people die, but can’t tell us what happens beyond our bodies physical decay. That’s why religion is so popular (yet seemingly unpopular). People want to know what lies ahead. Surprises are nice, but routine is less scary. 

The messed up part is, there’s no real way to know what you’re getting yourself in to, until you’re already immersed in it, because we can never know exactly what we have ahead of us. Educated guesses can fill in the gaps, but otherwise we are always walking toward the unknown. Even the Bible isn’t specific when it comes to certain questions we have in life, and leaves a lot open to personal experiences and interpretations. Unfortunately this is where a lot of things get jumbled around. They call it the unknown for a reason. I know, not very deep, right? As humans we like to have answers to every question we can muster up. We’re inherently curious, and infinitely worrisome of things we don’t know everything about. That’s why there are educated guesses, because we seek to find possible answers suitable to suppress our worries about that of which we do not know for sure. We can’t just let things remain unknown, we have to attempt to figure them out.

My unknown involved a husband, a bunch of pre-teen and teenaged Christians, a church, a house, and ultimately a new life.

Out of total bewilderment as to what was before me, I hoped to educate my guesses, so I purchased a book about being the wife of a pastor. Unfortunately about 40 pages in I realized it was more geared toward being the head pastor’s wife, about thirty years older than my husband and I are, and it didn’t help me find any answers that would help me deal with this change emotionally, really. I came to that book in hopes it would help me with specific, yet broad problems or life changes that come with being the wife of a youth pastor, maybe coming from someone who wasn’t terribly involved in organized religion until recently. Of course, that was too specific to my own personal needs, although I was hoping it would have at least been addressed in some small fashion. I know it’s hard to write a “How to” book when dealing with that kind of subject, and I definitely know that once thirty years have gone by, it’s probably not very easy to remember how you felt the first month you were “the pastor’s wife”, but I thought maybe, just maybe, the book would help a twenty-something out. But mostly, it told me how to keep my husband from overworking, how to keep him involved with our kids (which we don’t have yet), and how to manage keeping a clean house for our many visitors (which we haven’t had, either). When the author of the book I purchased was my age, there was no internet or Facebook. The internet is definitely something there needs to be a passage on in an advice book about becoming a clergy member’s wife, especially in this day and age, social networking is very prominent in people’s lives. The book was helpful, for prior generations I’m sure, but none of her proved to be immediately helpful, and probably won’t seem that way until many years down the line.

I realized that the only way I could educate my guesses was to see them prove to be right or wrong myself, and learn from the experiences as they came. Every church is different, but I have a feeling many aspects are the same. In every church there are good and bad people, and I know there’s definitely plenty of gossip. I knew those things going in, though, and had to make the rest up as I went along. 




(Please forgive the Eiffel 65 title reference!)

This blog is for myself, but mostly for you all.

I'm a youth pastor's wife. People tend to think that because of this, I don't get the same treatment that a Pastor's wife would. Maybe, but not in this church. If the congregation found this, my husband would probably get fired, that is, if they knew it was me who wrote it. I'm writing this in hopes that someone like me, put in the position I have been put into can relate and realize they're not alone. I'm not going to fill this with Bible verses, or inspirational dribble. This is my life, my real life. I try to be as real as possible. I'm Christian, I love God and I believe that Jesus was a real guy, with real wounds. But, for a pastor's wife, it's not that simple.

What if you feel completely ostracized by the congregation, like you can't be yourself? Like if they had any idea what you believed, or what you really thought, or how you really acted that your husband would lose his job? And why does that even matter? I am not my husband, he is the one on payroll, isn't he? The expectations of being a pastor's wife are incredible. I am supposed to be perfect. I am supposed to be able to do things for no pay. I am expected, when I get screwed over, to smile and be ok with it. I am expected, as the pastor's wife, to be Godly and clean, and happy all the freaking time. If people thought the Bible was full of fairytales, they would definitely think the standards a pastor's wife is held to are completely unreal.

I have tattoos, and they stare. I have strong opinions, and they scoff. I don't think piss and damn are curse words, but they do. I think that women should have a choice, and if we take it away isn't that messing with God giving us free will? Why say evolution is false because of the Bible? Maybe God just put it in laymen's terms so we could understand it, but knew we'd figure out how he really did things eventually. I'm not a conservative Republican. I believe pluralism is fine - and I support the first amendment. Maybe I'm not the best Christian, but neither are they. If someone can attest to their perfection, or even just their success at being a good Christian, they're full of crap. Read the Bible, and see what God asks of us. It's difficult stuff.


There is definitely an ugly side to the church, and I've seen it.

There's a good side - don't get me wrong. Most people who go to church get to see that side and don't even know about the troll under the bridge. Well, I'm not afraid of that troll.