Morning Glory

Sunday. Church x2 and the trip home. We decided to go to an 8am Mass at a nearby Catholic parish so that we could make it to the 10:30 service at the Orchard (with breakfast in between. I eat so much when I'm with Percy!). Percy had done his research on MassTimes.org. We pulled up to St. Philip right on time... and read the sign outside. MassTimes.org is a great way to find churches. Not so much for finding up-to-date Mass times. With some help from Percy's mother and his GPS (yet another reason to love it) we found a Catholic church 15 minutes away and arrived slightly more than fashionably late. It was a small church with lots of Steelers pride, and the priest had a pretty amazing voice. Percy liked what he had to say; I just liked to hear him talk.

Doubling up church in the morning is a lot better than doubling up breakfast. The congregation of the Orchard was small but incredibly welcoming. I became immediate friends with one of the ushers and his wife, who were friends of Percy's. We were right away on hugging terms. When the service started, he welcomed Percy back and had Percy introduce me. Only slightly embarrassing. Then the pastor spoke for a bit. It started off apocalyptic and relating to world events in Egypt, but ended with a message about putting your trust in God, which is always a good thing to hear.

Then we had an awesome combination of music and spontaneous prayer. The band would do a song and people would get up and stand, sing, dance, wave colored flags, or just lift their arms to the Lord. In between songs, almost invariably, a member of the congregation would shout something. Sometimes simply thanks and praise to God. Sometimes calling out the congregation: "Why are we sitting? Let's stand for Jesus! We are going to shout for the Steelers tonight! Let's make more noise for Jesus!" In fact the theme became, "We love the Steelers, but we love Jesus MORE!"

I loved the contrast between the rite and ceremony of the Catholic parish and the wild abandon of the Orchard, especially because the Orchard used to be a Catholic parish. While the lack of altar and tabernacle saddened me a little bit, it was impossible to mourn the joy in the congregation or the good it was doing to the community, as it served as a half-way house for a handful of homeless men. I wanted to stay and get to know the people, rather than merely passing through their lives.

Unfortunately we had to leave right after the service. I hated to extract myself from the welcoming arms of that crowd, but Percy wanted to be back in time for the big game. Which meant we had to be on the road five minutes ago.

I was tired from not sleeping enough, but I figured I could make it to a gas station before I got coffee and drive at least through DC. In fact, I picked a rest stop, just south of my hometown, where I would stop and let Percy drive. At first, it went swimmingly -- other than the odometer needle going down as I pushed harder on the accelerator. At some point however, my tired switched to a headache. I kept driving until we needed gas, but by then my head was going from ache to full-fledged migraine. So I let Percy behind the wheel.

Thank God, once again, for my road trip companion. I was completely out of it for most of the trip. I haven't had a migraine that bad in a while. I felt bad as I navigated Percy through the beltway, but by then I was wincing at any suggestion of the sun and fighting back nausea whenever food came up in the conversation or my head. Finally, I asked Percy to pull over and dug through my bag for medicine. At that point, I wasn't quite walking straight.

Eventually, the medicine did the trick. It didn't go away completely for another two days, but it got better. I could carry on a conversation about McDonald's oatmeal without wanting to vomit. And I could help Percy count down the minutes on the GPS to figure out how much of the game we would miss. The time lowered fairly steadily from NoVA to the 'burg. Our road trip ended at CCM at 6:40, only ten minutes short of perfect. And by the time we made it to CCM for the Super Bowl party, I could stand to be in the room with the cheering crowd.