I had been looking forward to Sunday morning for a couple of weeks. There was going to be a sermon at my new church on baptism, and my nerdy side couldn’t wait to hear the church’s position.

Baptism can be a hotly contested subject at many churches, one that has caused church and denominational splits. There are two main topics within this subject that are points of contention: the mode of baptism, and who should get baptized. Mode simply means how it’s done, either sprinkled with water or immersed in water. The question of who should get baptized has two possible answers: those who are old enough to decide for themselves if they want to be a Christian and the children of those who have decided to be Christians.

In my opinion, everybody should be able to get baptized: adults, teenagers, and children. I also think that either mode of baptism is valid. I also don’t think that the subject of baptism should be argued about, and is definitely not worth churches or denominations splitting or even fighting over. To me, it is simply not as crucial to the Christian faith as other issues, such as loving God and loving others. I was very pleased as the pastor was speaking, because he was saying almost exactly what I wanted to hear (I have theological disagreements with this church in other areas), even though I don’t think it’s worth arguing one way or the other.

Things were going well, until someone asked a question. It was a small group of people, so asking questions wasn’t a big deal, but I got distracted. It wasn’t the question that was distracting, but the person. She was sitting two or three rows in front of me, and was wearing jeans and a St. Louis Cardinals pullover jacket. But the thing that completely threw me off, and for the rest of the time caught my attention: MULLET!

If I couldn’t hear her voice, I would have thought it was Billy Ray Cyrus. Huge. The “business in the front” part was short and spiky, while the “party in the back” was an absolute blowout. Probably a five-kegger. The dark, wavy locks fell almost half-way down her back. I kind of wanted to touch it, just to see if it was real. The possibility of losing a finger helped me to restrain myself, though.

At this point, I had lost all interest in what was being said and I was thoroughly intrigued by the size of this mullet. It was almost as if the mullet was talking to me. It just kept repeating its name: “mullet, mullet, mullet, mullet, mullet, mullet.” I was mesmerized.

I don’t know this lady at all. She is probably extremely nice, and she was asking intelligent questions. But I just wanted to know how someone decides that it would be a good idea to grow their hair into a mullet. This one in particular has been a long-standing and very committed decision. And what does one think about when looking in the mirror to style it? This would make an interesting case study.

By the end of the sermon, the mullet had taken on its own identity. Instead of pondering the spiritual significance of baptism, all I could think about was, what if the mullet got baptized? It’s so fluffy and shiny right now, but what about right after getting dunked in the holy water? Would it reach even further down her back? I might go to the next baptism ceremony, just for the chance to see the mullet get baptized. Baptism is an interesting enough subject in and of itself, but a mullet getting baptized?

Now that’s entertainment.

Several months ago I lost hope that my yard would resemble something living. It was rugged terrain to say the least. The bald and bare patches connected like smallpox lesions. The only vesture of green came from weeds and ancient crabgrass. Broken stones, bricks and knotted roots sprouted up in every corner like tiny tombstones. I would have sold plots to the newly bereaved had it not been illegal to bury within the city limits without a permit.

I promised myself I’d do something about it. When winter was finished, so was the lawn. I would kill it all and start from the beginning. I so rarely get the chance to play God, but there was no Noah here to save those worthy of saving. This was mass genocide.

I sprayed the living parts with herbicide and churned the soil raw with a Rototiller until it resembled the front lines of World War I. People walked by and stared. Dead grass is common in winter, but not everyone reduces their front yard to a demolition derby track. To add to the blast zone appearance, the feral cats that roam nearby decided to defecate in the fresh soil. When I come outside in the morning, my yard smells like a massive litter box.

The seeds and fertilizer I planted will not show results for several weeks. In the meantime, I’m stuck raking soil and tending to the newly discovered trash in the backyard.

It is common knowledge our house was vacant for several months before we moved in. Before that, it was a crack house. I’m not positive the tenants dealt crack, but everyone in the neighborhood admits drugs were trafficked here and crack is the most common in the area.

I don’t know what crack dealers do in their spare time, but based on my archaeological findings, they seem to love to bury bottles and children’s toys. Every step I take is on top of some lost artifact that was resurrected during the soil renewal process. At first I just threw them away, but now I place them on the retaining wall and try to guess their origins.

By the looks of it, the backyard wasn’t much more than a second trash can to the previous tenants.

A plumbing compression fitting. An old cell phone. A Buzz Lightyear action figure. Various spoons and steak knives. Coat hanger. Numerous beer bottles. Caps and unknown plastic parts. A Mickey Mouse toothbrush. Baby Ruth wrappers. Brake calipers, a wrench and a street sign. Dog tag, but no dog.

These were not cherished items or sentimental ornaments. These were not missing centerpieces from an antique jewelry box. These were not things people grasped reassuringly as they slept. They were an afterthought. They were expendable because their owners felt the same way about them as they did the yard where they were left to rot.

I picked up every object and gave it a good look. I scraped the red clay and pebbles from crevices and smoothed the filth from labels. In the eyes of those toys and tools, I want to see some sign of appreciation. A carving of initials. Wear marks from repeated use. Something that proves these things weren’t just throw away as an afterthought. As contradictory as it may be, I want to view strangers’ pasts with a positive light.

On the north retaining wall of my backyard lies an army of nothing. A smattering of unwanted paraphernalia. My science is pitiable, so without carbon dating I have no idea if it all came from the same time, from the same family. I should have scrapped this junk a week ago, but I feel like it provides some obscure page to another life. Drug runners. Hermits. Daycare providers. Alcoholics. Mechanically inclined folk. I don’t know. It’s fascinating simply to lay it out and imagine lives taking place in this same space in a different time, under different circumstances. For now the army of nothing will stay until I become disenchanted with its possibilities.

The artist Corita Kent once said: “Life is a succession of moments. To live each one is to succeed.”

She was right. As I get older I’ve realized one of the most fantastic things about life is the newfound ability to recognize life-altering moments as they are happening. It’s not the kind of knowledge that comes in retrospect or in repressed psychological analysis years down the road. It’s living in the small, subtle minutes of everyday life and being able to recognize, right then and there, that your world has shifted a bit.

When you’re a child, you live completely and impulsively in the moment. You don’t care what your mortgage rates will be 10 years down the road. You don’t worry about defending your master’s dissertation, or the age at which you want to retire. But most importantly, you don’t easily recognize the quiet, solemn seconds that silently alter your life in ways you never imagined.

I liken it to the freeze frame function in movies or television shows; it’s that point of recognition when all action suddenly stops, characters freeze and one breaks free to address the audience, to play around with the scene a bit. It’s that point when you realize the trajectory of action will go a different way, when the audience realizes that this moment is more important.

I’ve been having more and more of these moments in my life. Like Kent, I’ve learned to admire their simple beauty and to savor them when they come. With more maturity I’ve realized the importance of really living each one to its fullest.

I can remember the very first one of these moments I had. I am 16-years-old and I am sitting on the dirt floor of a shack in rural Romania. I am wearing my favorite t-shirt of the summer and I am watching an eight-year-old boy dying from cancer, a mix of blood and tears crusty and dried on his face. I’m struggling to catch my breath, because I’ve realized that I’ve suddenly crossed the threshold into adulthood. It’s in these quiet and tragic seconds that I abandon my childish naiveté and begin to embrace the women I will become someday.

Six years later I’m sitting on a couch, with the lights off, in the sitting room of my sorority. I graduated college hours before, walking down the hill in my cap and gown, laughing and high-fiving in the last hot, sticky moments of the spring of 2007. It’s just us fresh college graduates left before the house is shut for the summer, to contemplate in this empty, rambling space. We’ve sat in this room so many times before, but this time it’s different. I’m looking at the faces around me. Someone is recounting the adventures and mishaps of the past four years. I’m laughing so hard my stomach hurts, and realizing at the same time how nothing will ever be the same again.

A year later, I’ve caught myself in another moment. I’m standing in the muddy, chocolate earth of southern Africa after a rainstorm. I’m in a refugee camp trying to console a cold, hungry, screaming child who has been forgotten for a few moments in his mother’s extremely anguished rant to human rights volunteers about the conditions of the camp and her fears of the future. Then abruptly, the world goes silent, his anguished screams become muffled and far away, though his tear-streaked face is right next to mine. A wave of incredible guilt and incredible gratitude washes over me. I’m realizing how lucky I’ve been born and how lucky I’ve lived. I’m grasping how massive the world really is and how small I am compared to it.

Months later, I’m alone in Scotland, wheeling two large suitcases, carrying my only possessions for this new phase of life, up the Royal Mile. I know hardly anyone here and I have no idea what is ahead of me. I stop for a minute just before entering the courtyard to my new flat. The throng of tourists making their way in and out of the souvenir shops next door suddenly blurs and fades away. I’m marveling how far I’ve come and how far I still have yet to go. I take a deep breath and then cross over the threshold.

My life has been made in the succession of these moments, each one tiny on their own, but when strung together, like pearls, making something worth holding onto.

For me it’s not about the big, earth-shattering moments that will change my life and the course of the world forever. It’s not the birthdays, the elections, the jobs won and lost, the academic degrees. Because life is not made up solely of the milestones. It’s about all the little things that happened in between those, that meant something to me. That forced me to freeze, to dance in that quiet moment of recognition, to savor its remarkable impact. To fully live each moment.

As adults, many of us tend ignore being sick by throwing back an extra glass of orange juice and going to work. We’re much too busy to rest; there’s too much to lose by missing a beat in our firmly packed schedules.

As a child, you take for granted the care you receive when you’re sick. I know I did, anyways. When I was sick, Mom or Dad would sit at my bedside, take my temperature, stroke my hair, and keep a cold glass of orange juice by my bed. They would bring my pillow and blanket into the living room and let me watch videos all day. They would make sure I had enough soup and Jell-O. Sometimes they’d even give me ice cream.

This last weekend I got incredibly sick, thanks to catching the flu from my husband, and was lucky enough to have both my parents around. It was like being a kid again.

Mom and I were at a weekend church retreat an hour and a half away from home. It was supposed to be Thursday through Sunday, but I began to feel achy Friday afternoon. After each meal, I felt more upbeat, but by the time evening rolled around, my temperature had spiked. After our last meeting of the day, I approached mom with tears in my eyes. I was flushed with heat and my body felt like it had been beaten with a baseball bat. I was desperate to go home.

She immediately got me some medicine, encouraged me to take a hot shower, and came to tuck me into the top bunk bed. She stood on her tiptoes, kissed my hot forehead, tousled my hair, and told me to get her at any time of the night should I need her. I turned over, relieved mom was just down the hall amidst all these women I didn’t know very well.

I barely slept that night. I could feel my temperature rise even more, and my aching muscles made me sweat. I prayed all night the morning would come fast so I could go home. As soon as 6 a.m. rolled around, Mom was the first to come into my room. Her cool hands felt my forehead, and I instantly relaxed a bit. I was embarrassed by how sick I was around all these new faces, and I felt I could hide behind my mother.

“Aw, my poor girl,” she said. “How do you feel?”

I was in so much pain, all I could manage was, “I need to go home.”

She nodded. “OK, I’ll take you. Let me get my shoes on.”

A half-hour later though, it was decided Mom should stay at the retreat. So Dad was called, and he was on the road right away. I managed to take another shower, as I had fought a fever all night and awoke soaked in sweat. When I got out, mom had packed up all my things, rolled up my sleeping bag, and was standing there with Dad, who welcomed me into a big hug.

I said bye to mom and got into the car. It was Dad’s turn now.

Before we got back to my house, he stopped at the grocery store for soup, Jell-O, Gatorade, Popsicles, ice cream and fresh fruit. I was eternally grateful especially for the lime Jell-O and the fresh grapes; nothing else tasted good enough.

At home, my husband, Cody, had changed the sheets on our bed, since he had been sick just a few days before and had the same fitful, sweaty nights. He took my temperature, got me medicine and let me sleep for the rest of the day. Meanwhile, Dad had gone home to make a huge batch of chicken noodle soup for me and Cody, which ended up lasting us about three days.

Today I am feeling much better, but I owe it all to my parents and Cody. Sometimes as adults, we want our parents to butt out, but I am grateful for parental instincts this time. I’m never too old to want my mom and dad when I’m sick.

I’m not very good at inaction. I’m never going to be the friend or the daughter or the sister who can’t decide what to do. In fact, I’m the one people come to when they can’t decide.

Decisions are my forte.

Recently though, I’ve hit a wall. I didn’t even realize I’d hit it until today, when I was standing in the darkness of a barely lit sanctuary singing a hymn.

Before the words had even come out of my mouth the tears were welling in my eyes. Perhaps it was the first time I had stopped moving — stopped thinking — in more than two weeks. Perhaps it was the hallowing words:

We are all here to find
The place where our restless souls will be free
We were all made to see
Our hearts could not rest until found in Thee

Whatever it was, I finally lost it.

I can’t decide. It’s waking me up early in the morning, giving me dreams, tightening my jaw whenever the subject comes up.

I have a student who has been in trouble since the moment he came my school. No homework, lack of motivation, poor choices with his peers. But it goes deeper than that. Since early fall we’ve been concerned about depression, drugs, lack of supervision at home. For every step we take forward at school it seems something happens at home to throw him back three or four. It’s maddening.

And what’s worse is when I look in his eyes all I see is a scared little boy. It’s heartbreaking to see a 10-year-old giving up on a life he’s barely begun to live.

What makes it all worse is that I don’t know what to do. I feel so helpless it turns my insides into a knot. There is no right answer. Call Child Protective Services under a loose interpretation of neglect and alienate his mother. Don’t call and watch him slip farther away. Work with mom, trust her to try and be more involved. Be wrong and loose his trust entirely.

Every few months another teacher gets closely involved and tries to help at home, talk to his mother, search for something — anything to help him. My response is always the same: “I’ve been doing this since September. Do what you can, but understand that in so many different ways our hands our tied with this kid.”

I always gave my warning with good intention. I wasn’t going to give up, and I didn’t want my co-workers to give up either, but I didn’t want to see them frustrated, hurt and overwhelmed by the situation. What I didn’t realize, was that my warning should have simply been: “Don’t let this consume you the way I have. It’s taking me down like a sinking stone, and I don’t even realize it.”

I can’t decide. And every day is a new challenge. A new problem. A new horrible decision at home. And I don’t know how to fix any of it.

Today I realized how much this all has been eating at me. Not knowing what to do. Not knowing what to say. Wanting with all my heart to fix it and living with the reality that I might not be able to. Sometimes having too many choices — too many ways to do the wrong thing — is worse than having no choices at all.

Standing in church today with tears sliding down my face, listening to the words the congregation sang didn’t give me the perfect answer to my question. It didn’t tell me whether I should confront my student’s mother or call CPS or just throw my hands up altogether. If anything, it made me more restless for a solution. But it also put me more at peace.

Singing praise in the midst of all the garbage life sometimes hands me is somewhat of a release. It’s as if to say “This is not great. This is so nowhere near great, but it is life, and I’m going to be thankful for every painful, frustrating minute of it.” Too often my faith comes out shiny and strong when I have all the answers and, on top of that, the questions are easy. But really, my faith got me here. My faith lead me to these kids. It’s not going to desert me in the thick of it. I’m at least wise enough to have figured that much out.

So I stood and I sang and I cried. I let go a bit. I let God in to the situation I’ve been holding so tight in my fist that I couldn’t even see how much it’s been hurting me. I don’t know what I’m going to do tomorrow when this kid shows up with no homework or a dirty shirt or downcast look. I don’t know what the outcome of this whole mess this child currently calls a life is going to be.

But I know he’s not alone. And neither am I.

This past week was spring break for the students I live with. It’s a good deal for all of us — they get to go away to warmer climates, and I get the house to myself for a week. I cook what I want, do what I want, sing in the house — and if I wanted to, I could probably do all of that naked.

The biggest drawback for me centers on my irrational fear that someone is going to break into our house when I’m alone and vulnerable. Some part of my brain is convinced that men dressed in black, wearing ski masks, are waiting for the night when I’m home alone to pry open our doors and take all of our stuff.

Rationally speaking, this is, in a word, ridiculous. The chances that this would happen are pretty slim. On our gentrified block, we are the only house that has retained its original shape of a basic rectangle. No turrets, no fancy siding, no nice landscaping. We are the slum house. The only advantage to picking our house is that it’s probably a lot easier to break into.

But sadly, in this particular area, I am not very rational. And our neighbors had their house broken into in October.

So nights when I’m home alone I tend to have lots of lights on, have my music going, and do everything short of propping up a mannequin in a dining room chair to make it seem like I’m NOT home alone. When I go to bed, I lock the door to my room, reasoning that at least if the burglars get into the house, they won’t get into my room.

I also bring the house phone in case I need to call 911.

Wednesday night of spring break, I shut off the lights in the basement, where I sleep, went in my room, locked my door, and went to bed.

At 2:26 a.m. I woke up. The basement light was on. I froze. I shut the light off, I thought. I definitely shut the light off.

Then, more panicked: Oh my god, who turned the lights on?

I did a quick inventory: one student was in Mississippi, doing Habitat for Humanity; two were in Moab, Utah; one was home with his parents in the suburbs; and one had left for Arizona the day before.

Then, I heard footsteps.

I jumped out of bed and grabbed the phone. I stood near the door, barely breathing, legs shaking. I can’t believe this is ACTUALLY happening.

Several scenarios ran through my head:

1. Someone has broken into the house. I should call 911, but since I’m locked in the basement, how will I let them in?

2. The students in Moab have come home early, both in terms of the morning and in terms of the break. I should go upstairs and check, but if it’s NOT them, how will I fend off the dastardly burglars?

3. Someone has broken into the house. Maybe if I lay in my room and don’t make any noise, they will take what they want and will go away. What do I need material goods for, anyway? Plus, our TV is pretty lousy.

I decided to sit in bed, clutching my phone, listening for any possible sound. If and when it sounded like the people were gone, I’d go and check things out.

An hour and a half never passed so quickly and so slowly. I prayed several hurried Our Fathers and Hail Marys for insurance. And I thought.

I’ve always wondered what kind of person I’d be in an emergency situation. I’ve never really had to be tested — no broken bones, no giving CPR, no sitting in a falling airplane. Would I be cool, calm and collected, a fighter and a problem-solver? Or would I cower helplessly and give up?

My mind went a million miles an hour pondering different solutions. I could call 911, and if it WAS the students, we could have a laugh about my paranoia later. I could go upstairs and, if it WAS burglars, I could yell and scream and hope to get them to leave.

As I listened to the footsteps, I noticed that they were mainly over my head – where one of my students who went to Moab usually sleeps. I slipped a little lower under my covers. It’s probably just him.

Silence for 20 minutes, then more footsteps. The basement light shut off, then turned back on for a split second, then shut off. My room seemed unnaturally bright to my darkness-adjusted eyes.

If they haven’t broken into my room yet, they probably won’t, I thought, sleepily. I lay flat on my back, still holding the phone, still wearing my glasses. I drifted off to sleep, and woke up at about 6:45.

I grabbed the phone and opened my door. I looked at the door to the other downstairs bedroom, where the other student who went to Moab sleeps. The door was closed.

They were home.

In a weird way, in hindsight, I feel like I’ve survived something. I overreacted, maybe, but I didn’t get completely irrational. I had a plan, I was ready to act, I was vigilant and ready. (In a fear-stricken kind of way.)

Now, when I have to fight off that serial killer that’s waiting in my closet, I’m totally going to be prepared.