Big Decisions in Their Little World
The Big Picture at “The World’s Smallest Church” Cross Island Chapel in Oneida, New York
--
When you start dating someone you really like, it’s a lot like watching Bob Ross paint.
You come in with a palette of fresh paint, having taken the necessary clockwork to coat-over any smudges from your past, and get a do-over with a blank canvas.
You have an idea — a fantasy of how this new Big Picture is supposed to look. The problem is you don’t know — in fact, not supposed to know exactly how it will turn out. You hope it doesn’t get messed up like last time. Paralyzed by perfectionism, you stare at what could be with the same intensity as Uma Thurman in Kill Bill when she’s staring at her big toe. But you’re not a paralyzed Uma Thurman in Kill Bill.
You’re you.
Your little piggies wiggle just fine, have no clue where to find a cadmium yellow tracksuit, and the nearby thrift store doesn’t sell ninja swords. No… you have a paintbrush. The nothingness bothers you, and eventually, you’re the Picasso who needs to move that paintbrush to fill-in the storyboard of your life. So you wash the brush in an odorless paint thinner, beat the Devil out of it, and start samurai-stroking the plain to add color to your dreams.
On my second date with Rachel, I took her to a painting class after church. She had two little ones, Tony who turned 7 and Elle who was 5. Because of the kids, I advised we’d take things slow — slower than a tortoise with arthritis trudging through the Boston Marathon in peanut butter if need be.
We were tasked with creating an underwater turtle scene. I had no clue what I was doing. Growing up, the only experience I had with painting was watching Bob Ross after PBS episodes of Mr. Rogers, Lamb Chop the sock puppet sheep, and Barney the purple talking tyrannosaurus rex. It was waaaaaaaaaaay too early for us to have a small dance routine while singing, “I Love You, You Love Me, We’re a Great Big Happy Family”, but I was hopeful that our date could give her a chance to mellow and have a few hours removed from the “mommy-mommy-mommy-mommy-mommy” life as a single mom.
In painting and what’s true in dating, you start by applying small brush strokes, taking it stroke-by-stroke, day-by-day. After all, it’s not like da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa during his lunch break. It takes time and patience until something worthwhile emerges. Over the course of the next two months, Rachel and I shared qualities that we both were drawn into; sense of humor, endearing personalities and Christian morals to ground everything. She invited me into the lives of her family. Backed by the cross as our easel, we were mixing color into each other’s lives, blending rich and vibrant memories with broad circular brush strokes to indicate that light was in our future.
But everything can’t be all sunshine and rainbows. As the picture progresses, you eventually need to add some black lines. Traces of the past would try to creep in. Two years had been removed since she escaped from an emotionally abusive marriage. She had been painted into a corner, all the pictures of her marriage having been vandalized by a war hero that she didn’t really know. Her ex’s addictions to drugs and gambling were hidden in shadows. War changes people — marriage changes people. After the matrimonial discharge, she was raising Tony and Elle by herself as a family of three. With her faith, she was starting over to rise to something better.
“You absolutely have to have dark in order to have light”, once said Bob Ross. “You gotta have opposites — dark-and-light, light-and-dark, continually in painting… It’s like in life, you gotta have a little sadness once in awhile so you know when the good times come.”
As our painting became clear— something better, something much deeper began to emerge. Colorful coral and plantlife began growing from the murky depths. Our seascape turtles had risen from the black rock bottom, and were surfacing towards the light, towards something better.
Before we called it a day and signed our initials, the art instructor gave one last recommendation:
“In your painting, you can draw as many turtles as you’d like to your family.”
Rachel painted her family with three turtles.
If the good times had come, my family had room for four.
September 26, 2015–4:18 pm Prayer: “The World’s Smallest Church” Cross Island Chapel in Oneida, New York
The scene looked like Bob Ross had dropped from the heavens to paint one last piece on a standard 18" x 20" canvas. The sun was just floating around, with some happy little clouds hanging above a pond. Nature had taken a trusty ‘ole fan brush, loaded it sap green with a touch of van dyke brown to dull the color and drew-in a big ‘ole tree. He needed a friend, so another was next to him. Using the ole corner of the fan brush, like magic there was a deep, deep woods with all kinds of trees and little rascals living there. Squirrels, geese, bees, who knows. It’s your world. Make a decision.
In the middle of the pond was Cross Island Chapel, a titanium white-painted church built on a low platform next to a wooden cross. A small billboard near the road filled-in everything you needed to know: “Built in 1989. Floor Area 51” x 81" (28.68 sq. ft.). Seats 2 people. Non-Denominational and Open to the Public upon request. ‘Cross Island Chapel’ is dedicated as a witness to God.”
The church was built during a pre-Pinterest era for a small wedding. It only had room for the minister, bride and groom atop the platform. The rest of the wedding party had to anchor nearby in small boats, and all guests witnessed the vows on shore. The chapel remained there ever since.
No church services were held here, unless you’d count a congregation of geese who — as my shoe bottoms had to avoid — didn’t make mistakes, just made some “happy accidents”.
Instead, I had come to the world’s tiniest church to pray. It’s the little things that matter, and this visit was to see what was emerging in my life’s Big Picture. Rachel and I had been dating for two months and everything was lining up that we were ready for the next stage. With the kids, I knew it wouldn’t be easy.
I had grown to admire Rachel’s character. Sure, she wasn’t perfect, but you learn that a person’s faults are largely what makes a person so darn likable. As a single mom, her day consisted of constant attention to the kids. She was tirelessly getting them out of bed, into bed, fed, bathed, dressed, keeping them out of harm’s way, answering their cries, questions, tantrums, and refereeing how many times they could jam out to “Uma Thurman” by Fall Out Boy.
I found that a vacation for her could be as quick as a trip inside Dollar Tree just to pick-up $2 worth of paper towels while I supervised the kids with YouTube videos of LEGO Marvel cartoons. She was constantly having to stay one step ahead of two kids to avoid them getting too tired, too bored, or too hungry, any of which could produce kicking-and-screaming at the expense of the hearing aids of the downstairs apartment neighbors.
It’s constant monitoring, constant touch, constant use of vocal chords where one minute she could sound like Mary Poppins and the next minute impersonate Batman. She faced constant scrutiny and second-guessing from her ex-in-laws. She constantly felt pressured from short-term relief to avoid feeling like it was at everyone else’s long-term expense.
And she was doing this all by herself, teaching EVERYTHING— manners, safety, respect, resourcefulness, discipline, curiosity, creativity, empathy. And most importantly, that Jesus loved them.
“Are you sure you’re ready for this?”, she texted one night after our phone conversation ended early for a nighttime tantrum.
I didn’t need time to think about my answer. I already knew. I was ready to make some big decisions in their little world.
I had learned that even though you’re teaching kids all these different things; how to read, how to use a fork and spoon, how to play guitar —you teach them all these different things. Yet in their own little unique way, they teach you simplicity. I would forget about the stresses of Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, work deadlines, and credit card payment due dates. You realize how much you’re rushing through life — yet kids are artists of living in the moment. They teach you how to use your imagination again to make any kind of a moment a masterpiece. In the complexities of life, our search for the best things are often simple enough for a child to understand.
Maybe this was the Big Picture to what God had been leading me to during my spiritual adventure. You have to ask yourself what do you want to be. You got to dream dreams. You have to have something to go after that inspires the heart and the soul. For me, this was something worth living for.
For Tony and Elle, I could be the biggest influence in their lives. They would copy what I did and what I’d say. They want — no, need someone to be present and live in their little world who wouldn’t let them down. That’s more important than any Batman or Frozen toy I could ever buy them. The way I figured it, the best gift I could give them was an amazing Christian-based relationship with their mother.
So that was my prayer that day. Everything that I touch, everything that I’m about, my vow to God was to make the lives of Rachel and the kids better than when I entered. So I stopped praying, and instead, decided to be the answer to their prayers.
Your actions are the paintbrush. Make it interesting.
Before I scribbled my signature to call it a day, I turned around to see the other side of the pond. I never even noticed what was over there. Maybe God had a sense of humor, but I had to squint my eyes to see what was in the distance. Standing atop a wooden log was something that had risen from the murky green depths of the pond. They had surfaced to the top.
It was a family.
It was a family of turtles.
