Your Son is an Electrician?

I walk with Anna (the nine year old I look after) to school almost every single day, because there simply aren't many children in the area whose parents drive to school. Most of the children in the neighborhood walk with their parents, but most of the parents don't have very young children to walk with. Most of them have children at least able to toddle around, who are able to control their own temperature, and who aren't as prone to getting sick. So some mornings when it is really cold, I have to bundle up the baby I look after, and walk to school with her older sister. Now, if the school was right around the corner (where the middle school is) I wouldn't mind it so much. Or if the backpack that I carry the baby in was easier to get in and out of by myself. But the elementary school happens to sit at the top of a ginormous hill. There are several steps of steep stairs, and then a very long winding path that lead to the school, and though the school starts later than most schools around, it is still freezing by the time her older sister and I have to walk. Most mornings nothing unusual happens. As always, there are other people who are walking their children to school, the sun rise to our right as we pant our way up the steep hill, and the rustling leaves on the millions (okay, maybe hundreds) of trees that surround the path.

Not today.

Not to say that the ordinary things weren't still happening. The sun still rose, (thank the Lord), the leaves are still on the trees, and there were still other parents walking their children to class. But the difference today, was that a humongous electricians truck was parked at the entrance to the school. The path isn't very wide, so even though the truck is the width of an average car, the entire path is blocked off. Anna and I could not make it to school.

It's a good thing that we always try to get their early. Now at least Anna understands why- she always thought I was crazy about going to school so early. Sometimes things come up that you just can't control. So, what do we do? We stand their awkwardly and wait for the truck driver to move the truck. Well, the truck driver is talking on his phone, and doesn't see us right away. After about half a minute of standing there in the freezing wind, he sees us and immediately gets off the phone. He hops the fence surrounding the path, and comes up to us.

"I need to move the truck, don't I?"

Anna and I both nod, sort of too intimidated by the truck to say much. So we just watch as he walks around to the drivers side of the truck, starts the engine, and begins pulling out.

"I'm scared that the truck is going to back in to us," says Anna, as she hides behind me, "I don't want it to squish me. Picture day is tomorrow."

So I shield her from the truck, even though their are weights keeping the truck from going any further back than it already is. And slowly, the truck pulls in to the school parking lot to let all the students that walk up the hill to pass.

After I drop Anna off at her classroom door, I have to walk back down the hill. Though the truck is gone, the man is still there, and he is leaning against the railing. He is obviously waiting for school to start, so that he can work in peace, without worrying about droves of children walking to and from school. It's very cold, but he is only wearing a thin jacket and work pants. I stop to thank him on the way down- it must have been a real setback to move the truck,but he did it anyways.

"Oh, no problem," he said, "I would have had to move it anyways." He says all of this with a Mexican accent and a slight grin. He can't be older than his mid thirties. There is something so compelling about him, that I decide to stop and chat, even though the weather app on my phone tells me that it is only 3 degrees above freezing, and I have an infant in my arms.

"Hi, my name is Rebecca." I say, holding out a mittened hand.
"J.C." he replied, "nice to meet you".

As I begin talking to this man, I see that he is not so different from me. He is working a job that pays the bills, that is not what he wants to do, but what he needs to do to support his family. Although I only have myself to take care of, he has a wife and two small children. The more I talked to him, the more I realized that he was missing the positive social interaction that comes from meaningful conversations, just as much, if not more, than I was. This man seemed so lonely for conversation, that I just had to keep talking to him.

Of course the conversation turned to the baby, and he asked me if she was mine.

"No," I responded, "I'm just the nanny. I take care of her and her older sister for most of the day, and then I go back to my house and try to act like a normal college student. I mean, believe it or not, I do have goals other than taking care of children for the rest of my life. I still want to go and be a student and learn tons of things." He studies me for a minute, and then says, "So... Are you still in high school?" Like most people that I meet during my day, he still assumes that I have not finished high school, and that this baby is mine, contrary to anything that I say.

"Well, I just graduated in May, and so now I'm taking a year or so off before college."
"Oh, which high school did you go to?"
"Well," I said, taking a deep breath, "you're going to think I'm crazy. I went to high school in Colorado. I actually just moved here about a month ago."
For a second he looks at me in astonishment, and then his curiosity gets the better of him. He asks, "Well, why did you do that? What made you move here?"

Whenever anyone asks me this question, I still feel very insecure about the answer. I feel like some people are going to write me off as just another Christian. Before I answered, I remembered a picture that I had seen on Facebook earlier this week. It is a very simple picture with a nun on the front. She is smiling at the camera in a smile reminiscent of the Mona Lisa, and there are only a few words: "Holiness is not for wimps, and the cross is not negotiable, sweetheart, it's a requirement -Mother Angelica." I could go on for days about how much this picture has inspired me to bring Christ back in to every aspect of my life, but that is for another time (If you all want me too). But at this particular time it made me think that it would be okay to tell this man why I had really moved here.

"Well, I was on a mission trip in Louisiana this summer, and I was praying, and I just asked the Lord where He was calling me, and He told me Virginia. And at first I didn't believe Him, but then everything started working out, so I followed Him."

This man did not believe me. He did not believe that I was only 18 and that I had moved across the country because I felt the Lord's presence here. He couldn't believe that I hadn't moved here with any family, and he couldn't wrap his mind around the faith it sounded like I had. (I mean, did a memo go out that only middle-aged and older people can do crazy things for their faith? Did I miss that?) The conversation soon ended with us finally introducing ourselves, and then we went our separate ways. I went back down the hill to the apartment, and he went back to work on the light that needed repairs. I was thinking about the conversation all the way home, and I couldn't stop thinking about how he was so disbelieving of me.

Even though the conversation did not end with his understanding my decision or faith, it really got me thinking about how easy-and difficult- it is to be Christ to others. It's hard not being accepted for your decisions, even if that person is the overworked electrician that you meet on the way to school. It's difficult talking about your beliefs and faith to people that aren't interested. I mean, we all want to be accepted by the world right? However, the thing I have found easy is to speak and act like Christ would have.  I didn't want to speak to the man outside on a cold day, but who am I to question the Lord? I know that He takes even the smallest things we give Him and turns them into blessings larger than we can imagine. And even though this sometimes doesn't feel like enough, and even though I didn't see any change in that man while I was there, I know that the Lord is doing some pretty awesome things with him.

I mean, who knows? Maybe he'll forget his preconceived notions about people still doing radical things for their faith. Maybe he'll remember that people still pray, still go to church, still take leaps of faith. Possibly, this will even challenge him to increase his own spiritual journey. Maybe the Lord will use this conversation as a way of reminding him who he really is: a child of God.