Des Moines, Iowa

I arrived last night in Des Moines, and was so pleased to see my friend Joan and her daughter Renee at the foot of the escalator. I ran up and hugged a couple of New Englanders, got into their car with its New England Patriots decals, and enjoyed familiar accents--made me feel like "home."

Joan has been the Director of Lifespan Faith Development at First Unitarian Church in Des Moines for three and a half years now. In her first year, during my last months as a minister in Boston, I visited Joan for a weekend during which I attended a conference on progressive religion in Des Moines, and got a chance to see the church and a little of the city. The church was on the verge of a capital campaign to do some building improvements and an addition, and Joan was preparing to find another apartment in Des Moines. (I think I've helped her move either two or three times, now!) At that time her daughter Renee was living in Florida (I think), and was preparing to join Joan in Iowa.

I'm going to be preaching at First Unitarian on Sunday, and am looking forward to it greatly. Rev. Mark Stringer, the senior minister, is on sabbatical, and a year ago I agreed to come for the weekend to fill the pulpit he normally occupies. I was pleased, then, to learn that the church was experimenting with a third worship service on Saturday evening, and was looking forward to seeing what that looked and felt like. I learned a few weeks ago that the Saturday evening services have been suspended during the sabbatical, so I'll only be preaching twice--which is, in and of itself, something unfamiliar to me, and I am looking forward to it.

I'm staying at Joan's house, which will be a joy. Joan and I became close at Andover Newton Theological School in the 1990s; I was completing an M.Div. and she was completing more credits than she needed for an M.Div. but never quite got around to completing Clinical Pastoral Education or finding a substitute for that important course. She also was working both as a religious educator and as the assistant to two professors at Harvard Business School--whew!

When I became Minister at Community Church of Boston, Joan became religiouos educator there--an overqualified person who was distinctly under-employed at CCB. I was pleased to have her around for a coule of years before she moved on to a more substantial church position. And then I was pleased to hear of her "fishing" expedition to find full-time emplyment as a Director of Religious Educaiton. Which she found in Des Moines . . .

Joan and I also have been roommates at General Assembly (a couple of years ago in Fort Worth, TX), a splendid time for me. We got to take a night off for dinner at a great Texas steak house, and also went to the National Cowgirl Museum and the Fort Worth Modern Art Museum. Great memories.

Joan is packing to move, next week, to Cape Cod. She will be "going home" to care for her parents--her mom, a fabric artist with a national reputation--will be having surgery in March, and Joan will be moving in to her house to aid her and her dad. I think she had every intention of staying in Des Moines longer, but the change in her family situation required an early and mid-year exit. I suspect the church will miss her.

But for now I will enjoy a couple of days among friends--and then preach in one of the great Humanist pulpits of our Unitarian Universalist Association. I'm optimistic.

Sunny outside, and since I'm in Central time, the sun seems to have arisen at a normal time. Who'd-a thunk it?