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Posted by Marti on 05-03-2005 at04:59:

  Say Your Prayers

In the spirit of "What the Music Means to Me" that jake started, I think I need to tell my Say Your Prayers story.

I have this resistance to the idea of putting my credit card number on the Internet (that I may one day have to overcome), so I had preordered SYP by check. Naturally, it took a little longer. In the meantime, life kept happening. I brought Brandon home from visitation one night crying and tripping over the lack of control he felt in the situation. I think it was over the fact that Mom had cleaned his space in the living room while he was out being told....God knows what about how ineffectual he was in life....and not there to do it himself. When it came time to get out of the car and go in the house, he wouldn't move because he couldn't deal with anymore. I prayed and kept an eye on him and made some calls to try to figure out whether to take him to the hospital or not. In the meantime, he came in some time while I was asleep after I finally passed out. I called him off school and called off work so that I could continue to keep an eye on him and see how well he was going to come out of it.

I've never been one to get mad at God, but I made it there in spades that day. I was tired of dealing with years of seemingly unchecked bad imput into his life and watching him hurt over it and feeling helpless to stop it. I went to get the mail in the midst of all of this fire, and there was my album. I sat down and listened to all of that mellow resignation and seeking after the close place with God, and then heard that "....the bad news could always be much worse." I realized that, although he was hurting and confused, he wasn't out sleeping in a car in a blizzard, and I wasn't staring at the phone waiting for the FBI to call. I humbled myself, and God and I went on stronger, and so did Brandon.

Hang in there, Mike--He believes in you, and so do we.