Classic NYC Story

It was just about a week and a half ago that the wife of the pastor of my ex-husband’s church called me up at my mother’s house to request that I sing the Sunday morning sermon selection in two weeks from today. She asked me to prepare two songs. She asked me how much I would like to be paid. I told her that anything she would give me would be more than enough. This, of course, almost ensures that I will not be paid much, but that’s fine. I leapt at this opportunity to travel two bus rides out of my neighborhood to the complete other side of southeast Queens to sing a couple of church songs with the man who scorned me just a couple of weeks ago.

Before you roll your eyes at me, though, and assert that I seem to have missed my “reality check,” remember that his church called me. I did not call them. My look-he’s-done-with-you-just-fucking-get-over-it plan might have been a little short-sighted. Consider this: he was just as married to me as I was to him. He was married to me for as long as I was married to him. Consider this: maybe there’s a difference between “he’s done with you” and “he’s angry at you.”

The analysis said “This won’t be the time for quick fixes in relationships or deals”… I have a tendency to lean towards the quick fix. A disappearance is a quick fix. I cannot disappear. I cannot make my ex-husband disappear. If I could make people disappear, there would be quite a few less people on this planet. But it doesn’t work that way. People are made of carbon. Carbon doesn’t just evaporate. Carbon doesn’t just disappear (spoken by one who has been trying to make herself disappear for no fewer than ten years now). There is no disappearing. Clearly, something has to be addressed, and worked through the hard way.

Hey, don’t blame me. I didn’t make the phone call. I didn’t even answer the phone. My sister did.

Some people would call this a funny twist of fate. The Christians might call it divine will. Still other people might call it an asinine and callous error on the part of the pastor’s wife. However you want to put it, something is almost certain to happen. Something. And whatever it is, I get the feeling I’m not supposed to be prepared for it. How can I prepare anyway? I have nothing more to say. I’ve said everything that I could say and more than once. I have nothing more to offer. I don’t even have any songs left. I have no idea what I’m going to sing, and maybe I’m not supposed to know. Maybe I’m not supposed to sing at all. Maybe this was just the universe tricking me into showing up.

Maybe my imagination is getting the best of me, but who cares?

This I did not imagine though: the pastor’s wife called me and invited me to sing. She offered me money but did not say how much. I marked off the date on my mother’s calendar. I’m going.

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