compatible

in case there was any doubt that scott and i are perfect for each other:

yesterday at church, i walked past the kids' wing on my way to our youngish marrieds class, and caught a glimpse of the elementary-age sunday school program.  it's in a gym with a stage, all of the grade schoolers standing around with the high school youth group volunteers wearing bright green shirts, a guy in a crazy outfit crouched on stage with bright lights, the "crowd" of kids chanting a countdown "4-3-2-1!" and the crazy outfit guy standing and throwing a beach ball into the air while shouting "happy new year!"

i laughed and moved on - then mentioned to scott on our way home from church that a) i could never do youth ministry, and b) i would have hated that sort of sunday school program as a kid.  when i was in maybe 3rd or 4th grade, our church went from a normal sunday school format (bible lesson on a felt board, color a few pictures, sing songs) where you're in the same classroom the whole hour to one where you do the lesson with your teacher, then go into a bigger room to do activities with a few other classes.  i think i went once, and all i remember is that we were supposed to stand in line and take turns acting like our favorite rock star.  umm - i was what, 8?  i listened to amy grant, had never seen mtv - let alone gone to a concert, and was unbelievably shy.  i tried my hardest to stay at the back of the line, and just stood there when my turn came.  after that, i stayed in my normal sunday school room when the rest of the kids went to the activity - my teacher was a friend of my mom's, and told me that i really should go to the activity time, but i'd have to learn something if i wanted to stay in there with her.  i was thrilled with that suggestion, so she taught me the books of the bible in order.

when i finished telling scott the story, he said that when he was in 4th grade, his family switched from a small baptist church to a megachurch with the bigger kids' program.  he was totally shy, hated going, and managed to weasel his way out of it until 7th grade.  then he told me that when he was in shop class in 9th grade (try to imagine that, please), his teacher had them doing book work for the first few weeks and threatened that if they didn't behave themselves, they'd do book work the entire semester and not actually build anything.  oooh.  while i'm sure that was a terrific threat for most of the jr. high boys, scott thought that idea sounded amazing and secretly hoped that - in shop class - they would indeed have to do book work the entire semester.

my take-aways from our shared story time were as follows: a) i wonder how many shy kids there are out there who don't go to the new high energy format sunday school or youth group because it feels awkward and forced to them?  b) this explains so much about our shared level of handiness around the house.  c) our kids have no hope.  no hope of not being shy, and no hope of not being nerds.