Thursday's Child

Happy birthday to me! And to my father, my uncle, and my great-uncle, and at least one second cousin. I know-- that's both weird and a little bit amazing. And also just an ordinary, rainy Wednesday.

I thought, for many years, that I'd been born on a Wednesday. This seemed extrememly unfortunate because of that little poem that popped up some time around 1838 and which various grandparents were fond of reciting:

Monday's child is fair of face,
Tuesday's child is full of grace,
Wednesday's child is full of woe,
Thursday's child has far to go,
Friday's child is loving and giving,
Saturday's child works hard for a living,
But the child who is born on the Sabbath day
Is bonnie and blithe and good and gay.

It's superstition at its finest, and when I was little, I was extremely superstitious. I was also extrememly bad at math, because recently my husband figured out that September 28, 1978 was actually a Thursday. I Googled it to check, and sure enough. I'm not destined to be full of woe.

I do, however, have far to go.

That's apt. It's absolutely the case when it comes to my spiritual life. I'm at a bit of a crossroads, and which I thought was going to be a temporary thing, but I seem to be growing some roots here. I might even be stuck. I'm trying to figure out whether or not that's a bad thing, because it's easy to conjure up the image of something permanent, like a tree, in the middle of two roads. One side labeled "Sure of This Thing," the other side "Not So Sure." Or, on worse days, the signs labeled "Yes" and "No." I'm kind of trying to decide that about a lot of things faith-related.

God. Church. My specific church, as in the one I attend. My denomination, which has always been Episcopalian. My prayer life. Whether I believe in all, or some, or none.

It's all in flux. There's far to go. So happy birthday to Thursday's child, still a child of God, I'm pretty sure. But here at the tree in the crossroads, watching all the other travellers, and not ready quite yet to make a choice.