First Day

Saturday, June 30, 2012

            It’s official.  I’m an introvert.  A very tired one, at that.

            At 4:30 p.m. I crashed for an hour.  Now I’m back at the convention center, waiting for the evening business session to begin.

            I’m very glad to be an observer.  Already I have made notes for GA 2014:  more than one pair of comfortable shoes, more time to adjust to the time change, and a two year program of working out to work up the stamina required for all the walking. 

            I’m blessed to have a great roommate, Brie Wentzel, commissioner from Bellingham.  We started the morning by scouting out breakfast:  coffee and oatmeal at the coffee shop in the Westin.   Then, while she waited in an endless line to get her GA meal card, I walked through the exhibit hall right as it opened for the day.  We managed two of the three time slots for the morning Riverside Conversations.  I’m afraid that I did not get a whole lot out of them because I was operating in a haze—after all, it was just after 6 a.m. Pacific Time.  We walked all over downtown in a fruitless search for a Starbucks (the only one we found is closed on weekends!) and ended up at a Subway for lunch and a coffee shop for coffee.

            . . . Well, I must interrupt to tell you that a small group of bicyclists, including the stated clerk, just rode in to applause. . .

            . . . Moderator Cynthia Bolbach has called for a 5 minute stretch break before the fourth ballot is cast to elect the new moderator.  I did not attend the first business session this afternoon; instead, I wandered the exhibit hall again and had what I would call a divinely appointed conversation at the Presbyterians Pro-Life booth.  Then, at 4:30 I retreated to my room and rested.  My search for supper yielded a trip back to the room for a granola snack.  I wasn’t that hungry, anyway . . . later, I discovered I missed the text from our NPSP presbyter to meet for dinner.  Oh, well.  My resolution is to remember to actually check my phone once in a while.

            . . . And we wait, yet again.  The results are in—yes, one of the two I hoped would receive the majority vote did:  Neal Presa.  His installation includes his two young sons, the older reading a Scripture passage and the younger a prayer.  There is joy in the assembly.

            And as poignant as Cynthia Bolbach’s sermon at this afternoon’s worship is her parting as moderator.  She is a brave soul in a cancer battle.  But that brings me back to the worship service and the music:  a huge choir, a brass quintet, a bell choir, an exceptional flutist, piano, organ.  Wow.

            Somehow it has gotten to be Sunday morning.  After a good night’s sleep, I am ready to worship at First Presbyterian Church and meet more new friends.  A well-rested introvert does much better in crowds and new experiences than an exhausted one.