The New Eve - Lewis Robert [71]
12
Your Biggest Challenge, Your First Bold Move
The early evening air was crisp and scented with autumn leaves as Susan arrived at the church. Children ran and laughed on the playground, playfully evading their parents who tried to collect them in the fading light. Susan stopped to watch. She thought of her childhood in Boston and her enchanted visits with Grandma in rural Massachusetts—the laughter, the ease, and the togetherness the whole family enjoyed over meals and backyard games. But that was before her parents divorced. Before she learned about relying on no one.
Now twenty-six, Susan was a world away from the family life she’d once known. Her house was in Raleigh, North Carolina, but she was a citizen of the world. As a hard-charging MBA, Susan aimed for the top. To prove her hunger, she traveled anywhere the company asked. Trouble in Chicago? Send Susan. There was nothing she couldn't do in a seventy-hour workweek. The Seattle staff needed training? Susan was the one. Boston, Los Angeles, San Antonio, anywhere, anytime. Susan's was a life in transit, and the transit began every Monday at 4:00 a.m. when she woke up, hopped a plane, and didn't return home until Friday night.
The money was good, but other priorities suffered. Saturdays were for crashing, and Sundays for church and maybe a quick visit with a friend. By Sunday afternoon she was packing for another workweek somewhere. Where did dating fit in? It didn't. But what choice did she have? Her career goals were as yet unrealized. She couldn't slow down now.
As she watched the last child hop into a waiting van, she sighed and turned to walk on to her Sunday evening meeting. She looked down at the book she was carrying.
Me, a New Eve? she thought. I just don't know.
On the other side of the playground, Patricia had just finished parking her car. She'd seen Susan walking along the sidewalk across the way and watched her pause to look at the children. What's she thinking about? Patricia wondered. She's young, talented. What does she want from life? Patricia felt she had a pretty good idea. She had Susan pegged for a single-minded careerist. So how has she been processing this New Eve study we're in together? Patricia wasn't yet sure. Since their meeting was set to start in five minutes, Patricia gathered her stuff and hurried into the church. But she did so with anxiety.
As a fifty-one-year-old business executive who had never married, Patricia had learned to be guarded around other Christians. They meant her no harm, of course, but Patricia often felt edged out of church life. People didn't know what to do with her. She didn't fit their categories or expectations. She didn't have kids or grandkids to chat about or a husband whose foibles she could laughingly reveal to a circle of sympathetic women. But the differences didn't end there. She had traveled the world on business and now was earning more money annually than most couples earn in years. All of this pushed Patricia to the outside. The truth is, she often felt more alone in church than anywhere else in her life.
How can I be a model Christian woman when I don't fit the expected mold?
Susan and Patricia met in front of the church and began to enter when they heard a car pull up in the lot behind them. They turned to watch Tracey zip her minivan into position next to Patricia's Mercedes. Tracey was a thirty-year-old, stay-at-home mom with two young kids and a baby on the way. She was barely holding it together.
“I made it!” she exclaimed with a big smile as she got out. “I told Trevor I can't be late again, so he got the kids distracted for me, and I rushed out of the house before they noticed! Isn't it crazy what a woman has to do to get out of the house?”
Patricia and Susan exchanged a humored glance. Neither of them could relate to Tracey's experience,