The Culmination Of My Fears

We will herefore be known as The Catholic Women From San Martin de Porres Catholic Church rather than just The Ladies Of San Martin because as Father Eduardo politely pointed out with an impish grin...he's pretty sure that San Martin de Porres did NOT, in fact, have any ladies. Thank you very much. So at approximately 10:50am, I rushed out of my house on my way to the Tierra Santa Country Club for my ladies luncheon...10 minutes to get somewhere I've never been before armed only with some vague directions and absolutely NO cell phone. Gads! My stomach was doing flip-flops. AND NO CELL PHONE! breathe in, breathe out. drive drive drive. What if I can't find it? What if I go to the wrong building? What if I walk into the wrong room? What if I'm the only Lady there wearing jeans? What if there are no more seats left at Pat's table? WHAT AM I DOING TURN AROUND GO BACK STOP STOP STOP THE CAR!!! I had spent my entire Friday evening counting down to this event. 14 more hours. and then at 1am....11 more hours. and then at 4am...7 more hours. and again at 6am....ONLY FIVE MORE HOURS!!! which led me to 7am with only 4 MORE HOURS TO GO! followed closely by 8am and then 9am....with two hours to prepare myself...I arose. And I declared..."I don't wanna go." to which Roy replied...."Go." I think I thought he would tell me that I didn't have to go. I was totally wrong. Instead he reminded me about all that crapola I said about wanting to know the other mothers and wanting to face my fears and BLAHBLAHBLAH ick. LIKE I REALLY WANTED HEAR THAT ROY! So it was with great reluctance that I slithered out of bed and made my way to the closet to pick out appropriate lunching attire. My closet contains two types of clothes. Business and Bum. I had to sort of unite the two to find an acceptable middle ground. I wore jeans with pastel pink slides that had a pastel pink leather flowerette in the strap. Very suburbia. On top I wore a wife-beater (hehehe) paired with a pastel pink shawl. Done. After showering and assembling a proper hair-do....I slapped on my watch and screeched outta the door. Completely forgetting my cell phone, which was still charging on the counter. DRAT IT ALL! but I had absolutely no time to go back for it as I didn't notice it was missing until I was rounding my third corner and had an urge to call Roy and whine. SO. There I was. Driving ALL the way down Westgate...past all the gated communities and ritzier houses...and finally I was pulling into the large stone gate which separated me from the lush rolling hills of a golf course. ugh. My nerves were strung tight. I saw the building ahead but I had no idea if it was the right one because there seemed to be several buildings scattered around the golf course...but I pulled in and parked. And I had the nerve to sit my Honda Civic next to a Lexus. HA! I took one deep breath and exited the safety of my vehicle. The closer I got to the door, the more I wanted to turn around and run. Then I opened it, walked in....and there were a bunch of golfing men sitting at a nearby table STARING at me like....WHAT THE HECK IS SHE DOING HERE?! and just when I thought...."I'm in the wrong place I will die of embarrassment I am turning around right now and leaving because my face is now bright red and those stupid guys think I don't belong here and they saw right through my facade and..!" then I was pointed in the right direction. I entered a room full of fall colors, fake pumpkins and tables sprinkled with artificial autumn leaves. And there was Pat. Hugging me, asking how was I doing, telling me she was glad I could make it...and even looking surprised to see me. I exhaled and sat down. After that it was all a blur. I met some nice ladies who WERENT starving werewolves OR bloodthirsty vampires and I actually ATE my chicken salad sandwich...aside from the HUGE piece of BONE that I (hopefully) discreetly extracted while attention was turned elsewhere. Although it spent a considerable amount of time wedged inside my cheek. I nibbled the fresh fruit and sipped some coffee and savored the cake and listened intently to Father Eduardo speak of....what did he talk about again?.....oh yeah! He spoke about Women! and Mothers! and Prayer! and he cracked a few jokes...and said some funny things...although maybe they were just funny because of his compelling accent. But either way, he has a great sense of humor. So before I knew it, we were done. We each received a small sterling medallion of San Martin de Porres to wear to our next meeting...which I THINK I will be attending. And then I was scurrying out the door...passing two OLD ladies whom I heard complimenting my shawl...ACK!....the one that I apparently will never be wearing again if two OLD ladies thought it was stylish...and I hopped into my car, name tag still intact (CeCe) and sped back to the sanctuary of my own home. Then we went to go see Shark's Tale with the kids and I felt oodles better about my day AND myself. So all in all...it wasn't that bad. And I have an entire month to prepare myself for the next one. I'll need it.