Milestones

Today I ran 5 miles. I've never run more than 4 before, so I was kind of nervous about it, but the really screwed up part of it was that I felt like I could do 6.  Or 8.  I had a great time, and when I was done I was so keyed up and proud of myself that I danced around to "I'm Too Sexy."  I'm sure I looked like an imbecile, but after what I just accomplished, I didn't give a crap.  I'm an imbecile who can run 5 miles...so there!

S was baptized yesterday.  I wanted him baptized Catholic, the obvious reason being that I myself am Catholic, but it's a little more complicated than that.  It's not that I want him to absolutely be raised Catholic.  His father is Protestant, and is active in his own church, which S attends with him.  S is able to participate actively there, but in order for him to do things like First Communion, etc. in my church, he has to be baptized as a Catholic.  So it's more a case of wanting him to feel equally at home in both denominations.  This had to happen before his 7th birthday if I didn't want to have to drag him to a bunch of classes for weeks on end, and since his birthday is this week, we came in very close to the wire. 

It was a beautiful ceremony, and our priest, not surprisingly, made a real effort to explain everything that was going on, mostly for the benefit of S's father, who participated, and for S. 

Here he is getting prayed for before the actual baptism.  I love this picture, it's one of my favorites that was taken yesterday. 

Just after the actual baptism.  I was bending over him to see his reaction, because I couldn't see his face during that part.  This is because I had been instructed to basically hold him like a battering ram with his head over the baptismal font while our priest (henceforth known as Father What-A-Waste - his nickname in our parish because many of the women are very, very sad about the whole celibacy thing as it pertains to him and, apparently, them.  I'd kill to be a fly on the wall during their confessions) did the baptizing.  It had to have been distinctly uncomfortable for S.  The pictures look like we're performing some kind of act of torture, and are really funny, but I can't include them here because S's godmother, E, is in them, and I try not to post pictures of people without their consent.  He took it pretty well though, as you can see.

Here he is with his baptismal candle.  We were all trying really hard not to laugh ourselves stupid at this point, because S was so obviously freaked out when it got handed to him.  He just held it out like that at arm's length and refused. To. Move.  He's never been allowed to hold candles before, and I could see his little mind envisioning the entire church going up in flames (which there was actually no chance of whatsoever, since anything he dropped it on would have been marble and/or flame retardant).

J's mother flew out for the baptism, and she was kind of fixated on that candle.  She kept saying how he could use it at his wedding, and then she'd talk about how he could use it at Easter Vigil, and some other stuff.  The nun who taught the parents' class on baptism said that what we're suposed to do with it, though, is to burn it for about 15 minutes on the anniversary of his baptism, and then do something small to celebrate, so I'm going with that.

Comments

[Em]

Congratulations! Two big events...running 5 miles and the baptism. Excellent.