The part they don't tell you about

I have a mouse.

It's not really my mouse.  It's the mouse that ate all our chips and used the space between the mustard bottles for its house.  Worse, it's only about an inch long which makes me think it's a baby.

When you hear people tell you stories of their time in ministry, no one tells you about that time when they caught the mouse or how they had to shovel burst bags of their neighbor's trash out of their back yard.

No one tells you about how sometimes, in the early hours of the morning when it's still dark, you get woken up by the desperate sobs of a woman wandering the street below all alone.

No one passes on advice about how to handle these things, which makes me think, maybe there isn't a correct answer.  We're always looking for the right answer, the right thing to do.  Maybe the world is so messed up that the possibility for right answers ended a long time ago. 

But I still have to decide what to do with this mouse, which means that I have to live with whatever I do or don't decide.  As for the woman, well, I can only hope that my half-awake prayers are enough. 

The woman, the mouse, me- we're all helpless for knowing what's next.

As I stood alone in the kitchen holding a frying pan and debating with myself I realized that there are some things that people just don't want to help you with.

Anyone up for a drive to the park?