On a recent visit with my daughter\u2019s family, I joined in a small gathering of friends from their church. While the children busied themselves with toys and art supplies, the grownups were led in a spiritual discussion by the group leader, a priest in their Anglican church. I was distracted by the children, though, and had difficulty focusing on what was being said; the children\u2019s talking and laughter drowned out the priest\u2019s words. Maybe a part of me was more interested in what my four grandchildren were doing than in listening to what a fairly new acquaintance was saying. But then,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhat are your thoughts, Karen?\u201d Father John asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was immediately transported to school days when I used to hide behind the student sitting in front of me, out of sight of the teacher, to avoid being called on in class. I was so shy, the mere thought of speaking terrified me. I hated, more than anything, to draw attention to myself, which I couldn\u2019t avoid doing if I were speaking up in the classroom. And what if the answer I gave was wrong? What would Teacher say if she thought I wasn\u2019t paying attention? All my fears from fifty-some years ago came flooding back. I felt twelve years old again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What do I say? I have no idea what he\u2019s asking about. OMG, I\u2019m the oldest person here. They expect something wise to come out of my mouth.<\/em> But nothing came to me. <\/p>\n\n\n\n How about trying honesty?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI\u2019m sorry, John, but I wasn\u2019t listening to what you were saying. I\u2019m too distracted by the children.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n He smiled, nodded, then continued on with his insights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Everyone else, surprisingly, seemed undisturbed by my response. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I felt relief\u2014not only that I didn\u2019t have to answer, but I sensed Father John felt my discomfort in speaking up and wouldn\u2019t call on me again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If only my teachers had been that sensitive, it would have saved me a lot of anxiety in my growing-up years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" On a recent visit with my daughter\u2019s family, I joined in a small gathering of friends from their church. While the children busied themselves with toys and art supplies, the grownups were led in a spiritual discussion by the group leader, a priest in their Anglican church. I was distracted by the children, though, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-636","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=636"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/636\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":637,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/636\/revisions\/637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}