I remember the desk I sat in during Mr. Andersons’s English Literature class spring semester of my Junior year of high School. It was situated in the middle of 5 rows, the 2nd desk back. From this vantage point, I could listen without distraction. With light blond hair cropped short and a petite and slender build, he stood my favorite teacher. His soft voice told stories to captivate the ragtag bunch of students in his English literature class. His glass eye gave him a unique and peculiar look that added character to the words he shared.
On a bright spring afternoon, he stood by the chalkboard writing out our reading assignment: the first 3 chapters of “Great Expectations” by Charles Dickens. Setting down the chalk he turned to us and spoke carefully.
"Class, mark my words, there are few things more disappointing than unmet expectations, but it is the person who can't move forward that experiences the greatest tragedy."
I sat down on my waterbed to start reading that evening. I was speed reading because I also had an assignment in Algebra II and Economics. Tuned into 105.7, the radio played “Smells Like teen spirit” but…HOLD UP! Miss. Havesham is sitting in a dark room still wearing the wedding dress from that tragic day in her past and spiders are crawling all over her? Whatever else I had to do that night, left my mind. The song playing in the background became a whisper as I physiologically tried to understand such a picture. I couldn’t imagine anything more terrifying than having a spider crawling on me, let alone many. “Ewww!” I said as the story drew me in further.
The story was about Miss. Havesham, the wealthy eccentric spinster that was known to be very odd and Pip a young orphaned boy asked to visit her and her adopted daughter Estella. The picture Dickens paints is so visual. He transports the reader back into the old 19th-century English society. Pip is a kind hearted young lad in need of a job, but Miss. Havesham is a woman blind and chained to the past. Never able to get over her broken dream, being stood up on her wedding day, she creates a cruel plan to ruin all of Pip’s and Stella’s hopes of experiencing love. Conflict and tragedy shape the bizarre story that is “Great Expectations.”
Skipping forward in my life to the fall of 1998 as I was entering my Junior year of college and a new season. I was a newlywed, living in my first apartment, with new student loans to pay. I had great expectations on myself to prove to everyone I could make it as a new married student. I had heard so many women say that they wanted to finish college but got married and became mothers instead. Not me, I vowed to myself! I can handle all this responsibility.
In September we decided to pursue a weekend ministry opportunity. The position was for a youth Pastor to hold a Sunday morning and evening service each weekend, at the Marshall Assembly of God church 2 1/2 hours away. The pay was $100 a week. Looking at the financial need we faced and the opportunity to impact a small town we thought, why not? We applied and landed the job.
The following Sunday my new husband preached at Marshall Assembly of God. The church looked big from the outside, inside it seated 500 people in the Sanctuary. It was large for a town of a population of 12,000. As Pastor Bean gave us a tour of the church we were amazed at the many rooms, but we had an eerie feeling as the doors opened. Each classroom looked as if it hadn’t been touched in years. There was even a calendar hanging on the wall from 1987, the year of the huge church split. It was as if the church had been frozen in time on that dreadful Sunday when 450 people left to start their own church in town. With broken hearts, the remaining 50 just stopped that day and waited for the rest of the church to return, but the people never came back.
As Brad preached that morning, he looked out on 30 white headed church parishioners. He had worked up a sweat to keep the man in the back row from nodding off, it didn’t work. Four rows back, he tried to avoid looking at Sister Smith who was rolling her false teeth around in her mouth with her tongue as she listened to his message “Taste and see that the Lord is Good.” Finally, he shared his conclusion. As I sat in the front row I smiled proudly at his “Ability” sermon and three sound points. Our homiletics professor would have been proud.
Pastor Bean and his joyful wife Carolyn invited us to the only sit-down restaurant in town, the Golden Corral. We were excited to eat more than the Macaroni and cheese our measly weekly budget allowed. Stacking roast beef, fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and green beans on my plate I sat down to enjoy a feast. At the table sat the Pastor and his wife next to the board member and his wife. A light conversation about Carolyn’s musical outhouse collection transpired as I enjoyed the first slice of roast beef. Brad arrived with a heaping plate.
Pastor Bean interjected with his love for “Precious Moments” figurines and the blessing it was to visit the “Precious Moments Museum.” He paused with his golden cod loaded fork suspended in mid-air just to savor the memory. Brad was so focused on the wonder of such food variety, without looking, he moved his left foot out straight behind him to get up for another plate. Before he had time to rise there was a great CRASH!!!
Pastor Bean was startled out of his reverie as we all turned to see an elderly woman face down on the floor with her tray of food splattered everywhere. Covered with Jell-O, gravy, and stove top stuffing she was looking around angrily, “Who tripped me? Who tripped me? Somebody tripped me!”
With a lettuce leaf hanging from her permed short hair she narrowed in on Brad. “It was you! You tripped me!”
Brad was looking down at his empty plate as if there was still a drop of dressing he could devour. Under the table, I kicked him. Realizing there was no way to avoid the embarrassment of the situation he jumped to his feet to help her up apologetically. She was ruined but accepted his youthful hand. Soon the lighthearted conversation continued on about Carolyn’s impressive collection of antique bedpans. Thankfully the uncomfortable moment passed so that Brad could get a second plate.
Later, in the back seat of Pastor Bean’s car a headache started to form from the many foods we had just consumed. I vowed to never eat that much again. We sat quietly as the Beans gave us a car tour of the community, before heading back to the church. From the outside of the church the heavy metal door opened to a narrow dark stairway to the second floor. As we carefully climbed the old wooden steps I saw spiders quickly dash into holes out of sight. Trying to be brave I ignored the unwanted critters. At the top of the stairs we walked into the little dusty apartment we would be staying in on the weekends. It was small but comfortable enough. There was a kitchen with an old 1950’s Frigidaire refrigerator, a living room, and bedroom finished with a small Pepto-Bismol pink tiled bathroom.
Excited and perplexed we drove home to Springfield that Sunday night. We talked about the eventful day and the future weekends to come. When the next weekend arrived we started our ministry with one youth. Sitting around a long folding table she sat on one side as we sat on the other. The room was so quiet we could hear the cricket chirping in the corner.
“So what do you like to do?” I asked cheerfully breaking the silence.
“Do you like school?” I tried again.
“I don’t know.” She mumbled studying her hands.
For a painful hour we tried to connect with the only student we were given. Dejected on the drive home that night we came up with a plan. Earlier that morning we remembered seeing 3 children in the service. We could start a children’s church! With new hop, we came up with a strategy. Later when we shared our idea with the Pastor he was happy.
The following Saturday we combed the neighborhood for possible children that we could invite to come. That Sunday morning we had 6 kids in children’s church. Brad preached for them, but even with 6, we realized this wouldn’t be easy. As we drove home that night we had fresh ideas for the next weekend. Through the fall and winter season, we kept working hard to reach the children on Sunday mornings. We had built the ministry up to 16 children. Still on Sunday nights we only had 1 student.
Spring arrived and with it a problem we hadn’t fully imagined. As the 2nd story apartment sat during the week in the warm weather it became the perfect place for spiders. It was a quiet repose for the “brown recluse” spider. We had seen spiders, especially in the children’s church room. Every Saturday we would draw pictures as visual aids for our lessons with the kids. Then we would tape the pictures to the basement wall. But the moisture in the air would cause the drawings to fall down in the night. The following morning we would find a spider stuck to each piece of tape, legs wiggling to escape. We also expected to see a furry brown arachnid dart out at us if we moved a box or table.
When we mentioned the obvious spider problem to the elderly couple that cleaned the church they just mumbled to themselves and walked away. It was just something they had accepted about the church as they waited, like Miss Havesham, for their dream to return.
Nothing could prepare us for the amount of spiders that would infest our apartment as the Missouri temperatures rose. On a personal level, I was starting to feel the weight of my own great expectations to be a good student, a good wife, a good worker, and now a good minister. I frequently found myself bursting into tears for no apparent reason. The pressure of full-time student, employee, and part-time minister were taking their toll.
On a late Friday night, we came sleepily trudging up the narrow stairwell in the darkness. In the kitchen by the table, I lifted up an Aldi’s fruit box left from the week before. Suddenly 6 hopping spiders darted toward me.
“Brad!!!” I yelled.
Usually unmoved by the creepy crawlers, he let out a scream as he jumped around smashing the aggressive beasts. On the alert, we began the hunt. Though we were both exhausted I refused to sleep with the thought that one of these spiders could be crawling underneath the sheets and onto me. Behind every door, 2-3 huge spiders darted toward us. If I had a plastic bag hanging on a door knob there would be at least one caught inside. Finally, after 25 minutes and many smashed remains the apartment was cleared.
Each weekend this episode would repeat itself. The problem stemmed from the fact that the huge old church had not been touched, for the most part, in over 10 years. It became a perfect breeding ground. Each week I became depressed at the thought of the creepy apartment. The stress I was putting on myself through my own great expectations led me to see a counselor.
One Sunday morning in late July Brad spotted me in the bedroom of the upstairs apartment. I was bent over putting on my shoes, as the brown recluse spider slowly crawled toward my shoulder. “Hi Honey,” he said as I felt a pat on the shoulder. Looking up he gave me a funny smile. He had just saved the thread of sanity I had left.
In August we resigned unable to keep up with all the demands the ministry had on our lives. We said good bye to the dear people we had met that year. We high fived the 16 children and the 2 students of our ministry and we drove back to Springfield. With the windows rolled down in Brad's 83 Cutlass I thought back to the words of Mr. Anderson in English literature class.
"Class, mark my words, there are few things more disappointing than unmet expectations, but it is the person who can't move forward that experiences the greatest tragedy."
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