A Foreign County

A Foreign Country          

     I never felt more like I had entered a foreign country than I did back in 1987.  In the spring of that year I was a single mom still living with my parents and trying to finish up my bachelor’s degree at Miami University.  I was working nightshift at a Perkins in Cincinnati, Ohio.  If you’ve never been to a Perkins, think IHOP and you’re close.   I’d work 9pm to 5am and then come home to breastfeed my daughter, Alison, who had been born at the end of January that year.  I’d sleep for a few hours before I’d wake to take her to the babysitter on my way to Oxford for my college classes.  What amazes me now as I look back on this time on my life is that I felt like a big failure.  You see, nice Catholic girls weren’t supposed to get pregnant out of wedlock.  The baby’s father was out of the picture.  I wasn’t even sure where he was.  I was working, going to college, and being a mom to a newborn.  I was a badass-I just didn’t know it back then.

     It was at Perkins on one of those 9pm-5am gigs that I met the man who would become my first and second husband.  But that’s not the point of this story.  That man was a foreigner of sorts.  When he and I began dating in April of 1987 and married in mid-June of the same year, he introduced me to what felt more like a foreign country to me than the other countries I’ve had the good fortune to visit.  He belonged to the Apostolic Pentecostal Church.  And when I married him, I married into a strange new world. 

    For starters, there were all the rules. So many rules.  Women couldn’t cut their hair, couldn’t even trim their hair.  No makeup of any kind was permitted.  Clothing had to be modest and had to fit the churches definition of feminine.  No pants, no shorts, nothing sleeveless or even cap sleeves were allowed.   Men had to have short hair and had to be clean shaven.  And for the men, no shorts ever regardless of the humidity were permitted.  No jewelry was allowed.  Even wedding rings had to be simple bands.  Watches had to be utilitarian and couldn’t look like jewelry.  I even heard a preacher give a lengthy discourse about the horrors of open toed shoes for ladies, as if the sight of my bare toes might incite lust. 

     The clothing and dress restrictions were hard enough, but then I learned the worst.  No “worldly” music.  Only Christian music was acceptable in this new land.  If I snuck and listened to (and I did sneak)  on the radio I had to be sure to turn it back to the gospel station before my husband got in the care.   The pastor at our church preached against having televisions in the home, so we didn’t have one.   Amusement parks were forbidden.  No Kings Island pass for me that summer.  Alcohol was right out, but I did sneak some wine now and then when I visited my parents.  No R rated movies.  No “mixed” swimming which basically meant no swimming, because unless you had your own private swimming pool it was pretty difficult to avoid seeing people of the opposite sex in bathing suits at the neighborhood pool.  No trick or treating or celebrating Halloween-it was the devil’s holiday. 

     I never felt like education was valued in my little sect.  When I finally graduated with my bachelor’s degree in May 1988 there was little fanfare from my husband or my church family.  When my daughter got older some of the church ladies seemed horrified when I mentioned that I planned to send my child to a public school or maybe even, God forbid a Catholic school.  I reasoned that I would send her wherever she’d get the best education.  They admonished me that I would be “giving my child to the world.”   

     We spent an insane amount of time at church and with church people.  We’d have Sunday school and worship in the morning which lasted about 4 hours total.  Then we’d go have lunch and stop home for a quick nap before turning around to head back to the church.  We’d have choir practice at 4 and then we’d have the evening service that would start about 6 and go to till 9 or 10.  We’d have service on Wednesday nights and then usually there’d be some prayer meeting on one of the other weeknights. 

     Why did I stay for so long in such an oppressive community?  What was the draw?  Looking back I think I wanted to succeed at something.  I wanted to follow all their rules and be a good little Pentecostal wife.  I was 22 when I got married.  I think I was looking for absolution somehow, that if I submitted to all of these restrictions it would make up for me getting pregnant.  I really believed back then that I had to earn God’s love.  I know better now, that He was there all along and that He wasn’t impressed with my long hair and my jean skirt and tennis shoes.  But He did see the sincerity of my heart-I do believe that.  And I know Him so much better now than I did back then.  Somedays I talk to Him about my Apostolic days and I feel like He just smiles kindly upon me and chuckles at the lengths I was willing to go to in order to try to please Him.