Thursday, May 11, 2006

Brief adventure in a Clerical collar

Well, I couldn't wait.

I had to get on with it. It was time to go to the West End of San Antonio with the collar on. I thought I would break myself in gently and went down very briefly and quite early, just to get over all the nerves.

Actually I was really surprised at how nervous I felt. If you're an anglican reading this you probably can't understand what all the fuss is about but I am not an anglican or from any kind of collar wearing denomination. In many ways I don't like the idea from a theological point of veiw, we are all priests, there is no divide, no special people who can be distinguished by their clothes, well at least not in Gods eyes!

So I get in the car, have a cigar and put on a worship CD, I soon ditched the cigar because I didn't think it looked appropriate, stopped at every zebra crossing, indicated at junctions, all of which are not typically Spanish things to do, I even parked legally for a change. Something about the Collar made me feel I should behave properly.

Sat in the car for a few minutes, bricking myself, then remembered my first ever time in Prison at 18, (I was incarcerated for an attempted robbery) I was walking on to the prison wing at chelmsford prison for the first time, a very scary experience for an 18 year old, and the old scottish prison guard who was escorting me whispered in my ear "listen son, get your chin up and stick your chest out, act like you have done this before". So there in the car through that memory God said the same thing. Never thought the prison thing would prepare for this but strangly it had.

So I got my chin up, stuck my chest out and did the walk, it wasn't busy, no pauline moments, no great conversations, a few hellos and a couple of jokes, but it was okay. This was dipping my toes in the shallow end I am going to go at later times and busier times. Felt I had to start somewhere so I have.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good on ya Brian. Something about taking a scary first step in Faith isn't there? Thanks for sharing the journey Chief! (There a pic coming?)

Globegirl said...

hello! i'm thrilled to have found your blog. i've thought about you guys much since hearing you talk about things at the ilg.

i visited a prision in southern mexico with my youth group mission team when i was about 17. it was quite an adventure. we were scared out of our wits, and the first thing our leaders told us girls was to stay with the guys. the first thing the guards did was seperate the guys and the girls for a search of our stuff. needless to say it was good in the end.

Anonymous said...

Brian I love you, you are a legend! I cannot wait to see you knock the inebriated masses for six. My prayers are with you mate... xc

Anonymous said...

you are the only person i know who would ever liken their first time walking in a dog collar around the streets of san an to being led around the corridors of a prison for the first time.

you are hilarious as ever - and very sweet - nice one - and well done for putting out the cigar, probably wise under the circumstances. similarly a good move for the parking, you probably should have double checked that you had all forms of id and no points on your licence just to make sure!

Brian said...

You are all very encouraging, nice one, I've got further adventures to post. Had a wierd one last night......