[Nevertheless] We Are Called

Minutes after my husband and I discussed the fact that I should not do anything on Monday, my only "day off" all of next week - holy week - and just take it easy at home all day, my phone rang. It was our church administrator asking if our eleven year old daughter, Alia, would be available to acolyte for a funeral. On Monday. 

Some might be shocked that an eleven year old would be asked to assist with a funeral service, but Alia is not your typical eleven year old. She and death have an interesting relationship. On her "letter to my counselor" form for camp when she was six, she put "I like dead things" in the "what my counselor should know about me" section. She's celebrated the deaths of two of her friends. She's dissected various animals and has seen dissected human bodies. She attended her Nana's open casket funeral. She has deep faith that death is not the end, that with God is the best place to be, and that people live on both in our hearts and in heaven. 

Alia, of course, said yes. I will take her to the funeral, help set up the reception, and otherwise take it easy that day. It will take much less out of me than the hike my husband talked me out of, saying I need a break, not to break myself. 

It wasn't what I had planned for my "day off." I could have said no. Nevertheless, it is what is we are called, literally and figuratively, to do.