Dear Lord

“Are you there, God? It’s me, Myrna Valentino Snodgrass, nee Smith. Yes, I know that’s quite a handle to my jug, but my mother loved the movies and Myrna Loy and Rudolph Valentino were her favorites. It’s a good thing she didn’t like Boris Karloff. Anyway, I’ve been meaning to get in touch. My eightieth birthday is next week, so I thought I’d better stop putting it off, seeing as what we might be meeting soon, begging pardon for my presumption. I don’t think I’ve done anything bad enough to send me to the other place. I’m in great health for my age, so this letter is a precaution, so to speak. Hopefully I won't be seeing you in the near future. Maybe it would be better if I got down on my knees and prayed. The trouble is I’d have a terrible time getting back up again these days. Also, I don’t do very well with thou and thee and wherefore and all that. Plain spoken, that’s me.

I was sent to Sunday school when I was little, but I think that was just to give my mother a couple of hours of peace and quiet. You were an old man sitting on a cloud in the pictures there, which looked like a fun thing to do. I was quite disappointed when I grew up and realized that clouds are wet and misty, not soft and fluffy like giant cotton balls. We were taught about our Father in Heaven who was kind and loving, except when he smote people for doing wicked things. I liked that word. Some of the Bible stories, like David and Goliath, were very helpful. I smote Billy Foster who was way bigger than me, because according to that story, the little guy could win. He was bullying my younger sister, Judy Paulette, named after Judy Garland and Paulette Goddard. I got mad and landed a lucky punch. His nose started bleeding, and he started bawling. His reputation in school never recovered.

I love animals, so I always enjoyed hearing about Noah’s Ark, though I did wonder how he got all those animals on a boat. It’s bad enough to try to get a cat in a box to go to the vet. I didn’t get the Adam and Eve story either. The teacher got annoyed when I asked how snakes could talk, so I learned to keep my questions to myself and just enjoyed the activities that we did, like coloring and singing.

We didn’t have much fun like that at home. I’d hear about my own father who might as well have been sitting on a cloud somewhere for all I knew of him since he scarpered when I was three and Judy was one. My mother certainly blessed him, but not the way the minister blessed you. As a child, I thought all the Sunday School activities that you provided were great, like the Easter picnic and the Christmas party. When I got grown though, I wondered why you made my mother go through having a husband who turned to drinking and then left her with two babies. Well, she did find herself expecting me before she got married, which was thought to be a terrible sin in those days, but it takes two to tango. Doesn’t seem to me she did anything wrong except fall for a silver-tongued devil, and she paid a price for it. I’m not sure what you were thinking there. Another thing I noticed as I got older was that men seem to write all the rules and do all the talking in church, which bothered me. They’d have us believe that it’s just the way things are meant to be, but I look around at the problems in this world, and I can’t see that women would do a worse job. Seems that people thought the sky would fall if women could vote or become prime minister or fly planes, and it never did, so I don’t see it would be different in church. I mean, I saw how strong my mother had to be to raise us.

I’m not well educated, and I don’t get into religious talk as a rule since that leads to trouble in my experience. When I have mentioned that I am not sure what you are, where you are and even if you exist, some people have acted like they expected me to be struck down by lightning on the spot. But if you do exist and know everything, you know my intentions, and if you don’t, it’s not going to matter anyway. I learned from my mother’s mistakes and found me a nice kind man to marry. Nothing silver-tongued about my Bob. In fact, he was so quiet, I’d forget he was there sometimes. But you can’t have everything, and he was a good provider and a loving father to our three children, which I did not name after movie stars, thank you very much. I miss him a lot, and I like the idea that I might see him again one day. Meantime I’m busy with grandchildren, I volunteer at the animal shelter, and I keep up with my friends Lilly and Mabel. My grandchildren think it’s funny when we call ourselves girls, so now we’re known as the Golden Oldies. I’d better wrap this up now. You’re probably tired of my rambling on and I’m going out with Lilly and Mabel to have dinner and plan our next trip. We’re thinking of a cruise, except I just watched a movie about someone getting kidnapped off a cruise ship, so I’m not sure if it’s a good idea. Mind you, who’d want to kidnap old timers like us? You must be very busy running heaven and earth, not to mention all the stupid things humans do to mess up creation, which I would be very annoyed about if I were you, so I won’t take up any more of your time.

Amen for now,

Yours sincerely,

Myrna Valentino Snodgrass