Sunday Favorites #73 --The Green Eyed Monster

Sunday Favorites is a meme hosted by Chari at Happy to Design. Chari asks us to drag one of our older posts out of mothballs and repost it. After all, only so many posts can be on the first page and once they move down the stack they are seldom ever looked at again.

You can check out this Sunday meme by visiting Happy to Design. Heck, you might find some great stuff and be inspired to join the fun and repost some of your favorites that have been long forgotten.

My repost for this Sunday was originally posted on a blog that I have since closed. The original posting was made in September of 2008 and was titled "The Green Eyed Monster"

There is an old saying “if Mama ain’t happy ain’t nobody happy.” Well, in our house, when I was a child, that saying went “if Mom can’t make it happen then no one can.” My mother had the ability to move heaven and earth when it came to getting the things she wanted for her family. Keeping all of us in a Catholic School was probably at the top of Mom’s requirements for her children. If you have read previous post then you know that she found some very creative ways to assure the old coffee can hidden in the kitchen contained enough money to cover the tuition each semester.

During my childhood, parochial school classrooms were still ruled by nun’s. Real nuns. I mean those pious creatures dressed from head to toe in black, with scrubbed faces poking through circles of starched white linen. Austere, gender neutral women, with long veils and flowing skirts, silently gliding down corridors, in chunky high-heeled orthopedic shoes. They wore heavy crosses around their necks and giant rosary beads hanging from their waists with the crucifix marching at the hem of their skirts.

But most importantly, that saintly packaging hid a formidable and stern character that could swat knuckles with rulers or match professional pitchers with the accuracy of tossed erasers magically retrieved from hidden pockets. Like all teachers, the nuns had different methods of teaching but fear and guilt were two that were universal. The Nuns of my generation could outdo even the best Jewish mother at instilling lifelong guilt while making every subject and situation a fearful lesson on the damnation of our souls.

High on the list of things that led us to the weekly confessional were the repeatedon Seven Deadly Sins: Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy and Pride. Sure, I have had my small encounters with most of the mighty seven but the one cardinal sin I have struggled with the most is envy. I once read that Envy is the desire for others’ traits, status, abilities, or situation and we do it because we think other people are so much luckier, smarter, more attractive, or better than we are. Envy is often linked symbolically to a dog or the color green, thus the terms “Green eyed monster” or “Green with envy”. According to those wonderful nuns that taught in my elementary school, the punishment for dying with the sin of Envy on our soul was not only being banished to Hell but having to spending eternity in a tub of freezing water as well.

Now, I certainly know the difference between envy and jealousy and do not get me wrong, I never wanted to trade places with anyone I envied. I am happy for all their accomplishments; but, I am sometimes envious that my life lacked the adventures or financial perks I saw others enjoying during my relatively long life.

Just yesterday I found myself being envious of the opportunities my dear husband had to travel the globe visiting so many interesting places while serving our country in the US Navy. When I mentioned this to him he admitted that he was just as envious that I had spent my life in one place with a large and loving family.

Oh well, I will save you the details of the discourse that followed but, I guess it is back to the confessional for me.