Marrying God on the "end of the world" day.

These two beautiful girls are my twin neighbors, Cindy and Sandy, who I've written about in previous posts. (Can you believe how grown up and gorgeous they are?) As a re-cap, they are from Guatemala, they always seem to ask the most profoundly astute questions at just the right and sometimes the wrong time. Such as "why don't you have babies?" after I've just come back from the fertility doctor. Or when our husky, Newman was ill and we knew our vet was going to come over and send him to doggie heaven, they came over to say good bye and asked "are you going to shoot him?" Or the time they came over and we had a Menorah and a Christmas tree in the window and they revealed they secretly wished they were Jewish, "because Jews are rich."

We first met Cindy and Sandy when they were ten years old and would come to our door dressed as little witches for Halloween, and here they are four years later, at their communion service in a very robust Saint Tomas Catholic church, just a few blocks away from our house. It's an all Latin American church and the entire service was in Spanish. My broken Spanglish got us through some of it, but truth be told, I'm embarrassed I don't speak more of the language. I grew up in Texas, live in Los Angeles and it was my minor in College. I have no excuses. I think I've been waiting for my Exchange Student experience that escaped me in college to happen as an adult. Bucket List: Live in a Spanish speaking country for a year (preferably Spain) so I can fully learn the language.

The communion for the twins was on May 21st, the day that the world was predicted to end by some English speaking radio minister who spent hundreds of thousands of dollars marketing this idea. Cindy, Sandy and the hundreds of other folks in the church, clearly didn't get the message. Maybe it was the language barrier. Their day was not about how the world was going to end and what can I sell before it happens, but more like "this is the day I'm marrying God, and I've got the white dress to prove it."

The proud woman behind them is their Aunt, you can't see their gorgeous Mom to her left. After the service we went across the street to the Catholic store and bought little religious bracelets and book marks about walking with the Lord and we gave them a little money. I had never been to a communion before. It's like a BaT Mitzvah with....wait for it.....JESUS. We went to their house, on the porch, party next door, and took pictures of the family, drank some red wine and listened to very loud Guatemalan Reggae/Rap. It felt good and we were both honored to be included in their celebration.

When I asked the girls what's the most important thing they learned during their communion studies they said, "Finally we get to try the wine and the bread." The twins never disappoint.

Whatever the case may be, while thousand of folks across the nation were preparing for the rapture, there were two young girls who live in a crowded two bedroom apartment with their Mother who doesn't speak English and cleans homes for a living, doing her best to give her gorgeous daughters a relationship with God and a leg up in this world that she didn't have. Jason and I are going to do everything we can to help them along the way.

Note to Self: Be good to your neighbor.