Hats in the Wind

Hat in the Wind

    Today I wish there was a wind that would blow the smoke away. A wind that would blow the fire back onto the area that has been burned and put the fire out that is near my community. One of my coworkers told me yesterday that the McFarland fire is within 15 miles of her home. My son has been out fighting that fire for 2 weeks.

    For the past two months I wore a different kind of hat. Actually, a bandana tied around my head for the sweat caused by the Redding heat. I have worn this "hat" before as a I had my own custodial business for over a decade. During that time I had many hats. Mum, Mommie, Wife, Home-school teacher, Taxi driver, Nurse, Counselor, Worship leader, and Student.

    After two months of 8 hour days as a school custodian I had three days to dust off my "Teacher" hat and get back to my school job as a classified instructional aid (CIA). Even there I wear many hats. Yard duty, Reading teacher, Cafeteria supervisor, and an assortment of other hats every day at the school.

I still wear the student hat and will begin a new semester this upcoming week. I may have my bachelor's degree by Christmas. So, for the present I am wearing the Student, CIA, Single-mom, Empty-nester, and Pet Mom hats. Molly-cat has been very good about my being gone a lot lately. She is such a good roommate.

In the past couple of months I mused about the habit of wearing hats and why people aren't wearing hats as much as they used to in year past.

My Clerical friends wear a Biretta

As with most of their Clerical Vestments this is a tradition that date back to the middle ages. The Anglican faith can trace back all the way to the first church, however, the current clothing worn by the clergy is only about 1,000 years old.

Thank you Firefighters

My son's helmet is much more than protection from sun or a symbol to identify him with his profession. It will do that but more importantly, it protects him from the extreme heat that he faces everyday in fighting wildland fires. He began fighting fires 7 years ago, straight out of high school.  He heard the calling to be a firefighter on 9/11/01 at a tender age. I had no idea as he followed this call how it would rip at my mother's heart. I am so thankful every time I hear he is home safely.

Judah's beanie

My daughter on the coast makes her little guy beanies to wear as it is always chilly there.

Em's sun hat

The grand-girls wear hats to protect their blondy skin from the sun as their parents did as children. I have a number of sun hats and a parasol for the sun too.

The costume had to include the proper head covering

My head covering that I wear on Sunday was what started this musing a few months ago. Since October 2019 I have chosen to cover my head in church. 

This is the style I choose

    I just wondered, why did women stop wearing head coverings at church and hats at all for that matter? I found from my research that many women began wearing bandanas when they had to work during WWII.  Textiles were limited during that time and fashion dictated from that point forward. Men wore fewer hats and most women only wore hats for fancy occasions. 

    I know that wearing a hat in the wind can be tricky. Wearing a hat in the sun can get hot, however, sometimes a sun hat is also shade. My parasol is a happy medium as it give sun protect and allows air circulation. But what about the practice of women covering their heads in church? When did that change?

    It was a slow process that happened during the 1960s-70s. For nearly 2,000 years the women in the Christian faith wore head coverings and then they stopped. There is now a movement to return to this tradition and I have embraced this tradition along with other traditions within my Anglican beliefs. The premise is that I am precious to God and I veil myself as the bride of Christ. There are many teaching pro and con of the subject and what Paul was meaning in I Corinthians 11. I do not wish to discuss them here. It was a personal choice and what lead me to St. Luke's in October 2019. 

    The men take off their biretta's when they approach the altar to perform the mass. I cover my head when the candles are lit in the church. It is my own form of worship. I am thankful for a place and time where I can worship my Lord in spirit and in truth.  My other hat is the president of the Anglican Church Women (ACW) and the Altar Guild of St. Luke's. These are both great honors of worship to me. Using my love for flower arranging, organization, and helping others in the body of believers is a calling I was happy to fulfill. 

CIA

    The 21/22 school year begins on Monday with few changes from the end of 20/21. The children will not have to wear masks outside. We will be able to have them in mixed groups for intervention, tutoring as long as we all wear masks inside. I can live with that as I have observed better health for everyone who complied with the mask mandate last school year. There is a great bit of controversy over the masks, but I have experienced less illness myself as the children are staying home when they are sick and wearing a mask to keep their germs to themselves. Schools are a petri dish. I have been around children in schools for over 25 years and my personal experience is that this will keep us healthy. The cloth face coverings do not cause the children problems. The medical professionals have been wearing them for decades and they work fine. I just wish people would not wear them outside or in their cars. These are the places that we get fresh air, except in Redding in August. 

    My heart is full after getting to see 4 of my grandchildren together last weekend for an August Birthday party. My oldest granddaughter will be 5 this Tuesday. My grandson on the coast turned two on the 10th. We got to have the baby come and all the kiddos and their parents had a lot of fun getting together. Now, on Monday I get to see my students after two months off school. I am excited for them to return to somewhat normal school. We have the smoke but I hope it wont last too long. There is a cooling trend and I look forward to days where the high is less than 105 degrees. 

 Then their will be leaves of multicolor in the wind.