Sleeping Naked

When I was in grade 6 one of my classmates wanted to be a horse. Really. She would gallop around the playground pretending - stamping her feet, tossing her 'mane' and whinnying. She had kind of a high pitched laugh that was like a whinny anyway. Her legs were very thin and she wore these thin canvas runners that, even when she tied them as tight as they would go, were loose on her skinny feet. Although I already loved horses, it is hard to be friends with a person who pretends to be a horse all the time. We only had one thing in common and that was our name. Over the years I have met a few people with my name, but it is not all that common. My family only lived in Lethbridge for a year and a half before we moved back to the farm and another school. Of the things I was leaving I doubt that I gave her much of a thought. I certainly didn't expect to see her again.

When I went to University, there she was on my floor in the residence. We talked sometimes because we already 'knew' each other. The conversations were interesting but not fun. I think she liked to shock me. Although she no longer acted like a horse, she enjoyed being shocking. Once she told me she liked to sleep naked and laughed that whinnying laugh. She thought I was shocked. Of course I knew that some people slept naked, but it was just more than I wanted to know about her. She also claimed to be a Communist (this was in the sixties), and she was an atheist. I don't know if she was really those things, or if she just wanted to be shocking. She thought I was naive and I thought she was, at least about the communist thing. We often talked about religion. Since she claimed not to believe in God, she liked this topic. She could laugh her whinnying laugh at my naivete.

She asked me about paying tithing once. At the time, I was kind of on the horns of a dilemma about that, if you will excuse the cliche. My school year was being financed mostly by my scholarships. Of the $900.00 I had received, I had $90.00 left. That wasn't a lot to buy nylons and toothpaste for the whole year, but besides that, I owed the whole $90, 10% of the scholarships, in tithing. If I paid it, with no other money coming in, I would have nothing left. I went to see my bishop about the problem. He could see my need but wanted me to pay my tithing, of course. So he offered to replace the money I paid with a welfare cheque. Somehow that seemed like poor faith or something - giving him the money and having him turn it around and give it back to me. It just didn't feel right. So I went ahead and paid the tithing and left it at that. I don't know why I told this girl all that but I did. She thought I was incredibly stupid. A week or so later I got mail.

My parents seldom sent me anything - not exactly a letter a week or even one a month. That week my dad sent me a letter and inside was tucked a cheque from my grandmother for $100.00. His letter went something like this: "I want you to know that your grandmother doesn't have a lot of money. She never gives money to anyone, but for some reason, this week she insisted that I give you this cheque. I want you to write her a thank-you letter." I was stunned. Do the math: if I paid tithing on the $100, then I had my $90 back.

I told this horse girl about my grandmother's cheque. She didn't know what to say. This event was too amazing to be considered a coincidence and she knew it. She was in the same university program as I was and we ended up being student teaching partners, but I don't think we talked about religion again. I had taken her breath away. Years later I heard her interviewed on the radio. She failed her student teaching and had become some kind of family therapist. Ironic since I was pretty sure she never married. I didn't get the impression she was that happy, quite the opposite. People who think like she did seldom are. I suspect she is still sleeping naked.

I still believe in God. I have had even more experiences that convince me of His reality. And I am happy.