“Checking room assignments for the annual church retreat”

I promise you this is more detailed than it sounds. You’re thinking “Oh, she’s just making sure everyone has a room.” Nay.

“Checking room assignments” entails an entire network of subtle, interwoven webs that I can only begin to know. Watching her work on it is like watching a neurosurgeon reading an MRI or a sea captain reading icebergs off the coast of Greenland. Some people just CAN’T be next to other people. Some families have really young kids and those kids can’t be anywhere NEAR the old grumps who show up hoping for their usual 5:00 dinner and 7:00 bedtime. “Checking room assignments” is organizing her own Battle of the Bulge. She’s against an ever-increasing tide of introverts vs. extroverts, kids vs. grumps, babies vs. tweens in the hopes that some of them will have a good time and come back next year. But rest assured, everyone will slumber peaceably at the church retreat. Mom is on the prowl, taping their doors shut at night to keep them from neckin’.