"Pull yourself together now," Judy finally orders me, trying to regain her composure and attempting, halfheartedly, a serious tone. "Ping-Pong balls in the medicine cabinet may be your only recourse."
The problem Judy and I are mulling, between sips of red wine and bites of leftover pizza, is one well-known to clergy spouses the world over: how to deal with curious congregants, in this case those fond of sneaking a peek in the medicine cabinet during the annual open house my husband and I hold for the church congregation. A cascade of Ping-Pong balls, Judy speculates, might provide an excellent discouragement.
Judy and I, both young pastors' wives in those days, quickly learned that a sense of humor was essential to surviving the peculiar stresses and strains of life in the parish. Arguably, no other profession inflicts quite the same mix of scrutiny, expectation, and duty on those married to its practitioners. Yet every clergy spouse I've spoken to also points to moments of great joy, amazing support, or spiritual growth that have come from being married to a man or woman of the cloth.
It seemed easier somehow to keep in touch with other pastors' wives back in those days. There were many of us in the small Midwestern town where my husband had his first parish, and for those of us who were young mothers, sitting around someone's kitchen drinking coffee while the kids investigated the pots and pans became a pleasant pastime.
But by the time Lee and I moved back to the city, our boys were in school and I was working again, and my busy schedule no longer accommodated coffee klatches. As time passed, I realized just how much I missed those opportunities to share the trials and tribulations of this unique lifestyle with the only other people who really understood--my fellow clergy spouses.
I decided to investigate, looking beyond just the wives of Protestant clergymen, my main contact with other clergy spouses in the past. What I found was that clergy spouses from a wide range of religions, cultures, and backgrounds weren't shy at all about telling me what bugs them most about their role--and what makes it worthwhile. And they usually have a few surprises about what it's really like to live with the man or woman who seems so holy in the pulpit each week.
"One of my greatest joys is that I've really been able to learn about Buddhism and make it a part of my life," says Kiyo Masuda, a Fresno, California, high school administrator whose husband, William, is a Buddhist minister. Without the opportunities she's had to meet Buddhist teachers from all over the world and to participate in temple life with her husband, "I might be just a nominal Buddhist," Masuda says.
When Masuda's life took a tragic turn, her faith and community of support became her lifeline. "Our daughter was starting her first day as a sophomore at the University of California at Santa Cruz. She was riding on the back of her boyfriend's motor scooter when she fell off and broke her neck and died." As the family faced the unbearable grief of losing a child, Masuda's deep faith and the support of the temple community helped pull her through. "My faith helped me understand and make sense of it," Masuda recalls. "I didn't have to be angry. It was no one's fault, it was karmic--it was an accident."
