Let's go to church!

From the time of my birth, until the age of 14, my mom took me to the church just down the road. She didn't have a driver's license, my dad always worked on Sundays and we only had the one car, anyway - so, unless my uncle stopped and gave us a ride, we would walk.
This was an uptight, white-bread Baptist church. People spoke in hushed tones. If the preacher was preaching and one of the deacons said "Amen," folks would stare at him. Once, we had a group of 4 teenagers, from another church, come sing for us. One of the girls began to sway to the music. Afterwards, I overheard an old woman comment, "Did you see that girl? I thought she was gonna start dancing!"
When I was 14, right before my dad died, my sister and her husband started going to a Nondenominational, "holy roller" church - across the river. Soon, my other sister and her husband began attending. Then my mom and I started to go. Pretty soon, both of my brothers in law's families began going there. It was like a movement. It spread like wild fire.
The Nondenominational church held its services in a run down recreation center in the projects. It was a diverse crowd - consisting of the old, the crippled, the mentally challenged, the blind, children, drunks, drug addicts and even a gay guy, who wore clogs to church. While the preacher sweat, paced frantically, pounded his bible and turned red in the face, the congregation would sing, cry, shout, speak in tongues, jump, run up and down the aisles and fall out on the floor. Everything short of handling snakes. It was culture shock to me.
I do have some good memories of going there, though. For one thing, I began to date the preacher's daughter. She wasn't the brightest girl in the world, but she was cute and extremely sweet. I still remember her fondly. Another unforgettable thing for me was seeing my mom, for the first time, playing guitar and singing - in front of the whole church! I had never seen her do anything like that. She was so confident. It was shocking and I developed a whole new respect for her. Later, my sisters got into the act and I began to play with them. It was an invaluable first experience of playing in front of an audience.