What this blog is

Come on over and read the earliest post in "Night Writing in the Morning Light" from 2008.

At the end of March 2008 I began a blog called, "Night Writing in the Morning Light". I expected it to be short lived with only one friend, perhaps, reading it. It was a Blog about my life as a Christian and then kind of morphed into something more, an examination of Scripture.

Surprisingly, I found people were clicking into it and I even got some regular readers, most of whom I now think of as friends. As a result I continued to post nearly everday. The volume grew and as I continued into 2009, I felt the number of posts was getting very long. So I created this second Blog for all the posts I did in 2008. I called it, "Night Writing in Twenty-oh-Eight" and it contains the 128 posts I did that year.

If you are new to my Blogs or have been reading "Night Writing in the Morning Light" for awhile, I invite you to read the previous posts here.

Thanks,

LEM

Seven: The Number of Completeness

And do this, understanding the present time. The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the sinful nature. Romans 13:11-14

(Left: my wife and I in 1975)

THE 1960s

Our Years of Protest and Anger

My wife on the left, was to be the vocalist in our band, "Ethereal", music by Jim (with bongos), lyrics by me (holding guitar).

Those weren't costumes, we actually dressed that way.

THE EARLY 1970s

Parties, Sex and Booze

B. and W. in rare photo - fully clothed

This is not the case with the Polaroid photos on the sheet W. holds in his hand. 

J. (far left) and L. (far right), friends through both periods, part of the Hippie group, a writer and later Vietnam war hero. They named their first child after me.

My wife and I are in the center. The little chest on the table next to my wife held a canister of Scotch and a canister of Wild Turkey Bourbon.

There was a well-stocked bar somewhere in the room, our idea of high sophistication. 

New Years in the Poconos. We and nine other couples use to rent a lodge each Christmas week. This was actually a good time. Despite the toasting, there was little drinking. Mostly we went sledding, ice boating and popped popcorn in the fireplace. Note there were children present. Several of the other couples were social workers and longtime friends of my wife's back to high school. 

One of several parties with V. and M. V. is playing my guitar. Another gathering where mostly sanity prevailed. Note again the presences of children. V. was from the Caribbean and of African-Indian decent. The couple with the child on the right were Jewish. M.'s foot is on the left, she was a "good" Catholic Jersey Girl. 

New Year's Eve 1974 with G. and B. No children here. There was a lot of booze.

This seemed to be our fate at this point, just drift along in life having parties and not much caring about anything else. 

We did not know with the dawn next day came a year which would change our whole perception of life.

By 1975 I would say we were in a state of resignation. The old associations and activities were left behind. I had been through three different jobs and as many addresses within three years. In 1972 we had moved to New Jersey because the company I worked for was going to build there. Instead it folded.  In 1973 I began work with a steel fabricator in South Philadelphia as an assistant bookkeeper. By the end of that year I was the assistant controller and by 1976 I would also become the systems manager. In 1974 I quit going to night college and stopped sending out manuscripts, seeing my last piece published that year in "Animal Lovers Magazine". We were also now living in a nice modern luxury apartment at Ski Mountain. 

I was also resigned to the fact we would never have children. This didn't seem so bad. We were unencumbered. Outside of work it was all play with friends or going to concerts and taking trips. Life had become something of a continuous party and a little bit of risk taking. As far as the Ten Commandments, if I thought of them at all, it wasn't that we were breaking them.

The first four didn't count anyway, since I didn't believe in God. I certainly didn't have any gods before or behind him. I was my own god, although I didn't think of it that way. I didn't have some complex, it was just that I was the only thing I really believed in and relied on. As far as taking his name in vain, well, I never had been a curser. I just didn't vocally blaspheme, so I figured I was pretty good on that one. And I rested on Sundays. I wasn't any too certain what keeping the Sabbath meant. If it meant going to church, then I didn't keep it. I didn't worry about it either.

Honor our mother and father, certainly, we kept on good terms with our parents, if at arm's length. They certainly felt more comfortable about us now that we had shed that Hippie persona. They didn't know anything about the sex and drinking.

We hadn't murdered anyone. We might have wished a few people drop dead, but hey, everybody does that!

Although we had a sex-oriented relationship with another couple, we weren't having physical sex with either of them. I had never had sex with anyone other than the woman I married. Oh, I had opportunities, but never took advantage. My wife said this was because I was too naive to know when a woman was coming on to me. I like to think I was just too honorable to commit adultery.

I hadn't stole anything since those "girlie magazines" when I was 13. I was honest. If someone gave me the wrong change in my favor, I pointed it out and gave back the difference.

I didn't tell lies about other people and I didn't envy anyone.

In my humble opinion I was a good guy. I certainly wasn't a sinner. Sin was doing things that hurt people, like stealing. The things we did weren't hurting anyone. They weren't any one's business. 

But why was my wife depressed so often and why did I have a constant feeling of dissatisfaction?

What we needed were a few more adventures. (I'd prefer not to go into some things. Let's just say we did things not made for the family channel.)

Then coming out of a coal mine tour in Central Pennsylvania during a vacation trip, my wife said; "Honey, I think I'm pregnant again."

Yes, she was. And baby number seven wasn't going to be anymore lucky than the six brothers and sisters that preceded her. Amy was going to be born in month five and die just like Sean and Michael. The other four miscarried before getting that far.

[Do you know what babies look like when born too soon?

Babies.

Back when we lost our babies, five months was too soon. Today a lot of those lost children would have lived. Human life begins at conception and it ain't above my pay grade to tell you that!]

Oh well, I'd been down this road before. We'd get over it. Except Amy was a fighter. They put my wife in a labor room of the hospital and did what they could to stall off birth. They had a monitor that registered the baby's heart beat. It was a strong beat. It stayed strong the whole week my wife was in that labor room and I was by her side every day after work. My wife was drugged up and often drifted in and out of sleep. I sat sometimes for hours in a silent room except for that beat...beat...beat...beat. 

Once upon a time, a decade before, a strange cross had appeared on the wall of my bedroom when I thought I was dying. I had forgotten that cross. I couldn't forget the beat...beat...beat. It was so determined. And when I was alone at home after the visits, I could not get that heartbeat out of my mind and I realized that God had to exist. I sure wasn't god. There wasn't a thing I could do for that baby or for my wife. I could only listen to the beat of life. And in that beating I knew there was something greater than me, greater than us all.

When the day came they could not stall any longer, labor was induced and Amy died. When the beat stopped it was to be the beginning of the deepest valley I ever saw my wife enter. And although I felt as helpless in rescuing her as I had felt about saving that baby I knew something had survived and was alive in me, a belief in God.

To be continued: An Oasis in the Valley of Death

Peace and Depravity

Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator Romans 1:24-25a

During the 'sixties a repeated chant was "never trust anyone over thirty". In the summer of 1971 I crossed that Maginot Line. In a couple more years the so-called Decade of Love would be over, the Vietnam War would end and Nixon would be sinking in the flood from Watergate. An era of my life was ending as well.

The group of artists, actors, poets and writers my wife and I had socialized with for several years was going separate ways. The Hippie culture and psychedelic streets near the river were fading from view. The Beatles had broken up in 1969. By 1973 a different sound was dominating everything, Disco. The new icon was a skinny John Travolta in a tight white suit.

I was still selling some writing, still going to evening college, still not believing in God, but I was losing the anger. Fighting every authority figure was behind me. I had been through a couple of jobs, had moved to New Jersey and in a sense felt at peace. I now had a job that was going to last several years. I was an Assistant Controller (and eventually would be the Systems Manager) for a steel fabricating company in Philadelphia. We were no longer living in the "roach hole", but had a very nice modern apartment at Ski Mountain in South Jersey. (If you know anything about South Jersey, you will chuckle at the idea there could actually have been a ski resort there.) 

In the near past we had lived with a motley crew of neighbors of sometimes questionable repute. Our life had been one of some austerity. There were months when I lived on soft pretzels for lunch and there had been stretches when I would walk along the trolley stops looking for dropped change in order to buy food. Now we lived among people who in a coming decade would be called Yuppies. The times of protest had ended; party time had begun.

Our old crowd had talked about art, literature, politics and philosophy. The new friends we were making had little interest in any of that.  If our 'sixties group was cerebral, our new associates were tactile. Pleasure was at the center of our relationships.

In began with W. and B. and a chance meeting in a lingerie shop. My wife was there to buy a teddy or something. She took a couple items into the dressing rooms and I found myself standing next to another fellow of approximately my same age self-consciously holding his wife's purse, too. A moment later this nice-looking young blond woman came out of the dressing rooms wearing only a fish-net body suit. She twirled about and asked her husband what he thought. He approved and she went back behind the curtain. He glanced at me and we smiled at each other.  What do you say in such a circumstance?

But somehow this turned into a strange contest between his wife and mine for most daring display. Out they would come in another brief wisp of material. The owner of the shop seemed delighted, and why not? When we turned to leave there was a large crowd gathered around the front of her shop watching this impromptu burlesque show.

While waiting, her husband and I had talked and exchanged telephone numbers and addresses and we became friends. We would get together at each other's apartments and play striptease games, take Polaroid pictures and have sex.

Now, I want it to make it clear. We were not wife-swapping. We only had sex with our own spouse.  I did not see any of this as sin at the time. I was still a faithful husband. And really by secular standards I was and am. I was a virgin when I met my wife and I have never had sex with any other person. By the worldly definition I have not committed adultery. By Biblical standards, I have over and over again. Besides this voyeuristic period of sexual games with another couple, I had long been a collector of pornography. But I saw no harm in it. I wasn't neglecting my wife. These were just images on the pages of magazines. Or those women contorting themselves in the nude upon some sleazy stage were just a show. Or those base acts were just shadows on a movie screen.  I didn't "really" break the Seventh Commandment. I didn't believe in the Ten Commandments anyway.

This friendship with W. and B. didn't last long. We began to suspect they wanted to go where we didn't and we broke it off.  We found another couple who we had a much longer relationship with. These were our drinking buddies.

When we met B. and G. we all lived in the same apartment building.  We would get together every weekend and sometimes in between. Sometimes we went out, but often we simply gathered in one of our apartments, played pinochle and drank. For some reason I had a great tolerance of alcohol and didn't get drunk. Not so much with B. Most evenings ended with me picking up his inert body and carrying it back to his bed before my wife and I went home.  There were also times I had to pull him out of a bar before fists began to fly or off the street before the cops came. But, although there were dirty jokes and innuendo aplenty in our conversations, there was no sexual play with B. and G. B. was an extremely jealous husband with a tendency toward violence.

This relationship ended when I got saved. Somehow after that, B. and G. found us different and no longer with shared interests.

We had some other friends during this period. We had a long and close relationship with V. and M. These friends would have been considered perfectly respectable. There was no sexual hanky-panky, no drinking to drunkenness. But there were a lot of parties and everything was pleasure. V and I played tennis almost every lunchtime during the work week and golf every weekend. 

For about four years life couldn't have been better as far as I was concerned. The only fly in the ointment had been losing another baby. It seemed pretty hopeless and I had accepted the idea of never having children. That was just one of those things. We had each other, a nice place to live and friends. We considered ourselves good people. We worked hard and paid our taxes, harmed no one, so what was wrong with having fun when ever we could. This was what life was all about was our motto. Grab the gusto. If it feels good, do it. 

Without kids, there were no encumbrances. We were free to do as we pleased. We could just take off on weekends and enjoy vacation trips each year. It was on one of those vacation trips my wife said something that would change everything. 

"Honey", she said, "I think I'm pregnant again."  This would make number seven.

To be continued: Seven, the number of completeness. 

The photo was me in 1971.

Angry Atheist

Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them. Romans 1:28-32

The photo is me in 1970, looking rather Edgar Allan Poe-ish. It's the same picture as on the last post, only reversed and not doctored. This was me on the outside; that other was me on the inside like the Picture of Dorian Gray reflecting all my sins. I was becoming a monster.

The world I inhabited was changing. I had found the 60's invigorating, inventive; art and music and literature all evolving to a higher plane. We hung with the Hippies, wearing salvation army clothes or Nehru jackets, flowers in the hair, love beads about the neck, Tim Buckley concerts at the Trauma Coffeehouse. 

We lived in an apartment in what was called University City. We shared the building with college students, prostitutes, drug addicts, Black Panthers, who held meetings in the lobby, and roaches in the sink at night. We had a pet iguana. I had quit my job where I had worked since high school and was freelance writing for local papers, the Underground Press and international horror magazines.

But the ugly side of the 'sixties was catching up and taking over. The 1967 Summer of Love in Haight-Ashbury crashed outside the Chicago Republican Convention in 1968 at the Festival of Love. The Beatles had broke-up in January 1969. A period dedicated to "coming together" and "flower power" had really been marked by violence. It had kicked off with the murder of Medgar Evers in June 1963 and the November 1963 assassination of President Kennedy. The period from 1964 through 1967, that portion of the so-called "decade of love" was fraught with civil rights riots in our major cities and National Guard troops and tanks in our streets. And in 1968 reality sunk in to everyone. Martin Luther King, Jr. gunned down in April at age 39; Robert F. Kennedy gunned down in June at age 43. It was now more the age of the Yippies than the Hippies. 

By 1970 there was no more delusion that "all you need is love". In May, National Guard troops at Kent State, there to keep order, opened fire and four students were left dead. The icons of the era were passing away from their habits and self-abuse. Jim Morrison in July. Jimi Hendrix in September. Janis Joplin in October. All dead at age 27.

I turned 29 in June.

I was taking on the world.

In 1968, the Republican Party attempted to take away my right to vote and I had to go to court to stop them. I was angry at all political parties. I was registered Democrat, but I voted for third party candidates like Dick Gregory. I didn't like the business world either. I was writing letters to the CEOs of major companies. They were not polite letters. But what I really went after was the church. 

What set me off?

My wife and I had visited my parents on Easter and went to church with them. Fine. But then I received a letter from the pastor, Reverend R. He told me I had hurt my mother. How?

Apparently some woman in the church had complained to him about our appearance, he had passed this along to my mother and it upset her. He suggested I should come and apologize and ask forgiveness.

Me? Why Me? How dare that women and this preacher judge me. And the church was a bunch of hypocrites anyway, whose only interest was money. I had not attended that church for a decade and yet the only concern they had was money. The only communication they ever sent me was an annual letter asking for donations. In fact, one such letter had come the same week as Reverend R.'s missive.

I set up a meeting to confront this man. I told him I didn't appreciate him sticking up for this woman and they shouldn't have put it on my mother. They should have told me to my face. I told him what I considered that woman to be. He said she was trying to lead me back to the Lord by pointing out my sins. I told him there were plenty of sinners in his church, tell her to point out to the usher who always smelled of booze his sin and then listed some others whose flaws I knew. He told me I needed to forgive those people and threw the story of the Adulterous Woman at me, the whole "casting the first stone" bit and that Jesus forgave the woman and that was the lesson, that I should forgive this woman and these others. I told him Jesus also told the woman to "go and sin no more". Repentance comes with forgiveness, I said, tell that woman to repent and that usher to stop getting drunk on Saturday night and then I'll forgive them. Oh, I thought, score one for me! 

We had other such debates both in person and in letters. Here are some of the milder passages of the letters.

After considerable thought, I have come to a decision about your question of my spiritual comfort and to which church or religious interpretation I entrust my allegiance. I conclude none; that is; if I don’t claim out and out atheism, I certainly admit to a deep-seated agnosticism.

There is another, perhaps tenuous, reason to give you an explanation. Because you are a man of God, it must be your duty to concern yourself when anyone strays from the religious establishment. If you would not ask why, would not care, would not debate such a profession by a fellow human, then you would be guilty of dereliction of your faith and calling. Whereas I reject the legendary and mythological ideal of Judeo-Christianity and am free to show no concern for anyone but myself (taking here the more common opinion of the non-believer), you by tradition and expectation must be immediately involved with your fellow man. If this was not so, then you would do far more damage to your church and faith than any atheist or critic can ever do.

The most interesting fact I ever learned in Sunday school was one of the teachers had a dog that was over twenty years old. Don’t you find that remarkable?

I was on a roll now. I wasn’t stopping with one preacher. Bring them on. Here are excerpts from another debate with another minister, Reverend D

Dear Mister D.,

They have taken away my Lord and I know not where they have laid him…

And here we have the crux perhaps of the problem. No church, none, meets the requirements of the Bible. Where the Catholics stress certain lines, they miss others, and so it is the same with the protestant.

Who has my Lord?

I am afraid I believe each man has his own Lord; and nobody has him. Who has exclusive rights to God?

 

I have rolled about our conversation in my mind and read further and rummaged in my own conscience and these are the thoughts I have dredged up from doing so.

Yet does not one in a heap if ruins

stretch out his hand,

And in his disaster cry for help?

Did I not weep for him whose day was

Hard?

Was not my soul grieved for the poor?

But when I looked for good, evil came;

and when I waited for light, darkness

came. (Job 30: 24-26)

 

You are certainly right in saying you find it hard to accept I would lean toward Catholicism. That was a passing island that I clung to as I attempted to claim some finger hold on religion. But like the other shaky grasps I have held in the past, a man of the cloth stepped upon my hand and loosened me.

As the churches rejected me, I am rejecting them you see. It is deeper than that, of course, but that is what most people will adopt as my reasoning, and so be it. I was forgotten by Bethel, ignored by the Lutherans, Episcopalians and Catholics and repulsed by the Ethics. Besides I no longer believe any man knows anything about God. If we did know once, then it was before weak churches or their opposite who subverted God. Anyway, I think, like the scripture indicates, God will give support to he who supports himself.

I don’t think God is dead: I think he is sealed in some church pledge envelope somewhere buried beneath the gold and silver.

I guess I’m incurable. But, oh God, I am not alone in my illness.

If those verses in Romans 1 meant God gave up when you resisted enough and left you go your own way, then I was lost for sure. There was no way back to God from here, not that I was looking for a way. Or was I? Or was God looking for me? 

I could explain away the Bible as legends written by men. I could explain away God because I couldn't see him.  I could explain away ministers as hypocrits.

But I still couldn't quite explain that cross the appeared on my bedroom wall.

To be continued: Peace and Depravity

Why Me?

The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen. Romans 1:18-25

For a time, I thought these verses meant if you resisted the choice of Jesus long enough, God would simply leave you to your own devices and you were lost forever.  I would see this in connection to the unpardonable sin.

"He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters. 31And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. 32Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.  Matthew 12:30-32

Then I would wonder, how did I escape God's wrath? Why me?

I certainly ignored those telling me I had to be born again. I was not moving toward God, but away. Or was I?

I have told how as a child I was forced to go to Sunday School until I reached Junior High and made such a fuss my folks gave up on that. The problem with my going was no one else was, so why me? Sunday School was boring.

In Junior High I was invited to a Methodist Youth Fellowship meeting by a friend. I went because of a promise of hamburgers at a favorite restaurant. I stayed because we played games and stuff besides all that Bible mumbo-jumbo.

My parents moved out of town several miles north as I ended ninth grade. In the new place, they started going to a Methodist Church and I was again forced to attend. I talked them into Sunday School, which allowed me to be home alone when they were in Church Service. I again joined MYF and in my senior year was elected President. I played Devil's Advocate. It was thought I was just facilitating to get conversation going, but I really was challenging the beliefs being held. I thought I was quite brilliant.

After my wife and I married, we didn't go to church at all. She had grown up a Lutheran and also been forced to attend, but her circumstance was a bit different. Whereas, for most my youth my family only went to church at Christmas and Easter, her parents were faithful attendees. In fact, they were heavily involved in their church; her mother was even the organist. They had a list of don'ts they made her pledge, that she would never drink, never smoke, never do other things. 

My wife started smoking at twelve.

We were very happy having nothing to do with church. Who needed it. We were just fine. We bought a house just before we got married. We weren't even eligible to sign the contracts at the time because we were underage. You weren't an adult until 21 in those days. I was just 20 and she was still 19 when we married.

We had a house. We had a new car. We ate out regularly. We had decent jobs. We had a plan.

Then the problems started.

She lost the first child at home alone. She lost her job. We lost the house. We lost another child.  I had a breakdown at work. She had an affair. We almost lost our marriage.

And I got very sick one day. I don't know what I had. I was as sick as I ever had been or been since. I literally believed I was going to die. I lay in the bed, soaked with sweat, my fever sky high, my body in great pain, exhausted and scared. It was dark. The blinds were shut. It was night out. I actually called out for God to save me cause I didn't think I would be alive come morning. Then I noticed some light on the wall. It was a cross. I don't understand where it came from. I looked around for the source, but couldn't figure it out. It stayed as I feel asleep and when I awoke in the morning it was gone, but so was my fever and my pain.

I looked for that cross time and again after that, but no cross ever shown on the bedroom wall again. Very strange, I can't explain it.

But that moment didn't save me. I just got well physically. And we lost the third baby.

I didn't totally forget that strange cross or God yet. We decided to give church a chance. Not the churches where our parents attended, but some other mainstream congregation somewhere. So we began visitations on each Sunday and no where welcomed us. We were just two strangers passing through. Perhaps we appeared alien in dress or with my long hair. One church was even outright hostile to us, as if we were disturbing their finely tuned clique. The sermons seemed empty, the buildings cold, God distant.

We had tried Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians,some others. Nothing worked.

At the time we lived with my wife's father. There was a Roman Catholic Church a couple blocks away. one day I wandered over and went inside during a mass. I became attracted to the ritual, the smell of incense, the candles and the saints. It was involving, always something to do. I got a rosary. I did the stations of the cross. I went to mass everyday. There were some things I couldn't do because I wasn't a confirmed member. So I got a book and studied all the doctrine and my wife and I talked to the priest about converting.

But the night he was suppose to meet with us to schedule everything to begin the process, he stood us up. That ended that. I didn't go back.

We moved on to churches outside the center. We had moved from her father's to an apartment in the city. We hung out in the Hippie centers at night and weekends. Nearby a popular gathering place in a city park was an Unitarian Church, so we started going there. All the talk there was on activism, protest of the war, doing street drama against the government, that type of thing. Well, we had been involved all ready in such demonstrations and acting out. It didn't seem a church for us and we stopped going.

We crossed the park to the other side and a different sort of church, called the Ethical Society. We began attending services. We sat in what was like a pew in what was like a church with what was like an alter at the center. Music played as a processional, but not a hymn; classical music. All the music was this type. A text was read, but it was from Socrates or Plato or some other philosopher. Then the "preacher" gave a "sermon". God was never mentioned. The talk was in praise of man and man's ability to overcome any problem through will and technology.

I told my wife later it seemed silly. If you didn't believe in God, why then completely imitate a Christian Church Service? To what purpose? It just seemed childish.

This ended our experiment with church going. I took a great interest in Buddhism. It was kind of prevalent in the underground culture of the time. I got some Zen and the Buddhist Scriptures and told everyone the Buddhists really understood. My interpretation was you could and should do everything. Go work hard and makes a lot of money. You would then find money didn't satisfy. Go and enjoy sensual pleasures, have as many sexual encounters as you lusted for. You would then find sex didn't satisfy. Eat and drink and do whatever felt good as much as you wished and you would discover none satisfied. Then you would be ready to move up to some spiritual level. Yessir, that made sense. Just think, you could grow spiritual after satiating your every whim.

Later I was to feel Solomon said the same thing in Ecclesiastes, except he didn't tell you to go out and do all that stuff. He told you the opposite. He was saving you the bother by telling you it was all meaningless and empty and only God could satisfy. 

So I forgot the Buddhism. Transcendental Meditation was also popular then, thanks to the Beatles, but Hinduism in any form never had any appeal to me. So I read a couple books on it, but never tried it. I did get into all those fad philosophies that came by and bought a lot of self-help books. I just went from one to another without much to show for the effort in the end. 

But now I was slipping into the occult and I bought the Satanic Bible, books on Voodoo, followed the life of Edgar Cayce, went out chasing UFOs across the night sky, until one day I said it is all bunk and simply stopped believing in anything beyond myself and this world. I declared myself an Atheist and an angry one.

I began a mini-crusade against ministers and organized religion, mainly Christian.

Those verses in Romans seemed to have come true. God had given me over to my own depravity. I was beyond hope. Of course at the time I didn't see it that way.

To be continued. 

What it is All About

Merry Christmas! 

Here this morning, before any other festivity begins, let's remember why we have this day and what it means to us.

Here is the Christmas narrative put together from scripture. The passage source book are indicated by color:

GENESIS   MATTHEW    MARK    LUKE     JOHN

Black text are interjections by me. The New International Version was used to construct this. 

May the Holy Spirit be among you as you read and may you be brought ever closer to our Lord, Jesus Christ. Amen.

THE FIRST CHRISMAS

 

The Eternal Christ

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and He separated the light from the darkness. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not extinguished [or overcome or understood] it. The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world.

He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.

The Historical Genealogy of Jesus From Abraham Through Mary

A record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ the son of David, the son of Abraham:

Abraham was the father of Isaac, Isaac the father of Jacob, Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, Judah the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar, Perez the father of Hezron, Hezron the father of Ram, Ram the father of Amminadab, Amminadab the father of Nahshon, Nahshon the father of Salmon, Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab, Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth, Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of King David.

David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah's wife, Solomon the father of Rehoboam, Rehoboam the father of Abijah, Abijah the father of Asa, Asa the father of Jehoshaphat, Jehoshaphat the father of Jehoram, Jehoram the father of Uzziah, Uzziah the father of Jotham, Jotham the father of Ahaz, Ahaz the father of Hezekiah, Hezekiah the father of Manasseh, Manasseh the father of Amon, Amon the father of Josiah, and Josiah the father of Jeconiah and his brothers at the time of the exile to Babylon.

After the exile to Babylon: Jeconiah was the father of Shealtiel, Shealtiel the father of Zerubbabel, Zerubbabel the father of Abiud, Abiud the father of Eliakim, Eliakim the father of Azor, Azor the father of Zadok, Zadok the father of Akim, Akim the father of Eliud, Eliud the father of Eleazar, Eleazar the father of Matthan, Matthan the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ.

Thus there were fourteen generations in all from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile to Babylon, and fourteen from the exile to the Christ.^[b]

 

The Legal Genealogy of Joseph

He (Jesus) was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph, 
the son[-in-law] of Heli, the son of Matthat, 
the son of Levi, the son of Melki, 
the son of Jannai, the son of Joseph, 
the son of Mattathias, the son of Amos, 
the son of Nahum, the son of Esli, the son of Naggai, the son of Maath, 
the son of Mattathias, the son of Semein, 
the son of Josech, the son of Joda, 
the son of Joanan, the son of Rhesa, 
the son of Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, 
the son of Neri, the son of Melki, 
the son of Addi, the son of Cosam, 
the son of Elmadam, the son of Er, 
the son of Joshua, the son of Eliezer, the son of Jorim, the son of Matthat, 
the son of Levi, the son of Simeon, 
the son of Judah, the son of Joseph, 
the son of Jonam, the son of Eliakim, 
the son of Melea, the son of Menna, 
the son of Mattatha, the son of Nathan, 
the son of David, the son of Jesse, the son of Obed, the son of Boaz, 
the son of Salmon, the son of Nahshon, 
the son of Amminadab, the son of Ram, the son of Hezron, the son of Perez, 
the son of Judah, the son of Jacob, 
the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham, 
the son of Terah, the son of Nahor, 
the son of Serug, the son of Reu, 
the son of Peleg, the son of Eber, the son of Shelah, the son of Cainan, 
the son of Arphaxad, the son of Shem, 
the son of Noah, the son of Lamech, 
the son of Methuselah, the son of Enoch, 
the son of Jared, the son of Mahalalel, 
the son of Kenan, the son of Enosh, 
the son of Seth, the son of Adam, 
the son of God.

 

 

The Birth of John the Baptist Foretold

[The Temple in Jerusalem B.C. 6]

In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron. Both of them were upright in the sight of God, observing all the Lord's commandments and regulations blamelessly. But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren; and they were both well along in years.

 Once when Zechariah's division was on duty and he was serving as priest before God, (he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to go into the temple of the Lord and burn incense. And when the time for the burning of incense came, all the assembled worshipers were praying outside.

 Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear. But the angel said to him: "Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to give him the name John. He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from birth. Many of the people of Israel will he bring back to the Lord their God. And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous—to make ready a people prepared for the Lord."

Zechariah asked the angel, "How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years."

The angel answered, "I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news. And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens, because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their proper time."

Meanwhile, the people were waiting for Zechariah and wondering why he stayed so long in the temple. When he came out, he could not speak to them. They realized he had seen a vision in the temple, for he kept making signs to them but remained unable to speak.

When his time of service was completed, he returned home. After this his wife Elizabeth became pregnant and for five months remained in seclusion. "The Lord has done this for me," she said. "In these days he has shown his favor and taken away my disgrace among the people."

 

The Birth of Jesus Foretold

(Nazareth in Galilee Late B.C. 6 or early B.C 5)

 In the sixth month [of Elizabeth’s pregnancy], God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, "Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you."

Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God. You will be with child and give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end."

 "How will this be," Mary asked the angel, "since I am a virgin?"

 The angel answered, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be barren is in her sixth month. For nothing is impossible with God."

"I am the Lord's servant," Mary answered. "May it be to me as you have said." Then the angel left her.

Mary Visits Elizabeth

(Judea Early B.C. 5)

At that time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea [a distance of 90 to 120 miles], where she entered Zechariah's home and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. In a loud voice she exclaimed: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed is she who has believed that what the Lord has said to her will be accomplished!"

Mary's Song

And Mary said: "My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed, for the Mighty One has done great things for me—holy is his name. His mercy extends to those who fear him, from generation to generation. He has performed mighty deeds with his arm; he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts. He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever, even as he said to our fathers."

Mary stayed with Elizabeth for about three months and then returned home.

The Birth of John the Baptist

(Spring B.C. 5)

When it was time for Elizabeth to have her baby, she gave birth to a son. Her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown her great mercy, and they shared her joy.

On the eighth day they came to circumcise the child, and they were going to name him after his father Zechariah, but his mother spoke up and said, "No! He is to be called John."

They said to her, "There is no one among your relatives who has that name."

Then they made signs to his father, to find out what he would like to name the child. He asked for a writing tablet, and to everyone's astonishment he wrote, "His name is John." Immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue was loosed, and he began to speak, praising God. The neighbors were all filled with awe, and throughout the hill country of Judea people were talking about all these things. Everyone who heard this wondered about it, asking, "What then is this child going to be?" For the Lord's hand was with him.

 

Zechariah's Song

His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied:

"Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come and has redeemed his people. He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David (as he said through his holy prophets of long ago), salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us—to show mercy to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, the oath he swore to our father Abraham: to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable us to serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all our days. And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him, to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace."

 

Joseph’s Visitation

9Nazareth B.C. 5)

This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus [Hebrew, Joshua, which means God is salvation], because he will save his people from their sins."

All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: [Isaiah 7:14] "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"—which means, "God with us."

 When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son.

 

The Birth of Jesus

(Bethlehem Autumn of B.C. 5)

In those days Caesar Augustus [63 B.C – 14 A.D.] issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. (This was the first census that took place while Quirinius  [Circa 51 B.C. – 21 A.D.] was {governor} of Syria.) [The word translated in Scripture as “governor” was  “hegemon”, which means “ruling officer or procurator”. Quirinius did not become actual governor {legatus – different word} until later, but there is no reason to dispute Luke calling him a ruling officer at this time. There were many censuses taken during this period of time, any number of which could have been this one.]. And everyone went to his own town to register.

So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. [Given the status of women at the time, questions have been raised as to why Mary would have went with him. I think it is silly speculation to think she wouldn’t, but here are possible reasons. God’s direction to them that she should go seems a reasonable explanation. Also, given the nature of Mary’s pregnancy and the suspicions this probably aroused, Joseph could have taken her for her own protection. Saying she couldn’t have gone or made the trip while being pregnant are just spurious arguments of disbelieving critics.] While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

The Shepherds and the Angels

(Near Bethlehem)

And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger."

Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, 
"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."

 When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let's go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about."

So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.

Jesus Presented in the Temple

(Jerusalem, eight days after the birth; distance from Bethlehem to Jerusalem is only 6 miles)

On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived and he gave him the name Jesus.

(Jerusalem, 40 days after birth according to Jewish Law)

When the time of their purification according to the Law of Moses had been completed, Joseph and Mary took him to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, "Every firstborn male is to be consecrated to the Lord" [Exodus 13:2]), and to offer a sacrifice in keeping with what is said in the Law of the Lord: "a pair of doves or two young pigeons."

Now there was a man in Jerusalem called Simeon, who was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he had seen the Lord's Christ. Moved by the Spirit, he went into the temple courts. When the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the custom of the Law required, Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying: 
"Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, 
you now dismiss your servant in peace. 
For my eyes have seen your salvation, 
which you have prepared in the sight of all people, 
a light for revelation to the Gentiles 
and for glory to your people Israel."

The child's father and mother marveled at what was said about him. Then Simeon blessed them and said to Mary, his mother: "This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too."

There was also a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was very old; she had lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, and then was a widow until she was eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshiped night and day, fasting and praying. Coming up to them at that very moment, she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem, when Joseph and Mary had done everything required by the Law of the Lord,

The Visit of the Magi

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod [73 B.C. – 4 B.C.], Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, "Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him."

 When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. When he had called together all the people's chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Christ was to be born. "In Bethlehem in Judea," they replied, "for this is what the prophet has written: 
 " 'But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, 
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; 
for out of you will come a ruler 
who will be the shepherd of my people Israel. [Micah 5:2]'"

Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, "Go and make a careful search for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him."

After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen in the east^[e] went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.

The Escape to Egypt

When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. "Get up," he said, "take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him." So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: "Out of Egypt I called my son." [Hosea 11:1 (Greek: egontos, eks aiguptou ekalesa ton huion mou meaning “Out of Egypt have I called the son of Me”.  Matthew was saying the statement was made perfect in Christ.]

When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah [Jeremiah 31:15] was fulfilled: 
 "A voice is heard in Ramah, 
weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children 
and refusing to be comforted, 
because they are no more."

The Return to Nazareth

(4 B.C. – Year Herod the Great died)

After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child's life are dead."

So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, they returned to Galilee and he went and lived in their own town, a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets: "He will be called a Nazarene." [Note this states “the prophets”, not “a specific prophet”. What is being said is the various prophets predicted Jesus would be despised or considered common. Nazarene was a person looked down on, a prejudice of the time. Look to Nathanael’s question in John 1:46: “Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?” But don’t look for the quote in any particular prophet.]

And the child [John] grew and became strong in spirit; And the child [Jesus] grew and became strong; he was filled with wisdom, and the grace

Christmas Eve Along the Climbing Way

I'm sure you understand that guys who wear red a lot and have white beards get kinda busy this time of year. Therefore, I've been taking the easy way out on my posts lately doing a lot of prepackaged goods; that is, things I wrote at some other time and some other place. You know, old poems or previous written stories, so as we come to Christmas Eve here is a Christmas-themed story I wrote. There some autobiographical stuff sprinkled throughout. It's in my "Currents of the Whiskeyrye and Other creeks" collection.

O ye, beneath life's crushing load,

Whose forms are bending low,

Who toil along the climbing way

With painful steps and slow,

Look now! for glad and golden hours

Come swiftly on the wing;

O rest beside the weary road

And hear the angels sing!

--It Came Upon a Midnight Clear

ALONG THE CLIMBING WAY

 

Grew up on a farm and learned to read weather early. Little turn of breeze and a good season can go south on vacation and leave you high and dry or two fronts will bump up against one another like long lost lovers and flood the Spring seed out of the furrows into a river that a month before was a mud hole suckin’ the soil dry. Freezes can pop up early and kill the orchard or the heat can grasp a hold of late summer to wither the tomatoes and shrivel the corn. You weather it out with a bank note and a church prayer till the next season comes with its own surprises.

Life follows it own seasons of drought and plenty and we hit a blizzard of want in the autumn of ’88. We is Charle Raye and me. I married Charle out of high school at eighteen just March mad in love with the boy, and there wasn’t any dissuading us. It weren’t any shotgun wedding. We was ten years into our marriage ‘fore I had a first kid in the oven. That was the girl, Amy Sue. We had Charle Junior two years afterward, and then no more in the chute. By Thanksgiving ’88 the girl had turned ten and the boy was on the edge of eight.

Charle had stayed on his dad’s farm first three years we was hitched, but at twenty-one he got his call up greetings from Uncle Sam and hauled off to the Army for two years. It was the concludin’ years of Vietnam and didn’t seem much purpose for the boys they called those years, ‘cept to be cannon fodder and go die in a losin’ cause, but Charle had a lot of patriotism flowing through his blood and never much complained, though I did a bunch of prayin’ the whole time.

 Wasn’t no trick for me to step over and take up his chores on the farm. Milkin’ and plowin’ were things I’d done since I was eight. It was a hard hitch for us both, I reckon, but the farmin’ kept me dog tired ev’ry day and I slept through most of the loneliness while Charle sat up in a barracks in Saigon for the last year of his hitch, till his outfit was evacuated out and that sad war came to a end.

When he come home he had no more taste for the farm life. In a couple months he had his Teamsters’ button and started haulin’ steel up the turnpike; tough life but good money for a twenty-something, and though the overnighters left me lonely much the week, we made it up pretty hot and heavy over those weekends.

Truckin’ got us right free of our farm roots. In a few years we was able to pick up an old bungalow out on Route 23 up in northern Ruhig County, just south of Pansville. Guess the soil swam pretty thick in my blood, though, cause in no time I planted my own truck garden up back of the house and sold the produce from a little stand along the road. Wasn’t but summer money and never ‘mounted to much, still it gave me my own means and stayin’ home never made me feel dependent on Charle, and he never minded either.

I got restless after a couple of winters, him on the road and me only lookin’ after myself for meals and cleanup ‘fore the kids come ‘long. Empty time piled up in my mind like dust, and after a couple of seasons of it, I invested some of my produce money in smalltime franchisin’ and started makin’ the rounds through the cold dead months burpin’ Tupperware at demonstration parties and bankin’ another lightweight income. Went through almost two decade this a way without so much a fluff-cloud in our sky, but I never forgot the lessons of the farmin’ life, so when the storm came I wasn’t taken by surprise. It was long overdue by my mind.

Didn’t right quite see it comin’, though. Nineteen eighty-seven had been a banner year. Steel was shippin’ at double time and Charle was pickin’ up extra runs and fat overtime. It left me high and dry lot of weekends, but it let him pay off his own truck and soon after the green sheet came from the bank he comes up behind and starts nuzzlin’ at my ear.

“Been thinkin’, Bess?”

“’Bout what?”

“How’d you take it if I turned gypsy. Holly Lentz done it last fall an’ he tells me he could hook me up with some guys to run wide-loads and hazmat on a regular basis.”

He kissed my neck. “You done any that?”

“I’ve done my share of wide-load, but I’d have to qualify for a hazmat license.”

“This get you home more often?”

“Probably not.”

“Okay, I’d probably get sick of seein’ your face if it did.”

He laughed and grabbed a hold a me and we was wrestlin’ around and Charle goin’ independent was a settled point.

 Charle figured it would take him a year to pick up the hazmat license and set up contracts to haul, but the whole plan got snatched from him in ’88 when the shipper went under and he was left without a sure paycheck. Never know in this world where the hurricane’s stirrin’. That year the hurricane was Japan dumpin’ steel in the Midwest and it spread a deadly virus of cheap prices that weakened and killed one big steel works after another, like flickin’ fleas off a drozy hound.

Didn’t seem too bad for a while. Charle build rail sides on the flat bed. He let the kid’s stand up on the bed and hand him the tools. Bein’ away as much as he was, he did what he could to get close to the kids from birth upward when he was home. He got jobs haulin’ Tomatoes out a Lancaster county to the ketchup factories on the west side of the state over the summer, and with school out, he even hauled the kids alone a couple times, letting them have the bunk and he slept across the seats. When autumn come with the crops harvested and the fields empty, Charle couldn’t get any loads of nothin’ but air and pretty soon he’s just sittin’ home or putterin’ on the truck.

Course end of summer was the end of my little roadside stand and my truck garden, too. I was just left with the Tupperware parties and what orders I could ring out of that. Problem bein’ there never was enough to call that a livin’. Just a bit of mad money really, maybe enough to buy us a night on the town occasionally or get the kids new shoes come a school year. Now it was bein’ stretched to keep some soup and bread in the panty. Worse to it was my income was droppin’ in that business for much the same reason we was needin’ it so bad. Most my customer list were fellow highway cowboys or assembly line men from the steel fabrication mills up in Pansville. Fabricators were movin’ out to the Midwest to where the Japanese shipments was landin’, cuttin’ the haulin’ cost down, and a lot of our friends were cast off in the same leaky boat as us.

Well, that boat hit a shoal ‘bout Thanksgiving. I’d been snitchin’ away the dinner makings for weeks and we had a whoop and holler Thanksgiving makin’ pretend that we had things to be thankful for and diggin’ out the Christmas music.

Charle and I done the dishes and was sittin’ on the sofa when Amy Sue, with Charle Junior in tow, plopped an old photo album on my lap opened up on an faded black ‘n’ white photo.

“Who’s those people?’ she asked.

“The little girl’s your grandma and the man was her daddy.”

“Why’s their tree outside?” asked Charle.

I looked close at the picture. In the distance I seen the ragged edge of the corncrib and a run of rail fence along the cow pasture. Most the background was a blur of white makin’ it hard tellin’ sky from ground snow. My ma and grandpa stood next to a little tree trimmed in popcorn strings, kibble balls and suet. A tinfoil star was on the tippy top.

“That’s the bird tree,” I said. “Every Christmas eve they use a go up a bit from the farm yard and decorate a tree with treats for the winter birds.” Ma had done the same for a time when I was young, but then it got forgot about and I hadn’t given it any mind since I was a teenager.

“You kids wanna go see Santa Claus tomorrow?” Charle asked.

“Yeah, yeah”, they shouted.

“Then you scoot yourself off to bed now and I’ll take you into town in the mornin’

They both ran off to bed and I closed the album and set it on the coffee table.

 

Charle still held hopes for Christmas. Countin’ out our dwindlin’ savings at the bank he figured we could get the kids a few descent gifts if he could get food stamps to supplement our grocery needs for a few months. He went into the government office that Monday to make application, but came home empty of pocket and cursin’ Uncle Sam down to Blue River and back.

“Gave me this here long paper of questions to answer. Asked for things like ‘own a home’ and ‘list vehicles’. Put down the old Ford and the Brockway and turned it in. Then this here woman gives it a look over and starts askin’ me stuff.

“ ‘You own this truck,’ she asked.

“ ‘Yes m’am,’ I said.

“ ‘You’ll have to sell the truck.’

“ ‘Sorry, m'am, what? Sell my truck?’ I says.

“ “You have a major asset here, sir. You can sell the truck and live on that. That runs out, come back and we can help.’

“That’s government backward logic for you. Sell off your livelihood ‘till you’re dirt poor rather than give you a bridge over a gully to ground you can plow.”

Men like Charle don’t cry in the night. Those tears were there though. I could see them there behind his eyes, but he sucked them in and swallowed. I knew what he was thinkin’. How we gonna explain a Christmas with no Santa to the kids. One thing havin’ kids, you puts your energy in worryin’ ‘bout their world and don’t never have time to feel sorry for yourself.

“I’ll take care of Christmas, babe,” I told him, holding his hand, knowin’ he didn’t know why I said such a thing. He nodded anyway. I smiled and patted his hand, but truth be told, I didn’t have no idear what I could do.

I walked away and stared out the window so he didn’t see the doubt on my face. Clouds had been thickin’ all days and now I seen the wind was kickin’ up a fuss.

I thought ‘bout the first year Charle started drivin’ truck and we had moved off his dad’s farm and got an apartment over a candy store in downtown Pansville. Only year of my life I was a city girl. Most the people I met there had been townies all their born days and you don’t learn much from studyin’ pavement all your youth as you do scrabblin’ crops out of dirt. Those neighbors got the Fogtown blues if a purple cloud drifted across the sun. I knew that old dark cloud might be the drink a good crop needed to sprout. This cloud I saw this a night was the start of a nor’easter ready to drop a ton of snow across the county and close most the roads out our way. That was our crop cloud for a bit.

It didn’t make for a big pot of pennies, but Charle was able to hitch up a plow to the tractor of his truck and pick up enough county road clearin’ money to keep the bill collectors at bay and keep some eats on the stove. Still didn’t stretch much toward the kind of Christmas your kids expect. There wasn’t no fat for presents and Christmas’ trimmin’ once you paid off the electric company and the mortgage banker. And there weren’t some endless chain of snow-drifted roads to run up the bank account into January either. By Christmas week we was back to feelin’ behind sofa cushions for enough change to assure a Christmas turkey.

On the day before Christmas Eve I was cleanin’ up the livin’ room. I picked up the photo album still on the coffee table to take back to the hall closet. When I lifted it a loose photo slipped free and floated to the floor. I picked it up and it was another old sepia colored photo of my grandparents and mother when she was a child. My mother sat at the feet of her parents, who sat in rockers in the old farmhouse parlor. A spate of toys lined the floor at the foot of the Christmas tree, a fluffy-haired rag doll, an ancient looking toy fire truck, a little corral of wooden farm animals and a miniature barn. My grandfather had handmade them all.

I sat down and found the page where the photo belonged, then I flipped through the book gettin’ idears.

Next hour I’m up in the attic movin’ boxes here and about, searchin’ through trunks and long ignored cartons. I knew the things was up there some place, but hadn’t given them a thought in years, but it hit that the answer to my promise to Charle was tucked away someplace under the dust and spider webs.

 

Christmas eve came a crisp, clear evenin’ and a sky of stars that sparkled like tinsel on black felt. Been a full moon day before and you still had it ninety-seven percent full face and it sparkled across the icicles on the eves and gave the snow a blue hue. Anybody out along the road that night would a said they seen a bunch of crazies hikin’ up the hill an hour ‘fore midnight carryin’ a picnic basket and totin’ a sled piled high with blankets and a grocery bag.

We parked ourselves at the peak, then wrapped the kids up in blankets. I pulled the contents outta the grocery bag and Charle and I set to trimmin’ a little pine that grew along the hill ridge. We hung garlands of strung popcorn and balls of suet. Then we sat down on the blankets and had a picnic supper of cold chicken, pickled eggs and potato salad and waited the midnight hour and the opening minutes of Christmas. Felt like some ancient sheppard tendin’ my sheep; felt like the glittering stars were those old hosts of angels.

“You lookin’ for Santa?” asked Amy Sue.

“Lookin’ at the angels,” I said, and she give me a tilted head look and a puzzled eyebrow. “But you can look for Santa. I bets you we get home Santa’ll already been there.”

Before we had left the house on this madness I had snuck down the box I’d found up the attic and arranged the corral of animals and the wooden barn, the fire truck and the other treasured toys ‘bout the tree.

At midnight, we stood on the hill before our little wild Christmas tree singin’ “Once Upon a Midnight Clear” and a gazin’ across the valley at the holiday lights on farm roof and post. You could see the colors spread out for miles, a mix of green and blue and red and yellow and green, some a blaze all red and some a glowin’ a moody blue.

Don’t have much more to say. Ain’t gonna tell you that was the best Christmas we ever had. Had better ones before and better ones since, just like those changes of weather, storms and sunshine, bright days and blue nights and all of life as life is. Did revive a family tradition, though. Ev’ry year after, we’d all hike up the hill on Christmas Eve and decorate that tree with treats for the winter birds and the squirrels.

Amy Sue’s off to college in Formton and Charle Junior’s out of high school and got a job as a bag boy in the Pansville Super Fresh. We weather the seasons come what may and Charle and I still carry on the tradition, and those old toys are stored back up in the attic again for the next generation. Like next month’s forecast, you never know, so rest your self a bit and hear the angels sing..