FOUR SCORE AND TEN

FOUR SCORE AND TEN

A Novel (of) Life

The old guy laid there, thinking, dreaming, reminiscing about life and life’s events spread over nine decades. It was a life well lived. Highs and lows? of course; joy and grief, yes; excitement and disappointments, definitely; expectations met, and expectations missed. But now as I approach my 90th birthday, someone remarked (tongue in cheek) “Why don’t you act your age?” I replied, “I don’t know how – I’ve never been this age before.” How do we prepare to be old? In our 30s we are getting settled in our career; in our 40s we are absorbed in job and family; in our 50s and 60s we may think abstractedly about future retirement; in our 70s and 80s we’re constantly trying to keep up with the calendar of medical appointments. Approaching 90 we ask ourselves ‘how did I get here? what about my old friends who didn’t come this far?’ This is tough. I can’t drive; I can’t go out at night; I must always be conscious of finding the nearest bathroom; why don’t we have some way of training to be old?’ Parents teach some things to their children (well, some do, mine did not. I was like a weed instead of grass – I just grew untrained like a weed rather than being nurtured like grass.) But to grow old gracefully – that should a goal for all.

Actually, we do have a “training manual” – the Bible, God’s Word. The Scriptures are quite numerous that tell us of God’s plan for us whom He created.

GOD’S PLAN FOR OUR LENGTH OF LIFE

Psalm 139:16 Our days were all written in the Book of Life before any one of them came to be.

Job 14:5 Our time on earth is brief, the number of our days is already decided by (God). Every man has been allotted a number of days on earth.

Psalm 57:2 I cry out to God Most High, to God Who fulfills His purpose in me.

Psalm 90:12 So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.

Psalm 91:16 I will satisfy you with a long life.

There are more.

To grow old gracefully is best done by honoring the fact that we were created in God’s image, to show His image, His grace, in our daily living. In just over 100 days, if the Lord wills, I will reach Four Score and Ten, 90 years of age. Am I growing old (or perhaps I should ask, have I grown old) gracefully? I have a lot of friends, and more acquaintances, and thousands whose paths I’ve intersected in these decades. I know better than to presume there would be unanimity if that question could be polled; nevertheless, I’ll go to my grave confident that whatever grace I may have exhibited is God’s grace, not my own. I’m also confident that, particularly beginning with my salvation in Christ on Easter Sunday 1957, I was a living example of Psalm 57:2b: “. . . God Who fulfills His purpose for me.”

LIFE’S EVENTS

I was born in the depression-era 1930s, the second child, first son of a lower middle-class family economically, preceded several years by a sister (Evelyn) and followed 13 years later by a brother (Jan). In ways it was almost like three one-child families. But Evelyn, six years older, always looked after me in my childhood. In my young adult life it was Evelyn who taught me the social graces.

Our family was never destitute, but every penny was squeezed until Lincoln hollered! Through much scrimping and saving the house was paid for but there were no extras though Dad had a steady job. Yet somehow, for Christmas (1938) I received a red wagon – a Radio Flyer which was the standard in those times. There were a few children in our neighborhood – I was the youngest and was accepted by all. Twins lived next door, Boyce and Loyce Perry. They were a few years older than I. At that time, we were living on Farr Street in San Angelo.

1938 – my parents and the other older folks are talking about something I know nothing about: Depression, what’s that? It seems to have something to with money and poor people and who knows what else. But it’s Christmas time! and this morning I got up and rushed into the front room to see if there were any gifts. I’m overjoyed to find a brightly shining new red wagon just for me! At five years old who can imagine how that wagon, the only gift I remember, can come to mean so much.

Much later in life I learned the history of the 1920s and 1930s – the Great Depression followed so closely by the Dust Bowl years – years of financial ruin for so many families. The author John Steinbeck has chronicled the huge impact of the Dust Bowl years in his novels, “Grapes of Wrath,” “Cannery Row,” and “Tortilla Flats;” stories of Plains farmers who lost everything and migrated to California looking for work. In retrospect, and curiously, I knew nothing of the wide-spread suffering in my pre-teen years. In 1938 all I knew was my comfortable cocoon of family, my parents and sister, before my brother was born.

1939 – I started first grade school in the Lake View ISD in September, at age 6. Somehow, in the shuffle as the Texas school system went from eleven grades to twelve, I was advanced after three days in second grade, to third. Then, when we moved back into San Angelo I was enrolled in sixth grade in 1943; I finished sixth grade when I was ten years old (finished in May 1944; turned eleven in June). In September 1944 I enrolled in 7th grade at Edison Junior High. I clearly remember April 1945 – I was playing French horn in the junior high band; we were performing a public concert the night FDR died. In September 1947 I entered San Angelo High School, 10th grade, and graduated from 12th grade June 1, 1950; I was 16 years old.

In my adolescence I was never taught anything about life by my parents. The only teaching tool my mother employed was a willow switch – anytime I displeased her the threat was “I’m going to whip you.” The threat was often enough carried through. I don’t recall ever getting a spanking from my Dad. We were a very matriarchal family and he generally left everything to our mother – he never pushed back. My parents never said or taught anything about “the birds and bees.” Anything I learned in that subject was absorbed from overheard conversations among guys at school. The “safe subjects,” the social graces, my sister taught me as I entered my teens.

After graduating from high school at age 16, I had no real firm direction on college; having some friends who were a year behind me, I stayed out a year between high school and college. I started college at San Angelo College in the fall of 1951. (At that time SAC was a two-year college; it later became a four-year university.)

1957 – Called to salvation!

1958 – Graduated from Texas Tech and started my career.

From 1958 forward my life followed the typical trajectory of career and family, but 1972 added a new facet to my life. We were living in Dallas and attended First Baptist Church. We sat in a Bible class taught by Dr. William E. Nix. The Scriptures as taught by Bill prompted a desire to learn more theology, more about God’s presence in “everyday life.” Our commitment to church life eventually led to my being elected to the Board of Trustees at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, a defining point in my life. (Bill Nix remains one of my very dear friends to this day!)

My life’s trajectory is on the downward spiral now. With 89+ years of personal history I could go on, but I return to my theme: How to deal with growing old. The mundane things: sight – cataract surgery; heart – get a pacemaker; dizziness – carry a cane; driving – stay off the freeways at night; relationships – always be kind, you never know when you’ll need kindness returned; food – eat what you want, you’ve earned the right; activity – keep your mind occupied (for me, it’s writing blogs and essays). The important thing: God – stay caught up in Scripture reading, prayer and repentance, you may see Him face to face any day now!

GO WEST, GO HOME

“Lost in West Texas” is the title of a book by Jim W. Corder. Mr. Corder was born in a farmhouse in Stonewall County, Texas in 1929. In the book, Corder relates tales of growing up poor and describes his boyhood explorations of the “Croton Breaks.” On reaching adulthood Corder attained BA and MA degrees from TCU and his PhD from the University of Oklahoma. Mr. Corder’s West Texas is that area including Kent and Stonewall Counties, approximately two hundred miles west and angling slightly north, from Fort Worth.

Many (most?) folks have a special place in their hearts and psyche, perhaps where they were born or a place they’ve found on life’s journey. I contend that anyone born and raised in West Texas will always, if they’ve left, will feel a special yearning or a ‘pull’ to return. Maybe we all have the homing instinct. Canadian geese return to the same place each summer and each winter. Salmon return to spawn where they were spawned. Homing pigeons return to the coop. West Texas just simply has an aura, an atmosphere, a certain culture, a nostalgia that a native son or daughter cannot lose. People find a special place to visit or to vacation but it remains a second choice. True sons (and daughters) of West Texas may quash the instinct or resist for a while but it will always be lurking in his subconscious or his psyche. The problems that we suffer as ‘pigeons’ is that when we return from a mission, from a career, from raising a family, the coop has changed. In Corder’s case Big Rock Candy Mountain had been bulldozed to make gravel for the highway department, the road to Double Mountain is now a private road, and Grandpa’s old house had long-since burned. It’s hard to go back.

My West Texas is a wider area, mostly north, west, and south of San Angelo; with Snyder as the northern limit; Santa Anna and Brady the eastern-most points; Bandera and Uvalde and the Rio Grande River bordering the south; and west to El Paso. Towns are much more scattered, further apart such that one might drive fifty miles or more and not see another car.

There is a beauty to this West Texas. The weather is generally temperate, with a few days of possible freezing in late January or early February; a few days of 100-degree temperatures in mid-summer; with daylight saving time one can play golf or tennis without lights as late as 9:00 P M in June and July.

The sky is higher and bluer than most anywhere, untainted by industrial smoke and fumes. The stars are brighter in the clean atmosphere, free of the reflected glare of big city lights. (As the song says: “The stars at night, Are big and bright! Deep in the heart of Texas!”) The sounds of nature are unmuted by the hum or roar of traffic.

The people are more down-to-earth and friendly west of Dallas with her wanna-be big shots, or the clannishness of East Texas. (Probably most of the readers will remember the long-held motto of Fort Worth: “Fort Worth is where the west begins.”) There is a corollary to that: “Dallas is where the east peters out.” Further, if Fort Worth is where the west begins, San Angelo is the focal point of West Texas!

HOW DARK IS DARK?

HOW DARK IS REALLY DARK?

From my earliest growing up years I’ve never been afraid of the dark. I will admit though, that if I were walking by a cemetery after dark, I would whistle louder and walk faster! When we were living in the country there was no “light pollution” such as one sees in or near a city, reflected from cars, houses, businesses, signs etc. ad Infinium. Nights in rural Texas are simply beautiful with the star glow of millions of points of heavenly light.

I suppose there are perhaps numerous ways to experience total darkness. I DO NOT recommend being locked in an abandoned ice box or refrigerator. Nor do I recommend falling behind the tour group and being left behind in King Tut’s tomb or pyramid or whatever! I relate my “opportunities” to experience that sort of blackness. At my first one I was too young to remember much but I include it here only for the sake of a complete list.

Sometime in the earlier part of my first decade, my family (Dad, Mom, older sister) decided on a trip to Carlsbad, NM, to visit the famous Carlsbad cavern. We were living in San Angelo at the time, and in the mid-1930s I expect this was a pretty good haul. (In my adult years that would not at all be considered a long trip.) In these cave tours it is typical for the tour guides to turn off the lights in order that the visitors can experience total darkness, but I was much too young to realize the effect.

Carlsbad Caverns National Park comprises several caves, the largest one is named Carlsbad Cavern. The Park is in Eddy County, New Mexico, about eighteen miles southwest of the town of Carlsbad, in the high Chihuahuan desert and Guadalupe Mountains. The Chihuahuan Desert is a large ecosystem mostly located in the Mexican state of Chihuahua but extending northward through western-most Texas and into New Mexico. A prominent feature of the Chihuahuan Desert region is the occurrence of mountain ranges surrounded and separated by desert lowlands. Two of these mountain ranges are the Franklin Mountains near El Paso; and the Guadalupe Mountains which rise up 3,000’+ above the desert in West Texas and extend northeastward toward Carlsbad, NM. Guadalupe Mountains National Park is also located in the same ecosystem. Guadalupe Peak is the highest point in Texas at 8,751 feet.

The caves were known of by the Mescalero Apache Indians and other tribes, as well as by the early Spanish explorers in the southwestern area of what is now New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, and part of Colorado. Pictographs on the cave walls and firepits and other evidence in or near the entrance pre-date our modern knowledge of the cave by several centuries.

The modern “discovery” of the cave occurred in 1901 when a young cowboy thought he observed smoke in the distance. Fearing a grass fire might be threatening the ranch, Jim White rode closer and was amazed to find clouds of bats emerging from an opening in the earth. Over the ensuing months White and a buddy explored deeper, then deeper still in the vast cavern. Today the largest known room, the “Big Room,” covers approximately eight acres. Though this is the largest known room, it covers only a fraction of the entire system of caves. The area was designated “Carlsbad Cavern National Park” in 1930.

My next opportunity to experience true darkness was a return trip to Carlsbad as an adult, with wife and children. That was around 1970 so my memories are dim, but what I remember most from this trip is the vastness, yet beauty, of the cavern spaces (“rooms”) with all sorts of stalactites and stalagmites and colorful formations infused from minerals in the rocks and in the waters which formed the caverns. Again, the darkness is complete when the guides temporarily shut off the lights!

Flipping the pages of the calendar ahead several years, my next ‘opportunity’ was almost traumatic; not because of dark itself but due to claustrophobia!

In the early 1980s I was in the Energy Loan Department at First National Bank of Fort Worth. One of our borrowers with a significant loan balance had put up collateral including a coal-mining activity in Kentucky. Along with one of our loan officers, I went to Kentucky to visit the mining operation. I had heard the term “low coal” but had limited knowledge of just exactly what that meant. In this operation, the coal seams were only about three feet thick, running through and underneath low mountains (in Colorado they would be hills rather than mountains). Rather than vertical shafts, the miners accessed the coal face by means of small tractors hauling the miners in, lying down in low trailers. Tractors and personnel trailers were limited in height to travel through horizontal shafts or tunnels only three feet high. The tractor driver’s position was horizontal, looking alongside the tractor rather than over the motor. When removing the coal, pillars were left in place to support the mountain above. (I don’t remember the spacing of the pillars.)

Lying on one’s back in the trailer, side by side with five or six others, with that black coal seam inches from your nose, a mile deep into the mountain, is guaranteed to improve one’s prayer life! I was praying almost constantly: “Lord, please get me out of here and I’ll never inspect another coal mine, not for the rest of my days.”

A few years later I had the unexpected experience of finding that “dark” on the surface of the earth can be almost as oppressive as “dark” in an underground cave or coal mine!

I was working for a European oil company which had its US office in Fort Worth but was affiliated with a financial group with offices in Paris, Brussels, and Geneva. Early in my association with the conglomerate, I had appointments in each of those cities to meet and establish working relationships with the European personnel. My late wife, Wanda, went with me. We flew first from the US to Paris. No time for sightseeing on this trip but I’ve always wanted to go back to Paris after our previous trip there. After a couple days in the Paris office we went up to Brussels. While there, one of the officers, together with his wife, took Wanda and me out to dinner. (At that dinner I was prompted to try eel twice – the first and last time!)

From Brussels we decided to rent a car and drive to Geneva. It would have worked okay except that it was late afternoon, almost evening, when we left Brussels. We had anticipated seeing Luxembourg on the way, but it was too late in the day to stop there. We decided to drive on through to Geneva, thinking we could stop in a while and find a hotel or bed and breakfast. On a previous trip we had made a three-week circuit of Germany, Austria, and Switzerland and never had a problem finding lodging. Not so in France!

As the night came on the countryside grew darker and darker. We were also concerned that service stations appeared to be non-existent and we might get low on petrel. There were no lights along the highway, there was no moon, and I was and remain convinced there is nowhere on the surface of the earth as dark as the French countryside near midnight!

DARK IS DARK AT THE BOTTOM OF A COAL MINE OR IN THE MIDDLE OF FRANCE!!

At every little French town we would find a hotel, and in every case the desk clerk knew only one word: “complet,” (pronounced kum-play’, translated No Vacancy). I think they just didn’t want to discomfort themselves for an American.

Just before midnight we found a small hotel on the square in a French town whose name I never knew. The room was right over the bar and tiny dance floor, bathroom down the hall. I was so tired by then that I might have slept in the barroom.

We made it to Geneva the next day and found a luxury hotel to make up for the night before. When we returned to Fort Worth, naturally we had to fully describe our trip to our two daughters. When we described the part about the obscure French hotel, with my comment that we were the only guests who stayed through the night, our daughter exclaimed: “you stayed in a bordello!”

Guilty as charged, but just passing through! My chastity remained untarnished.