The Backbone of America

The backbone of America is aching. Haunted eyes reach out a hand imploring for a job. The words are proud but the eyes speak the fear of children that feel the gnaw of hunger.

At the grocery store she examines her meager cart before she enters the line. Quietly she picks out one item, places it under her arm … then two more. She turns and walks back into the aisles, her cheap flip flops slapping as she shuffles stoically returning that which she knows she does not have the money to pay.

As I stride impatiently to the druggist counter to pay for some allergy medicine I am pulled up short by an elder couple with matching gray hair. His thick lens, gold frame glasses are dirty but his denim overalls are clean and pressed. She wears a print cotton dress. The colors are faded; the once vivid violets melted to a dingy blue. His hand shakes with palsy as he reaches the bills out to her steadier hand. The cashier matter of factly utters, “That’ll be $92.53, mam.”

She looks like a feeble school marm as she stares blankly at the cashier for maybe the count of three. The old man blanches and growls shakily … “Never mind. I’ll just have to do without it. The insurance is supposed to pay more. Somethin’s wrong. It’s them new changes the gov’ment’s makin’ with Medicaid, I reckon.”

“I’m sorry sir but there is nothing I can do.”

I’m frozen in place as she takes his arm and they slowly walk away somehow more stooped than when I first laid eyes upon them.

As I depart the store to go to my place of business I realize that my heart is heavy and my eyes have filled. Business has been slow for a long time now. Folks are hurting. They are hurting in a way that lives at the core of who we are. Once determined and confident people are reduced to a state of despair that is sadly similar to that gnaw of physical hunger but instead it gnaws at our heart.

Adding to the worry and doubt is the pervading fact that the neighbors are the same … and their families and everyone they know. This is deep and dark water and our limbs are weary. We question how long we can continue to tread water. We stopped swimming long ago because there was no land in sight and all that was left was to hold on.

We know the fat cats are still on the hill. The papers tell us the bonuses still roll on and the corporations are back in the black. Legislation saved those "too big to fail" yet left the backbone of America to ache. As the aching grow s... there is the looming need to marshal all energies … stand tall … walk slow … and keep our eyes on the Father we know is watching.

"I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry"

A few years back, when asked by singer David Allen Coe to write the perfect country song, songwriter Steve Goodman wrote a couple of catchy verses. They were added to Coe’s hit “You Never Even Called Me By My Name” that attests to the importance of a broken heart, getting drunk, going to prison, mama, pickup trucks and trains. These are supposed to all be necessary ingredients of any successful country song. There is another kind of country music though that touches my soul like God’s finger reaching down to touch Adam’s on that ceiling in Italy.


Born in the twenties and raised through the Great Depression in south central Alabama little Hank Williams was poor as dirt and beset with what was only known at the time as a chronic spinal condition (probably spina bifida) that would torture him mentally and physically all his short life. His father died when he was seven. There was no reason for this guy to be anything but mean and pissed off: no hope, no peace, no education, no health and very little food on the table. Instead, he learned the blues and gospel from rural folks both black and white. The music sustained him. He combined those music forms with the country music of the day to produce a sound that was unique for his time. Unlike many he remained true to his musical roots until his death. The guitar fit him like those favorite blue jeans that make your butt look good.

I could spend time describing his tragic life to you. It would read pretty much like that country song I mentioned before. It was basically a train wreck. The thing is that out of that wreck sprung an American poet. He wrote many songs; even some hymns. I believe that from the throes of his alcoholic pain oozed the raw truth that punches us in the gut so that we remember the ache every time we think about it.

In one song he asked if we can hear life … “Can you hear that lonesome whippoorwill? It sounds too blue to fly.” He saw hope in a vision … “The silence of a falling star lights up a purple sky.” He painted loneliness with the brush of his heart …”and as I wonder where you are, I’m so lonesome I could cry.”

At first blush, you figure he’s talking about a woman. Then you have to wonder; maybe it’s God he’s looking for, as he howls at the moon in his high-pitched tenor wail.

When I hear Hank Williams cry his lament laced with feeble hope my eyes never fail to well up. My gut tightens. The top of my ears tingle and the hair stands up on the back of my neck. His yearning lays heavy on my soul.

I can see him now flying down a lonely country road in the back of a huge old 50s Cadillac just like in the movie “Your Cheatin’ Heart”. Mom, Dad and I saw it at the Monroe Drive In Theatre out on Hwy 74 when I was a kid. He’s drunk and strumming that old guitar and he knows he’s committing suicide on the time payment plan.

He also knows that he loves God but his demons are winning. He can still tell us though who he is and what his dreams are made of. He can still believe that somewhere in his loneliness a “whippoorwill sings … a falling star brings light” … and a poor country boy can share his poetic genius as true as any man. He can cry out in his pain and the world can hear him clearly.

I’m no expert on music or art. All I know is that when I can see inside an artist by experiencing his work I am closer to what God meant for us to be. When someone can show us his or her soul then we all walk on hallowed ground. It’s a shame country music has such a tawdry and simplistic reputation because at its best it can be as powerful a gift as any art form that has ever existed. If you get a chance … one day when you’re not too busy and no one is around … maybe “google” or “You Tube” ole Hank and take a listen. ‘I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” is the title. Maybe … just maybe you’ll come away with a little different perspective.

I’ll close with a line composed from the heart of a simple backwoods troubadour they called Hank … “Did you ever see a robin weep, when the leaves begin to die? That means he’s lost the will to live. I’m so lonesome I could cry.”

Strikes me as living proof that “simple” doesn’t always make “dumb”.

Our Father's Call

One morning I was rushing to and fro caught up in what I had to get done, I was pumping gas, building up a head of determined steam when I heard a voice. “Excuse me, Sir. Would you like to read a copy of the Watchtower?” I turned my head and there stood a boy of about eight holding out a couple of thin magazines.

 He was clean-cut, hair slicked down with a blue oxford shirt sporting a yellow and blue striped, clip-on tie. His too big shirt framed his skinny neck. He appeared freshly scrubbed with light brown eyes. He was reaching up to me … hesitant, shy, and maybe even a little afraid of the weathered older man with the furrowed brow and deep voice. All I had to offer him was my knee jerk reaction to anyone “pushing” religion at me.”I’m good son. No thanks.’ I barked, as I turned back to the pump. Out of the corner of my eye I could see him walk away.



As a lifetime of sometimes small and sometimes not so small cruelties flooded into my heart I realized that I was ashamed. I stopped pumping gas, turned and stomped over to the mini-van where he had retreated. The van was full of folks of all ages, black and white, male and female. I spotted the small boy settling there in the back. Now it was my turn to feel a little shy, maybe even a little afraid. “I changed my mind,” I growled and again he reached out with the pamphlets and magazines, smiling that angelic grin that he had originally produced. As I turned there was an audible “awww” from the women.

Religious intolerance at the very least is an ugly beast. At its worst it robs us of our humanity. The greatest shame about that is our loss of the Father’s call. I can only hope and pray that each day as we all walk through our trials and tribulations we can be willing to meet the outreached hand of God as he speaks to us. I failed to get your name, my little friend. I failed to shake your hand. I hope you know somehow the power of your touch. I hope that you can receive the Father’s call as you so willingly gave it to me.

Time With the Boys

There’s no doubt that Father God has a sense of humor. One sure sign of this is the fact that I was blessed with twin sons at the age of 44 years. Having lived a rather rowdy existence I was somewhat “stove up” yet still full of spit and vinegar and  quite capable of the physical trial that lay before me. I can sometimes be more than a little cranky about the whole affair though.

They are 14 years old now. Often I find that I am somewhat critical of what I perceive to be their lack of a work ethic and a general teenage aversion to chores and the duties of life.

School is out and their mother needed the house for a client so I offered to take them to work with me. I figured I would teach them a couple of things and let them experience the down and dirty trench warfare that self employed entrepreneurial endeavor can encompass. I also figured that I would get little accomplished during this educational experiment.

As I showed them the ropes I noticed they were calm and absorbed seeming to take it all in. It was 95 degrees of oppressive heat so of course I would have enjoyed a little more enthusiasm but I could in no reasonable way complain.

Eventually we took some photos and loaded them to the hard drive of my computer. As I went to explain they would complete the tasks before I could finish. At one point there was a mistake where I would usually begin all over and go through and entire process. They quickly resolved the issue and moved on. One wise sage of the two can seldom fail to remind his “Pops” that only dinosaurs struggle with such evolutions and that their abilities are simply par for the modern course.

Their mother came and picked them up at mid-afternoon. After they left I was a bit chagrined and found myself yearning for their presence. I reviewed the half days work and realized that though a little behind I was by no means lacking in the days work needs and that they had been quite a bit of help. They had also learned at a remarkable clip though an employee had suggested I was giving them too much information at one time.

I sat at my desk looking out the window, as I am periodically prone to do and found that I was in an emotional state. Memories flooded my mind’s eye as I bathed them in their basinet and swung them in circles grasping under their armpits. We would laugh insanely as I placed them on their tiny feet and they would careen into a face plant onto the soft summer grass.

I pushed the small bicycles with training wheels hoping and praying they would not fall and get a nasty strawberry as a result of Daddy’s insistent encouragement. I watched them toddle onto the huge orange bus, more backpack than child, in the early dark of pre-dawn and remembered feeling much the same way that I feel in this moment staring out the window.

Yeah … old Father God sure has a sense of humor. I can’t help but wonder what his next joke’s going to be?

Masks

There’s a macramé piece of art on my office wall. It was given to me years past by a young woman I had befriended. I had originally met her at work when she bounded out of her compact car clad in the remnants of a clown outfit. She still had on the colorful polka dotted jumper with its frilled collar and blousy legs. She was barefooted as she loped through my asphalt world. She worked for one of those companies that send “happy grams.” That is to say, an actor will sing a song or read a card like the strip-o-grams without the stripping. Her shtick was the “clown thing.”

Lori was an artist of sorts. She had a predominantly American Indian heritage and much of her art was native. The piece on my office wall was somewhat more eclectic and fascinated me. It is three masks in a simple frame on a faux granite background. They remind you of the actor’s guild symbol with the two faces … yet they are more enigmatic. Each has a jewel at the forehead. Two small ones have a pearl and a turquoise respectively. The largest consist only of the eyes and nose like the masks that women held up at masquerade parties in the 16th and 17th centuries. It sports a red star with golden beams rising out of it on the forehead spot.

At first glance I saw myself in the work. Two faces representing the good and the evil: the dark and the light: the sun and the shadow: happiness and sadness. The third is freedom. It is the rising up out of our conflict into a new awareness: the truth of ourselves if you will.

I was so taken with the piece that she took it down off her wall and gave it to me. I barely knew her … but then in some unspoken way … I had known her forever.

We became friends from a distance. She was in and out of my life for one reason or another for many years. Eventually she became friends with the girl that became my wife. I tried to do business with her once. When I wouldn’t toe her demanding line she told me “So you’ve sold out have you?” I resented it and disagreed at the time.

Lori and I had come from a generation and culture that wanted to “burn down the mission” and start again. The industrial military complex was the enemy and it was our job to resist the capitalist narrow-minded dogma of the previous generation. Needing to provide for children (Lori didn’t have any) I suppose I had cast aside many of the idealistic convictions of my younger years.

Lately I have entered a state of life that leans more toward contemplation and less the material. I chased a dollar for many years with an unflinching zeal until I began to feel empty.

How easily we embrace our shadow. It takes so little for us to cast aside our ideals for the sake of material comfort. Many years now the masks have graced the wall over my shoulder as I work. Every now and then I lean back and look up at them. I had thought that I had reached the awareness of the “shooting red star”.

Today I have begun to question that awareness. Do we as working units in a capitalist structure grow up, earn a living … rise to adult awareness; or are we just putting on blinders so we can justify the casting off of youthful conviction?

I suppose in the end, like so much else in life it’s just a matter of perspective … or is it? When we vote do we use our convictions or our need? When we teach our children do we err on the side of idealism or acquisition … achievement? I would like to think that Ihave been true to the desire to rise above the material focus of the generation before me. Then I look at the masks … and I can’t help but wonder

Father's Day Reflection

Father’s Day I sat and watched the ending of a movie from ten or so years back. “Tombstone”. It is a stylistic interpretation of the adventures and life of Wyatt Earp. Earp is played by the Disney icon of my childhood Kurt Russell that psychologically and emotionally adds a layer of identification.

These men are tough; hardened by the environment and the loose society of mostly men who seek out these rugged untamed places in mid 19th century America. Many fall to their basest animal instincts. Those who would settle and bring civilization … the money require that the animal be controlled; “Stage front” … the lawmen of the Wild West.

I can’t help but see this scenario as symbolic of the struggle of modern man. Instinctually we would grasp what we need and want and wrest it from the wilderness that is our environment. Civilization has it’s rules though so we learn to play within those rules like a helmeted warrior on the football gridiron or and agile dancer on the stage at the Met.

In the movie we are gifted with periodic peeks at the inner tenderness that is at the core of most men. We see that the beauty that comes to visit their harsh world softens them. We clearly recognize their loyalty and yes their love of one another as brothers in combat yet there is more.

To love another man is to know beyond any doubt that you can count on him. These men live in a world where should anyone falter in the support and courage that carries the unit forth … all may well fall. Here we see the symbol of man’s fall from grace. To give up … to lie down is to fail not only yourself but also your fellows.

The bible tells us “greater love hath no man than to lay down his life for his fellows.” Here lies the only gift of war. Here lies the only gift of violence. Here lies the deepest truth of what we demand of our men.

Yet we ask them to be gentle. We ask them to bring forth vulnerability that in the world of men can bring the fall that these same men so desperately fear. So in “Tombstone”, in the end we see these men stand as the dust settles. Good has ultimately won and as they depart the brotherhood of battle one “gristled compadre” utters, “I just ain’t got the words to say, Wyatt.” Wyatt intones from glittering blue eyes and that walrus mustache of virility … “It ain’t necessary Bill.” The other man standing there meets the eyes of Earp, nods knowingly then turns and walks to his horse.

At last Earp is free to follow the love that wells up from the tenderness he has so long denied. He goes east and finds the beauty that had floated through his violent world so briefly yet had left possessing his heart.

This is a symbol of today’s modern man with his family. This is where we are required to bare our hearts in the vulnerability that so threatens who we are. If you can … forgive us; if you can give us room to learn each day who we are and where we belong, if you can love us then we will not falter.

If not … know this. We would be gentle but there are forces that strike at the core of our being. Our first job is to be warriors; to protect and defend and provide.

“Greater love hath no man than to lay down his life for his fellows.” These “fellows” are not only warriors on the field of combat but our family and our church … our coworkers and those less fortunate who need our help.

Let us though not lose sight of the fact that each man … each day struggles to balance the “beast and the beauty.” It is only through God’s love that we know the difference. It is only through God’s love that we persevere.

A Gift

I had only known my mother-in-law, Becky, for a short time. It was obvious from first blush that she was a warm and “easy to talk to” lady. Actually she never stops talking but that’s a good thing when you’re the new guy and terribly uncomfortable.


It was the first Christmas at their house for me. Christmas … and it was 75 degrees in Jacksonville, Fla. I had been working in the cold rain all month in North Carolina. Becky had called one day and asked how I was doing. I said that I was wet, cold and busy. “I really don’t have time to talk right now, Becky”. I don’t think I was rude but as can be my way, especially when working, I was, no doubt a bit brusque.

Fast forward to the following Christmas morning as wrapping paper flies everywhere. Each person eagerly explores his or her Santa Claus booty.

“OOOhhh. …. AHHH … Just what I wanted! Thanks Grand Ma … Big Daddy.” Over to the side, I was busy extracting a black raincoat with a red flannel lining from a tissue filled box that had been carefully wrapped in red and green. I seem to remember holding it up with both hands and having to consciously close my gaping mouth as I gazed up at it in the glaring light.

For some reason I was somewhat confused. The only thing I knew to do to show my appreciation, other than mumble, “Thank you”, was to try it on. The moment I donned that flannel-lined jacket over cargo shorts and tank top, I started sweating like a pig. I was red faced and a little perplexed that this petite and yes, somewhat aggravatingly eccentric lady had gone searching for a warm raincoat in the tropical Jacksonville heat.

I could just see her padding across the sweltering black asphalt of the mall parking lot. The fact that in order to accomplish her goal she had considered me, even though we barely knew each other, working wet and cold was what stuck somewhere inside me.

I wore that raincoat out. It still hangs in the closet at work. It’s all torn up so I don’t wear it anymore. I’ve had it in my hands with other stuff headed for the trash can but I never could bring myself to throw it out.

Every now and then, on a cold rainy day … I’ll pull open the closet door … stand there … and just look at it for a moment or two.