Month: September 2015

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Faces

I see black faces.

Reverend Alta, our lady minister, signaled me with a compassionate but direct look. It was Sunday evening worship time in Okmulgee. I had entered my last semester of high school.

Jerry, there are many of them gathered, she continued. A sea of black faces. You are standing before them. Speaking to them. I’m not sure what it may mean. But I see this.

Her eyes and voice conveyed certainty. Rev. Alta was confident of what had met her vision.

Vision. Rev. Alta saw a vision – at least a mental impression – with me in it?

I thought of the picture’s content – tried imagining the scene. My response was respectful silence.  No goose-bumps or chills. Still I knew from my heritage that these kinds of things can carry meaning. Maybe there is a scent of something here that I’ll connect with further ahead. Maybe not. I shelved the message of the vision, asking the Lord to do his will.

Weeks later green buds started showing on trees. Leaves emerged, flowers revived. With them, spring colors. Senior commencement drew nearer. I fell into a reflective mood – calling to mind people and events intersecting my life up to the present.

A leg brace – pear-tree climbing with Tim – Opaline and VBS – mischief – a polio ward – hayfields, heartbreak, home. . . And. Youth rallies with friends – Billy, Marilyn, James, Pat. . .

Musings continued.

From age five I sang lustily on Lord’s Day. Up front in the sanctuary with my peers. A happy routine each week – us all in a line across the front. Just before dispersing to our Sunday School classes. . .

This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine. . . Deep and wide, deep and wide; there’s a fountain flowing deep and wide. . . Zacchaeus was a wee little man, a wee little man was he. . .

I drew a handkerchief from my back left pocket and tooted my nose, telling myself it was seasonal Sinus.

The reflective mood carried me deeper. To feelings beyond simple nostalgia. Shortly, another tune surfaced. I had learned it at youth rally. And we sang it at Robbers Cave Park Camps. Humming it again, the lyrics came easily. I smiled, remembering it’s first try among us. Led by wavy-haired Pastor John.

It may not be on the mountain’s height,
Or over the stormy sea;
It may not be at the battle’s front,
My Lord will have need of me;
But if by a still, small voice He calls,
To paths that I do not know,
I’ll answer, dear Lord, with my hand in Thine,
I’ll go where You want me to go.

I’ll go where You want me to go, dear Lord,
O’er mountain, or plain, or sea;
I’ll say what You want me to say, dear Lord,
I’ll be what You want me to be.

The song stirred memories. Feelings. Of gathered teens at the front of campground chapels or church auditoriums. Singing the prayer and praying the song. Church ministers sometimes label things with short phrases. Our teenage faces were often moistened by the last stanza. . . Tears of Consecration.

Sensing the tender presence I again fished out my handkerchief. I grew thoughtful. An image of some months ago visited my mind.

Of distant lands. Of black faces.

Seth. O

©2015 Jerry Lout

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Musings

Did you hear the president’s been shot?

 During several high school summers – when not bailing hay with him – I helped Dad as senior gopher in his small business. At City Plumbing my duties featured grunts, grime and unmentionable substances. Dodging spiders in under-house crawl-spaces I soaped fitting joints of gas lines. Bubbling up of liquid detergent applied by paintbrush around the galvanized joints revealed any leaks. I, otherwise, threaded galvanized pipe and maneuvered flat steel rods (snakes) along clogged-up restaurant sewer lines. My before-dinner hand scrubbing redefined the term, ferocity.

My Preston High years behind me, a construction firm hired both my father and me in late Summer. As plumber’s apprentice I shadowed my journeyman dad, gaining experience in the trade. We were on a team renovating Okmulgee’s Post Office building. I sniffed the bunker-like quarters. Blended smells of concrete, sawdust and dankness indicated our basement environment. Carpenters, electricians, plumbers, playing their roles in a tradesmen’s symphony.

November 22, 1963

The basement elevator door opened to my dad and me. It was midday. We would surface to first floor and take to our charcoal-black lunch pails. The kind with contoured lids harboring a thermos drinks canister. Dad responded to the terse question about the president.

No, what about it?

I dusted my work cap. Dad waited for a punch line to the man’s unsavory joke. It didn’t come.

It’s not a joke, Clyde.

That Friday our lunch pails lost their appeal as our transport hauled us upward. The elevator scene found permanent residence in a newly-fashioned file in my brain.

Years later the writings of a gifted Oxford professor captured my imagination. I would rate the Irishman – who died the same day as President Kennedy – among my favorite authors. C. S. Lewis.

I believe we all have a limp, perhaps more than one. What manner of crippling could so wreck a person’s mind to make of him a murderer. Of America’s thirty-fifth president?

I worked with dad throughout the post office project. Over time I knew. The plumbing trade isn’t for me. I just wasn’t suited for it. Dad’s work was an honorable vocation. For me, the sensation of typewriter keys clicking under my fingertips felt more at home than the imprint of a pipe wrench on my palm.

Preston High had provided me time in the company of names like Royal and Underwood. I loved the forming of words. . . of thoughts transmitted to paper – loved the clicking beneath my fingertips.

Writing. the Thinker. Image (2)

I wondered. What if words, sentences, communication could lead to something? Excitement stirred – if only mildly.

My simple musings proved momentous. Leading me to broader worlds. Toward adventure.

Even romance.

©2015 Jerry Lout

 

 

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Bronco Country

Accounting. What am I doing in accounting?

 My course choice made no sense. Like a Wall Street trader striding up to mount an unhappy bull at our rodeo.

I had registered at Okmulgee Tech without the benefit of academic counselling – or common sense. I knew nothing of bookkeeping, had no aptitude for it. Better judgment won out before my second class ended. The vocational school – an arm of Oklahoma State University – did offer other tracks. I returned to the catalog.

The printed word interested me and teletype included the word ‘type’. Working for a newspaper means no shortage of words. Nor did the name of my new chosen direction, Teletypesetter Perforator Operator.

The high school from which I recently graduated lacked size and, therefore, course options. I very much wanted to gain two skills – Spanish and typing. But administration said I could only choose one. Learn a second language or learn to type – but not both. My plight was bothersome but promptly resolved. I never learned Spanish.

My instructor sat at the glorified typewriter and introduced its features. A machine that yielded a stream of punctured tape as the typist pecked the keys. Combinations of the circled holes translated into letters, words and symbols. The coded tape fed into a big linotype machine. Molten lead formed imprints, cooled, took on ink, released the creation to the press room. . . Steps in a process ensuring paper boys had a product to deliver – the daily or weekly newspaper.

OK Jerry, give it a try.

Adjusting my chair I rested eight fingertips in their sequence atop familiar symbols. A S D F . . J K L ;   (the right pinky paired itself up, as always, with the semi-colon).  A good feeling settled in. Eight drifters returning to their common home. In pecking order.

Jerry, would you consider taking a job far from here?

The question was my first introduction to the notion my typing fling may spirit me to sights and places beyond. Both geographical and figurative – to kindred-spirits. To surprises. One of them wrecking me – for life. in a very good kind of way.

My training supervisor studied my face for a response. Obviously knowing something I didn’t.

Yes, I’d be happy to consider it, sir.

Well, a weekly newspaper called the Cody Enterprise – it’s in Wyoming – contacted us. I’m prepared to recommend you for the Operator position if you’re interested.

I would be glad for the opportunity. Yes. Thank you.

So, twenty months removed from an earlier Oklahoma departure, I again boarded a Denver-bound bus. Though in a much healthier frame of mind.

A new passenger with a telling weakness for drink stepped aboard in Pueblo, Colorado and seated himself next to me.  Noting the Bible resting open on my lap he slurred an observation.

Oh! You’re readin’ the Bible. Good! His interest rose another level – as did his voice.

Are you a Christian?  More direct.

Yes, sir, I am. I was a kid – sure of my faith but not sure of myself.

Wonderful! I am too. Then he announced it. I’m Pentecostal!

Electing not to fuel the visit by confirming our common faith tradition I offered, That’s nice. He sank contented into his seat and slept. In a moment I glanced his way. I wonder what’s led him to seek comfort, or joy, or escape through a substance in a bottle? A nudge of compassion stirred. I silently prayed God’s care over the random stranger next to me – my fellow-pentecostal.

North of Denver I squinted through a bus window. A passing car sported a red Wyoming license plate. On it I glimpsed a compelling image. A bucking bronco giving his all to dislodge from the saddle an equally-determined cowboy.  Cheyenne boasted her Frontier Days. Laramie, her Jubilee Days – rodeos taking center stage at each.

Indeed, Wyomingites dubbed themselves the Cowboy State. Stretching myself out, I slid my feet beneath the seat ahead and let my chest pillow my chin. I was soon dreaming of my brother Tim and me. Of Bill, our horse clippity-clopping under us – to Okmulgee’s Rodeo Grounds. To the annual PowWow and Rodeo action.

By the time I stirred the bus had entered a land of breezy landscapes. The vehicle jostled under wind gusts as it navigated high desert near Casper. Wind River Canyon enthralled us – its rich blue waters snaking along canyon walls. Past Thermopolis the bus climbed to flatter plains, and finally our destination.

Soon we met with a sign along a city street. I chuckled to myself. Why should I be surprised?

Cody, Wyoming – Rodeo Capital of the World.

©2015 Jerry Lout

 

 

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Tug

Excuse me, sir . . . uh, Pardon me.

The raised yet hesitant voice came from the gravel entry into our farm driveway. The black gentleman’s call turned me to his direction. He was on foot and I looked beyond him to the road. The four-lane highway passing our place linked Tulsa to Dallas and bore the weight of unnumbered vehicles each day.

A long Buick sedan rested on the northbound shoulder, it’s trunk lid open.

On my Tulsa-to-Cody bus ride my mind revisited that day of a year ago. How did I rally the courage to share my faith with that stranger? And how did I then draw back from another stranger – who asked me of my spiritual life – just hours ago?

I’m sorry sir, the Buick-driver offered, but would you have a tire jack I could use? I got a flat just now and my jack is busted.

Drawing a jack from dad’s Oldsmobile I joined the visitor. We moved toward his car.

Where are you headed? I asked. Eyeing the flat tire, we exchanged general comments – about travel. About weather. As if the elements were listening in, a chilly gust delivered a shiver along my spine.

As we loosed lug nuts and cranked the jack I felt a tug from inside.  A sense that I needed to share something of Jesus with the traveller. My pulse picked up as I considered what to say and, as importantly, how to say it. He topped my age by fifteen years at least. And he was – in the language of the day – a negro, a man of another race. My mind went to our town’s Five and Dime Store of only a short while back. Displaying a pair of drinking fountains side-by-side. Twin porcelain fixtures – except for the defining labels above them. One marked COLORED, the other, WHITE.

Could I ask you, sir (my turn to employ the polite term), do you know Jesus Christ?

He studied my face a moment – mining it’s features for sincerity perhaps? Or anything.

Returning to his work, he secured the last lug nut with the tire iron.

I mean, sir. . .  do you know God In a personal way, as your Savior? Jesus gave his life to save you – make you right with God. He did that for me, too.

The lines of his forehead snugged together. He was thoughtful, not resistant or offended as far as I could tell. My relative calm in the moment surprised me. We deposited the wounded tire into the trunk, shut the lid and dusted our hands. I felt the inner tug again.

Have you trusted in him? Are your sins forgiven?

A short pause and his reply.

No, I haven’t, really. Though I know I do need to.

That’s all any of us really need to know. He loves us and just waits for us to turn to him.

Well, He displayed a stirring. I think I’m ready to do that turning.

We waited together. The busy highway seemed miles away.

Would you be O.K. kneeling with me here? We can ask God together.

Without hesitation he knelt to the pavement. I joined him. I felt elated, but tenderly so. Like in a holy place. Of joy. God’s presence meeting us on Highway 75 – and Tulsa-bound traffic breezing by.

Our prayer together was simple – uncluttered. An offering of confession, birthing of new faith.

In Jesus’ name. Amen.

We stayed kneeling a few seconds longer. The car’s bumper served us well – an altar of chrome. We rose from our knees and smiled at one another and embraced. A union of common son-ship conferred by a shared Father. Brothers.

He entered the car and resumed his journey – with an added destination and travelling companion.

Lord, up here in the Northwest now, would you bring my heart close? Near to you. Like on that day? Lead me to a family of believers. A church family in Cody – I’d like to feel at home.

A familiar accent lay in wait, for just the right time.

©2015 Jerry Lout

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Accent

The bustle and charm of Old-West-revived enveloped Sheridan Avenue. I alighted to my destination’s main street in late July, 1964. The summer air was warm – absent Oklahoma’s thick humidity – indicating the mile-high elevation. Tourism thrived, as it would this time of year.

Resting my suitcase at the curb I stretched. The bus moved on, making visible Sheridan Avenue’s attractions across the way. A renowned hotel stood at a corner.

Buffalo Bill Cody – co-founder of the town bearing his name – built the hotel in 1902. He christened the it Irma – after his youngest daughter – praising it as, “just the sweetest hotel that ever was”*. I shifted my weight to my better leg and wondered at the flow of tourists entering and exiting Hotel Irma. To most, their destination lay fifty miles away. For now they were visitors. Of Cody, Wyoming – Eastern Gateway to Yellowstone Park.

Taking up the suitcase I set off for my new quarters four blocks away. Stranger to independent living I settled into a tidy rental room in a private home. No kitchen access.

Would you like coffee, Sir? I’ll take your order when you’re ready.

My first morning in Cody found me in a diner two blocks East of the Irma.

I nodded to the young waitress.

Sure, thanks. And I’ll just have a couple eggs over-easy, with bacon and some toast.

The waitress went silent. Her gaze unnerved me. Uh, Sir. If you don’t mind, could you repeat your order? As I spoke she seemed to dissect each word as it left my mouth.  

Mm, I’m sorry, Sir. She was clearly distracted. And enthused. Please wait just a moment. I’ll be right back!

In seconds she returned, another waitress near her age in tow.

Sir?  If you don’t mind, could I ask you to repeat your order – just once more. For my friend, please?

Both girls leaned forward. Then I caught on. Neither one knew the Oklahoma drawl – much less spoke it. Even in a tourist town – so far from home – my voice was an oddity. An early morning marvel for a café wait staff.

The matter of accent resurfaced.

After two mornings – on my first Wyoming Sunday – I slipped into Cody’s Assembly of God church for worship. In seconds an unmistakable accent seized my attention. I discovered its origin – one of Oklahoma’s seventy-seven counties.

Okmulgee County.

*http://www.irmahotel.com/

©2015 Jerry Lout

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Seed

Alright everybody. It’s that time!

 Though the sanctuary lighting was nothing exceptional it highlighted the richest shock of blond hair I had ever seen. On anyone – male or female. The occasion – our youth rally, where teens showed up at that monthly gathering’s host church – wherever it happened to be.

Oddly, for a clergy simply receiving an offering Pastor John’s enthusiasm seemed tangible. Contagious. The glint in his blue eyes conveyed his pleasure. And warmth. This was near his heart – this offering – for missions.

Songs had already been sung. Hands had clapped. Youthful energy released into guitar strings, accordion keys and the occasional tambourine. It was the way with our youth rallies. Kids with musical talent – whether well developed or barely evolving – united in praise. John affirmed at every level. No spectator himself, his own electric guitar drooped comfortably at his midsection. It responded easily to his familiar touch.

Two empty collection baskets sat at the church’s altar up front.

OK, here’s our chance to join the Lord in sending his Good News of Jesus throughout the world.

The contagious smile, strong as ever.

Our Rally Offerings help Nigerian evangelists share Jesus way over there in Africa. But now first, young people (his voice softened), let’s quiet ourselves. Let’s pray for our dear brothers laboring in hard places far from here. These servants need our prayers as much as our quarters, dimes and dollars.

By the prayer’s ending most of us guys and girls fished what currency we could from our blue-jean pockets or pink-and-silver purses.

Filing from our seats, weaving forward, we dropped our modest offerings in. Dispatching salvation to the ends of the earth.

Pastor John laid aside a guitar pick. He took up his microphone, then his Bible. And soon found a reference.

Young people, listen up. I want you to hear this. Tonight we are helping dear African brothers to go among their own – taking God’s precious message of hope and life.

Listen. The slight pastor with his planet-size heart paused reverently. The room grew still.

God calls every one of us to the mission field in one way or the other. All of us to the world’s unreached nations. Now. I want you to do something. Turn your eyes toward your shoes. Just do this would you. Look at your shoes now, your feet. Keep your eyes to them.

Our focus shifted from hair-dos, from after-meeting burgers and fries. And from wherever our minds may have been carried by a random daydream.

Pastor John read slowly – his tone deliberate – from the book of Romans in the New Testament. We young people each one remained still. Eyes fixed – throughout the sanctuary – on our respective pairs of feet.

“How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!”

I stared at the pair of shoes nearest me. My own. The shoe at the end of my shorter leg – that limped, sometimes tripped. My mind went to descriptive mode. Shoes housing the weirdest, most pitiful-looking feet in the county. Maybe the state? I let myself try to imagine.

What if, though, in God’s eyes somehow – What if he sees beauty. Even in this pair of feet?

I smiled slightly. In the continued quietness supplied by Pastor John the  question surfaced again. From within. More forcefully, but sweetly. What if.

What if?

I felt my eyes moisten. As if to water a seed.

©2015 Jerry Lout

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Heart condition

Thirty years after my mother’s California journey I took the same bus line toward Colorado’s Rockies.  Past giant grain elevators of Enid where nearly half of Oklahoma’s harvested wheat is kept. We passed towns with romantic, historic, sometimes fanciful, names. Stillwater. Fort Supply. Slapout. At seventeen I had never travelled alone nor with strangers beyond about six miles of my home.

Melancholy. Adventure. Tension. The feelings mingled with others. Back home at Preston High my twenty-or-so classmates navigated two modest hallways. I, meanwhile, moved with each passing fence-post, toward a high school larger than I’d ever seen. Greater Denver’s population numbered more than half my state. What’s a big school like anyway? For an outsider entering twelfth grade?

I suspect my father’s stringent measure in sending me here rose largely from fear. Tensions, frustrations, awareness of his own short fuse. He couldn’t risk distancing me more. Ironically, this distance may be a safer, more promising, choice. He could take comfort, too, that I’d be in good hands with his daughter, my sister. Betty. One he knew to be responsible. Neither dad nor the rest of us knew of her struggles in a tough marriage. She and her four little ones – even as I approached Englewood, Colorado. She met me at the arrival depot. We were en route home.

In 1962 fewer than 500 McDonalds restaurants dotted our nation. I entered school right away and took a weekend job at the Golden Arches. I served up fifteen-cent burgers and fifteen-cent fries. Colorado introduced me to stock car racing, pepperoni pizza, moisture-starved nasal passages from the mile-high climate’s dry air. And, to the Cuban Missile Crisis. T.V. anchors drilled viewers with contingency plans. Looping announcements to run through each day. All traffic lanes will become one-way. Taking commuters outward – away from the metro area should evacuation sirens sound.

Somewhere in the mix, my dear sis was there for me. Supplying perspective in nonthreatening ways to her kid brother. Cutting through, patiently, confused tangles of my unsound thinking.

Months in, I somehow received word that my dream-girl had left Oklahoma.  I traced a number to Sue and, through an operator, dialed it.

Hello.

A flat male voice answered. I was standing – my back grazing Betty’s kitchen wall. For a moment I was quiet. I found my voice.

May I speak with Sue?

The male voice went silent. After some seconds she took up the phone.

Hello.

Sue have you gone back to your home – in your own state?

Yes.

Are you with him?

Yes.

Does this mean things are over now?

Yes. (a pause). I need to go now. Goodbye.

Concise. Surgical. Indeed, the raw announcement severed. As with a swift amputation. And minus anesthetic.

I began unraveling. I was, to a degree, unaware of surroundings. Not caring to mask emotion, what followed likely seemed melodrama. Still, I was a wreck – a heap of pre-twenties hormones and misapplied affections. Undone. The wreck slid down the wall. Not having really sorrowed for a good while – mark of my callousing heart – I let flow a torrent. After minutes, when the sobs waned, I was spent. I breathed a long sigh. I took in my surroundings and was relieved that I was still alone.

A clearness of thinking emerged. Slowly at first. The fog of misplaced affections, of contrivances, faded. Giving way to clarity. Tears resumed. But washing tears this time. Truth – deep and rich – seemed to find its footing inside me. Truth – like a homesick reject returning after a long absence. Unresisted. What irony. I softened further and my eyes lifted.

Father. Father.

I am so sorry.  Tears again.

 Added words didn’t seem needed, or expected. I sensed that God wasn’t after a homily, a prayer as such. Just my heart. Responding to grace. To Him.

A deep quiet followed. I savored it a while. Thankfully. So thankful.

Home. The word came as a silent whisper inside. Then repeating itself.

My lame foot had gone to sleep from my position on the floor. I rotated it a little. It stirred. I drew myself up and reached again for the wall-mounted green phone. Yes operator. I need to make a call. Soon a familiar voice was on the line.

Dad?

Yes.

I’d like to come home.

Your mother and I are here, son.

It was my best Oklahoma Christmas.

And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children,

 and the heart of the children to their fathers

                                                                                                               – Malachi 4, the Bible

©2015 Jerry Lout

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Tension

 

Clyde and Thelma Lout

My friend Dan and his wife raised eight kids. Dan speaks of the foolishness of youth that only age cures. I qualified, and hope a lasting cure finds me soon.

I fell hard for a girl. I’ll call her Sue.

I was too young for such a relationship. Too naïve. Too much a romantic. And too head-strong. Sue was nineteen. And I only sixteen. Just out of eleventh grade. Other factors, not noted here, compounded the issue.

To her credit, Sue did not initiate the romance – nor encourage it. Not strongly. Still, our affections for each other grew. My parents were concerned and advised against the increased times together.   

I was headstrong, but didn’t think so. I was ‘in love’ – and knew so. Not helpful this – in view of mom and dad’s objections. They tried reasoning. I spurned reason. They warned. I dug in. Short of direct surveillance Mom and Dad paid more attention to my movements. So I schemed. I’ll just walk the two miles to her place after lights out. Visit with her awhile and walk back.

My games were short-lived.

Poets say love is blind. I proved them true. By forgetting how visible a horse is.

Jerry, I have one question. It was late afternoon – several weeks into my ruse. My father’s tone was ominous.

I saw Bill tethered today in front of Sue’s grandmother’s place.

I knew I was in for it. How could I have been so dumb? I had secured Bill by his bridle reins to a tree in front of the grandma’s house. Along a route my dad regularly travelled.

You were there, weren’t you? With Sue? By this time I’d become obstinate.

 The accusing edge in his tone angered me. I didn’t reply. Rather (though knowing better) I returned his glare.  My brand of love was moving from blind to idiotic. Dad’s fingers slid along his leather belt. My thoughts went to earlier years. I was ticked off once about mowing the lawn. Though I was outside, dad read my lips through a window of the house as I kicked the grass and silently formed the D*!% word. Memories evoked by his fingering the leather weren’t pleasant.

My seventeenth birthday came and went with little, if any, flourish.

After the latest confrontation my good parents felt more grief than indignation. They prayed. They deliberated. Adults – especially parents – can envision things their strong-willed children if left to themselves, cannot. Unnecessary pain. Needless grief.

Some things call for preventive medicine – extra strength.

The hard decision was made. I was actually thankful to go away. From here – even Sue for awhile. My mom and dad and I had reached an accord.

I boarded the bus.  I’d soon leave for another state. My sister’s home. I glimpsed out toward my mother and father. They both looked glum. Tired. I felt pity. Sadness.

Where will this take me? This time in Denver.

 Hear, my son, your father’s instruction,

                       And forsake not your mother’s teaching

For they are a graceful garland for your head

    And pendants for your neck.

                                                                                                                                                              –  Proverbs 1, the Bible.

©2015 Jerry Lout