Tell Me a Story

I recently picked up Sue Grafton’s book, “Y is for Yesterday,” the twenty-fifth mystery of an alphabet-based series that began with “A is for Alibi.” I’ve enjoyed her writing style for years, listening to her books on our way to Maine or curled up with her pages as the autumn evenings stretch before me. 

Each book stars the feisty private detective Kinsey Milhone, who Grafton suggests is like herself, only “younger, smarter, and thinner,” or “the person I might have been had I not married young and had children.” Sadly, as I turned the pages of the “Y” book, I already knew there will be no “Z is for Zebra, Zoology, or Zeus,” for Ms. Grafton died late in 2017, one book shy of her goal.

Over the decades, I’ve gotten hooked on authors, such as novelists Agatha Christie (fun “who-dun-its” I enjoyed as a teen), Susan Howatch, (especially the Starbridge series), and books from the prolific pen of Father Andrew Greeley, priest, sociologist, journalist and story-teller. He claimed to write five thousand words a day – that’s a lot of writing. I’ve recently sought out Jacqueline Winspear and her investigator/psychologist Maisie Dobbs, and have been captured by the story lines arising from Louise Penney’s Three Pines, so much so that this faithful library patron and connoisseur of used books paid full price for her last release.

At age eight, the lovely Madelyn Simone is “catching the bug,” discovering the quirkiness of Shel Silverstein’s poetry and the imagination of Roald Dahl. She’s been renewing Dahl’s “BFG” each week from the school library, and carries the tattered copy around with her. I’m planning to expand her personal library this Christmas, probably selecting Dahl’s “James and the Giant Peach” and “Matilda”(with the terrifying headmistress, Agatha Trunchbull). And BFG!

What is it about story that draws us in? Whether on the silver screen, flickering on our televisions, or hiding between the pages of a book, story calls us. As Margaret Atwood, author of “The Handmaid’s Tale,” reminds us: “You’re never going to kill storytelling because it’s built into the human plan. We come with it.”

I’ve wanted to write fiction for as long as I can remember, because I’ve always loved the magic of stories. I started a handful of novels, but even with the motivating helps of National Novel Writers’ Month (an annual November event), I’ve struggled to get past page twenty. As a preacher, columnist and mother, I’ve always wanted to preach, convince, and instruct in “the way,” so it’s been tough to simply allow the story to speak on its own. Rachel Held Evans describes my struggle: “If you’re going to be a believable storyteller, you have to avoid writing like a woman, or writing like a man, or writing like a pastor, or writing like a theologian, or writing like a Southerner, and start writing like you.”

Yet as of this week, after a long gestation and a hesitant birth, my first novel is done, ready to read, in my hands, in the trunk of my car, and available on amazon! “The Sally-Ann Goodwife” asks: Can Elizabeth Anne Stanton find her way from the privilege of Main Line Philadelphia to the challenges of life as a faithful Salvation Army servant to the poor and marginalized? Can she figure out how to be a good wife to her beloved Bram without losing her own identity? In an attempt to answer those questions, my main character dons the navy blue polyester of the Sally-Anns and begins her story: “We stood together at my father’s grave, our tears washed away by the unremitting rain punctuating the dismal morning.”

Maya Angelou understood my need to write this story: “There is no agony like bearing an untold story inside of you.” “Autobiographical,” asked a friend? Somewhat, as the Salvation Army connection acknowledges, for as P. D. James, another favorite author counsels, “You absolutely should write about what you know. There are all sorts of small things that you should store up and use, nothing is lost to a writer.” 

Reading about Kinsey Milhone, Maisie Dobbs, Matilda and Miss Trunchbull, or Libby Stanton-Pearson this week? Greet my literary friends, and be sure to share a favorite of your own.

Won't You Be My Neighbor?

The recent Mr. Rogers documentary has left me singing his theme song, “It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood,” with its familiar tag line, “won’t you be my neighbor?” It’s a question many are considering in this rather tumultuous world, often with a sense of nostalgia for the 50s and 60s, where life centered around the neighborhood in ways that have seemingly disappeared from contemporary culture. 

In chatting with a friend, we wondered, “what happened to the sense of neighborhood we remember from our childhood?” In response, I made a couple of guesses. The most common answer in Family Feud style would be that women entered the paid workforce and no longer were at home. But I also thought about the difference it made when a household got its second car. Once a family could go in two different directions, there was seemingly little to hold them to life in the neighborhood.

My other guess was that air conditioning was installed in many homes. With the advent of AC, there was no need to open the windows, let alone go outside, thus providing little opportunity to even see our neighbors. Those of us of a certain age miss the nights when the kids would play tag, kickball, and SPUD until the streetlights came on. Now, as I said way too many times this summer, “I don’t want to go outside – it’s too hot!” And the mosquitos . . .

Other answers include our changing lifestyles, the role of social media (it get blamed for a lot these days), and a fear of the unknown. Brian Bethune offers this warning: “The evolving modern definition of a good neighbor is no longer someone who is part of your life, someone you chat with over the fence, a reliable shoulder in good times and bad, but someone who doesn’t bother you, either in your enjoyment of your home or by threatening its property value.”

Despite Bethune’s words, there is something about being a good neighbor that still calls to us, even in 2018. Why? For one, it’s good for us. Susan Pinker explains how humans need face-to-face contact, just as we need air and water. Those who are “surrounded by a tight-knit group of friends who regularly gather to eat – and, crucially, to gossip – live an average of fifteen years longer than loners!”

Good neighboring can also improve our neighborhoods. If we know each other, we’ll watch out for each other, lend out a lawnmower, report suspicious activity, or deliver a casserole when the new baby arrives or grandma dies. 

As a final motivation, there is a spiritual connection to neighborliness. As Fred Rogers said, “I believe that appreciation is a holy thing--that when we look for what's best in a person we happen to be with at the moment, we’re doing what God does all the time. So in loving and appreciating our neighbor, we’re participating in something sacred.”

To help us become better neighbors, Park Street Brethren Church is hosting a conversation on Wednesday, September 26^that 6:30 p.m. entitled “It’s a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood.” I’ll be joining Donna Thomas, who coordinates community outreach for Park Street, as we look at ways we can be better neighbors – without turning off our air-conditioning! Rumor has it that there will be fresh-baked cookies to encourage our discussion. Check with Park Street for more information and come along.

Also in Ashland, beginning September 18, Ashland University will host a series on the topic “Who is My Neighbor?” There’ll be lectures, a film, panel discussions, and a book discussion, with details on their website. These sessions will take the discussion of neighbor beyond the end of our block to wrestle with the age-old question: who is my neighbor?

A recent study in the United Kingdom discovered that nearly a third of its 2000 respondents could not pick their neighbor out of police line-up. I could identify everyone on my block when I was ten, but today? Not so. As Mr. Rogers describes, I’m ready to participate in something sacred, so it’s time to visit my neighbors. Maybe I’ll bake a batch of my Aunt Annamae’s sugar cookies to take along! 

Autumn Winds

My granddaughters and I recently talked about summer coming to an end. We’ll know it’s fall, I told them, when the days get cooler, the spray park and splash pads close, and the leaves begin to change their colors and drop from the trees. Another sign to look for, I told the girls, is the presence of the big yellow school buses on the road, colorful symbols that school is in session.   

Technically, summer isn’t over until September 22, the Fall Equinox, but I grew up believing that summer began on Memorial Day and ended on Labor Day, when we had to put our white shoes away until the following year. I’m not packing away the shorts and tank tops yet, as we may need them at least until the first official day of autumn. 

According to the Royal Museums Greenwich, because the earth’s axis is tilted 23.4 degrees, during our summer, the sun illuminates the northern hemisphere more than the southern hemisphere. Thus, while the U.S. sweats, South America and Australia shiver. The longest day of illumination is called a solstice. Then, on specific dates in September and March, it’s even – we get the same amount of sun (unless it’s cloudy). “The plane of Earth’s equator passes through the centre of the Sun’s disk (the moment the Sun passes the celestial equator from the Northern to the Southern Hemisphere)” – thus the equinox. 

I’m glad astronomers and weather people have that figured out. I just know that the hours of daylight will grow shorter, not my favorite part of autumn. Already, nearly every restaurant, bakery and coffee shop is featuring pumpkin-flavored treats to help us get through the lessening hours of sunlight.

But just think of the fun of autumn. The Ashland County Fair will conclude its 2018 run on the fall solstice. The corn maze, wagon rides, corn cannons and pumpkin slingshots will open at Honey Haven Farm on September 29^th. High school football is well underway, and the cannon blasts shook the air as the AU Eagles scored in their first home game last week, only to fall short in the final minutes to Indiana University of Pennsylvania. And the Browns are undefeated!

Another mark of the American autumn is the Halloween candy displays in the stores. Will Americans really pass out that much candy on one night in October, or do they buy it to keep a secret stash in their office drawers? With parties, costume capers, trunk or treat events, and neighborhood trick-or-treating, I guess we do need that mountain of candy, but I’m hoping some gets marked down to half price on November 1, giving me an excuse to stock up at a bargain price. 

Autumn also promises us cooler weather. I’ve been singing Cole Porter’s “It’s Too Darn Hot” for weeks, but soon, we’ll be reaching for our jackets on the way out the door. It may not happen until Christmas, but it’s coming.

Hanging in our chapel is a worship banner quoting Song of Solomon 2:12: “For now the winter is past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth, the time of singing has come.” We often speak of spring as a time of new beginnings, yet in our contemporary world, less driven by the cycles of harvest than biblical times, autumn comes with its own share of fresh starts, of buzz cuts, new school clothes, and the obligatory posting of “first day of school” pictures on social media. 

I’m finishing this column on Thursday morning while the delightful and determined Elizabeth Holiday is at her first full morning in nursery school. I’m sure she’s having fun, but the hands of the clock are moving slower than usual for me on this September day, a new beginning for Lizzie and for Nana. She’ll be dating before we know it!

Meister Eckhart reminds us that “suddenly you just know it’s time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings.” I’m grateful our singing isn’t limited to the springtime, and new beginnings aren’t dependent on the calendar or the temperature. Here’s to new opportunities, new friendships, pumpkin spice lattes, and even a “W” for the Browns!

John McCain, Patriot

With the final memorial service today and a private burial at the Naval Academy tomorrow, our country’s formal farewell to Senator John McCain will be complete. Although he never achieved the presidency of the United States, McCain played a major role in the governance of our country for many years, and despite political differences, his loss is being keenly felt on both sides of the aisle in D.C. 

Many words have been written, tweeted, and spoken about this man, but perhaps none more striking than his own final words to the nation: “We are three-hundred-and-twenty-five million opinionated, vociferous individuals. We argue and compete and sometimes even vilify each other in our raucous public debates. But we have always had so much more in common with each other than in disagreement. If only we remember that and give each other the benefit of the presumption that we all love our country, we will get through these challenging times. We will come through them stronger than before. We always do.”

I’m a staunch believer in the “we have more in common with each other” school of thought, the centerpiece of those final words. Who was this man? What did we have in common? 

John McCain grew up in the culture of a military family. Most of us haven’t experienced that path, yet many follow a parent into the fields or the coal mines, or take on the mantle of medicine or ministry. For the McCains, service to country was what they did and what they do, instilled in their DNA. When John’s father was reassigned, they moved with him, not always welcome news to the kids, but they did what they needed to do.

When John left the navy to run for a congressional seat, he chose Arizona, the long-time home of his second wife, Cindy Lou Hensley. Accused of carpetbagging (moving to a location for political gain), his response is classic. “Listen, pal. I spent twenty-two years in the Navy. My father was in the Navy . . .I wish I could have had the luxury, like you, of growing up and living and spending my entire life in a nice place like the First District of Arizona, but I was doing other things. As a matter of fact, when I think about it now, the place I lived longest in my life was Hanoi.” 

Yes, Hanoi, as in the North Vietnamese prison nicknamed the “Hanoi Hilton.”McCain’s strong family heritage of military service didn’t guarantee smooth sailing for the young man and his family. Initially, John nearly didn’t make it out of the Naval Academy, picking up at least one hundred demerits each year and graduating fifth from the bottom in a class of 899. Yet his class ranking mattered little as he flew missions over North Viet Nam, and after his plane was shot down on October 26, 1967, he spent more than five years in that wretched prisoner of war camp. 

With scars from his POW experience, a divorce from his first wife, several miscarriages with his second wife and her battle with pain killers, McCain carried on. His failed attempts to gain the presidency stung, and a terminal diagnosis of glioblastoma could have turned McCain to bitterness. But he credited his mother, Roberta McCain (surviving him at age 106), with forging a different path for him: “She taught me to find so much pleasure in life that misfortune could not rob me of the joy of living.”

Singer Geoff Moore asks: “What will be remembered of where I’ve come, when all is said and done?” Obituaries describe McCain as a rebel and a maverick. He is being mourned deeply by his beloved family. Yet perhaps what will be most remembered will be what McCain himself wanted. In a 60 Minutes interview with Leslie Stahl, he spoke of his desire for his funeral to be at the Naval Academy, where a couple of people will stand up and say, “this guy, he served his country.” Patriotism may seem old-fashioned in today’s world, but there’s no argument here: Senator John McCain was a true patriot.

Rest easy, John McCain. We have the watch.