Reflecting on Order and Quiet and Knowing God

Certainly the inscrutable nature of God is real. As well as His simplicity. And it seems, maybe, the order of a monastery, at least in the ideal, is an effort to arrange our real human lives as simply and plainly and orderly as possible so the seeking of the transcendent, necessarily inscrutable nature of God does not completely ruin us.

The contrast between us and God is off the charts. Is this why we are to live quietly and go about our business, why the east has this beautiful doctrine of apophaticism -- "We know what is not true of God but positive assertions we handle with great care -- all but complete silence?"

Perhaps this is why the ordering of quietness opens the door to awareness of God. Quietness, when even a naturally is a simple discipline that gives room for the (to us) impossibly infinite God to be known in some small measure. And to know God in the smallest of ways is larger than a life. Busy-ness wars against such a thing, though certainly diligence does not, for it is the same kind of ordering I am searching to understand.

Chesterton: The Great Shipwreck as Analogy

This is one of Chesterton's masterpiece essays, published May 11, 1912 in the Illustrated London News. I'm glad he could do so well in a moment when the best reflection was necessary.

Excerpt: Some hundreds of men are, in the exact and literal sense of the proverb, between the devil and the deep sea. It is their business, if they can make up their minds to it, to accept the deep sea and resist the devil. What does Miss Pankhurst suppose a "rule" could do to them in such extremities? Does she think the captain would fine every man sixpence who expressed a preference for his life? Has it occurred to her that a hundredth part of the ship's population could have thrown the captain and all the authorities into the sea?

The tragedy of the great shipwreck is too terrific for any analogies of mere fancy. But the analogy which springs to the mind between the great modern ship and our great modern society that sent it forth--this analogy is not a fancy. It is a fact; a fact perhaps too large and plain for the eyes easily to take in. Our whole civilization is indeed very like the TITANIC; alike in its power and its impotence, it security and its insecurity. Technically considered, the sufficiency of the precautions are a matter for technical inquiry. But psychologically considered, there can be no doubt that such vast elaboration and system induce a frame of mind which is inefficient rather than efficient. Quite apart from the question of whether anyone was to blame, the big outstanding fact remains: that there was no sort of sane proportion between the provision for luxury and levity, and the extent of the provision for need and desperation. The scheme did far too much for prosperity and far too little for distress--just like the modern State. Mr. Veneering, it will be remembered, in his electoral address, "instituted a new and striking comparison between the State and a ship"; the comparison, if not new, is becoming a little too striking. By the time you have made your ship as big as a commonwealth it does become very like a ship--rather like a sinking ship.

For there is a real connection between such catastrophes and a certain frame of mind which refuses to expect them. A rough man going about the sea in a small boat may make every other kind of mistake: he may obey superstitions; he may take too much rum; he may get drunk; he may get drowned. But, cautious or reckless, drunk or sober, he cannot forget that he is in a boat and that a boat is as dangerous a beast as a wild horse. The very lines of the boat have the swift poetry of peril; the very carriage and gestures of the boat are those of a thing assailed. But if you make your boat so large that it does not even look like a boat, but like a sort of watering-place, it must, by the deepest habit of human nature, induce a less vigilant attitude of the mind. 

An aristocrat on board ship who travels with a garage for his motor almost feels as if he were travelling with the trees of his park. People living in open-air cafes sprinkled with liqueurs and ices get as far from the thought of any revolt of the elements as they are from that of an earthquake under the Hotel Cecil. The mental process is quite illogical, but it is quite inevitable. Of course, both sailors and passengers are intellectually aware that motors at sea are often less useful than life-boats, and that ices are no antidote to icebergs. But man is not only governed by what he thinks but by what he chooses to think about; and the sights that sink into us day by day colour our minds with every tint between insolence and terror. This is one of the worst evils in that extreme separation of social classes which marks the modern ship--and State.

But whether or no our unhappy fellow-creatures on the TITANIC suffered more than

Sylvia Pankhurst

they need from this unreality of original outlook, they cannot have had less instinct of actuality than we have who are left alive on land: and now that they are dead they are much more real than we. They have known what papers and politicians never know--of what man is really made, and what manner of thing is our nature at its best and worst. It is this curious, cold, flimsy incapacity to conceive what a THING is like that appears in so many places, even in the comments on this astounding sorrow. It appears in the displeasing incident of Miss Sylvia Pankhurst, who, immediately after the disaster, seems to have hastened to assure the public that men must get no credit for giving the boats up to women, because it was the "rule" at sea. Whether this was a graceful thing for a gay spinster to say to eight hundred widows in the very hour of doom is not worth inquiry here, Like cannibalism, it is a matter of taste. 

But what chiefly astonishes me in the remark is the utter absence which it reveals of the rudiments of political thought. What does Miss Pankhurst imagine a "rule" is--a sort of basilisk? Some hundreds of men are, in the exact and literal sense of the proverb, between the devil and the deep sea. It is their business, if they can make up their minds to it, to accept the deep sea and resist the devil. What does Miss Pankhurst suppose a "rule" could do to them in such extremities? Does she think the captain would fine every man sixpence who expressed a preference for his life? Has it occurred to her that a hundredth part of the ship's population could have thrown the captain and all the authorities into the sea? 

But Miss Pankhurst's remark although imbecile, is informing. Now I see the abject and idolatrous way in which she uses the word "rule," I begin to understand the abject and idolatrous way in which she uses the word "vote." She cannot see that wills and not words control events. If ever she is in a fire or shipwreck with men below a certain standard of European morals, she will soon find out that the existence of a rule depends on whether people can be induced to obey it. And if she ever has a vote in the very low state of European politics, she will very soon find out that its importance depends on whether you can induce the man you vote for to obey his mandate or any of his promises. It is vain to rule if your subjects can and do disobey you. It is vain to vote if your delegates can and do disobey you.

But, indeed, a real rule can do without such exceptions as the Suffragettes; de minimis non curat lex. And if the word "rule" be used in the wider sense of an attempt to maintain a certain standard of private conduct out of respect for public opinion, we can only say that not only is this a real moral triumph, but it is, in our present condition, rather a surprising and reassuring one. It is exactly this corporate conscience that the modern State has dangerously neglected. There was probably more instinctive fraternity and sense of identical interests, I will say, not on an old skipper's vessel, but on an old pirate's, than there was between the emigrants, the aristocrats, the journalists, or the millionaires who set out to die together on the great ship. That they found in so cruel a way their brotherhood and the need of man for the respect of his neighbour, this is a dreadful fact, but certainly the reverse of a degrading one. 

The case of Mr. Stead, which I feel with rather special emotions, both of sympathy and difference, is very typical of the whole tragedy. Mr. Stead was far too great and brave a man to require any concealment of his exaggerations or his more unbalanced moods; his strength was in a flaming certainty, which one only weakens by calling sincerity, and a hunger and thirst for human sympathy. His excess, we may say, with real respect, was in the direction of megalomania; a childlike belief in big empires, big newspapers, big alliances--big ships. He toiled like a Titan for that Anglo-American combination of which the ship that has gone down may well be called the emblem. And at the last all these big things broke about him, and somewhat bigger things remained: a courage that was entirely individual; a kindness that was entirely universal. His death may well become a legend.

G. K. Chesterton

Why Don't We Confront?

Why don't we confront when errant ways we see?
Reasons rampant litter the path.
Who knows the motives, walked the path of erring friend?
It may not be error after all, sight being what it is.

But there's little knowing without asking.

No one wants the pained response, the indignation, the affront.
We grieve for others but leave be because it is hard to confront.

But at what cost?

We have all erred painfully in life. Why did no one speak up?
For me I know now I was headstrong, self-willed, 

preoccupied with my own way. 

No one wanted to tell me how wrong I was.

Do I have the love, especially with the young, to pray and wait
and then when it is right, sit down and listen? And then, maybe,

after listening long:

“Can you hear an alternate opinion?
I am concerned where this may lead.
I made a similar step when I was young:
here is what happened."

There is no substitute most of the time for relationship.
Most cannot hear well if they do no know you on some level.
But all are begging for clear direction. And caring.

Clear and caring is what they will thank you for.

And would-be confronters will mostly remain silent unless
they think it will be worth it.

It is the story of life. We don't listen, and those who could help,
won't. Why should they? 

Love is the only reason; love willing to bear the pain of rejection.




Help me, Lord.

Confessions

“Snide remarks do not become thee” --
('whispered' in my ear);
I know ‘the wound is more than kiss'
But this I could not bear.

“It feels so good to let it out,
to show how right I am!”
“And full of self,” came the reply,
“Your rightness is a sham.”

“When putting down the other one
to make the point you make;
You undercut pretended gain
and all for ego's sake.”

“What can I do?” I asked askance,
my lingua franca lost;
“Maybe silence – there's a start,
attending to the log

“within your eye that's overlooked,
so easily ignored;
The easy snark and cutting down
grows out of grievance stored.

“The 'healing' you so crassly give
With 'truth' 'neath ugly shroud,
Will ne'er be real until you know
your own heart is afoul,

“and let the Wounded Healer in
to heal your broken soul;
He needs no snide, but walks beside,
and makes the wounded whole.”

On Heritage, the Goodness of God, and Planting Seeds

The value of some encounters cannot be measured and we are blessed when we dare to believe the goodness of God is with us. I always remember this glad truth when I consider my beloved Kansas heritage and the little town of Miltonvale that looms large.

Last year I wrote about my Dad's coming to school at Miltonvale Wesleyan College and Academy, a spiritual anchor for several generations in my family, starting with my Great-great Grandfather Markey in 1908. It would be impossible to count the number of my relatives whose life was shaped by that place that many called “a prairie fortress for righteousness.”

On the Huff side my Dad's elder brother, Wayne, came to the Academy in 1957. As Uncle Wayne explained to me, Larry (my Dad) had stayed home in Emily, Minnesota to help his parents as there were four younger children still at home. My Dad, 3rd of 8, would have turned 18 that November and he was out of school so he could work full time with my Grandpa in the family business.

After Wayne finished the school year he came back to Minnesota and he and my Dad worked in Minneapolis for the summer in road construction as Minnesota was beginning the new Interstate highway system. I can feel the thrill of it in my bones: the time together, the long hard days, fending for themselves with camp stove or getting a burger at the diner, perhaps driving north to Emily late on Saturday and back again before Monday morning. Good days, sore muscles, long conversation, love — with the blessing of God near and promising.

Highway workers near Minneapolis, 1958.

Each August Wesleyan Methodist folks from Minnesota, Iowa, and South Dakota attended a camp in Charles City, Iowa. Uncle Wayne and my Dad decided to go down for weekend services. They drove the 180 miles or so and found lodging and meals and friendly people who loved God and loved them.

Representing MWC at this camp was one of the college teachers, Rev. Warren Freeborn. Wayne was happy to see him and more happy to introduce him to his brother Larry. Rev. Freeborn encouraged him to finish his schooling and this encounter changed the direction of my Dad's life, and mine in turn. In tears for all it meant, Dad decided to leave home and finish his High School at Miltonvale.

Rev. Warren S. Freeborn (1902-1978)

There were difficulties. My Dad worried about his folks getting along without him at home. The school had no lodging space ready for them and besides, the two young men had work obligations to fulfill, not least so they could pay their school bill. They explained this to the school and were allowed to come two weeks late. When they arrived they stayed for a few weeks with Aunt Eunice, my Grandpa Stacy's sister, while workmen refurbished an old basement room to serve as their dorm room.

That year was a good one, I am sure of it. As Uncle Wayne tells it, “We worked together, studied together, double dated together, and helped each other through!” They graduated that spring and were married two years later to gals they both met in that happy place – my Aunt Alice and my Mom, Glendah. In later years I often walked those grounds, ran up and down the old Abbott Hall where their dorm room had been, played ball in the old gym, even went to the old college snack shop.

But most of all I remember the spiritual impact of the place and the camp meeting on those same grounds that hosted a gathering each summer. It was life-changing because it brought one into touch with God. Eventually the choice my Dad made brought fruit in my own life, and I found myself letting go and finding God was able for me as well. I had my own set of hurdles, and my version of Miltonvale was 1500 miles away. But I have never been sorry, and will never stop being thankful for my precious Dad and Mom and the heritage of faith and goodness they passed to me by way of that humble place on the Kansas prairie.

Addendum:
There is a subtext to this, an important note I failed to emphasize. The influence of my Uncle Wayne was indispensable in this process. As an elder brother his word carried weight with my Dad and his encouragement helped make it all happen. It is an old truth of course -- we all stand on the shoulders of others. Everyone plays into our lives for good or ill, and in this way Uncle Wayne -- whose life has counted for good with countless people across the years -- planted seeds in my Dad that will grow forever in my life and with all whom I am able to love and serve. It is the truth of the old saying which I first heard, not incidentally, on that very Miltonvale Campground from a preacher in 1979:

"Anyone can count the number of seeds in an apple; only God can count the number of apples in a seed.”

Thank you, Uncle Wayne, for your life of faithful planting.

Uncle Wayne (far right) with me and my brothers at an event honoring my
late father in 2018. Always with us whenever he can, encouraging us upward.

The Mystery of Reciprocity

Reality should give us pause and make us hold our tongue,
For words are deadly boomerang and 'karma's' never done.
'The way you judge,' the Master said, 'the same will come in kind
into your teeth' and be assured the taste will not be fine.

So when the weapon's ready to release from angry heart;
Or when you see another one who fails to do his part;
Remember that the way we see has resonance within,
And hold your peace (lest you project) and then you truly win.

Of Laws and Life and Getting Along

“No one is above the law.”

We hear it often and we believe it. And yet we know, like all things in this world, it is an ideal with myriad mixed application and painful failings all about. It came to mind as my wife and I visited with a friend.

This new friend was a somewhat refugee, settled legally in an American state, staying in the home of friends. She has been there for two years. Her friend's HOA has strict rules about house guests. Two months maximum, no exceptions, no loopholes. The HOA president is popular, not least for her consistent application of the rules.

“No one is above the law.” There have been no exceptions, until now. The HOA president, if she even knows, doesn't care. And if anyone else cares, they don't say.

This means several things: personal freedom in one's housing decisions really matters, the spirit of the law matters more than the letter, and some things transcend the law, like mercy. I think our friend should be able to stay there as long as it is workable for all.

This is instructive, though HOA rules are tangential to our judicial system. Numberless factors always come to play in the courts, not all of them sinister. The worst violations are money and political power – unless of course it serves my ends – then I don't protest as much. As the ancient expression has it, “It all depends on whose ox is getting gored.”

I grieve over the litigious nature of our culture. Frivolous lawsuits, the mere threat of lawsuit, and “lawfare” plague our judicial system in ways that hinder it from ensuring justice for all. And yet there are factors at play we often overlook. Local matters, for example, are often decided with local concerns in mind, the strict idea of “no one is above the law” set aside. I saw this once in a rural community where a murderer received the leanest possible treatment due to the mitigating circumstances obvious to all who were there.

And yet one man's happy justice is another's broken scale, as we are seeing in spades today. The new President is doing things that, charitably considered, are merely reflections – perhaps correctives – of President Biden's misdeeds. One person's tit-for-tat is another's “at long last justice is done.” And we learn about it by means of variously construed media outlets which we trust or not, based on our own assumptions going in.

I think of two helpful reminders in this quagmire. One is to know various extra-legal factors affect the process of justice. How often have mere good looks swayed the opinion of all involved? Or what has a bad day for judge or attorney brought to bear? How often does sheer cleverness win the day when everyone looking on knows justice failed? Circumstances, particular venue, luck of the draw, some obscure point overlooked by court or prosecutor– they all come into play and we know pure justice was beyond reach once again.

The other thought comes to mind from the New Testament where Jesus speaks to how we handle ourselves in court. There is mystery to it, but Dallas Willard puts it helpfully. He says Jesus was after something like this: When you come to court be at peace with whatever the outcome will be and, moreso, be at peace with your opponent. Even be ready to greet him as you enter with a handshake and a greeting: “Well, I hope this works out for the best for all of us!”

Such an outlook might be ludicrous to an attorney but as Willard also says, we should take Jesus seriously enough to imagine he knew what he was talking about. Perhaps he was helping us know God is the final judge, life is short, it is likely we will not get total justice here, and we just as well be at peace with that. And maybe we love the other person – even our enemies – more than our own way.

I don't think this means for a minute that any person is above the law or that we must accept injustice as a matter of course. But it does mean, seems to me, that we remember we ourselves – the one looking back at us in the glass – are faulty. We judge poorly, and try as we might, we will get it wrong. We hope mercy will triumph over justice on our behalf. And in turn we learn to back off our insistence on what has become a legalism in new quarters: maligning and despising those who depart from whatever orthodoxy breathes the zeitgeist.

True enough, no one is above the law, except when they are. It is for us to do what we know is right, love our neighbor, even tell the HOA president to take a hike if we feel we must. And if she hauls us to court for it, well, maybe she is right. Let's try to work it out in the fear of God and pray the good prevails.

In time all will be made right, and I don't want to surrender to hate or fear along the way.

What is a Thing, Really?

Nominalism is a funny word. Though its use is vanishingly small, the idea is ever with us. Nominalism comes from the Greek word nomos meaning “name.” It says, “Call me my name; never mind what I really am.”

This first came to mind when I read ads for lumber in the paper as a boy. “Nominal measurement 2 inches by 4 inches” the small print said. What? Yes, a 2 x 4 is simply called a 2 x 4. In reality it is a 1 1/2” by 3 1/2” board. It is a nominal 2 x 4 – “in name only.”

No one really cares about this, of course. No one says the lumber man is lying. The expression has worked itself into the vernacular by very natural means. Lumber is milled as a 2x4, dried and then milled again so the final size is an actual 1.5 inches by 3.5 inches.

But the issue is ever with us. What is the difference between what I call a thing and what the thing actually is – its ontology, or being? Is it what I say it is, or does it have substance in and of itself?

This problem sometimes unsettled me as a boy. I would hear a word – almost any word: maybe the word “school.” Having heard it a zillion times, the sounds of it and its common use would suddenly seem divorced from anything real. It felt like a nightmare: the world had no real meaning. It was all fake, reduced to sounds coming from my mouth.

I was grappling – unknowing – with this basic idea that a thing is what it is, no matter what you call it. Words are necessary so we can talk about reality, but they have no substance in themselves beyond the actual meaning agreed upon. If the expression “school” always means a place where students and teachers gather and etc., well and good. The word has meaning, borrowed from that to which it refers and given credibility through common agreement. In academic jargon, referent and sign are agreed.

Enter Elon Musk and anyone else who falls into the unlucky category of making a particular sign with their arm. “He made a Nazi salute” we are told, and large swaths of the electorate are dumbfounded or reduced to peels of laughter. “He did what​?!” I am in this category. It never entered my mind that he was making such a salute.

But if I step outside of my own mind I see there is a large swath of the electorate who think the occasion of Musk's expression was not unlike a rally where folks are eager for things the Nazi's were fond of: group-think, un-bridled dominance, blind allegiance to their leader, restoring the Fatherland to greatness. In such a rally someone – an abject fool, in my view – might be inclined to make a Nazi salute and mean it as such.

I remain dumbfounded by the idea Musk was doing this.

One could argue, of course, that the salute is primal; that a society who never heard of nor witnessed the Nazi salute might use it in a given context to mean what salutes mean: respect, allegiance, obedience, even adoration. And this brings further the question of what a salute really is supposed to mean. When the common private salutes an officer, when a letter begins with a salutation, when a military escort salutes a government leader -- what is the meaning?

Elon was saluting the crowd. He was saying "thank you, I honor you, I appreciate you, I respect you." He needed something to add to his words, so he used a hand expression from heart-to-crowd that meant exactly that to him and, he assumed, to onlookers. The fact it looked like a Nazi salute to some can hardly be helped, and should not matter anyway.

The minimum of charity insists we try to discern what a person had in mind. Was Elon imbibing the spirit of a Nazi rally?

This brings us back to nominalism. Is a salute “Nazi” because it entails the lifting of the arm and shaping of the hand in a particular way and at a given angle? Or is it “Nazi” if it shares in various external similarities with a Nazi rally? Strict nominalism says all that we need is the gesture: if it fits the name, that's what it is. The corrective notion – ontology – goes to the actual rally and claims there were various components that made it “Nazi-like,” lending credibility to the idea Musk intended the Nazi salute.

Is this possible? I suppose, but I simply don't believe it. I think the man has enough sense to avoid an actual Nazi salute, and accusations otherwise seem, at minimum, quite uncharitable. I have tried to understand where others are coming from and have no doubt let my own bias color the effort. I began by wondering if Musk's accusers were mere nominalists but I have concluded they believe the rally was indeed Nazi-like. This is distressing.

We have reached a place in our national discourse where major press organs think a hand-gesture is Nazi because they believe the Nazi 'spirit' was at the very inauguration rally. And they mean it. Meanwhile, an enormous portion of the electorate deeply identifies with that rally. And they mean it. When you say Elon gave a Nazi salute you say that those people – representative of that electorate – were Nazi's.

Such a situation is untenable and portends the end of charity in public discourse. And while such a conclusion is deeply painful, I am a slave to hope, to the idea our nation can still be good and strong; that, in the end, it is our homes and communities that determine that, not Washington or press organs.

To paraphrase an ancient oracle, “A nation can only be great when it learns to be good.” Which is to say there is no true greatness without goodness. Otherwise it is just a name, or a salute: a word with no substance. I want the real thing.

A good start would be daring to believe that those who won the election are not Nazi's.

"If the Shoe Fits, Wear It!"

"If the shoe fits, wear it!" or so the saying goes. How often we read or hear a comment and know the person had us in mind. And yet how often, red-faced, have we confronted, only to learn they had no idea we were even "in the room," much less did they have us in mind.

I've been on both sides of this as perhaps we all have. Being accused of accusing or feeling the sting of affront when none was intended -- both are painful.

We usually know our flaws. The more serious the more sensitive. Pity the soul who unwittingly uncovers them. I pray for the grace to hear the affront and own it, intended or not. If the shoe fits, it makes no sense to pretend otherwise or take offense.

It's "Getting Along 101," but alas these jars of clay are fragile.

"For grace, O Lord, I pray. When the shoe fits, let me walk barefoot, learning -- listening -- rather than lashing out. Maybe, in time, I will learn the peace only you can give, the peace that refuses to be angry at accusations, true or otherwise."

When He was reviled, He did not revile in return; when He suffered, He did not threaten, but committed Himself to Him who judges righteously (I Peter 2:23)

Kepley School, Life, and Lessons

Kepley, looking SW from Kansas Ave.

That adjoining hallway is left-center. I thought the old gym was 

   demolished but it appears in the background. Looks almost 

                                     same after 45 years.

Time passes and we all learn to deal with it. Memory seems a gift, a salve along the way (except when it isn't.) Today I am thinking of those years at Kepley School, that place straddling Colorado Street that served, in 1977-'79 as “Junior High.” We went there after Joyce and before High School. It was a big change.

I remember being shy in the 7th grade, trying to stretch out of myself and not doing so well at it. The gathering in the main lobby before class was always a thing, forgettable as so much is, except for one notable encounter with a new student that sticks in my mind. We would get new students now and then: parents transferring in and out, moves for other reasons. I always felt for these kids but it seemed hard to properly befriend them. More on that later.

I almost always walked to school, it being a mere 10 blocks from my house on N. Glenn. The route was basic: Sykes to Main to Kansas to School, with the normal shortcuts and detours to keep an active boy active. I usually walked with my older sister who was on her way to High School six blocks or so further on (younger siblings were still in Hickok.) I remember all but nothing of those walks, only that they happened most days, and that sometimes we would stop at the Dart-In on the way home.

Kepley was new and mysterious to this 12-year old boy. I think 1977 was the year they finished a hallway tying the new cafeteria area with the main, original building. I had been there in the summer for band practice with Mr. G (can't remember the full name). That newer building also housed, as I recall, vocal class with Mr. Young, Art Class (can't remember the kind teacher's name), Home-Ec with Mrs. Chadd, and of course the cafeteria.

It was in that adjoining hallway, at the start of my 8th grade year, I had one of those coming alive moments. Still trying to stretch out of my shyness, I was walking along toward class and decided I would do the impossible and greet someone. I still remember who it was and see the whole thing for the change that it was. “Hi __________.” I had done it, stepped out of myself! The world was new!

Kepley was so many things. Sports of course, with wrestling workouts in the old, smelly

The old gym as I remember it.

gym. PE had a lot of fun games and I always loved it, even the archery. There were 8 classes to fill in those days including electives like shop or band, vocal, language arts, art, and home ec. I remember laboring through verb conjugations with Mr. Fast and joining in the torment that must have been daily for the librarians. Most of us didn't mean to be annoying but I am sure we were.

I remember one effective first-day-of-class introduction. After all the normal explanations the teacher brought out the paddle, sat down next to the desk and then crossed one leg up on the other, the sole of his shoe a ready target for the paddle. “If you cheat in class there will be consequences!” – and he would slap the sole of his shoe with the paddle. “If you lie or steal someone's things we will deal with it!” Wham. I had no problem with the teacher or his style. He wanted a well-ordered class and, as best I remember, we had one! And I seriously doubt he ever used the paddle for more than an object lesson. It worked!

There were many good teachers – they were all good to my mind now, for they were giving themselves for us, and that's no small thing. And I remember something we called “Lyceum,” a fancy old word meaning a gathering in the auditorium for a special speaker. I (almost) always enjoyed these. One time we had a guy from NASA who showed us a machine that could count grains of sand as you poured them out of a bag onto the sensor. Another was an escape artist, slipping out of handcuffs while he talked casually. He later extricated himself from a strait jacket to our amazement. Neat stuff.

And there was STUCO. I remember seeing the sign, something like “STUCO needs you to run for office.”

“What's STUCO?” I asked an unknown 8th grader. “It's Student Council. You should run.”

It was John Hastert. He helped me make signs out of news print paper and we posted them around the school. “Randy Huff for Rep.” I had zero idea what Student Council was, but John said I should run so I did. The election happened and I was befuddled to find myself a representative in some capacity for the 7th grade. We met in a common room that I think adjoined the shop area. The principal met with us and we talked of student leadership which involved, I learned, serving in concessions at home games. At the end of the year we enjoyed a bus trip to Wichita.

There are books to be written of all one learns in school. As important as the classroom was, for good or ill we learned maybe more about life outside of it. This lesson never left me after one new student came. It's rough being new and some of us were less than welcoming. He looked a little odd – don't we all sometimes? – and we picked on him. His first day at school he was in a white dress shirt, untucked, and we made fun of him. “Whitey!” we called him. I can still see him that first day in the lobby, off to the side, timid.

Later that spring I saw him on a street near my house. He was pushing his bike and attached to it by a string was a lawnmower. He was going through the neighborhoods to mow lawns. I ran over to him to say hello, forgetting my previous ill-treatment. As I approached him I saw him withdraw, a look of reluctance and concern, even a hint of disdain for me, given my prior cruelty. I suddenly remembered, somehow realizing I should tread carefully.

I had only meant to greet him and see how he was doing, and so I did. We chatted, and he warmed up a bit. I may even have apologized, and should have, though I doubt I did. Nonetheless, he went on his way and we were at least casual friends from then on. The encounter remains a life lesson. How we treat others really matters. Self-centeredness can make us cruel and oblivious. Something like repentance is needed, and forgiveness. Somehow my friend forgave me, and I am glad for the lesson learned.

There are a thousand other lessons from life and Kepley, all woven into so many good memories. I am grateful for the gift of life, and the many blessings of those Ulysses years.

Obvious

I speak a word, it's clear to me;
How could it be a fog to thee?
For ardored amour holds my mind;
Self-evident and satisfied.

Conclusions happy, logical;
To disagree? Impossible!
So leave behind false omnibus,
and walk with me in obvious.

Ulysses, Hickok School, and a Near Miss in the Principal's Office

There are always a thousand stories to tell, and the telling goes as deep as anything we know. I loved those happy Ulysses years, love to remember them, and love to tell about them from time to time.

We arrived in Ulysses near New Year's Day 1971. I was 5 and had three siblings: 7, 2, and 5 months. Our first house was at the far edge of a new subdivision on the Northeast corner of town. You could take Missouri Street North, pass a flower shop and the old Hungarian mechanic's back yard shop, past a public housing area and the dirt track by Hickok school. There was a park on your left followed by an old folks home.

Next you would come to that main cross road – Patterson -- that led out to the famous railroad bridge, go two more blocks or so and hit a wheat field. The airport was a mile distant to the West and our house was a brand new little brick place that we rented right on the corner where Missouri St. met farmland. It was so new there were sink holes in the back yard left over from excavation. We parked our Ford 500 in the front yard, friends unloaded the farm truck that served as a U Haul, and my folks set up house.

We only lived there a year or so but as memories go that little three bedroom home with a full, unfinished basement is etched in my mind. Someone was building another house next door in that first year, and the backhoe was fascinating. We had neighbors, especially the Akagi family whom I knew in school and always enjoyed knowing. Others from surrounding homes I remember by face or experience, but not name.

Of course there was the first year walking to Sullivan for Kindergarten. Who walks that far anymore? We did, and thought little of it. I passed the time on the way to school by kicking rocks and swinging sticks, once to the dismay of my elder sister, a second grader walking along side. I was oblivious and energetic, and the end of my stick found her eye one morning. My teacher had a stern word for me when we got to school, and my sister was at the eye doctor before the day was over. No more swinging sticks while walking!

Sullivan was good though I've forgotten my teacher's name. It was larger than the little country school I had attended far away in Miltonvale for first semester. I still remember the circle drive where my Mom would sometimes drop me off and say cheerily, “Let your light shine for Jesus.” I think of it now with gladness, though I often left the admonishment unfulfilled!

The next year I went to Hickok for first grade. This was a much shorter walk, all decked out in my Sears Toughskin pants and a new shirt. Mrs. Bowen was my teacher, nearing retirement and seeming old, like every adult does to a 1st grader I suppose. I loved her and knew where she lived in later years – seems like it was on my way to Kepley, maybe Baughman at Sykes or somewhere in there. I loved Mrs. Bowen even though she gave me a swat for tripping my friend, Troy. Life was pretty real then.

And I received other swats at Hickok, not for the telling now, except for this near miss. In first grade we were in the lunch room acting as boys will do. I was sitting next to my friend, Dale. “Get over there by your girlfriend,” I said playfully, pushing him away as we sat on the cafeteria table benches. “Get over there by yours!” he shouted back, shoving me in return. Without warning a man grabbed my left elbow and Dale's right, yanked us off of the bench, and marched us into the office adjoining the cafeteria. I was terrified. The Principal, Mr. Welch, knew we needed attention and he definitely had ours. I still remember the long narrow paddle with holes in it. He got it out of the bottom drawer and laid it on the desk where we could see it plainly.

I was a tender soul and some would say this was too much, even traumatizing. But I am not so sure. It put fear in me, and fear is what is needed sometimes, or so seems to me. I can assure you the idea of shoving a friend in the cafeteria never again entered my mind. Lesson learned! After a stern lecture he set us free, the paddle back in the drawer un-used.

There were other memories at Hickok. My teachers were, I think, a Mrs. MacArthur who taught us Spanish a little in the second grade. Another lady whose name slips my mind filled in for awhile in 1972 second grade – she also taught us kids piano lessons and lived over on Ulysses Parkway or adjacent. In fact, seems she had a bad accident and it may have been Mrs. MacArthur filling in for her. Third grade was Mrs. Day and I once got into well-deserved trouble with her in which I barely dodged the bullet.

Fourth grade was good – I learned how to multiply – and I can see the teacher's face but forget the name. Fifth grade was Mrs. Bender and she made a good positive impact with reading and other qualities of her class. I once remember, with childish innocence, telling a racially crass joke and receiving a hasty correction. Years later I had occasion to chat with her son, Gary, the noted broadcaster, and it was good reminiscence on Ulysses and her teaching life.

I think a Mrs. Oches taught music there, including occasional days when we would all play random instruments. And there were creative escapades into things like square dancing. PE was always fun with some pretty tough and challenging exercises, like holding the parachute all on the edge in a circle and pulling it up and down while balls bounced in the middle. Team work, strain, unusual muscles, and awkward all rolled into one.

And there was always something like a field day at the end of the year when, to my delight, Sullivan would send over there teams, or vis a vis, and we would have, among other things, a great softball game out on the playground.

Not long before we moved to Ulysses, I am told, someone lost there life at the electrical site on the south end of the Hickok school property. That always made me sad and thoughtful when I would go on that part of the playground. And among other things at Hickok there were the occasional after-hour activities for 4-H or music recitals that brought me into the building and I would see the halls, dark and mysterious behind the barricades.

I loved Ulysses and I loved Hickok, principal's office and fear of paddles notwithstanding. And I am deeply grateful for all those who gave their gifts and love and labor to help me and my siblings get through those happy years of school.