Remembring
13/09/15 05:14
Thirty-two years ago we were in Berkeley, California. It was our first extended study leave since we had been ordained. We had served five years in our first parish and although there was no sabbatical policy and the parish had never had a minister take a sabbatical, we worked out an agreement that allowed us to combine our vacation with two extra weeks of study leave so that we could participate in a short-term pastors in residence program at Pacific School of Religion. The school arranged for a small apartment and provided access to the library and classes. We defined a writing project and set off in our Ford Escort for the west coast.
Although our son had grown up with lots of car trips, it was the longest trip we’d ever taken with our then two-year-old. Our car had a cassette tape player in the dashboard and we had a cassette of the soundtrack to “A Chorus Line,” the 1975 Broadway Musical. A year or so earlier we had seen a production of the musical by the touring company in St. Louis, where my sister lived at the time. Our son loved the overture and the beginning of the musical, so that tape got played over and over as we ticked off the miles from North Dakota to northern California. And, of course, we didn’t take the shortest route. Susan had a sister living in Spokane and I had a brother in the Seattle Area, so we went out to the coast and took the drive down 101 to California, tent camping along the way.
By the time we got to California, I was tired of listening to A Chorus Line.
We thought our car was a pretty good deal. We had traded off our Ford Pinto for the smallest station-wagon in the Ford Fleet. The new car had a five-speed transmission and cruise control. We didn’t have air conditioning. We didn’t think we needed it, living in North Dakota. Times were different. Four doors are a luxury when you have a car seat in the back and the extra space afforded by the square shape of the car meant that there was room for our luggage and tent and sleeping bags, and, of course, the manual typewriter that we used for our writing projects at the time.
Having left Chicago with full access to the University of Chicago’s Regenstein Library, (one of the top five libraries in the world at the time) we were really looking forward to being able to spend time in a big library again. We had enough experience under our belts to be ready to do a little research and add a bit of learning to equip ourselves for going forward in the ministry.
It was an exciting trip. We drove across the Golden Gate Bridge and the Oakland Bay Bridge. Then we drove back over the Oakland Bay Bridge to visit San Francisco. We ate crab fresh steamed on the pier. We watched people in a place with a more diverse population that rural North Dakota. We met with seminary students for whom our parish was a yet unfulfilled dream. We took our son to meet a seminary professor who had moved from Chicago to California.
Life in North Dakota was going on while we were away. On September 14, as we were beginning to think about our return trip, a baby was born in Grand Forks to a very young mother. We’ll never know the full story and we certainly were unaware of the events as they unfolded, but the baby spent a few extra days in the hospital and was released from the hospital into foster care. Grand Forks was pretty much the opposite side of the state from where we lived, and we didn’t go there often.
We hadn’t planned to come home from our study leave and then head off, just a couple of weeks later for a trip to Grand Forks - 425 miles away in the days of 55 mph speed limits. But when the phone call from the adoption agency came, we quickly made the trip and were there to pick up the baby within 24 hours of learning of her.
She became our daughter and one of the deepest blessings of our life.
That was 32 years ago. In that time she has grown up, gone off on her own adventures, gone to college, traveled internationally, gotten married and established her own home. Over the years there have been a few birthdays when we were in different places. We didn’t make it for a face-to-face birthday party when she lived in England for two years, for example.
But this year it is going to work out for us to celebrate with her in her home tomorrow. After the events of today’s church services and church school kickoff picnic, we’ll drive a few miles in that direction and finish the trip tomorrow in time to have a birthday dinner with our daughter and her husband. We’re not driving a 1982 Ford Escort these days. We have air conditioning and the 55 mph speed limit is just a distant memory.
I don’t think I was capable of imagining such an adventure back in the days. I think I was looking forward to the days when we would have our children toilet trained or perhaps first days of school. We had not yet discovered the path our careers would take or the places we would live as a family. We weren’t thinking about college for our kids or who they would marry. All of those events unfolded in their own time and in their own way.
Looking back, it seems as if a lot happened in those 32 years. And they have gone by incredibly quickly. It was, after all, half a lifetime ago when our daughter was born.
But from the first moment I met her, I knew that I couldn’t imagine life without her.
I think I should download “A Chorus Line” to listen to as we travel.
NOTE: As usual when we travel, I don't know fully about Internet access while we are away. I'll still write the blog, but may upload at different times of the day for the next week.
Although our son had grown up with lots of car trips, it was the longest trip we’d ever taken with our then two-year-old. Our car had a cassette tape player in the dashboard and we had a cassette of the soundtrack to “A Chorus Line,” the 1975 Broadway Musical. A year or so earlier we had seen a production of the musical by the touring company in St. Louis, where my sister lived at the time. Our son loved the overture and the beginning of the musical, so that tape got played over and over as we ticked off the miles from North Dakota to northern California. And, of course, we didn’t take the shortest route. Susan had a sister living in Spokane and I had a brother in the Seattle Area, so we went out to the coast and took the drive down 101 to California, tent camping along the way.
By the time we got to California, I was tired of listening to A Chorus Line.
We thought our car was a pretty good deal. We had traded off our Ford Pinto for the smallest station-wagon in the Ford Fleet. The new car had a five-speed transmission and cruise control. We didn’t have air conditioning. We didn’t think we needed it, living in North Dakota. Times were different. Four doors are a luxury when you have a car seat in the back and the extra space afforded by the square shape of the car meant that there was room for our luggage and tent and sleeping bags, and, of course, the manual typewriter that we used for our writing projects at the time.
Having left Chicago with full access to the University of Chicago’s Regenstein Library, (one of the top five libraries in the world at the time) we were really looking forward to being able to spend time in a big library again. We had enough experience under our belts to be ready to do a little research and add a bit of learning to equip ourselves for going forward in the ministry.
It was an exciting trip. We drove across the Golden Gate Bridge and the Oakland Bay Bridge. Then we drove back over the Oakland Bay Bridge to visit San Francisco. We ate crab fresh steamed on the pier. We watched people in a place with a more diverse population that rural North Dakota. We met with seminary students for whom our parish was a yet unfulfilled dream. We took our son to meet a seminary professor who had moved from Chicago to California.
Life in North Dakota was going on while we were away. On September 14, as we were beginning to think about our return trip, a baby was born in Grand Forks to a very young mother. We’ll never know the full story and we certainly were unaware of the events as they unfolded, but the baby spent a few extra days in the hospital and was released from the hospital into foster care. Grand Forks was pretty much the opposite side of the state from where we lived, and we didn’t go there often.
We hadn’t planned to come home from our study leave and then head off, just a couple of weeks later for a trip to Grand Forks - 425 miles away in the days of 55 mph speed limits. But when the phone call from the adoption agency came, we quickly made the trip and were there to pick up the baby within 24 hours of learning of her.
She became our daughter and one of the deepest blessings of our life.
That was 32 years ago. In that time she has grown up, gone off on her own adventures, gone to college, traveled internationally, gotten married and established her own home. Over the years there have been a few birthdays when we were in different places. We didn’t make it for a face-to-face birthday party when she lived in England for two years, for example.
But this year it is going to work out for us to celebrate with her in her home tomorrow. After the events of today’s church services and church school kickoff picnic, we’ll drive a few miles in that direction and finish the trip tomorrow in time to have a birthday dinner with our daughter and her husband. We’re not driving a 1982 Ford Escort these days. We have air conditioning and the 55 mph speed limit is just a distant memory.
I don’t think I was capable of imagining such an adventure back in the days. I think I was looking forward to the days when we would have our children toilet trained or perhaps first days of school. We had not yet discovered the path our careers would take or the places we would live as a family. We weren’t thinking about college for our kids or who they would marry. All of those events unfolded in their own time and in their own way.
Looking back, it seems as if a lot happened in those 32 years. And they have gone by incredibly quickly. It was, after all, half a lifetime ago when our daughter was born.
But from the first moment I met her, I knew that I couldn’t imagine life without her.
I think I should download “A Chorus Line” to listen to as we travel.
NOTE: As usual when we travel, I don't know fully about Internet access while we are away. I'll still write the blog, but may upload at different times of the day for the next week.