things of this earth
Sit still in church or mom will pinch the shit out of the soft flesh just above the knee. Pretend to listen while dad leads the service. Music always the best part, try to sing along. Prayer and sermon instantly send my little mind into flights of fantasy.
Had an unexpected turn of thought the other day. Editing some photos shot for another story idea, a line from one of the songs they sang in church in those days suddenly came back to me ....and the things of this earth grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace....
One of the most enduring memories from childhood is the image my little minds eye saw as we sang that hymn. A scene very much like the picture of Blue Bird Cafe shot from the dark street, warm light in soft focus on the other side of a shadowy void. Lights dimmed perceptibly with that line, returning to normal when the singing ended and the folks settled back listening to my old man's prayer and sermon.
Started out with the idea to write about how my brother Justin and I used to go into a shared fantasy about having lunch in a cafe while we spent bleak February days framing houses ten miles outside town. We had lots of other places we went as we spun yarns from childhood days too. Probably nothing different from what good friends do together all the time. I wouldn't know. Not till sometime after he passed did I realize that Justin was the only person in this life with whom I actually shared a close personal relationship. On every other level of personal contact large parts of myself feel strongly that we are not really there participating in things at all. Completely disconnected. An actor on stage giving the kind of performance a critic would call phoned in. I ain't saying that Justin had the disassociative personality too, but he and I certainly shared the early childhood experiences that led to this for me. Here is the story.
Sense of isolation permeated my early childhood life. As the song lyric says, living ones life separated from worldly things is a religious duty. Follow the rules, shun life's forbidden fruits and you will be saved. All or nothing like the strictest vegan you ever knew. Step over into the din and glare of the outside community at pearl to your immortal soul. Might make a guy want to keep his distance.
On top of that, as preacher's family we had even more rules to follow. We had to model proper behavior in church as a part of dad's teaching mission. He and mom felt very strongly that a quiet, reverent atmosphere during service is an act of piety demanded by God. Set them apart from the Pentecostals, who believed about the same thing as the Nazerines, but like loud demonstrative behavior during church services. Even the smallest churches had a nursery at the back, glass window so the attendant can see the program, for infants. Toddlers were expected to sit quietly in service, trained by semi public spanking when necessary. Mother trained us to sit still, she did not approve of parents who failed to follow her lead.
Sounds draconian now, but that't the way everyone lived in those days. Probably no higher rate of actual child abuse then than now. All us kids accepted spanking as a part of life, laughed and talked about it among ourselves all the time. We discussed strategies for getting out of a spanking, hiding sticks and switches, Billy and Bobby actually took off running when the old man took a notion to give one or the other a whipping. I fail to see that our current crop of younger folks from the never hit a kid generations are all that much better people than those of us who came up under the older ways.
Old preacher joke about the bus driver who came to church, had one question after the service, "how do you get them all to sit in the back?" Non of that for us kids. Part of dad's strategy to get the hall to fill in closer to the front is for mother and us kids to be seated second or third row on one side early enough to draw others down front. We were an important part of the show, including being seen to follow all the rules and regulations of the church. Not just on Sunday either like most of the others in the group. Parade day in Great Falls, every kid with a boy scout shirt got into the civic center auditorium free for Ma and Pa Kettle movie. Seen Ma and Pa on TV, civic center not really a theater, but too close to the forbidden world of movies, mom and dad couldn't let us go. Even the kids of the strongest family in the church went, but if Justin and I had been allowed into the show tongues would wag. We were not part of the community.
What's the old saying, little pitchers have big ears? Dummy up on the adult gossip if the kids can hear because they will go out and blab the whole thing in front of the wrong people. Not in our family. Folks had to talk shop in the car or over dinner, and us kids had to follow the rule, keep your mouth shut. Only time I remember braking that rule the old man liked to bust a vain going after me. Said something in front of the wrong people that he and mother had said to one another almost word for word in the car the day before. "Don't you ever talk that way about.........." as if I has uttered a vile curse.
Considering the reaction, I'm certain that this is the only incident when one of us kids violated that rule. How many times as an adult have I had one too many and run off at the mouth to my later embarrassment. Wish some of the discipline had stuck.
At home, within our private family circle we had our own exceptionalism setting us apart even from these other two powerful influences. Mom enforced strict language rules. Fairly certain that something as mild as bullshit never crossed my lips until after high school graduation. Other adults never cussed in front of us either. I actually thought kids outgrow cussing along with all the other playground games as one moves through the teenage years. We also were cleaner than everyone else, not just wash hands clean either. Our immediate family circle, including aunts and uncles and cousins, were cleaner than everyone else on some intrinsic level, others are still fully human, but too close of contact would surely be dangerous. Sounds almost twisted now, but it probably came out of the pre-vaccine, pre antibiotic era when contact with strangers often had deadly results.
Me and Justin used to station ourselves near the food tables at church potluck night, making sure we knew who prepared each dish. Not sure if the folks forbid us to eat from certain kitchens, or if we decided on our own based on their private conversations. At least once we had to accept the invitation to dinner at a forbidden household. Family struggling to build a house on a shoestring, living in the dugout basement with no running water. Woman had a skin condition as well. Nothing against those folks personally for us to feel cautious. Sure miss those potlucks though, good eating and just because we had to play our little rolls didn't mean we couldn't have fun within the kid culture that always swirled around oblivious to adult chatter.
About half way through our at home years dad changed to another religious sect in which the ascetic separation from the things of this earth didn't play a big part. Still preachers family with all those rules to follow and of course mother is still mother in so far as that part of our lives goes. She proved to be even more forceful in getting her way through strength of personality as she had been with spanking belt in earlier years. I learned early to deal with her the same way I did with the rest of the world. Hide behind the actor playing my part. Shit might occasionally happen to him, but none of it really touched me. Besides, I wasn't really there in the first place, just standing around waiting for my big brother.
So the picture in my six year old head painted the shadowy foreground to symbolize the angst of living life as an actor in dad and mom's traveling preacher show with the lights of the cafe in the distance representing my longing to be free from that world. Or not.
Threading this story together my eye kept going back to the picture of the Blue Bird that started the whole riff. Suddenly it came to my why this particular image touched that set of memories. In fifty three or so, me age five and Justin seven, we moved from Ephrata down to Ellensburg. Big fun in the car every time we drove up the main drag in town watching cowboys hang out on street corners. I think the image in my mind when we sang the song was a restaurant on that street, warmly lit on a Saturday evening, cowboys milling around. Me and Justin looking out from the back seat of dad's forty nine two door Chevy. That's the scene. Dark between the car and the curb, dim fifties street lamps brighter interior of the cafe. Me and Justin looking out at the world from the back of the car. Next time the song came up at church, my minds eye saw that restaurant, that part of my mind still longs for the sense of community we imagined existed in that place.
Course we got into a fight in the back seat because I came over to Justin's side to look out the window when we spotted the cowboys. Pre seat belt days may have been dangerous for kids, but wrestling around the back seat and floor with your brother was ever so much more fun than riding along strapped in like some clown going over Niagara in a barrel.
Started out with the idea to write about how my brother Justin and I used to go into a shared fantasy about having lunch in a cafe while we spent bleak February days framing houses ten miles outside town. We had lots of other places we went as we spun yarns from childhood days too. Probably nothing different from what good friends do together all the time. I wouldn't know. Not till sometime after he passed did I realize that Justin was the only person in this life with whom I actually shared a close personal relationship. On every other level of personal contact large parts of myself feel strongly that we are not really there participating in things at all. Completely disconnected. An actor on stage giving the kind of performance a critic would call phoned in. I ain't saying that Justin had the disassociative personality too, but he and I certainly shared the early childhood experiences that led to this for me. Here is the story.
Sense of isolation permeated my early childhood life. As the song lyric says, living ones life separated from worldly things is a religious duty. Follow the rules, shun life's forbidden fruits and you will be saved. All or nothing like the strictest vegan you ever knew. Step over into the din and glare of the outside community at pearl to your immortal soul. Might make a guy want to keep his distance.
On top of that, as preacher's family we had even more rules to follow. We had to model proper behavior in church as a part of dad's teaching mission. He and mom felt very strongly that a quiet, reverent atmosphere during service is an act of piety demanded by God. Set them apart from the Pentecostals, who believed about the same thing as the Nazerines, but like loud demonstrative behavior during church services. Even the smallest churches had a nursery at the back, glass window so the attendant can see the program, for infants. Toddlers were expected to sit quietly in service, trained by semi public spanking when necessary. Mother trained us to sit still, she did not approve of parents who failed to follow her lead.
Sounds draconian now, but that't the way everyone lived in those days. Probably no higher rate of actual child abuse then than now. All us kids accepted spanking as a part of life, laughed and talked about it among ourselves all the time. We discussed strategies for getting out of a spanking, hiding sticks and switches, Billy and Bobby actually took off running when the old man took a notion to give one or the other a whipping. I fail to see that our current crop of younger folks from the never hit a kid generations are all that much better people than those of us who came up under the older ways.
Old preacher joke about the bus driver who came to church, had one question after the service, "how do you get them all to sit in the back?" Non of that for us kids. Part of dad's strategy to get the hall to fill in closer to the front is for mother and us kids to be seated second or third row on one side early enough to draw others down front. We were an important part of the show, including being seen to follow all the rules and regulations of the church. Not just on Sunday either like most of the others in the group. Parade day in Great Falls, every kid with a boy scout shirt got into the civic center auditorium free for Ma and Pa Kettle movie. Seen Ma and Pa on TV, civic center not really a theater, but too close to the forbidden world of movies, mom and dad couldn't let us go. Even the kids of the strongest family in the church went, but if Justin and I had been allowed into the show tongues would wag. We were not part of the community.
What's the old saying, little pitchers have big ears? Dummy up on the adult gossip if the kids can hear because they will go out and blab the whole thing in front of the wrong people. Not in our family. Folks had to talk shop in the car or over dinner, and us kids had to follow the rule, keep your mouth shut. Only time I remember braking that rule the old man liked to bust a vain going after me. Said something in front of the wrong people that he and mother had said to one another almost word for word in the car the day before. "Don't you ever talk that way about.........." as if I has uttered a vile curse.
Considering the reaction, I'm certain that this is the only incident when one of us kids violated that rule. How many times as an adult have I had one too many and run off at the mouth to my later embarrassment. Wish some of the discipline had stuck.
At home, within our private family circle we had our own exceptionalism setting us apart even from these other two powerful influences. Mom enforced strict language rules. Fairly certain that something as mild as bullshit never crossed my lips until after high school graduation. Other adults never cussed in front of us either. I actually thought kids outgrow cussing along with all the other playground games as one moves through the teenage years. We also were cleaner than everyone else, not just wash hands clean either. Our immediate family circle, including aunts and uncles and cousins, were cleaner than everyone else on some intrinsic level, others are still fully human, but too close of contact would surely be dangerous. Sounds almost twisted now, but it probably came out of the pre-vaccine, pre antibiotic era when contact with strangers often had deadly results.
Me and Justin used to station ourselves near the food tables at church potluck night, making sure we knew who prepared each dish. Not sure if the folks forbid us to eat from certain kitchens, or if we decided on our own based on their private conversations. At least once we had to accept the invitation to dinner at a forbidden household. Family struggling to build a house on a shoestring, living in the dugout basement with no running water. Woman had a skin condition as well. Nothing against those folks personally for us to feel cautious. Sure miss those potlucks though, good eating and just because we had to play our little rolls didn't mean we couldn't have fun within the kid culture that always swirled around oblivious to adult chatter.
About half way through our at home years dad changed to another religious sect in which the ascetic separation from the things of this earth didn't play a big part. Still preachers family with all those rules to follow and of course mother is still mother in so far as that part of our lives goes. She proved to be even more forceful in getting her way through strength of personality as she had been with spanking belt in earlier years. I learned early to deal with her the same way I did with the rest of the world. Hide behind the actor playing my part. Shit might occasionally happen to him, but none of it really touched me. Besides, I wasn't really there in the first place, just standing around waiting for my big brother.
So the picture in my six year old head painted the shadowy foreground to symbolize the angst of living life as an actor in dad and mom's traveling preacher show with the lights of the cafe in the distance representing my longing to be free from that world. Or not.
Threading this story together my eye kept going back to the picture of the Blue Bird that started the whole riff. Suddenly it came to my why this particular image touched that set of memories. In fifty three or so, me age five and Justin seven, we moved from Ephrata down to Ellensburg. Big fun in the car every time we drove up the main drag in town watching cowboys hang out on street corners. I think the image in my mind when we sang the song was a restaurant on that street, warmly lit on a Saturday evening, cowboys milling around. Me and Justin looking out from the back seat of dad's forty nine two door Chevy. That's the scene. Dark between the car and the curb, dim fifties street lamps brighter interior of the cafe. Me and Justin looking out at the world from the back of the car. Next time the song came up at church, my minds eye saw that restaurant, that part of my mind still longs for the sense of community we imagined existed in that place.
Course we got into a fight in the back seat because I came over to Justin's side to look out the window when we spotted the cowboys. Pre seat belt days may have been dangerous for kids, but wrestling around the back seat and floor with your brother was ever so much more fun than riding along strapped in like some clown going over Niagara in a barrel.
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