#34 12/31/2013
Black Dirt
Black Dirt
Fertile
Ground
The
rusty pickup truck, tattered rain gear and the fact that he was working in the cold
spring rain told me where he was on the organization chart. The steady downpour masked my sloppy approach through
the puddles so he was startled, “Aunt Bev would appreciate your work.” “Thanks, but I could do without the rain”, he
muttered beneath the towering pines sheltering us as he measured the cavity one
more time. While he carefully carved her resting place, other stones nearby drew
my attention. Dad was laid in this ground in 1977, mom joined him in 2009. They
lay near my baby brothers Michael, 1946 and Stephen, 1951. There should be
another marker for a sister but that wasn’t done sixty years ago when the baby
never took her own first breath.
Drifting
back to the five-gallon-bucket sized hole being carved out of the earth, “These
trees were only chest high when Grandma came here in 1971”, I remarked looking down at Gladys’ monument next to the marker that would soon receive a
final date. “Glad they are so big today,” he replied, clearly not used to
conversation while excavating resting places. The lush black soil that would soon envelope a
small canister of Bev’s ashes held my attention as he finished up.
Fort
Dodge, Iowa is in the heart of some of the richest farmland God’s ever stirred
together. Folks have an unusual pride for this loam and the crops it can grow;
even the state song brags of its fertile fields. I suppose anything that holds the title of
‘The Best’ can instill pride but you have to admit that dirt is a unique
category. It is hard to describe this
vibrant material because it looks alive, petroleum like and makes amateur
gardeners look brilliant. Fixated on that black hole, I realized that this
little patch of ground not only contains my ancestors, it is the soil I grew
from.
Sainted
Grandma Gladys was a single parent when it was scandalous. Charles Lemuel was a
shiftless spouse that deserted his family in the middle of the Great
Depression. Forrest and Clayton grew up
determined to have good names to erase the disgraced one they were left with. Adopted
son, Chuck followed in his father’s dishonorable path but daughter Beverly
stayed loyal to Gladys until her death. Clayton served in the Coast Guard, wed
godly, schoolteacher Charlotte and poured out his life from the pulpit.
Childless, their attention was directed at Forrest’s kids. Forrest grew up
under the dark cloud of abandonment that drove him to work tirelessly, serve
four years in the National Guard and three years in the South Pacific with the
Marines. Wounded at both Tarawa and Saipan, he returned home to his bride
Margaret, graduate with honors from the engineering program at the University
of Iowa and start his family.
Hallowed
Ground
There’s
a church on the corner of North 24th Street and 14th
Avenue North, a dam holding back lake of memories. Entering the sanctuary for the
third Bailey funeral attended there released the flood of recollection that
became a celebration among the only congregation Bev knew in her eighty five
years. After singing Bev’s favorite hymns the pastor asked if anyone would like
to say a few words. “We had three sets of parents growing up”, stated Coni.
“Bev, Gladys, Charlotte, Clayton, Forrest and Marge raised the three of
us.” ”We learned to sing, to harmonize,
in these very pews.” Mark explained why each of us now sat in a different pew,
the ones we remembered sitting in decades ago. “Blood,
sweat, and tears,” I contributed. There is a piece of glass at the east
entrance that doesn’t match the surrounding door assembly. A rambunctious eight
year old crashed through it in the middle of just another tussle with his
buddies. There’s a scar on my chin from a ragged floor tile in the nursery.
“Lots of maid-rite [the Iowa term for sloppy-joe] sandwiches and Margaret
Carr’s mayonnaise chocolate cake consumed back there,” I pointed,
recalling families assembling at the
construction site to feed men working all hours into the night to complete this
very structure. Forrest did more than
come home each night and swap his white shirt and tie for coveralls. He
co-signed the church’s note and mortgaged his home to ensure its repayment.
Before
the service, we three stood at the front of the church together. “Do you see the notch?” ”It is right there, “I
declared after finally locating a blemish on the alter dad had lovingly shaped
for his church. I tried to find it in 1977 before dad’s service but was
unsuccessful. Coni and Mark were surprised to see the two inch by one inch
imperfection and learn the story surrounding it. The pastor and organist were
just as taken back because neither had noted the scar beneath them for all those
decades of kneeling there.
It
fell upon dad to construct that alter in a church where the alter represents
salvation and healing. He solemnly carried out his task. Nearing completion of
the structure, the next step was routing a round edge to protect those resting
their arms and hands upon it. Whether a
machine fault or a bone weary amateur carpenter, the bit came loose and tore
into the back edge near the right end. Mortified by the gouge in that hallowed
surface and without a simple way to replace the damaged board, dad remained
throughout the night to locate a piece of matching grain to make a plug. After
several attempts to hand fit a filler block to his satisfaction, he rerouted
the edge, sanded the surface, walked home to shower and dress for his job that
day. Dad knows now how many tears are soaked into that alter and how many have
joined him there after kneeling upon that wooden ark of redemption.
Good Ground
Seven
hundred miles driving home brought another story of dirt to my mind:
Luke 8: 5 A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was
scattering the seed, some fell along the path; it was trampled on, and the
birds ate it up. 6 Some fell on rocky ground, and when it came
up, the plants withered because they had no moisture. 7 Other
seed fell among thorns, which grew up with it and choked the plants. 8 Still
other seed fell on good soil. It came up and yielded a crop, a hundred times
more than was sown.”
The
author’s lesson is the stuff of learned writers and preachers but permit me
some latitude. Images and memories from the last two days reminded me of the rich
and fertile soil, the good soil, provided by my family and church. They gave me everything
I needed to produce a good crop with my life. How would those gathered to remember
me some day consider the soil I’d left for them?
“…
some fell along the path; it was trampled on…”
Did
my kids get trampled by my agenda, ambitions and pursuits? It is so easy to
keep on pushing for your own dreams instead of adjusting for a wife and
children. I wonder if I gave them my first or just seconds and thirds during
those years when every moment was so important.
“…Some
fell on rocky ground…”
Yep, guilty. There were many times when being authoritative
was too severe for my tender kids. Becoming a grandpa has made me more gentle
about being right. Right doesn’t seem so important if you damage everyone
around you. Know some children who struggle to forgive the hard man that
fathered them well into their adulthood?
“…Other seed fell among thorns…”
Values. We all have them
but unfortunately many have really bad ones. Did I give my kids the values they
need to succeed financially, mentally, socially and most important eternally.
Maybe more than anything a dad can do, his values may be his most important
legacy.
“…Some
fell on good soil…”
The years are teaching that
parenting does not end when your children can vote. Perhaps my most important
parenting is still ahead of me. If I can get it right, then when my decedents are
driving home from the service that commemorates my life, they too may conclude
that they were raised in good Black Dirt.
Tome 34
December 31, 2013 written in a series by Timothy Bailey and posted at adifferentstoryblog@blogspot.com
