by Lisa Samson
“Granted.”
“Well, it’s a new day. God was merciful to you.”
“Some kind of mercy.”
“Can you think of a better way He could have done it?”
Sure. One not involving Daisy would be a fine start. Why did He drag her into the mess?
Oh, that’s right, I did that all on my own.
“And, Chris, I know what I did was wrong. I hate myself for what I did.”
That’s when he gave me the repentance vs. self-loathing speech. “You see, brother, one of the reasons we need repentance so badly is because we need the forgiveness more. Have you asked God for forgiveness?”
“No. It’s complicated.”
“No, it isn’t. Having been forgiven much, there will be much required of you. You don’t like that. None of us do. It’s why so many relationships stay in the trash can. Person doesn’t want to go say he’s sorry ’cause if he does, he’s got to stay around and play nice.” That must have been funny to him, because he laughed and laughed.
“Not to mention I don’t even deserve to ask after what I did. Daisy’s just one of the fallouts, Chris. After a particularly thrilling sermon”—my voice fell in sarcasm—“about how God would bless the people of my church if they gave of themselves for the church building fund, one family gave their entire savings—windows of heaven pour out a blessing and such, right?”
“I know the verse.” He squinted at me.
“A month later the wife came down with MS, and guess what? They didn’t have insurance and no savings either. They’re in horrible financial shape now. I don’t even know what’s happened.”
“Brother, if most of those name-it-and-claim-it TV preachers knew, case by case, what havoc they’ve wreaked across this land, I think they’d never get on the air again.”
“Really? I’ll bet they do know. I’ll bet they get letters all the time, but they’ve got planes to catch and bills to pay. And they can always blame it on the other person’s lack of faith.”
“Maybe I’m a little more trusting here on my corner.”
“Then count yourself blessed.”
“So you’ve got to repent, Augustine.”
“I’ve confessed, does that count?”
“Are you sorry?”
“Yes.”
“Then ask God to forgive you, my friend. Jesus already died for those sins, so why not get the full benefit?”
“I don’t know, Chris.”
“Oh, man! If it helps any, you’ll still be a sorry, stinkin’ old sinner. Does that make you happy?”
I laughed there on sidewalk and a young black woman with skinny little braids falling to her waist glanced at us, shook her head, and then she couldn’t help it, she smiled. “You all are crazy.” But it felt like a compliment.
A minute later Chris plucked the flute from its case. “Seems to me, brother, after all the confessing you’ve done, just do some forgiveness asking, some turning away, and you’ll be right with God.”
Sounded like something Monica would say.
He lifted the flute to his full lips, pursed them downward, and the strains of “Be Thou My Vision” floated from the end of the silver tube, rising into the sky like a prayer over all the houses, office buildings, stores, churches, and people.
The next week, a young man from Philadelphia visited The Hotel. Sister Jerusha, a jumbo-sized Sister of Charity, pulled the dreadlocked, skinny young man in her arms and said, “Frish, but it’s been a long time since you’ve been down, Shelby.”
Her face flushed and she ushered him into her apartment and made him a cup of tea. She invited me back, saying, “This is Augustine. He needs your help. He’s a church boy who needs God again.”
Lord, why oh why did You surround me with frank women? And who says they can’t teach men a thing or two?
Shelby told me about his “monastery” in Philadelphia, and it sounded like a bunch of liberal radical idealists who couldn’t find anything that satisfied them in normal church circles.
I liked it.
I liked the liberal part because it thumbed the nose at my father. I hate to admit that, but it’s true. Even at the best of times it’s hard to separate the policy from the purveyor. And it got me up there.
Before I left for Philly I sat by Chris and listened to his flute. “What do you hope to accomplish here?” I asked.
“A megachurch question if I ever heard one. But I’ll bite. I like to make people uncomfortable on one level. A black man with Bible verses set up around him will do that. Especially these verses.”
The verses broadcast messages of God’s love and care for His creation. Verses like, “Taste and see the goodness of the Lord.” Or, “Your heavenly Father knows what you need before you ask.”
“Why would these verses make people uncomfortable?”
“It’s hard to keep someone like that at arm’s length.”
True enough.
I went to Philadelphia and unrolled my sleeping bag on a cot. I prayed all the time, steeping myself in communication with God, feeling sorry for my sins, begging God to forgive me, and so gaining the healing I needed. Feeling like an orphan since the age of twelve, I found a loving Father.
Chris was right about a lot of stuff.
He’s still on that corner, by the way. Stacy moved her racket down closer to the Inner Harbor.
And the love of God surrounded me, wound through the inner-most portions of my soul. For two years I saw Him in the eyes of the people I served with and the people I served. I saw Him in a loaf of bread and a two-paragraph report that Chandra or Willis or Juan wrote. And we laughed a lot.
Did I tell you about the laughter?
It cleansed me.
I laughed with people who had nothing to laugh about. Who were free from the avarice and the power-hungry beast that still tried to free itself from inside me. I learned more than I taught and so took more than I gave, but for some reason it felt okay.
I realized we are all God’s children. Every single one of us.
Val’s in Shalom’s kitchen with Bobby, a kid from the nearby trailer park. Bobby’s fat and mean and by the usual definition, white trash. His parents both rely on welfare with no plans of exiting the system anytime soon, and although Bobby wears ripped, dirty clothing, they always have enough money for beer and cigarettes.
This is where serving the poor gets hard for me and I’ll just admit it right now. Helping out the working poor, or the kids of a single mom who messed up but is trying to get her feet back beneath her is easy, even lending a hand to those so burned-out or oppressed they don’t know how to rise above it. But it takes some supernatural interference when helping people like Carrie and Billy Morgan, who lie to get their checks and feed their habits rather than their son—Bobby’s fat because Twinkies and frozen pizza are cheap. And the school meals aren’t much better, burgers and potato nuggets or more frozen pizza, and guys like Bobby aren’t about to take the green beans, and who can blame them? I swear they’re plastic anyway. For white people, helping out in the ghetto holds a sort of glamour, but ministering to trailer trash with no jobs and a sense of entitlement—well, those people get no respect from anybody.
But there’s a Bobby in that trailer who needs to know Jesus is in his corner because his parents sure aren’t. They scream at him, yelling obscenities and put-downs for what I wouldn’t even consider an infraction, more like a kid just being a kid.
“Shut the —— —— door, you little ————!” Carrie will scream.
No kid deserves that no matter how mean and annoying he is.
Serving the kids—that’s my favorite part in all of this. I’d like to think it’s the way to break the chain. Even for just a few.
From the darkened hallway I watch Val and Bobby sitting on the worktable as she patiently flips flashcard after flashcard in Bobby’s face. He stumbles his way through. Then gets angry with her. He slaps the cards out of her hands.
“Okay, let’s take a break.” She hops
down off the table and turns her back on him. “Want something to drink? We only have soy milk and tea. And water.”
“I want Coca Cola.”
“We don’t have that.”
He crosses his arms. “Well, that’s all I’ll drink.”
She turns around and crosses her arms. “Go thirsty then, big shot. It’s your choice.” And proceeds to make herself a cup of tea. “Go home even. I’m sure it’s more exciting there than this gloomy place.”
Gloomy? What’s so gloomy about Shalom?
I look around me. Cracked walls, buckled linoleum floors severely lacking that lemony fresh glow you see on TV commercials.
“Anything’s better than that trailer.” Bobby.
Now here’s the thing. Bobby’s been coming around here for a year and he’s been nothing but trouble. Scares the other kids off. And when we have feasts, he fills his plate up like a mountain and eats only half of it. If you say anything to him, he flares up and makes a scene.
I guess he thinks he doesn’t deserve any pity, or much of anything for that matter, from Valentine. Not with her face the way it is. Maybe she’s the first person in the world he’s ever felt sorry for. Who knows?
“So, you want that cup of tea?” she asks.
“I’ve never had one.”
“I’ll put lots of sugar in it.”
What I wouldn’t give for a cup of that stuff. Nothing but water since Ash Wednesday. What nobody else knows is that I’ve given up every other edible luxury. I’m so sick of beans and rice, that’s all I’ve got to tell you. And I wonder if this is all really necessary, but I remember how much Christ gave up for me. It causes me to remember. My sacrifice seems pretty pathetic in light of that.
I’m dropping weight quickly. I should write a book, The Lenten Diet: Just Give Up Practically Everything. With my luck, it would give me the fame and money I always wanted back in the day. No thanks. I’m not that strong.
Sitting down on the couch in the main room, I miss the wave of gut that, until very recently, used to crash over my belt buckle. I sorta liked it. Drew was so thin. I don’t want him to return in any way.
Fourteen days until Easter and then I’ve got to tell Val. I think. I’ve been praying and God’s still silent. I decided not to ruin what Lent seems to be doing for her. The secret has kept for this many years; it’ll keep for two more weeks.
I want to serve her. But I don’t know what to do for her other than give her apple turnovers from the bakery over on the square, which I found out she loves. I give her funny cards and keep offering to go on her midnight walks, but she refuses.
Turnovers. God tells me to serve her and all I’ve got is turnovers.
I turn to Janelle and pick up her reader. She’s a first grader with dark, ashy skin and a smile that pretties up even this place. “So, let’s see what Al the Alligator is doing today, shall we, Janelle?”
She giggles. “You make Al so funny, Pastor.”
Oh, the south, the south. I was trying to get away from that pastor title, but they just won’t let it go! I pat her head. “Well, Al has a personality all his own, doesn’t he?”
“He sure do!”
I point to the platter of snacks on the table. Val’s doing. Cheese, crackers, and grapes never looked so good. “Did you get a snack?”
“Uh-huh. We all did.”
Sitting around the room at card tables, seven other children do their homework. Charmaine Hopewell helps with the math and geography. Jessica with science and language arts. I’m the reading guy.
Laughter suddenly fills the kitchen. Bobby’s laughing like tomorrow’s never going to come. Val too. My eyes meet Charmaine’s.
Not long until Easter and I’ll have to tell Val the truth. It’s not going to be pretty.
Janelle looks at me and says, “Where’d you get that crazy hair, Pastor?”
Before Val leaves she thanks me for the turnover. “And Janelle’s question. Where did you get those dreads?”
“A lady in Philly, Celestine, from Haiti.”
“Oh yeah?”
“She was a sweet person. She’d been involved in the dark religions and swore the demons still followed her. Part of me wanted to think it all her imagination, but many was the night I slept in my sleeping bag outside her bedroom door so she’d get a good night’s sleep.”
“That sounds like you.”
“I told her I was going to Mount Oak—”
Val crosses her arms. “Why Mount Oak anyway? This isn’t such a great place.”
“God told me to.”
“In an audible voice?”
“Almost. He wanted me to settle in a place that would constantly remind me of my wickedness and my foolishness.”
She rolls her eyes.
“To keep me in a state of humility, Val.”
She rolls her eyes again.
“Anyway, Celestine wanted me to take a piece of her with me. So she gave me dreadlocks.”
“They’re pretty crazy.”
“My hair hadn’t seen a pair of scissors in three years and was halfway down my back, so I thought, Why not? ”
“I could give you lots of reasons.”
“Well, while she was committing the dastardly deed, I could have told you why not myself. When she was finished teasing and rubbing, I was surprised a single hair was left on my head.”
“You have good hair for it. Thick and curly, I’ll bet. But don’t you have to do something to keep them … you know …”
“A Haitian refugee keeps them up for me here in Mount Oak. She laughs and laughs at a white man with graying dreads. I swear Celestine put the gray in with all that rubbing.”
“Good story.”
“I’ve got a million of them.”
“I’ll bet.”
“Really, Val. Doing this kind of work just gives you the best stories. It’s kinda cool.”
“I dunno, Gus. I kinda like stories of the rich and famous.”
Say it isn’t so. “Really?”
“Nah.”
“Good.”
Dad strikes again. This time by US Mail. Guess he realized the phone angle was a bust. He tells me he realizes what a terrible father he was and then gives the tired old quote, “Nobody gets to the end of their life and wishes they’d spent more time at the office.”
Yeah, right, Dad, okay, fine.
Not word one about my mother, admitting his scheme bordered on the diabolical. I don’t know. I don’t know.
Great Drew, you’re sitting here about to beg Daisy’s forgiveness and you won’t even give your own father the time of day.
Mother Teresa once said, “You only love Christ as much as the person you love the least.”
Sometimes I can’t stand that woman.
I read further down the letter.
“Please, Drew. Please,” he writes.
The old Charles Parrish wouldn’t have begged anyone for anything.
So we are all God’s children. Isn’t that right?
Val was tired so I told her I’d take tonight’s Vigils. My father’s letter crinkles in the pocket of the shirt I slide on over my head.
Will I tell him to come on down and bring his inoperable cancer with him?
I guess this thing we call faith is a climb. I always wanted to think of it as a big slide straight into the arms of God who waits at the bottom to catch us. But instead, He’s a God who’s on top of things—and like any mountain you climb, the closer we get to Him, the steeper the terrain.
Yes, yes. Jesus is the one accompanying me on the climb. I get it.
Huh. If you’d have asked me last year what my future would hold, I’d have said more of this. Just living simply here at Shalom, doing justice, loving mercy and all that. I didn’t think my father would show up. I never expected Daisy would show up. I thought I could put the past behind me.
God’s will be done. And it ain’t gonna be pretty. I just have a feeling about that.
God’s will be done.
I haven’
t any other prayer that makes sense.
I lean forward on the sofa and light a candle.
I lift the book of prayers into the circle of my gaze and I pray words I wouldn’t think to pray on my own right now, but words I need, nonetheless.
Monica calls me as I sit down over yet another delectable bowl of beans and rice. For breakfast.
“We have to forgive him,” she says.
“I know.”
EIGHTEEN
VALENTINE: 2009
I’m crankier than I’ve ever been and that’s saying a lot. I point to the Apostle John. So John, wanna know why I’ve been hanging around the Laundromat so much? To keep from smoking, that’s why.
And to pick up the turnover Augustine buys for me each day from the bakery on the town square. He says I deserve something sweet in life.
What a cornball!
My room, my window, what used to be something to look forward to, has become something to avoid. But where else am I going to go? Walking around town? No thanks.
And all these comic books.
Bartholomew smirks.
I’m sick of them. Sorry, girls.
I throw an issue of Betty and Veronica across the room just as Rick opens the door. It hits him in the chest. “Whoa, Val.”
“Sorry. Nasty coincidence. I didn’t know you were going to be there, and you know, a knock would be nice, Rick.”
He holds out an envelope. “Sorry, Val. I guess I wasn’t thinking at all, but you got a letter from Lella and I thought you’d like it right away.”
He hands it to me.
“Thanks.”
“You’ve been more cranky than usual lately.”
See?
“It’s this stupid smoking moratorium. That was just dumb. I’ve been smoking for five years and I thought I’d quit just like that?”
He shoves his hands in his pockets. “I dunno, Val.”
“You dunno, what?”
“I think this is about more than smoking.”
“Oh, you do, do you? And what could it possibly be, oh great psychologist?”