March 7th memories

I had to get to know my neighbors before I came to understand that Luxembourg, the nation, and the neighbors' country of origin, is just about the size of Plymouth County, Iowa, a place a goodly number of Luxembourgers came to live when they came to this new land.

It was 1870 when they got here on a long, ox-drawn trek from other side of the state and a tiny town named for their own patron saint, St. Donatus, which, by the way, is  the name first given to the village of Alton, just down the road. 

The rural lands all around must have looked emptied and intimidating, even though nothing caught the eye but everlasting swaths of wide-open land and sky. One of the early immigrants to Orange City said when he looked over the land that would become a town, he could see only one tree. One tree in infinite open space. Only in northwest Iowa would the newest state residents put up sod houses. Sod was all they had.

There weren't a ton of neighbors either. What's more, prairie fires and a sky full of grasshoppers didn't make the world, out here, particularly accommodating. One of the very first families to inhabit the space that would become Sioux Center, Jacob Koster, who homesteaded the town's downtown park and planted mammoth cottonwoods didn't stay around long, but high-tailed it back east where life wasn't quite so blasted tough. 

The world created by Ole Rolvaag in Giants in the Earth ain't much of a joy really, no more fun than that created by Hamlin Garland in Main-Traveled Roads or Josephine Donovan's Black Soil. For the legions of mixed blood white folks flooding the plains, life was never a cake walk

However, maybe--just maybe--tough worlds create sweet myths. If you work your hands to the bone for your first fifty years, when things slow down a bit you may just make up sweetness if there's not any to be found.

How about this little story? In the early 1870s, Jacob Koster's wife's stove went kaput. Off they went, in the wagon, to LeMars. The Kosters were among the very first white people to settle in the grass we now call Sioux Center. You can't get along without a stove. 

Five miles south, the horse needed water so they pulled the wagon up at a soddie, where a woman came out, busy with something or other. 

Now listen, this is something.

This brand new prairie woman looks up at Jacob Koster, who is sitting beside his wife on the seat on the wagon, unmoving, still as death. Both of them stare, transfixed, before the woman, who is still holding the blanket/door to the mean dugout where her pioneer family lives.

Koster doesn't move. He cannot find words. 

The woman nods, as if to give him permission.

The words come slowly. "Are you not Yentji?" he says.

Her eyes don't move. "Yes," she says, drawing a long breath. "And you--are you not Jacob?"

In Holland, Jacob sometimes took Yentji with him to the singing school. In our language, they had once, thousands of miles away, dated.

Yentji and her family arrived in northwest Iowa from the Pella area; Jacob Koster, along with four other families had come from southeast Minnesota.

On Hegseth's "sphere sovereignty"

I'm thinking I was in college before I ever heard someone with theological chops put two words together into a phrase with some chops of its own--"sphere sovereignty." I remember learning that "sphere sovereignty" was a phrase worth knowing, in part because it originated in the quite sovereign rule of a Dutch preacher/politician named Abraham Kuyper, a man who was spoken of in very high-regard-ish tones.

I wasn't the greatest student back then, never was really, so let me tell you what I remember of "sphere sovereignty": it was a good thing, a good, good thing because it set boundaries by making the claim that the institutions of society each had their own separate domain and calling, their own private property. Thus, the Christian school I attended as a boy was not run by the c0nsistory of the church, any church--it was "parental" Christian education because a stratagem of the Calvinism at the base of our faith ruled clearly--"Kuyper said it!"--that the church had its own "sphere" of influence, as did the school. While the same men (not women back then) could be members of the local Christian school board and members of the church consistory, one of those organizations should not run the other. 

Why? Because sphere sovereignty was a principle of life, or thus saith Abraham Kuyper, who, I learned, gives us Reformed-types our marching orders. When Kuyper created a university--the Free University--he named it what he did because it was free from entanglements of any political or ecclesiastical entity. In it's sphere--the sphere of education--it was sovereign--or free.

"Sphere sovereignty" might have created some heft at Dordt College midway through the 20th century, but it's never been slung around on a banner or proclaimed on a t-shirt in the U. S. of A, never, that is, until Pete Hegseth, Trump's Secretary of War (their language, not mind). 

Hegseth's form of Christian nationalism has its own take on "sphere sovereignty," and what he and his cronies say doesn't set forth the kind of liberty and diversity at the heart of the doctrine's original application. In other words, what Secretary Hegseth and other Christian nationalists (who often brandish the word "Reformed" too) are selling isn't what I heard for the first time in 1966 just a few blocks down the road from where I'm sitting.

As Justin Bailor, from Calvin University, writes in a recent column in World, 

. . .it is Christ who is sovereign over all, and not any institution or any particular Christian–whether preacher, pope, or prince. A proper regard for the origins, essence, and purpose of sphere sovereignty reveal it to be a theory of limited government, and even more than that a theory of social diversity, cultural pluriformity, and civil liberty. It is as such opposed to all forms of tyranny.

There's no room therein for Hegseth's noxious Christian nationalism. 

Thus saith sphere sovereignty. 

Updike's fortunes

 

I'll tell you, there's some astonishing familiarly to this shelf. At one time or another, I must have had just about every one of the books, or at least most. No more. My guess is that they were among the books I unloaded when I left my office at the college. I don't think they were ever home in our country place, and they certainly didn't come along to Woodbridge, the place we now call home. Where they once stood proudly, today they're gone.

In that way, I guess, their disappearance takes the same track as the work of John Updike does in the culture these days--he's simply not as hot as he once was. Critics far sharper than I am claim that some of what's there--the Rabbit foursome--won't disappear from American literary consciousness, nor will short stories still taught in Intro to Lit classes--you may remember "A & P," one of the most popular short stories in American literary history, or "Pigeon Feathers"--if I had that story anywhere here today, I could read it again and fawn embarrassingly about the Christian faith so beautifully evident at the end of that story.

Aspects of Updike's work, and his confession/profession in interviews--posited his deeply felt Christian faith. However, my mother would absolutely never considere him a "Christian writer." Nobody did sex as dreamily as he did--or as horridly. Nobody looked so closely without blushing. No world-class writers spent more time or interest in the male anatomy as did John Updike. 

And that itself may be one of the major reasons that his work has fallen out of favor with many of the mainstays of literary culture--if there are such folks.

My introduction to him came in an English class at Dordt College, when a brilliant but nutty professor named Meeter chose to bring in a copy of Couples he had been perusing and to read a hot passage--steamy and forbidden--in class, in public, standing right up in front, behind the podium. I'm not making this up. He wanted us to hear some torrid sex because he wanted his good Christian students to be as perfectly appalled as he'd been when all those gymnastics came alive on the page before him. 

Didn't work. I wasn't appalled, I was fascinated. I got interested in John Updike, out of class for sure. 

I'm no expert but it seems that Updike may have been one of the first to feature full frontal nudity in mainstream literature, as many writers broke down bedroom doors to bring us up close and personal to the act most of us crave. My literary hero at the time, Frederick Manfred, spent goodly hours watching nakedness do its thing. It was the late 60s, and lots of taboos were falling. Honestly, the only question I was asked that had real oompah when I interviewed for a job at Dordt, some years later, was "Will you teach dirty books?" a question that was so facile it answered itself. Imagine if I'd said yes!!!

Updike's disfavor today come at the hands of the "Me Too" movement as well as people tiring of white male writers. Today, some roll their eyes at some--if not all--of his fervid sexuality finding it altogether too, well, male--and too, yes, Protestant. And prurient. 

Still, I really, really admired the character Rabbit from Rabbit Run, and I'm quite sure--I hope I'm not being sexist here--that in Rabbit John Updike created a very real American character, a young man of his age, as was  John Updike himself, and, to be sure, at least one of his greatest admirers, me. 

Time changes things--that's maybe one of the best moral lessons I can pull from all of this. Thanks, Merle Meeter.

Sunday Morning Meds -- Psalm 32

 

“But the Lord’s unfailing love surrounds the man who trusts in him.”

 Our former preacher once said that the first words that famous chorus of angels offered to the quaking shepherds on the hills of Galilee are the entire scripture in a nutshell: “Fear not!” Thar’ ‘tis--the whole Word of the Lord to those who love him: “Fear not.”

 Those two words are the heart and soul of this verse from Psalm 32 too, as well as the answer to the first question of the catechism I was reared with.  The question is, “What is your only comfort in life and in death?”  And the answer is simple:  “That I am not my own, but belong, in body and soul and in life and death, to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ.”  Same as.

 “The Lord’s unfailing love surrounds the man who trusts in him.”  Surrounds.  When my grandson and I go to the park a couple of blocks from our house, he’s a terror.  He’ll try anything.  The only way for me to keep him from scoring something purple on his forehead is to stand beside him or around him or behind him, close enough so that at any moment I can save him from his own. . .his own what?—silliness, childishness, inexperience, innocence, stupidity?  Maybe I should say, save him from being a kid.  Not unlike us.

 That’s not exactly what the verse implies, perhaps, but it’s close.  Try this—God’s love makes us all look like the Michelin Man.  In our every moment, he outfits us with rubber bumpers.  Okay, maybe it’s not the best image.  They’d get a little cumbersome, I think, and one couldn’t tap dance all that well.

 How about this?  When we trust him, we’re got airbags on all sides, like a Lexus maybe.  That’s surrounded.  But somehow it doesn’t quite ring true either—maybe because of the level of wealth the Lexus connotes. 

The first time I put on our married kid’s DVD player and heard the sound of Tora, Tora, Tora—or whatever—through speakers mounted in every corner of the room, the soundtrack took my breath away. I was in the middle of the action.  God’s love is like surround sound.  We are cocooned.  We’re swaddled in his love.  Whatever happens, we’re in his hands—always, forever.

 That still runs up short.

 If you think I’m being a little glib, you may be right.  I’m sitting here smiling, but then I’m not sure that a smile is the wrong tone of voice.  You may even call it childish, if you’d like, but the implication of this verse is soooooooooo good that it’s tough not to be a little goofy.  It’s hard to write without a smile.

Years ago, a woman told me a story of how, one night here on the prairie, her husband and young son were killed by a tornado that left her hospitalized on the edge of both death and despair.  She told me that the only thing that got her through her travail was her repetition of the answer I quoted above:  “I am not my own.  I am not my own, but belong, body and soul, to my faithful savior Jesus Christ.. . .I am not my own.”

 A Calvinist mantra, so to speak. 

 In life and in death, David says, fear not.  The love of God surrounds you unfailingly. 

Say it again and again, Michelin Man.            

Way too many chains (reprised)

 

[This blog is getting ancient--twenty years old and more, thousands of posts, most of which can quietly slide into oblivion with no particular sadness or pain. But once in a while I go back a ways and hunt around for something lively, like this one from 2012. I'd just retired. I have no memory of where I was, but I remember the mammoth picnic table that earned, to my mind, a few words.]

I suppose one of the sentences I'm serving in my life is being forced to look at picnic tables.  I've lifted more than my share, painted dozens, even repaired 'em by the lot; so many that when I sit at one, I can't help look. And yesterday, here's what I couldn't help seeing.

When I walked out of church, it felt like early June in Omaha--had to be 60. The congregation was going to have lunch together and then do some caroling.  Imagine Christmas caroling in weather so warm you really should be playing church-league softball.  But I couldn't stay, so I got in the car and started steering north and homeward.

I grabbed a Philly Cheese Steak sandwich at Arby's--big mistake because it was too darn big--then decided I was retired and there was no reason to chase home on such gorgeous day, perfect for most anything but caroling. So, sandwich and curly fries in hand, I pulled over at a rest stop and took the closest picnic table. Everything tastes better outside, we used to say at the state park where I worked, even too much Philly cheese steak.

That's when I noticed the heavy chain beneath the table.  See it?. Incredible. You have to notice, first off, that nobody ever has to repaint this mammoth.  The top is that unforgiving hard rubber stuff, and the base is honest-to-goodness concrete. Nobody ever repairs this thing either.

And it's chained down--that's right, chained down, presumably because otherwise some petty thief idiot would walk off with it.  I can understand people wanting one of these heavy suckers in their backyard--it'll last forever!--but I could not begin to imagine how on earth some deviant yokel could grab one, then hoist it on the bed of a pickup without some huge wench and a world-class hernia.

Seriously, someone's going to steal this table?

What kind of world do we live in anyway?

We all suffer for the damned. Starts in third grade, when some kid rips up a library book and the rest of us lose our recess until the creep 'fesses up. Thus we strip at airports and let some unsavory stranger have a look at our private selves in an x-ray lest some fanatic Islamicist tries to light up his Nikes.

Made me sad, honestly, this human condition.  Some crew has to put chains on what must be a couple of hundred state-owned, ten-ton picnic tables because out and about on the land there's a highway robber who'd otherwise grab one of these and take it home?  Oh, geez.  Woe and woe and woe.

It was a gorgeous day. Thank goodness for global warming. But there I sat, stuffing my face and, on account of a heavy metal chain, lamenting the human condition. And I'd just come from church too.  What I should have done is turned around, gone back, and done some good old-fashioned holiday caroling.

Instead, I sat there angry, finishing that cheesy-mess of a sandwich--and the curly fries, all of 'em.

Woe and woe and woe. Sometimes, Lord, I think I got a chain on me.

Farch, Dogwood

With any kind of lovely dawn, something about this tree, a mile south of the blacktop, down an eighth of a mile from Dogwood is just gorgeous. I've got dozens of pictures of it, from all kinds of angles. It's sits out there all by itself on a road the county doesn't keep up, and it foregrounds a space, a wide-open landscape that seems iconic. 

On this particular Saturday morning--February 27, 2009--it just happened to be shimmering.

I don't know if I'd call this morning subject more or less enchanting. The ice is almost a shock, but it imprisons as much as it beautifies. One more--

Once the sun gets a head of steam, it pours forth that Midas touch that is itself a reason to be out there down some gravel road.

The richness of that gold mantel turns everything heavenly.

If  you think there's any beauty here--with this shot--thank light, the gilded spell of early morning.

To be honest, I don't remember that morning, but I'm happy to be reminded by what the camera recorded, fifteen years ago.

"Farch," some people call it right now, a season two boring month roll slowly along while we wait for emerald to be born once more. But, hit it right, and even "farch" glows.

A man named Ree

 

It's there. I know it is. I saw it. Took me a while to actually notice it specifically--I mean, there are other names carved into this healthy peace of Sioux Quartzite, but it's there. I drew a light circle around it so you can pick it out--the name of Joseph Nicolet, the French Renaissance man (geographer, explorer, astronomer, and who knows what else?). It's right here at Pipestone National Monument, just up the road a couple of hours.

Here's shot I found on line. You can't miss it. 

Just plain hard to believe that Nicolet was in Minnesota before there was one, before almost any other white guy--1838. There had to be more, of course, but Joseph Nicolet, explorer extraordinaire, was there at Pipestone National Monument before you could buy a pipe.

As was George Catlin, explorer and artist, a man who left two jobs behind out east, where he'd been a barrister, a lawyer, as well as a portrait artist who turned a buck or two by putting famous people's faces on canvas, suitable for hanging.

Catlin said that one day in Philly he met some Native people and was, well, mesmerized. There's no mention of where the vision came from or when, but what he said he'd suddenly determined he'd been born to do was go west, young man, and paint portraits of every last tribe, today yet, if not yesterday. Must have been a striking vision. 

If you've ever been to the Pipestone National Monument, Catlin's portrait (circa 1838) requires a second look. No trees, just a massive outcropping of pink quartzite, rising from the grassy prairie like an ancient shipwreck amid the sea of prairie grass. 

Catlin documented the place by staying around for a spell, observing rituals, and putting them on canvas, just exactly what the Yankton Sioux warned him not to do What happened around all that red stone was none of his darn business after all. But that Philadelphia vision had to had nailed him. He stayed around anyway, left his brushes out, and he left behind was a gallery of work documenting life here almost 200 years ago.

Nicolet has his monument and you can Google dozens of Catlin's stolen drawings, but the real hero is rarely celebrated, Struck by the Ree, the lead signatory of the Yankton Sioux, who traded 11 million acres of tribal land for peace. "He's a hero?" you ask. Well, when it comes to Pipestone National Monument, yes, because what was included in that massive deal did NOT include pipestone.

A Yankton Sioux chief called Ree would not give it up and thus saved it for its use as a source of soft, pinkish stone for making pipes, which are, remember, instruments of peace. 

Struck by the Ree is buried in Greenwood cemetery, which you can visit--it's just up the road from town and just past the 1858 Treaty monument. Just drive in. His stone is huge. You can't miss it. 

He saved the place and all that soft, open-grained stone--it's called Catlinite. Isn't that just the story? But the man who deserves more credit that Nicollet or Catlin is Yankton Sioux, a man called Struck by the Ree.