Sounds of Hope

Maybe I am just noticing it more, but it seems that snow is on the increase everywhere.   One is tempted to joke about global warming.   The other day someone asked where Al Gore was with all these frigid temperatures and snow.   I replied maybe he was hiding in a pile of snow.   Truth is, I don’t understand the whole global warming thing and take a very simple approach to these things.   As the song says Que Sera Sera, whatever will be, will be.   I do my part to reduce, reuse, and recycle.   That’s about all any one individual can do.   I have at least two “hometowns.”   One, of course, is my beloved Brooklyn.   The other is Columbia, Missouri.   I love them both but in different ways.   Both have some wonderful memories as well as some pretty sad and awful ones.   I have snow memories from both hometowns as well.   I’ve written about Brooklyn snow and you can find it here . I am thinking about Columbia snow today...

Once in the delivery room Dr. Halverson took his place. I was already fully dilated the full ten centimeters. I was ready to push. I hadn’t seen Jane since the Emergency Room. I was alone, all alone. I assumed she was somewhere. I was pretty sure she was praying. It was a very good thing that she was. While I was ready to welcome this new member to my family, I was worried about our future. I knew God. I’d known Him since I was a child. I had received Jesus as my savior many times. I was always riddled with guilt so I almost always responded to an altar call. One can’t be too careful about one’s salvation if you are full of guilt. I really felt my life was over. Alvin and I had remarried. I had such hope. I thought sure we were going to be that couple with the great testimony. Eventually, I would be the preacher’s wife. I would be respected. But here I was, ready to bring another child into the world. We had no money. I didn’t even have a telephone in the trailer I lived in. I had a ...

My mother-in-law Estella thought I should go to work. She said she had always worked. She had no sympathy for our lack of food in the house. It didn’t matter to her that we went without. She felt I should work. I tried. I had several jobs during those first few months I was married. My mother had only one job during my years growing up. It lasted one month. To me, married women didn’t work. Married women were to be like the role models Donna Reed, June Cleaver or even the young wife, Samantha Stephens. I wasn’t lazy. I told someone recently that I still hear the tape of my mother-in-law. She is still telling me I am lazy. So powerful was her influence. At times I still believe her. Getting a job at 16 was not easy. I had no clerical skills. I didn’t know how to type or take steno. I knew neither Gregg nor Pitt stenography. Most of the summer jobs were given to people who knew people, children of a friend. I eventually landed a job at a drug store on Broadway, the main business street...

It is tempting to go on with just the story of the molestation. To tell you how eventually, many years later, I began to experience healing. It was important for you to understand my comments about the effects of being molested as I tell my story. The rest of that story, will wait for another time. Now is the time to finish the story I started. I thought I was in love. I assume he did too. We were children really. Children who thought we were old enough to assume adult life and responsibilities. Obviously, we were not. His background and childhood was equally marred. I give him no excuses for the pain and abuse he ultimately inflicted. Nevertheless, his childhood shaped him into the person he became. He was living in an apartment near the campus. He was still in high school. Rules were lacks. He managed to get an apartment, live on his own and go to High School at the age of 17. I don’t remember the first time I visited his mother. She lived 10 miles away in the unincorporated “to...

I don’t remember what I wore that day. I am sure it was a dress of some sort. We still were required to wear dresses in public school in those days. The church was very conservative and pants were never allowed anywhere. When moving to Missouri, we had started at First Assembly. It was the logical choice. We had always been Pentecostal and strict. No make-up, no movies, no card playing, were standards of my upbringing. Even a simple game of “Go Fish” or “War,” played with "devil cards" were unacceptable. I’ve written before about not being able to see Sleeping Beauty . One of the arguments was, even if the movie is okay, would you want to be watching a movie when Jesus came back? Heaven forbid - your rapture readiness would disappear in the twinkling of an eye. This church added no pants, no short sleeves dresses and no mixed bathing (swimming in the presence of the opposite sex). Television was frowned upon with long hair preferred for girls. I guess my parents thought...

It was Easter Sunday, our first Easter in Missouri. We had not gone to the Sunrise Breakfast, an Easter tradition with the church we were attending. The next Easter I would go. I would be married, be a mother whose first child would be dedicated that morning at First Assembly of God in Columbia MO. I had thought moving to Missouri was a great adventure. I had visited with my parents the summer before. My oldest brother was working on a doctoral degree at the University of Missouri. Looking back it now seems odd that we moved. At the time, perhaps I looked at it as the same as so many of our friends moving to Long Island, New Jersey or Staten Island. Brooklyn was experiencing exodus. Replacing the Norwegians were mostly Puerto Ricans; later would come the Chinese. The neighborhood was changing. My father was retired. Being in his 50’s when I was born, retirement came while in Junior High School. They would tell you that the reason for the move was me. I am not sure if that was real...

I got a call yesterday from the funeral home that handled the arrangements for my mother. A pleasant woman called to tell me that the date of my mother’s date was now on the headstone. Having purchased this headstone in 1982, for 18 years it has been waiting for this date. The many times I have visited my father’s grave I have also stared at my mother’s would be grave. I have looked at that headstone and wondered what date will appear. Now there is a date. Now it is final. It is official. On February 25, 2010, almost one month ago, Elsie Mae Bumbaugh Johannesen Martin joined with my father all those who worship around the throne of God. Many years ago while still a teenager I had a pastor who is buried not far from my parents at Memorial Cemetery in Columbia MO. I stopped at his grave when we buried my mother. I think I will stop there often as I visit both of my parents. Brother Parker, my pastor, preached a sermon series that I still remember. He preached from Hebrews 12:1 The...