Be Careful about Threatening, Part One

"Rebel, for two cents, I would whip you right now!" _____________________ You are going to threaten someone? Think about it first. Then think about it again. Consider the other hand, or maybe even another. You never know how your threat will be received or what response it might draw. _____________________ Their disagreement was getting shorter, temperatures rising. It was James who said: "Rebel, for two cents I would whip you right now." Does that sound like a threat to you? Rebel, James, Karcher, Jesse, and I were "barn boys." We were college students who worked at the college livestock barns. We lived in the barns. That was a way to insure that we would not be late for chores at 5:00 a.m. James, who was majoring in campusology, didn’t show up for chores one cold October morning, The beef herdsman, a no-nonsense man of few words, asked where James was. James had come in too late too many nights and had been too sound asleep for the rest of us to get him up. Someone answered: "James is still in the sack." Mr. Dehay filled a bucket with water, walked in to James’ bunk, emptied a five-gallon bucket of cold water on James, from toe to head, then simply said: "Time for chores, James." Mr. Dehay didn’t threaten. It was this same James who told our Arkansas "Rebel," that for two cents he would whip him then and there. Hot-tempered Rebel turned around, walked across the room to his desk drawer, found a dollar bill, and walked back across the room. He extended the bill to Jams and with a fiery voice announced: "You owe me ninety-eight cents change!" Their conflict had been over something relatively trivial. James was so struck by humor of Rebel’s overreaction that he burst out laughing. Poor Reb didn’t know what to do now that James had defused the threatened explanation. You never know how someone will respond to your threat. You may wind up looking like a fool. Think before you threaten. Part two will follow.

The Good Life

In Leider and Shapiro’s, Repacking Your Bags, they suggest that we write, in a single sentence, our own description what would constitute The Good Life. I thought it sounded like a good idea, so I made the following attempt. I acknowledge that I have written a long and complex sentence and used some abstract concepts and terms. I saw no other way to get it into one sentence. The good life--as I see it and can, in one sentence, express it–is one that is: “The good life--as I see it and can, in one sentence, express it–is one led by the Holy Spirit, at peace with God, the world, and themselves, and is melodiously, harmoniously, and with dynamic rhythm loving those whom and working with that which they have found to be their appropriate others.” What follows is a brief commentary on the statement. • led by the Holy Spirit, Apart from attunement with the creator of the universe, and following his–the conductor’s–lead, a truly good life cannot be found. • at peace with God, the world, and our self, and is The good life never comes until we actually accept–heart, mind, body, and soul–God’s ways; that the world is like it is; that we are who and how we are. • melodiously, harmoniously, and with dynamic rhythm Our life must develop and follow a line that has meaning; it must blend appropriately with all we touch; it must have a pulse: systole/diastole, ebb and flow, activity and dormancy, something that gives it a measure of regularity, but flexible enough to modulate the music of our life in the evolving ways our love and work calls for. • loving those whom and working with that which Freud correctly said that the good life consists of love and work. We must have both. • the person has found to be their appropriate others. We actively love everyone. Love takes time and makes demands. Led by the Spirit, and patiently allowing time for development, we will come to see that those we can and should truly love will be clearly disclosed to us. Similarly, we must have tasks that have meaning, that bring joy, and that are fitted to our ability to perform them. Here again, the work that is ours to do will sort itself out only as we patiently adjust to life’s change. Our appropriate others are long-term commitments, but some will find fulfilment and completion and be followed, sometimes surprisingly, by new appropriate others. Some of our others will be appropriate for the remainder of our good life. ________________________________ Such would be a life of peace and joy. Stated differently, it would be a most satisfying and enjoyable way to live.

College Education

Yesterday, a friend told me that one of my former students had called me the most irresponsible teacher he had ever known, perhaps even the most irresponsible person--but that he thanked God for my irresponsibility because it made my students think. Along another line, he emailed me later in the day, asking what I thought about the purpose of a college education. After emailing my response, I decided to post in on this blog. Whether I am a responsible person, citizen, consumer, or whatever, is an interesting question. To whom are we responsible, for what, and who is to determine these things. Shortly after a new man came on our faculty some years ago, he said to me that propriety was very important to him. My first response was that propriety was not one of my major concerns. Then I got to thinking. Propriety is cognate with appropriate. Most of the time, I say and do that which I think appropriate. That which I think appropriate, right, fitting. Much of the time I believe that socially correctness–propriety–is more concerned with maintaining a simple harmony in the status quo. Much of the time I think the status quo is not anything to quo about. Much of the time I believe that “status quo” is Latin for “the mess we’re in.” [I apologize for not translating the following. The man to whom I was responding is a professional musician, so I used some of his language.] So, it seems to me, it often is time to change the music from a I, V, IV, and back to I harmony, and interject some sevenths, elevenths, seconds, and other seeming dissonances. Some elements of social correctness need to be diminished, others augmented. Sometimes I think the occasion calls for modulation to another key: perhaps minor, Aeolian, Lydian, Dorian, Phrygian, . . .. Maybe pentatonic, blues, or some other kind of gapped scale is more appropriate at times. Propriety is relative to culture, situation, issue, assignment, etc. Responsibility is relative. "If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer." None of this is written as personal defense, nor a rebuttal to any of what my former student told you. Rather, it is a line of thought stimulated by your remarks of yesterday, and part of the ongoing effort to understand myself. “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I– . . .” Now, as to your question about the purpose of a college education, who is authorized to give the definitive answer? We have many divergent judgments and opinions. Mine follows. The purpose of a college education is: • To learn how to read. (Most of those who come can do it only after a fashion. A college education should be an advanced study of how to read) • To learn how to write. (Most of those who come can do it only after a fashion. A college education should be an advanced study of how to read.) • To learn how to think. (I’m not sure how many of them can do this at all. If so, they don’t often engage in the practice. A college education should be an ongoing provocation to thought.) • To do a lot of the above. • To learn life’s issues, and the highlights of the past and ongoing conversation about these issues. • To give them the requisite vocabulary, categories, and skills, then the encouragement to join the conversation. • To bring them in touch with standards of excellence, to put them in contact with true excellence. • To let them know that all formal education is merely a course of studies called, “Introduction to Life,” thus, the necessity of lifelong learning if they are to live a good life. • To give them models who are passionate and rigorous about all this.

Grandma Was Churched

Grandma was churched, voted out, kicked out of her church. This was back in the 1920s. My father was then a young fellow in his upper teens, a self-proclaimed atheist. The next day, Uncle Charley, one of Daddy’s older brothers, looked up from his barnyard chores only to see his younger brother walking down the dirt road toward the church, a mile away. He was carrying a pearl-handled revolver. Uncle Charley caught up with his hot-tempered brother and asked: “Harry, where are you going with that gun?” “I’m going to kill that preacher that kicked Mom out of the church.” I don’t know the details of what happened next, but Daddy and the pistol went back to the house rather than to church. A few years later, when I was eighteen-months-old, Daddy left the farm he was sharecropping, and became a preacher himself. For the next sixty years his ministry blessed untold numbers in small churches, a World War II chaplaincy, and in large churches. The last forty of those years brought him great respect and much love. I’ve known the story of Grandma’s being churched and Daddy’s intent to kill the man responsible, but only in recent years have I learned, from one of his sisters, the rest of the story. My grandma, an active and outspoken member of the church, had learned that her pastor was having an affair with a woman in the community. Grandma intended, at the next church business meeting, to inform the church and call for the pastor’s dismissal. However, the preacher learned of her intentions, seized the initiative, trumped up some kind of charges against my outspoken grandmother, and had her voted out of the church before she could act. Thus, her voice was effectively squelched and discredited. I had always wondered why my devout grandmother would be dismissed from a church. Although all of those involved have been long years gone from any earthly involvements, I have written this as a belated public vindication of Emma Roark. This prompted me to do some thinking about strategy and tactics. One of the most effective elements in any kind of conflict is to seize the initiative before you are forced into a confrontation in which you may be at a disadvantage. Another closely related important strategical element is surprise. Grandma lost on this occasion because she did not keep her own counsel. She talked with some others. Who talked with others. Who talked with the pastor. The story would have ended differently if Grandma had done two things: quietly gathered and verified the relevant facts, and then kept it all to herself until she caught the congregation and the minister by surprise. They might not have believed her at first, but since Grandma was a respected member of the congregation, they likely would have listened as she laid out the indisputable facts. As they recovered from their shock, it probably would have been unnecessary for the church to have voted to dismiss the offending minister. I suspect he would have seized the initiative and resigned before it came to a vote.