Good Friday

Diana Nyad

 When I was growing up in the 1940s, Good Friday was a very different experience, whether you were Christian or not.  

From noon to 3:00 P.M., everything closed down.  Restaurants, stores, offices, all closed in respect for the perceived time Jesus hung on the cross.  

Lent,  the 40 days from Ash Wednesday to Easter,  has traditionally been a time of introspection for me.  I am not a religious talker so I don't usually share my introspectiveness, but it is there and it is meaningful to me. 

So, for Holy Week, and especially today, Good Friday, I want to be solemn much of the time and contemplate what my life is all about and what the next chapter will look like.

It's easy to get distracted by other things and people I love, and knowing how blessed I am.  

So, what to do?

You may find this offensive, but what put me in the proper frame of mind was watching the torturous movie, NYAD on Netflix.  The movie stars Annette Bening as Diana Nyad, who, in 2013, at age 64, swam from Cuba to Key West without a protective cage.  She covered the 103 miles in 53 hours,  

The movie has received positive reviews but I found it to be almost more than I could bare.   Am I comparing what Diana Nyad achieved to Jesus dying on the cross for our sins?  No.  Am I seeing a person who chose to undergo a truly torturous journey (after four earlier attempts)? Yes.  

And it helped me stay focused on what Good Friday is all about.  I just heard the following quote a few minutes ago.  It speaks to me. 

Embrace the darkness of Good Friday.  

***

Hoop Dreams

 

TOM MESCHERY

In the late 50's my husband, David, went to the University of Kansas, the same years Wilt Chamberlain attended.  He said once in Forum that Wilt Chamberlain was really smart, and an older woman in this group said she taught Chamberlain in high school and, yes, he was really smart,

Who knew?  Everything I knew about Chamberlain up to that point, I learned from Saturday Night Live. 

Another bit of knowledge my David brought to our community was cribbage.  He taught me early on, and others later on, to play.  And to this day, I can, on any given Tuesday, go to the food court  in the mall and find two of David's best (Florida) friends, Charlie and Art,  playing cribbage.

Where am I going with this?

A few days ago, my friend, Charlie, who is a real sports guy, sent me a full page article from The New York Times (March 11th issue) about this guy named Tom Meschery, who started alongside Wilt Chamberlain, and named a 1963 N.B.A. All-Star, and became the first player to have his number retired at the Goldengate Warriors. 

The article is titled, Finding the Words For His Final Verse In Hoops and Love. 

I know what you're thinking because I've never heard of him either!  And why did Charlie send this story to me?  I don't have hoop dreams. 

Tom Meschery is a writer.  He's written five books of poetry, two memoirs, and six novels.  Much of his poetry is about his remarkable life.  He was born in Manchuria to Russian parents. I can't relate to basket ball or being born in Manchuria,  but I can relate to many things he experienced in the decades that followed. 

Much of my poetry came (and comes) from my big and little life frustrations.  When I was much younger and was up to my ears in frustration,  I would write a poem about it. It made me feel better.  Then, if I sold the poem to a magazine for say, five dollars, I felt even better about it. 

TOM MESCHERY

OK, for those of you who know me, or are one of the many folks I've never met but read this blog, you know that, after a long first marriage, the last ten years of which were constant caregiving, I fell madly in love with David.  We ended up playing cribbage all over the world!

Tom Meschery, at a late stage in his life, fell madly in love with a woman he met on line, with the help and approval of his son.  The Time's article says they connected over their creative curiosities and their love of literature.

What?  No way.

So many other similarities in Tom Meschery's life and mine.  I'm beyond grateful to Charlie for sending me the article.  I'll close with a Tom Meschery poem.

This morning, didn't I wake up to

     sunlight

and a warm breeze?  Didn't my wife

poke her head into the office 

to tell me she loved me?

I flavor my coffee with honey that is sweet as

     life.

I should live a little longer.

***

Snakes

 

This past Sunday our sermon series on Moses and the promised land continued.  It was excellent.  Pastor David made himself vulnerable, and, as usual, presented exceptional insights into the Israelites' situation - and ours.

We have Moses and the Israelites stuck at the entrance to the promised land with several of his followers wanting to turn back.

In all of the churches my husband Ken pastored and most of the other institutions I was involved with there was always a "Back to Egypt" committee - people who were afraid to move ahead. 

But Pastor David's message is not my topic today.  My topic is Snakes.  Almost all of us are afraid of snakes. Even Indiana Jones is afraid of snakes.  In the Bible they are portrayed as symbols of evil....but, later on, a symbol of life and healing.  Moses was the first to put a bronze snake on a pole and that symbol is still used by health care facilities across the world. 

My husband, Ken was a complicated, brilliant, eccentric person who knew the Bible will and knew the snake, viper, serpent symbols.  He was also very familiar with the creation story, as most everyone is.  He had to put of with my season of life where I hung my "Eve was framed" poster over the washer.  In the last few weeks of his life, his body and mind were barely hanging on.  I was being pressured to stop dialysis which would result in his fast but painless death.  

During this time I, of course, wrote a poem.  Therapeutic for me but I've never had even one person respond to it.  I'm thinking that they just didn't get it. At the time he was pretty much non-speaking   So his words were astounding to me on several levels.  Here it is.  

THE ADVICE

Remember when you were

Fading in and out of consciousness, 

 

Drive you to the hospital?

Call an ambulance?

I could not decide.

 

And there was a snake in the garage.

What should I do?

 

Lying on the couch,

You whispered to me. 

 

“What?  I can’t hear you.”

“Are these your last words?”

 

I leaned close, 

With my ear to your mouth.

 

You barely gasped, 

“Cecily,

Don’t let the snake tempt you.”

(If you want to see last week's sermon, you can find it on YouTube at FUMCWP.org)