By Deborah Carmichael
(2015 Neuse River Senior Games Silver Arts)
For NC Senior Games State Finals 2015
Literary Arts
Life Experience
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ANY GIVEN SUNDAY
On any given Sunday, you can see her on the left side of the church in the pew second from
the front. She glides into the same center position, leaving room on each side of her, as an
invitation for someone to come and sit there. Usually, those positions are left open on the pew,
as if those who enter the doors following her purposely leave them open for her grandchildren,
children, or friends to slip in beside her. Maybe they, like me, have built up a picture of her in
which she is smiling as she reaches out to clasp a loved-ones hand in greeting, before once again,
facing the front of the church in preparation for the morning’s service.
Those sitting behind her have a perfect view of the gold butterfly ornament holding her silver
hair in place in the customary bun. And if they look closely, they may be rewarded by seeing a
rainbow of brilliant color reflected through the stained glass window onto her gilded hair. If she
is studied longer, they may notice her body swaying back and forth, as if she alone can hear the
sweet singing of a heavenly choir - for it is only later that the blue-robed church choir will file
sedately into position up front.
Anyone taking the time to stop and greet her would notice the extraordinary blue eyes and
joyful smile. Her eyes remind me of the periwinkle so tenderly cared for in my grandmother’s
garden every year before she passed away.
If you went a step more, you might ask her how she’s been getting along. Her answer, would
be as always, “Blessed.” She does not hesitate to tell you that she arrived here at church this
morning because the pastor’s wife stopped and signed her out of the assisted living facility to
make sure she was given the opportunity to return thanks to God for everything he has done for
her this week.
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As the ushers pass the collection plate, your mind might picture her as a mother, creating
memories with her children at the ocean, in her kitchen planning birthday parties or preparing to
bake holiday memories, making handmade Easter dresses, or wiping tears from a toddlers eyes.
She was there with a loving family, teaching them to believe in dreams even though the castles
they worked together to build might one day turn to sand.
As the congregation rises to sing “The Old Rugged Cross”, you find your mind wondering if
maybe this person raised her sweet voice in tune with her husband and children each Sunday in
years past, in some other church where she encouraged them to pray and trust God. Did
someone let her know how much she meant to them? Do they tell her they love her now?
As the pastor begins his sermon, she leans forward in her seat to hear every word. Does this
precious lady understand that when I see her each week, I don’t really see “her”? Instead, I am
thinking of my own father and mother. Their impressions are so strong in me, as I am sure her
own parents are imprinted in her memory. Would her story reveal a beautiful tapestry of
memories? Do they wrap around her heart when she is alone to give her warmth when it is
needed? Does she know that powerful kind of love of friends and family?
She is loved as surely as she sits there, and she knows it. I believe that.
If you take the time to visit her “at home” as I did, she will sway back and forth in excitement
with a smile never leaving her lips. Her smile is sweet and genuine. With pride she will point
out to you the pictures of her children and grandchildren strategically placed to the right side of
her bed, in such a position that she can “be” with them before she falls asleep. They are with her
every night, as familiar as if they were sleeping in the empty facility bed across the room. And
when morning comes, they are the first smiles she sees upon opening her eyes.
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Next, she will point out the two pictures above the head of her bed. One is a child’s coloring
page of Snow White holding the poisoned apple in her hand before she takes that fated first bite.
The other is Sleeping Beauty in a beautiful gown of maroon. “I did those,” she admits proudly,
and she should be proud because both are colored brilliantly with perfect edges, by a hand that
lovingly saw the beautiful addition they would become to her small room.
On her bed is a skein of yarn with a crochet hook stuck in its side. “I’ve made a mess of that
roll of yarn!” she says, pointing to where the center of it has been pulled out and wadded back
into its middle. As I offer to rewind it for her she says, “Oh, no need! I’ve got someone who
always knows what to do to fix it. I seem to do this all the time!”
She doesn’t say much else, as if waiting for you to bring up a subject you can both talk about.
I ask her if she has seen her family lately. “Well, not for a while, but I talked to my son
yesterday,” she states.
I am relieved. I would not want her to be lonely.
“But you know, everyone here is my family,” she continues. “We all get along great. You and
the other people from church are also my family. And I love it here because it feels like home.
We’ve always got something going on and we look out for each other.”
As I listen to her, I realize that she is telling me the truth. Inside myself, I had carried a
concern for her. I had judged her to be someone to pity because she was alone. She stares
kindly at me with those periwinkle eyes and I realize that she is trying to reassure me. She may
live in this home away from home with what I might consider to be strangers, but it is here that
she feels love and safety.
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As I hug her good-bye and reassure her that I will be back again, she follows me out into the
hallway to thank me for visiting.
“You sure surprised me,” she states happily. If I were honest, I should have said, “No, you
surprised me!”
As I left the facility, a tidal wave of emotion welled up, causing me to blink back quick tears
as I made my way across the parking lot, unlocked the car door, and fell into the driver’s seat,
stricken. Whatever the emotion was – pity, anguish, compassion - it soon left me. It was just
something that, for a moment, made me feel as if someone had reached out and touched me.
I had spent my childhood in fear of being on the receiving end of rejection from my father,
which caused me to immediately think about my mother. Our home was not always a place of
wonder. It wasn’t a big house and we didn’t have indoor plumbing or climate control. It wasn’t
filled with crisp, white doilies and grandfather clocks. But it was filled with love because Mom
was there. It was through her that I learned about love and received the legacy a mother passes
to her children so that they become even stronger.
Sometimes, I hide my feelings very well, but I can’t hide my feelings from God. There are
feelings that I have never expressed to another person that have weighed me down most of my
life. It is only recently that I have accepted where that burden came from.
My father was a good man, and having been forced by the death of his mother at the age of
fourteen to quit school, he became the mainstay of the family and took care of his father, the
farm, and several younger siblings. He never had the carefree days of a teenager. After
marrying mom when he was eighteen and she sixteen, he left the following month to serve in the
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Army during WWII in Germany. Following his discharge, he came home to a wife, and a son
who was born eight months after he left.
His life went from taking care of a large family, to taking care of an added family. He and
mom had four children together, with me the only girl and the youngest. I don’t think he ever
had time to just be a child or young adult because his life was filled with challenges, both
mentally and physically. He was pulled too many ways for a young man to cope with.
In his early thirties, Dad began having problems with a form of severe rheumatoid arthritis
that doctors at Duke felt would have him in a wheelchair before the age of forty. These burdens
made him extremely hard to live with by my early childhood. He became short tempered and
very strict. Mom had her hands full just trying to keep the peace, especially when my oldest
brother began dating someone of whom Dad did not approve. But those were not the arguments
that hurt the worst.
In those early years, Dad was not kind to Mom. He belittled everything she did and was. I
would be awakened by their arguments. With no job or money to be had, Dad insisted on feeling
sorry for himself. As stubborn as he was though, Mom was just as stubborn that she wasn’t going
to let her children go on welfare.
There were many things going on during that period that a small child would not understand.
While I did not know what was going on - I knew things were not going right - and I came away
with the feeling that nothing I could ever do was going to measure up to Dad’s expectations. I
think that Mom felt the same way.
At times I hated my father. I hated him for what he was saying to make my mother cry and
hated him for his willingness to give up.
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It was only when Dad was at rock bottom that he allowed God to step in and transform his
life. God healed his body, called him to preach, and challenged him to forget his own problems
and serve God and others. Dad become a minister, as well as a loving and gentle father and
husband. It took a healing from God in the hearts of each of us to take us to a place of love and
respect.
Maybe that is why this little church lady made me remember everything now and what caused
the raw emotion I felt. It isn’t as if her story is anything like ours, even if I knew her entire story.
Maybe it is God’s way of reminding me that love and forgiveness are what is important, so I am
thankful God spoke to me when I was ready to stop and listen. God took away the hurt and
anger I had carried for years in my heart against my father.
Dad has been dead for over forty years, having died at the young age of forty-seven from a
heart attack. There was a time when it seemed so unfair to me that he was taken so young, after
my siblings and I had moved out of the nest to create our own families. He and mom had so
little time to spend together and discuss those past hurts, if they needed to. As a daughter, I had
come to love him so deeply and only after he was gone did I truly realize that my heart shut
down a little bit when he died.
My thought is not to leave anyone with the sense that Dad was a mean man; he was far from
it. In the early years, he was burdened with family in a way that caused him to feel a little
hopeless, I think. In his last years, he still was burdened with family, but through his desire to let
God into his life, he lost that hopelessness and became the best father anyone could ask for. It
was through him that I learned the valuable lessons of what not to do, as well as what to do right.
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I still feel a sense of connection to my father, even as I feel a sense of loss in my life on
holidays and other times, like playing with my grandchildren – times that were meant to be
shared with him and family.
So when I sit in the fifth pew on the left side of the church on Sunday mornings, and notice a
gray haired man or woman all alone on the pew in front of me, I believe that God understands
why I may not catch all the words in the song the choir sings, or hear every point being presented
by the pastor. He understands that my mind wanders back to another time when my family and I
labored together in a garden that may not make it through the month of April, or a time when we
lost our favorite pet because it wandered into the old sow’s pen to play with her newborn piglets.
Remembering those things we did as a family brings a small measure of comfort to me.
When I see the sunlight shining through the stained glass window on Sunday morning
creating colorful patterns on the floor, or my eye catches the movement of dust motes in the
bright beams as they spin about, I am remembering another time. I clearly see my father standing
behind the pulpit with bulging veins in his neck, preaching in a rapid, loud, hoarse voice, trying
to keep up with the words pouring out of his heart and into his mouth from God.
God loved him as he was. A changed and loving man to his family and congregation. And
because God changed me, I was able to forgive and love my father with a whole heart. I miss
him terribly.
If you see a sweet lady sitting on the left-hand side of the church in the middle of the second
pew, stop to ask her how she is and notice that her periwinkle blue eyes are sincere when they
say, “Blessed!”
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