Notes from my Knapsack 8-26-21

Notes from my Knapsack 8-26-21

Jeff Gill

Granville and Deadwood

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Two summers ago, at the encouragement of a friend, we stayed a few nights in Deadwood, South Dakota. Our plans were to hit the Corn Palace and Wall Drug on the way, and up to Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse, and Custer State Park's bison herd in the Black Hills, all of which lived up to advance billing and beyond.

I knew Deadwood was touristed up, and my expectations were lower. Seth Bullock's grave I visited, but Al Swearengen the actual or the fictional character isn't in Mount Moriah Cemetery, though Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane Canary and Preacher Smith and Dora DuFran are.

Down in the town, which is clustered tight in Deadwood Gulch on either side of Main Street, I was pleasantly surprised. Yes, they built their renewal of the historic district on gambling years ago, and casino action is still woven into the streetscape, but the peak excitement downtown is three times a day all summer (except Mondays), when they have . . . shootouts. 

Yep, shoot outs on Main Street. If you are a fan of logistics and crowd management (which my wife and I both are), it's fascinating to watch the cast quietly move into place, set out cones to re-route traffic, and start into their scripted but mildly variable live show at 2 pm, 4 pm, and 6 pm (with a trial for that last shooting in a theatre on the west end of Main most nights, which they claim is one of the longest running audience participation dramas in the world, and they may be right).

But there's no getting around it: we're making a show, and a tourist attraction, and an event to photograph and enjoy, out of something we eye nervously and bemoan on social media when it happens on city streets and side alleys every weekend in urban centers all over the United States. It's . . . odd, if you think about it. Obviously, the appreciative crowd is not thinking about it (and are on vacation, and many are in a very relaxed state of mind to be kind).

For two years, I've kept thinking about it. Deadwood has a history, and a narrative thread of wild west storytelling which has been celebrated for years on television, in movies, and to more recent acclaim in the history warping but recognizably parallel and profanity laced HBO series. So it fits.

But can you imagine any of the cities, Midwestern or elsewhere, which are experiencing tragic levels of gun violence due to lawless, chaotic fights between drug dealers and other desperate characters, re-enacting those sudden fatal encounters in the year 2164? Perhaps they will, but I can't quite see it.

It's a good example of how we enjoy what we're familiar with, even when it makes no sense. The tourist crowd was "out west," the town is Deadwood, and actors are shooting each other dead with stage pistols in full and no doubt very warm costumes of leather and denim. Entertainment for all, huzzah! If I were to stage shootouts on Broadway in Granville, and do it just as well from an acting and logistical point of view, on a busy summer Saturday, how would people respond? Applause? Confusion? Probably more the latter, and hopefully someone would ask "Why?"

Ironically, we went to a church right off Main Street that Sunday, built in part by Seth Bullock, tied to the local history directly and personally. We were warmly welcomed, but it came up a couple of times before and after services that our appearance there was unusual. "Tourists never come here." Even though this, too, was literally part of that early history, there to be experienced.

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he's interested in living history, though perhaps not with bodies in the streets. Tell him how you've encountered the past in your present at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

Faith Works 8-14-21

Faith Works 8-14-21
Jeff Gill

A point that needs making
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I have a long simmering hot take which I've kept pushing to my mental back burners for some weeks now. At this point, I just want to get it out of my head & out there in front of you all, as we look at all manner of reasons & rationales & strategies on vaccination, and that odd category of "vaccine avoidance" which we've all heard about, but I'm not sure we've considered sufficiently.

It comes down to this: for four years in seminary I ran blood drives three or four times a school year, along with the 40-plus years across which I've been a fairly regular blood donor. And whether I was directly asking, simply promoting, or just having it come up that I'd just given blood, I have for all those years heard many, many, many reasons people feel compelled to give me about their not giving blood.

At Christian Theological Seminary, the obvious but un-anxious reason was "I was just in Africa." That used to be an effective lifetime deferral, and we had a hatful of former missionaries on campus. But that was that. Some were on chemo, again, certainly. Others had health issues like diabetes or blood pressure: they'd note the barrier, and often ask if they could bring brownies or cookies for the donors. Great! Those were swift and simple and tension-free interactions over the blood drive, and the clipboard I would carry with my books the week before those events stayed in the crook of my arm.

But the overwhelming and more time-consuming group in size and defensiveness I can boil down to this: needles made them crazy. I've heard more stories than I can recount here, and rarely did I even try to argue, and my practice has always been to just answer what questions I'm asked. Even so, it was and has been a long-standing part of being a blood donor to keep smiling and nodding and being reassuring and supportive of people who feel very awkward if not guilty about not giving blood because "I just can't stand needles."

The Lord and the Red Cross be my witness, I have NEVER wanted to or tried to make such people feel guilty, and usually say when they wind down from their explanation: "it's okay, I'm giving for both of us!"

Seriously, I don't think ill of such people (maybe you, dear reader, but I doubt it); I tell this now to say I know from personal experience, while rarely hearing mentioned in public discussion: lots of people HATE and FEAR needles more than spiders or IRS audits. And that HAS to be driving a great deal of the vaccine avoidance out there. Which is also why I wish video media would ease up on all the close-ups of needles going into arms. I don't think you're helping with that large but indeterminate cohort, the needlephobic, aka trypanophobia, which I firmly believe is a thing.

How many people fit into that category? I don't know, and casual internet searching isn't showing me much. What I do suspect from my personal experience is that 30% of all people having a deep aversion to getting a needle stuck in their arm is a not unreasonable figure to start with. Deep, as in "I'd rather court death or debility than get that poke." Deep-seated fear and anxiety that people still apologize to me about literally decades later after seminary for not having been a donor, "but needles just scare me to death."

To get a vaccine, you gotta go out of your way to ask someone to do that very thing.

As a Christian, we've all heard and I've preached how we all have to accept carrying our cross. Often part of that message is a reminder that when the time comes, we need to faithfully and sacrificially accept the cross we're given to carry, and also a passing thought that we shouldn't be rushing to grab the nearest cross to die on. God will provide, in blessings and in crosses, but don't expect to pick the where and when.

Getting your shot is a little bit different, and the evangelism around it of a very different sort. How do you lovingly and compassionately encourage someone to step forward and do something that might not rattle you a bit, but fills them with fear? All I know is to walk with them, as far as I can, and let them know they are not alone.

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he is not a doctor nor has he played one on television, but he did play a coroner once on stage. Tell him how you think we can keep our population safe and hospitals as quiet as possible at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.