Notes from my Knapsack 6-6-19

Notes from my Knapsack 6-6-19

Jeff Gill

 

Crops in the village

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Granville's recorded history, to me, begins with Jesse Munson clambering down out of a wagon and tasting the soil when asked what he thinks about the place.

 

This was the night before the legendary race of ox-drawn wagons across Clear Run into what's now the center of the village, and the chopping down of a tree with a sermon from the stump.

 

That was November 17, 1805, but it was a mile or so east, near where today's Cherry Valley Road runs into Newark-Granville Road. The so-called Nash cabin property was where John and Lilly Jones had attempted a homestead in 1802, and where she died giving birth to a child, sending John and the older children back towards the Ohio River. It was around that abandoned (twice over, it seems) cabin that the first group of "The Licking Company" pioneers made their last temporary camp, and where grandfather Jesse tasted the dirt and declared it fit for farming.

 

The Munson family bought that whole stretch of land, now mostly the Erinwood housing development. Just east of where the Munson farmhouse once stood (a major part of it now built into the Welsh Hills School complex, rolled east in a creative act of preservation years ago), the 1810 House stood in what's just a patch of woodland opposite Fackler's Garden Center on the historic intersection. Across the road under a shade tree was Licking County's first legal existence in 1808 as a county Common Pleas Court session.

 

But behind the Munson place and the 1810 lot was good farmland, as Jesse had declared, ranging from the Raccoon Creek bottomlands north to the edge of the Welsh Hills, a long ribbon of good soil and well-watered bluffs. It was ploughed and planted in the spring of 1806 by the Munsons, as much as they could turn, more each year.

 

Today, it's mostly homes, the Great Lawn before the Bryn Du Mansion, and a lone patch which just got plowed and planted. Which made me happy.

 

I'm a realist, and I know the piece of surviving farmland here in the village was eyed for a new elementary school at one point, a new intermediate school later, and most recently for a commercial development. The work went into the parcel enough to clear trees up the Welsh Hills slope above it, and the farmer wasn't given the lease to plant in 2018. But the plans hit snags, as development often does; now we see dramatic work on the downhill side of the road to Newark further east, up Ashley Hill. And the 1810 House parcel, adjoining and historically blending into the Jones-Munson parcel, will be built on at some point in the near future, I'm sure.

 

But it is the longest continuously farmed piece of land in the township that we can say that for certain of. Up in the Welsh settlement there may be a garden patch that's had seed planted for a year or two longer, but for actual regular farming, this is a special place. And it made me smile to drive by and see one more crop planted on that hallowed if not quite holy ground.

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's interested in the landscape of this whole Land of Legend we call home. Tell him about a crop that caught your eye at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

 

Faith Works 6-1-19

Faith Works 6-1-19

Jeff Gill

 

Don't look up

___

 

Our prayers are certainly with everyone affected by winds and rain and flooding, which covers a great deal of the country this year.

 

From the recent Dayton storms to the earlier Oklahoma and Missouri tornados to rising waters along the Missouri and Mississippi, everyday people and sacred structures have been damaged by the insidious work of water going where it's not wanted.

 

Water has been called the universal solvent, and we all know how a dripping spring can carve a hole in solid rock. What's faster is a leak in a roof above plaster.

 

Something they don't tell you in ministerial training (it's quite a list, actually) is that you'll never look up at the ceiling of a worship space the same way again. It's something like going from being a child to a renter to a homeowner, and you realize when the toilet clogs or the drain backs up that there's no one to call: it's your problem.

 

Stains on the ceiling evoke the same feeling of helpless dread.

 

Depending on your polity, there may be trustees or a property committee or even a diocesan office to call for help. But in the immediate realization that a) there's a problem, and b) it's not going to get better, and c) the longer a solution delays, the more costly the final bill will become, it's often the parson who stands there in the middle of the week thinking "I need a bucket, and then  . . ."

 

And there are roofers, and there are roofers. But after the roofer comes (hallelujah) and goes (oh, but wait), there's the damage done and repairs within, all of which involve ladders at best and scaffolding and/or harnesses at worst.

 

Not to be flip, but a windstorm and massive damage means an insurance call and contractors. The steady drip-drip-drip of managing a physical plant is less the big boom than the everlasting question of what needs painting up there, versus what needs work up above those discolored areas of paint or plaster.

 

Ideally, you have a team and a good contact person beyond your church to help with the big stuff, but it's the little incidents of a leak here, a drip there, a stain in that corner and a little crumbling plaster along the wall that pulls your attention away from where you're trying to focus.

 

Looking up ideally should be a religious impulse of hope and joy, but if you have any kind of building responsibility at all, it can be a hazardous undertaking. I've talked to pastors of large churches, college presidents, and theatre managers, and we all agree: you never look up quite the same way again. Even some retired clergy have told me they visit a church and glance skyward and think "uh oh . . . " and can't look away.

 

Last summer we had a few days in New Mexico, and visited an adobe church we know well, first built in 1812 (and trust me, there are plenty older). Adobe is a form of architecture that has the built-in knowledge that you have to keep rebuilding; it's ideal in desert climates, but it's not that it never rains in an arid place, just that you deal with water differently.

 

So you know with adobe you will re-mud on a regular basis, and it's an art and a skill to apply the materials properly and durably. Still, you have to put a roof on top of those mud brick walls, and need a decent overhang, eaves to keep the casual shower from melting a bit of the exterior, plus solid sheathing up above to prevent the infiltration of run-off from the interior of the structure.

 

I enjoyed our visit to this sacred place, but I knew it hadn't been renovated since our last visit some years ago, and as I looked at the eroded ends of the beams, and considered the patches of adobe crumbled off inside and out, I just kept thinking "someone's got a big job ahead." My first visit was decades before that, and at least one resurfacing cycle back; I'll bet the same signs of decay and needed maintenance could be seen then. But in my early non-ministerial twenties, it was all just quaint.

 

Now, I'm thinking "hope they have a good property committee here" all through my time in the pews.

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's been in a few attics and on a couple of roofs. Tell him about patch jobs you've regretted at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

lyrics

Wide awake while the world is sound asleepin'
Too afraid of what might show up while you're dreamin'
Nobody, nobody, nobody sees you
Nobody, nobody, nobody would believe you
Every day you try to pick up all the pieces
All the memories, they somehow never leave you
Nobody, nobody, nobody sees you
Nobody, nobody, nobody would believe you

God only knows what you've been through
God only knows what they say about you
God only knows how it's killing you
But there's a kind of love that God only knows
God only knows what you've been through
God only knows what they say about you
God only knows the real you
There's a kind of love that God only knows

There's a kind of love that
There's a kind of love

You keep a cover over every single secret
So afraid if someone saw them they would leave
But somebody, somebody, somebody sees you
Somebody, somebody will never leave you

God only knows what you've been through
God only knows what they say about you
God only knows how it's killing you
But there's a kind of love that God only knows
God only knows what you've been through
God only knows what they say about you
God only knows the real you
There's a kind of love that God only knows

There's a kind of love that
There's a kind of love
There's a kind of love that
There's a kind of love

For the lonely, for the ashamed
The misunderstood, and the ones to blame
What if we could start over
We could start over
We could start over
Oh for the lonely, for the ashamed
The misunderstood, and the ones to blame
What if we could start over
We could start over
We could start over
'Cause there's a kind of love that God only knows

God only knows what you've been through
God only knows what they say about you
God only knows the real you
But there's a kind of love that God only knows
God only knows what you've been through
God only knows what they say about you
God only knows the real you
There's a kind of love that God only knows

There's a kind of love that
There's a kind of love
There's a kind of love that
There's a kind of love

God only knows where to find you
God only knows how to break through
God only knows the real you
There's a kind of love that God only knows

Faith Works 5-25-19

Faith Works 5-25-19

Jeff Gill

 

Singing as a family

___

 

Many local churches in Licking County host musical performances from outside our community, and I do try to mention those I hear about far enough in advance (these columns are generally written weeks ahead of when you see them in print).

 

While I try to keep this space more general, speaking to people of faith writ large, and with an admitted bias to the Christian perspective out of my own experience, I wanted to tell you about a very special concert being hosted at my own church next week.

 

The Watoto Children's Choir is an ongoing series of concerts sung by the children of the Watoto communities in Uganda and South Sudan. These orphanages are set up along family lines, giving what stability they can through residential "house parents," and supported in part by the free-will offerings at concert tours they do twice a year, through the United States and around the world.

 

On Friday night, May 31, Watoto Children's Choir will be singing at Newark Central Christian Church on Mt. Vernon Road at 7:00 pm. This is free and open to the public, with a free-will offering as part of the program and items such as CDs and DVDs available for sale.

 

We made contact with Watoto through our pastoral associate, Rev. Karen Gebhart, whose journey of faith and path to ordination led through a mission trip to Uganda some years ago. Karen was moved by the work done by Watoto Church, and the family communities they establish for the children who live there; soon after she came to us as a field education intern, she mentioned what she had encountered with Watoto.

 

One quote she shared with our church was another person's encounter with this musical group: "What an extraordinary experience it is to host the Watoto Children's Choir. I mean it lights up the place to see these beautiful kids, and when you hear their story, you think of all God has done – where they have come from, to the transformation that has happened in their lives. I would strongly recommend that you welcome the choir. They're only going to bless you and the people will love it."

 

So we're having them in our church next Friday, May 31, and in our homes that night; they travel on to other communities, more concerts, carrying a message of transformation and hope around the world. You can learn more about them at their website, www.watoto.com.

 

You are invited, both to come hear the children of Watoto at Newark Central, but also to share with me other such concerts and programs you might have open to the general public. My email is always at the bottom of these columns, and with enough notice I'm always happy to spread good news of all sorts across our community, especially regarding music!

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he can't sing all that well anymore, but he's always happy to listen to music in almost any form. Tell him about programs you want to share at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

Faith Works 5-18-19

 

Faith Works 5-18-19

Jeff Gill

 

A flat of geraniums

___

 

In the latter half of May, when we'd go to Grandma Walton's house for a weekend, whether it was Memorial Day or not yet we'd end up going out on Saturday with a flat of geraniums.

 

Decoration Day had roots well before the Civil War, up into New England when the first time you could plant flowers around gravesites was the very end of the month; mid-Ohio is more mid-May for our frost-free date, but in any case geraniums are fairly hardy, which is why I imagine they became associated so strongly in the Midwest with the first planting at family headstones.

 

The Civil War brought a new meaning to the end of May, starting in 1868, but whether you're thinking about the last Monday in this month, or just the first weekend with decent weather, Decoration Day is still hidden within Memorial Day as an observance. Memorial Day was more the wreaths and the salutes and Taps, but Decoration Day was personal.

 

We'd get in the car and head out across the downstate Illinois landscape, east to Fairview and Grandview and Hoult Cemeteries, looking for Newlins and Cartwrights and other relatives whose names I didn't know. We'd pause sometimes at crossroads with a sparse corner and a huddled few upright tilting stones. Then we might steer north to Greasy Point, east of Arcola, to tend Walton stones there.

 

At each halt, the flat of geraniums would come out, the apron, the basket with trowel and tools, a roll of waxy canvas for kneeling. Grandma would be in charge, whomever came along that year, whichever car (she never learned how to drive) and she had a plan and a kind of budget for which geraniums went where.

 

My recollection forty years later is that however we offered or asked or started out, Grandma planted most of them. Or at least put the final pats onto the soil when everything was in place. Most went close to the headstone, but not where they'd obscure the inscription, though no too far wide, either "or they'll get cut down by the mowers." She knew where they went. She'd planted geraniums there before.

 

There wasn't a great deal of sentiment, or sorrow, or standing around in a reflective haze. For the most part, there was always one more country cemetery to get to, so we jumped in the car and kept moving. It was the act, the work of planting geraniums . . . and the knowledge that they were growing there, long after you left . . . that was the purpose and the prayer. Consider it a kind of Protestant lighting of candles at a shrine, the planting of geraniums.

 

Not without a little guilt this time of year I think of her, and her grave, and those graves she took us around to tend. Most I've not visited for years, and they're all 300 miles and more away. Mostly geraniumless.

 

And I think about how best to maintain memories, and gratitude, and thankfulness. For my own family, known and unknown; and for a wider spiritual family, from church members to parishioners where I've served before, to inspirations farther afield. This week I'm remembering Jean Vanier and Rachel Held Evans who have recently passed on, to wide appreciation and ongoing consideration of their witness in the world; even the more secular fond memories of Doris Day and Tim Conway nudge their way into my thoughts. How do we honor and celebrate and hold in remembrance our own community of saints? We can't plant geraniums for them all.

 

Next weekend we have many ways to keep in memory those who have died in the nation's service. The color guards and buglers and parades keep us on task for Memorial Day. Each of us needs, though, a different sort of ceremonial to celebrate our own saints. Sometimes it's pictures on a wall, a screensaver on our computer, a list of names on a piece of paper in our Bibles tucked into Hebrews chapter 11.

 

It is a good time of year, for any of us, in any location, to think back over those individuals who have shaped us and brought us and sometimes carried us to where we are now. And to decorate their memories even if only in our minds, with prayers and appreciation, and maybe even to tell their stories to others for uplift and inspiration.

 

As I just did with my grandmother and her flat of geraniums.

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's pretty sure he's not planted a single geranium since his grandmother died. Tell him about the flowers you associate with certain souls at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.