Time Machines

You better run for the hills before they burn,
listen to the sound of the world, don’t watch it turn.
I just want to show you what I know and catch you
when the current lets you go

Late last year, the company I work for installed a new voice mail system. We were told to listen to all of our old messages on the old system and get whatever information from them that we needed because they would not be retained. Now, it is well known that I don’t know how to work the telephone. Oh sure, when inclined (not usually), I can answer a call and most of the time, I can even place a call. If I’m really on my game, I can listen to messages in my voice mail, but all other functions of the telephone are inaccessible to me. I tried pressing the SPKR button once, but couldn’t get it to work, and the TRAN button is just another way of hanging-up on someone, so I don’t press that one anymore, either. The FEAT, ICM, FLASH, ADD, and LINE FLOAT buttons are completely mysterious to me.

I found the printed telephone instructions buried deep in my desk drawer. Between using those and the automated help system, I was able to navigate the complicated series of menus, buttons and codes that allowed me to access my old messages. Sure enough, there were dozens and dozens of old messages that had been left in the system. Some of them were years old. I spent the next ten or fifteen minutes listening and deleting. Most of the messages were from vendors (which was why I had ignored the call in the first place), but every now and then, there would be a message from my wife or from a friend. There was Janea (“Listen to your little voice!”) getting in touch for the first time in years to talk about the reunion year before last. I continued to listen and delete. And then, over a year after she was dead and buried, my friend Carie was talking to me over the telephone.

I looked at the MSG light blinking red on the time machine that was sitting on my desk. Carie was telling me something about how she would be late for drama practice, because she had hurt her back. I wanted to tell her to forget about her back. There was something else wrong with her. Which of these buttons do I push? Something is killing you, Carie! Get to a hospital now! But of course, she couldn’t hear me. The time machine was one-way – a failsafe to prevent me from changing the course of history. And that history came back to me in a flash flood.

At Carie’s funeral, I walked up to my group of friends, who were standing on a hill at the church. I had already stopped attending the church and I hadn’t seen most of them in months. They were in prayer, asking God for the strength to get through the service that they were about to deliver. I stood quietly on the outside of the group. When the prayer was over, Lori Howe looked up and saw me. For as long as I live, I will never forget the look on her face. Then she was almost hysterical, screaming at me, “Where have you been? Where have you been?”

I reached out for her and pulled her into me. She was shaking like crazy and sobbing into my shoulder, asking over and over again, “Where have you been?” We stood there for a long time. Where had I been? What was wrong with me? I stood there with my pain and my baggage, my inability to understand that people could need me and the consequential hurt that I cause. How could I have walked away from my friends? I said I was sorry. Over and over again, I said I was sorry. Just like I’m sorry about everything I have done. But, for reasons that I cannot explain, Carie’s death poisoned that part of my life. If there was a chance that I could return to my church, it couldn’t happen then. After the service, the old programming team got together at Kirbey Lane Cafe. Kimberly remembers us laughing, but I only remember brave faces and the awkwardness of it all. I was in emotional anaphylactic shock; the poison was closing my throat and I couldn’t breathe. I loved these people, but I was already gone, so I just stayed gone.

The good old days
the honest man
the restless heart
the promised land
a subtle kiss
that no one sees
a broken wrist
and a big trapeze

A few weeks ago, I went to another funeral, this time for the father of my friend Anna. The surrealism of that began with Janea calling me to tell me that Anna’s father had died. In high school, it had been Anna calling me to tell me that Janea’s father had died. I drove to New Braunfels and sat with Janea during the Catholic service. I felt like a heathen. I didn’t know when to sit, stand, or kneel. Worse, I didn’t know any of the responses. Janea is Lutheran, so I mostly followed her lead. At one point, they called for a hymn. Oh, I can do this, I thought. I turned to the hymn, the organ played, and…nobody sang a note. Not one. Sigh. I put the hymnal away. Then they did something called “passing the peace”, or the like. All of a sudden, everyone turned to the person next to them and said “Peace be with you,” after which they would embrace or even kiss! I began to panic. I know there is something in the Bible about greeting with a holy kiss, but we didn’t do that in my church –we listened to rock music! Then the three women in front of me turned around! The first woman must have seen the startled look in my eyes and saved me by thrusting her hand forward. Whew. I shook their hands in turn. “Peace be with you,” I said. “And with you,” they replied.

After the memorial service, I drove Janea to the graveside service. We laughed about how we were wearing the same clothes that we would wear to go out for a night on the town. I was wearing the same outfit (not that men have outfits) that I wore to my company Christmas party. We agreed that at our age, the funerals were only going to come more frequently and maybe it was time to invest in some appropriate clothing.

At the graveside service, there was an Air Force honor guard, who could not seem to fold the American flag correctly. An honor guard is all about precision. If they don’t fold the flag right, they have to unfold it and start all over. I think everyone appreciates that…up to a point. We all sat in rapt silence, the wind blowing through the trees and scattered raindrops falling on those who couldn’t squeeze under the tent. But about the fourth time the flag was unfolded, the tension began to mount. Oh my God, I thought, Anna is going to stand-up and slap the crap out of that poor airman if he doesn’t get it right. Luckily, he did and he availed himself with a beautiful rendition of Taps. Then the priest stood-up and promptly began calling the deceased by the wrong name. Who’s Frank?

The real surrealism began when I started to see people that I had forgotten I knew. This time, it was the people who were the time machines. Just seeing them unlocked whole new areas of my memory from long ago. Of course I knew I would recognize Anna’s immediate family, but I was surprised at how many from her extended family that I remembered. I sat next to Anna during lunch, her husband on the other side of her. He was the man she had begun dating after me. So, it was impossible not to look around that church banquet hall and think that if a few fateful days had been different, this could be my family. Those could be my kids. Anna’s son looks older than I was when I was dating his mom. Heady stuff. But as much as I felt sadness for Anna and her loss, the whole event played to the things in me which I love. I had hoped that I was being selfless for a change, but I wasn’t. The thrill of being with my old friends transcends everything.

Last Monday, Mrs. Pribble and I had dinner at Kirbey Lane Cafe with friends from one of my old high school cliques: Mat Farabee, Lisa Rivers (Slagle), and Leah Langsdorf. Lisa, Mat, and I were able to get together for dinner last November, but Leah lives out of state and wasn’t able to join us until we caught her and her family in town, visiting her parents for Easter. It was really great to see Leah again. She immediately wanted a ten-second overview of our lives since school. Easy for her to say; she was using words like “Ph.D., wife, mother, polymer patents, and just got back from opening a plant in Japan“, while Mat and I were using words like “steady work” and “major credit card holder.”

We laughed about our school days together (lots of talk about Ms. Menasoff and Mrs. Rice) and talked a little bit about the old neighborhood, which has been in decline since we lived there. In fact, on that previous Saturday, a man was shot dead in broad daylight, right on my old street. The shooter escaped by running through the creek, where I used to play. Nice.

Lisa’s husband, Rusty, was at the other end of the table managing their high-energy, six-year-old boy, Conner, so I didn’t get to know them as well, but I sat next to Leah’s husband Steve. I really enjoyed getting to know him a little. We seem to share a similar artistic disposition and sense of humor, as well as some other specific common interests. Steve is a photographer and has even been a photography professor. We had a brief conversation about the state of digital photography, but I would love to talk with him more about the general subject. I sat directly across from their daughter, Alex, who is a beautiful young woman, about four years older than Connor. Considering the deep family history and friendships, Alex and Conner have arranged marriage written all over them. I’ll bring that up to the parents, the next time we all get together. Anyway, Alex mostly sat quietly, maybe shy, maybe polite (or both), but she didn’t fidget and never looked bored (though she might have been), so I think she was listening carefully. I wonder what she thought about her mom’s friends.

In almost no time at all, Kirbey Lane Cafe had become the time machine, transporting us back to the Lanier High School lunchroom. Leah kept saying that we all still looked the same and mostly, we did (she most of all). So there we were, like hundreds of times before, eating and talking together, Mat’s dry, one-liners eliciting the same red-faced, wide open laughter from Leah that they always have. I was in heaven. After my last experience at Kirbey Lane, it was good to share so much joy in that place. Killer pancakes, too.

It’s good to have you with us,
even if it’s just for the day

On Friday the 13th, we saw The Killers at the Frank Erwin Center with some friends. Brandon Flowers and Co. skipped the chit-chat, not even bothering to introduce the band or (thankfully) drop local names to rouse the crowd (“Hello Austin. We just got back from dinner at…Threadgills!). Instead, they opened with an ear-splitting, note perfect rendition of Sam’s Town (“I’ve got this sentimental heart that beats…”) and they never let-up. They delivered their synth-rock hard and fast, with no lulls throughout the concert. We never sat down. We never stopped dancing. I sang at the top of my lungs, a harmless drop in an ocean of sound. With only two albums, I just knew that they would have a cover and sure enough, they delivered a nod to their post-punk roots with Joy Division’s Shadowplay. At the end, we all wrapped our arms around each other and swayed to the piano-bar ballad Exitlude (“It seems like heaven ain’t far away…”).

I feel my vision slipping in and out of focus,
But I’m pushing on for that horizon,
I’m pushing on,
Now I’ve got the blowing wind against my face.

On Sunday, I ran my very first 5K, the Schlotzski’s Bun Run. I didn’t know how well I would do, because I had really done a number on myself at the concert. My calves were sore and on the verge of cramping, because I had jumped up and down for an hour and a half, my sides hurt from all of the singing/screaming, and I was dehydrated from all of the drinking. Awesome training regimen I’m on. Blake’s goal was to finish the race in under 30 minutes. I agreed, but secretly, my goal was just to finish. Once we settled down after the start, I did much better than I thought. I was even able to pick up the pace in the second mile. Blake is still more fit than me, so he was able to start his finishing kick earlier and he beat me by seven or eight seconds, according to the big clock (another time machine?) at the finish line. I finished in 28:27.1, which is a pace of 9:07/mile. Okay, I’m not exactly Carl Lewis, but now I have a baseline. Anyway, it was a blast.

We were finished by 9 am, so afterwards, we went to church. That’s right…church. Our church. My church. That church. Over the past six months or so, I began to feel a distinct change in my conviction of ACF. The influences came from disparate sources – a book I was reading, a comment from a friend’s wife at a Christmas party, Blake’s simple and incessant take a lap and get over it philosophy, an awkward moment at a movie theater, and conversations with Mrs. Pribble over our Saturday morning cups of coffee about the state of our spiritual health. Our search for a new church had turned-up a couple of candidates that seemed like they should be a good fit, yet nothing moved us to return. I was really starting to feel lost. But ever so slowly, I could feel something in my heart start to change. After awhile, it seemed indisputable that I was being led back. I was a little worried that Kimberly would think I had lost my mind. Besides, she had agreed with us leaving, because she had her own reasons that were separate from mine. However, when we sat down and I told her what I had been feeling, she said that the same thing had been happening to her! If we can all agree with who was in control of all of this, then none of us should really be surprised. So, we decided to go back.

About six weeks ago we went to a Sunday night worship-only service with Blake and Dee. I admit that I was a little trepidatious. But as soon as we walked in, we were greeted with a humbling outpouring of love. The service had already started, but people where coming up to us and hugging us. Lori Howe smiled and waved excitedly from where she was singing on stage. We finally found our seats and Blake leaned over and said, “You guys are like rock stars.” After the service, Will finally saw us. He shouted my name, picked me up and swung me around like a child. The pastor is hardly any bigger than I am, so I’m sure he killed his back in that display of enthusiasm, but at that moment, I needed something like that from him. So many people talked to us that night that I didn’t think we would ever get out of there. But God proved that he would take care of us and lead us to where we needed to go. In this case, it turned out to be back home. Amen.

As good as it feels, it’s still a little awkward. First of all, once you are in the habit of not going to church, it’s hard to get back into a regular rhythm (that boat won’t be much help, either.) We also aren’t back into any kind of serving roles, which made-up so much of our first ACF experience. After the service on Sunday, I was standing outside talking to J.R. Taylor, Jim Shields, Tony Colvin, and a bunch of my other friends who are still leading or serving on the arts teams. I’m the one who made myself an outsider, so I take responsibility for the awkwardness I feel around them. I know it won’t change overnight, but it will change. I just need to have faith. Tony had a huge HD video camera slung around his shoulder. Without taking my eyes off of it, I leaned over to Jim and said, “Who does that belong to?”

Jim grinned at me and said, “We’re evaluating it. It’s HD.”

“I can see that,” I said and I let my mind wander to a little film that has been playing in my head lately. EXT. DAY – Early morning sunlight reflects off of a quiet lake. Suddenly, the peace is broken by a man breaking the surface of the water from underneath. He is fully clothed…

Yeah, everything is going to be alright.