Peace, Grace, and Jazz!

{Here we go again: another room, or this time, a number of rooms designated for dining. It’s part of my series in Lent 2024, in case you are just reading this in 2057.}

Joan and I joined our friends Chuck Melchert and Anabel Proffitt in Gloucester, MA for a poetry and art workshop many years ago. It was led by the artist and writer Carol Egmont St. John at the Rocky Neck Art Colony. We wrote and we drew.

One of the first exercises Carol led us in was in thinking about our childhood family dinner table. Who was there for meals? Where did they sit? We weren’t to answer verbally, but to draw the scene. With our non-dominant hand. Probably so the real artists couldn’t show the rest of us up! Plus those childhood memories when documented on paper looked as if they were drawn by children! It was a fun activity to help us all get to know everyone in the group. But it also grew more serious as we shared our earliest memories of our childhood families around dining room (or kitchen) tables. Some stories were tinged with melancholy, some with joy.

The table I drew was the one pictured here. I’ve previously written of the Liberty Ave. house, a touch of village history, having been built in the mid-1820s by a prominent family in the town’s history. It was the home Mom loved most looking back, and the one in which all six of us kids grew up (in one stage or another…I, the oldest, was in my teens and the youngest was born while we lived there). Dad sat at one end, Mom at the other, the end closest to the small kitchen. The three of us boys sat on one side, and the three girls on the other. I don’t recall whether we always sat in the same chairs in the same order.

The kitchen of that house was, as I said, small. No room for a kitchen table. That meant that every meal was served in the dining room.

Breakfast didn’t always find us together. Especially when school was out for the summer. With rare exceptions, it was cereal and milk, orange juice, and for Mom and Dad, coffee. There might have been a cooked breakfast now and then, but not very often. While many families didn’t have lunch at home while school was in session, we sometimes did. School was always “walkable,” and if there was time, some of us would rush home for sandwiches. I don’t remember eating many meals in elementary or junior high school. High school was a different story; it was too far to walk home for lunch. Dad might even have come home for that mid-day meal if he could break away from IBM, just two miles from home.

We called the evening meal supper. And except for brothers Kim and Steve, who in our later years on Liberty Avenue might have had some sports practices, we were all around the table at suppertime. And with eight of us there, you can imagine the pandemonium. Dad once or twice placed a small tape recorder under the table to record the sounds of six kids at table, the confusion of voices, dishes being passed, laughter and arguments. We were all astounded at the clammor when Dad played it back to us.

When I look at the slides I took back then, I see countless birthday parties around that table, I see Grandpa Kellam’s birthday celebration, some special year I’ve forgotten, maybe he’d turned 70? 80? We had a rare family portrait taken in that room. It’s great of everyone but Mom. She looks so tired. Of course, she is. She had to get six of us ready for it, and that wouldn’t have been easy. (I’ve spent two hours looking for that picture; I’ll find it someday.)

Of course, through the years, that was not the only Kellam family dining room. When the family moved from Liberty Avenue, I had gone to college, so my visits home to other dining rooms were infrequent, whether going home to Endicott or to Raleigh when Dad’s work moved them there. My brothers and sisters shared meals and special occasions in rooms I can’t draw with one hand or the other. But if I go way, way back, I can picture the dining room of the house in Vestal (NY) where I lived from age five until I turned 10 or 11. The house was new, but interior photos show old furnishings. And in that dining room, besides the table, I see Mom’s old Singer sewing machine, converted from treadle operation to an electric motor. And this clear memory of the day I scared the daylights out of everyone.

My Aunt Marge and Uncle Keith had come over (they lived nearby, so visits were frequent), and for some reason, I decided to hide from everybody. I must have been maybe 6. It was a game at first. Between the kitchen and the dining room was swinging door. It was propped open, into the dining room. The space behind the door was the perfect place to hide. When I was missed, voices started calling for me. I stayed hid. I could hear the concern in all their voices. But I stayed hid. Until Aunt Marge happened to see me behind the door. “He’s here!” I can still hear her voice. As well as the expressions of relief, and the warnings that I should never pull that trick again. I didn’t.

Until I ran away. But that’s another story.

In the meantime, try drawing your family table from your childhood years. Use any hand you like; no one’s looking. Tell yourself a memory. And ask yourself what you learned from it.

{During this Lenten period of forty days, I am reflecting on the meaning of room(s). Today, something a little different.}

A few days ago, I wrote about the spacious (to us) backyard of our former Ithaca home. Spacious: another word for roomy. The Old English 14th C. word rum (long u, not the drink) meant a chamber within a building. So, I’ve been writing primarily with that original meaning in mind, but today, I’m reflecting on the idea of roominess again.

When I was very young and we took those Sunday drives in the Ford Country Squire nine-passenger wagon, as we drove through the rural hills above the Susquehanna, I’d see acres and acres of land, and think, “Wow, there’s so much space for people to live here.”

I know some land developers look at certain areas in a similar way, but I was more innocent, more naive. I didn’t see dollar signs, but roominess.

In playing with this series since Lent began, I’ve been reflecting on how to approach the idea of “making room.” As if my writing weren’t random enough already, here are some more haphazard considerations.

Making room for someone to sit beside you on a bus or in a restaurant booth, or a church pew. The Rev. Bill Summers, with whom I worked at a large Richmond church, once remarked about the sparse summer congregation, “I see the church is comfortably filled today; by that I mean there’s room for everyone to lie down and be comfortable.” When there’s space between us, there’s always room to “move over.”

There’s also the idea of my making room in retirement life to write every Lenten day; I’m already pretty busy, you know, but this was my choice. I must make room for it each morning for forty days.

What about making room in your life for someone or something? I think of my daughter-in-law who makes room in her daily schedule and in the home to rescue kittens. Now and then, our ornithologist son makes room for an injured bird someone has brought to the college for possible rehab. My daughter and her family were into fostering abandoned dogs…until they so fell in love with Scooby that they adopted him and further fostering wasn’t allowed. Making room to rescue.

More profoundly, there’s a family in our church that has made room for fostering and adopting children. My impression is that they have fairly modest jobs and subsequent incomes, but their hearts have dictated more room for love to live in their home. Their children are a gift to our church family, and there’s plenty of room for them in our midst.

Making room for volunteer work. I’m currently working on three videos that will tell the stories of three recipients of the local council of churches’ Lives of Commitment awards. I’ve done this for several years and am always inspired by the time and energy people in our community donate in service to those in need. These volunteers were already busy living very full lives, but when the call came, they made room.

And making room for Sabbath. Speaking of busy-ness, the world around us seems in so much of a rush. It’s not just the work ethic; it’s also a play ethic. We create and we recreate. But everyone from clergy to self-help gurus, from the medical pros on “Doctor Radio” to the local masseuse — they urge us to take a breath, or lots of deep ones, to stop and smell the spring flowers that are coming up. One Sabbath is a day of rest. A whole day. Another might be one hour a day to make room for reading, listening to music, meditation, a quiet phone conversation (with no agenda), or listening for the sounds of nature, or the sounds of love. That sabbath rest might well be like making room for rescue again…saving time for our very selves.

Making room for strangers. I mean, of course, immigrants. People seeking asylum. People joining the centuries of immigrants who cried real tears upon seeing Lady Liberty in New York Harbor. We have physical room for them. We have room to employ them. We have room to welcome them. And we must make room in our hearts. It is our biblical mandate. Need I rehearse the verses?

“The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God.” Leviticus 19:34

“Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing so some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it.” Hebrews 13:2

{If you are just now finding your way here, what took you so long? Since Lent 2024 began, I’ve been writing each day about “room(s).”}

Many people, occasions, and places in my life have given me — and are still giving me— pleasure. Mostly, pure pleasure. Sometimes though, as is the case I cite today, guilty pleasure.

I’ve been thinking about rooms for this Lenten series. Or, just the idea of room itself. As in room for roaming, or room for growth, or…more on that later this week. For now, a room in which Joan and I find great pleasure. It’s not cheap to be there. It is not at all good stewardship of the earth, and that’s why this is a confession. A confession with no intent to repent. But that room is an escape room…at sea.

We took our first cruise to Alaska when I was still a pastor. We’d never had the time nor money before that trip, but somehow we managed to board the Royal Caribbean “Vision of the Seas” and travel far away from of our Ithaca neighborhood. Just as I was thinking that some members of our former Vermont congregation might think this was an inappropriate and unnecessary journey, excessively beyond what a pastor should be able to afford — well, we discovered that quite by coincidence one of our church farm families would be on the very same ship at the very same time. Maybe some would think the daily presence of church folk from a previous church on the cruise would cramp our style (style? what style?), but we truly enjoyed bumping into the Rowells on that ship, and sharing our adventures.

After our initial cruise, and after retirement, we discovered other ships and faraway places, and we found that many of those opportunities were quite within our budget. I know: cruises sound so luxurious, so expensive, so, um, “upper crust.” [Your lesson of the day: the upper crust was that part of the loaf that was placed before the most honored guest, thus the aristocracy.] But if one were to spend a week in a nicer hotel in a large city, eat all three meals “out,” and look for some entertainment or enlightenment each day, the cruise is a far better value. Sometimes we find one that is around $200 a day, including great meals (even snacks), a show each night, lectures during the day, and that room referred to above, the one that gives us pleasure. The stateroom. Or, cabin. (So odd to use that word. Usually I think of a cabin as some primitive abode in the woods.)

Travel was rare when I was a kid. Dad had a good job, but with six kids and his own reluctance to go very far from home, our vacation time was spent at Cape Cod (Mom’s childhood vacations were on the Cape), or just at home. Joan and I, with resources limited by modest church salaries, didn’t exactly see the USA in our Chevrolet (or the Pontiac or Toyota). We were able to travel by car, though, so our two children could get some idea that life existed beyond our Richmond suburbs. But still…I never imagined that I would see England, Russia, Hawaii, or the Azores. Or, cruise the Caribbean with both kids’ families to celebrate our combined anniversaries.

That room. The cabin. Small, basic, and with a shower that would keep me from gaining 10 more pounds (in other words, not much room to move around in there!). We almost always get a room with a veranda or balcony, and spend hours out there reading and watching the sea roll by. The idea of just stopping, staying put…listening to the waves and the wind… looking out at the horizon and watching the sun set. Yes, it is a luxury; I admit it. I also admit that it gives me great pleasure.

We don’t do the chocolate or champagne fountain midnight thing. We don’t eat between meals. We don’t do room service. We eschew the art auctions. We do like eating by ourselves at some meals, and we like meeting interesting people from around the world at shared tables. We enjoy the port lectures and take a few affordable excursions. (On the Jazz Cruise, we ignored the ports. People would ask where that cruise was stopping and we’d admit we didn’t really care; it was the music we were after.)

So, yes. Great pleasure. And no little guilt. First there’s the whole idea of splurging on oneself. Is there a justification for that? Perhaps. I know there’s a rationale. (See above about vacationing for a week in a large US city.) We do have a respect for our religious stewardship commitments, tithing for example to serve others. Yet, in our retirement years, we are indeed treating, serving ourselves too.

But the other confession we make is that we know these huge ships are an environmental threat. The fuel, the trash, the ecological footprint. The cruise companies boast about their environmental stewardship, but like any other corporation, they are good at PR and not-so-good at transparency. This isn’t the place for me to write an essay comparing modes of vacation travel, researching jumbo jets vs. cruise ships of various sizes vs. a coast-to-coast AMTRAK trek. I’m merely writing about rooms here. But it’s Lent, so yeah, there’s that confession that we could do better. Like stay home and watch videos of scenic places. But the videos we enjoy most are the ones I’ve edited from our many journeys to see the world’s wonders.

I shudder to think what our cruise schedule might be like if we lived near a port city like Miami or Long Beach. Some of those last minute cruises are almost cheaper than staying home. Oh, and have you heard about people who sell their homes and move onto cruise ships permanently? A nice room, entertainment, fine meals, even healthcare, to say nothing of the views. Not for me, thanks.

The funny thing is…I can’t swim. You’d think sailing for days without seeing land would be spooky for me. But there’s something about the wild seas and far horizons that speaks to me of creation’s wondrous width and length and height and depths. Well…let’s not talk about depths.

{Forty days in Lent, forty thoughts, room-inations, about room(s). That’s what I’m doing here. What are you doing here?}

Dungeon: “A dark, often underground, cell or chamber for confining prisoners.” The official definition. But, you notice, not always underground. The one I write of today was on the top floor of a seminary building. If that old red brick church building had had a bell tower, this would have been the tower room. A chamber, for sure. I wasn’t exactly a prisoner there, but I did some time there, and not by choice.

Let me go back aways. When I entered seminary, my understanding was that my work scholarship was to be in the school’s radio station, at that time a 16,000 watt FM. I had done campus radio in college, and had in fact chosen this seminary primarily because it had that broadcast outlet. My call to media ministry was that strong. So, indeed, I received my work assignment, and there were some hours announcing at the station. But wait. What’s this? This thing about cleaning films? What films?

It turns out that part of my work scholarship included laboring within the bounds of the school’s Audio-Visual Center, the anchor of which (at the time) was the Reigner Recording Library. The shelves there included thousands of recorded theology courses, lectures, sermons, panel discussions, and the like, all on reel-to-reel audio tape. And then dubbed onto audiocassettes for convenient mailing to the school’s constituents. (Now, I suppose much of the material has been digitized.) This was an deep trove of church history and educational materials available to anyone who wanted to do continuing education, research, or personal devotions. (I’ve previously mentioned that I used cassettes of Thomas Merton’s lectures while I retreated at Holy Cross Abbey each summer. I borrowed those recordings from the Reigner Library.)

Also a part of that collection was a huge library of 16mm films, not necessarily for distribution or borrowing, but simply in storage. Many of the metal film cans contained network television programs that had been produced by or for the National Council of Churches. Somehow, our seminary had become the repository for those movies. “Look Up and Live” and “Lamp Unto My Feet” were long-running network series that again had some historical value, and unlike most of today’s media resources, these recordings were preserved for…well, mostly for preservation’s sake. They were stored in a non-descript (saves me from finding desciptors) “chamber” up a steep, dark stairway on the uppermost floor of the building. No rooms adjoined the film room, and no one would have heard our cries for help, we who were sentenced there to clean films.

Periodically, evil dust particles would penetrate the film cans, and to preserve the library of NBC and CBS films, we A-V scholarship recipients would have to rack up the reels and manually turn a crank to move the film to a take-up reel, and back again, while applying a cloth saturated with some unknown solution that would clean the film without melting it into a mass of celluloid. Boring. Not what I had signed up for.

Apparently the radio station announcing staff numbered so many guys (yes, all men back then) that we first year students had to work some of our weekly hours in the upstairs dungeon. We worked alone since there was only equipment for one operator. Though the work was routinely uninteresting, I have to admit that I was fascinated by the labels on the film cans, titles that showed the progressive nature of the then-mainline denominations. The films were primarily from the 1950s, and the topics ranged from the arms race to racial justice, from fresh interpretations of scripture to jazz performances. Those were the days when national networks donated production facilities and broadcast time as a public service. The ecumenical nature of the National Council of Churches allowed the networks to broadcast religious programs to a wide audience without being accused of aiding those church groups in proselytizing.

I guess a phone call to the seminary would answer a question that still occurs to me all these decades later: are those archived films still there? Have they been sent off to film heaven? Or, digitized to further preserve the historical content? Or, if they remain in that dungeon of a room, is there still a hapless seminary student dumping some unknown liquid onto an old sock and cleaning the films that will probably never seen the light of a projection bulb again?

I think I’d rather not know.

{Yesterday, this Lenten series about room(s) noted the den in which our kids grew up. Today, another den, or living room, or either one … in my Mom and Dad’s last home.}

This will be short since there’s only one point to make. It’s something that Joan and I still smile about today, decades after it happened. And it happened again and again.

My parents lived in Raleigh, NC. They’d moved there in the mid-1960s when IBM opened a big plant at the then-new Research Triangle Park. Decades later, the last home they purchased was a cozy two-bedroom ranch in a very pleasant neighbohood in North Hills. The front door opened directly into the den, and a quick turn to the right — there was the living room. They lived equally in both rooms. The living room had a slightly more formal look, and more seating, and since the TV was in there, and Dad’s stereo (including a reel-to-reel tape recorder!), it was more the entertainment center of the house than the den. When family was visiting, we gathered there. Sometimes.

Other times, and because the dining area was in the den, we’d plop down in the den furniture or around the dining table. The den was warm and inviting as one would expect dens to be. There was a nice brick fireplace surrounded by bookcases. Dad liked history and Mom liked novels and the books were segregated in the two bookshelves. I recall only two comfy highback upholstered chairs in there, so when the larger family gathered, we made use of the chairs around the table. The too-small kitchen was just off the den, so obviously any offering of food or snacks drove us to the den, not the living room.

Here’s the thing that still tickles Joan and me. So…we’d be visiting from Virginia or Vermont, and natually my siblings and families would come by to see us. Not the whole crowd all at once, but enough to fill the room. Which room? Well, we’d find ourselves in the den first. Some commotion, then settling, and lively conversation. Nearly always, there’d be a quiet one-by-one migration to the living room. Maybe the TV would be the draw, or just more comfortable chairs. Joan would find herself sitting alone in the den, maybe having taken on some handicrafted distraction. She’d realize the crowd had moved to “the other room” and she’d join us.

Then, at some point, she’d look up to realize everyone had moved again…to “the other room.” The other, “other room.” Many times the migration was just a trickle, unannounced. Now, we weren’t intentionally leaving her behind, and she wasn’t being anti-social in missing the cue to move from den to living room to den and back. It was just something that happened, every time we visited. And sometimes, it was just a quieter time with only the four of us in the house, Mom and Dad, Joan and me. Three of us would be in the den, and Mom would ask, “Is Joan in there (the living room) by herself again?”

We Kellams were always on the move. At least, from room to room.

See? This reflection was no big thing. It was just a smile for our family, and the luxury of two rooms in which to live, move, and have our being. Especially move.

{Forty days in Lent and forty rooms to explore…that’s where we’ve been and where we are headed.}

The room where our kids grew up was the den in our home in Settlers’ Landing.

That neighborhood was in the Chesterfield County suburb of Richmond, a subdivision that had been intended to be a little Williamsburg. Originally a wooded area between two older developments and including the property of a former Girl Scout camp, Settlers’ Landing would have included some sizeable “colonial” homes, in Williamsburg-approved colors, on smaller lots. But the developer apparently built only two or three homes before the concept failed. So, the bank(s) took it over (as I understand it) and much smaller homes were constructed by three or four different construction companies. But the Williamsburg/colonial idea remained, if downsized. When we bought our lot and had a home built, only certain exterior colors were allowed.

Our home was a two story, four bedroom house. Like most of the other neighboring homes, the first floor plan included a living room, dining room, kitchen, and den. Since this had become a kind of “starter home” neighborhood, it turned out that a few first-time homebuyers had too little furniture to place in a formal living room, and those rooms were nearly vacant! Nice carpet, a chair…that was about it. Not many folks used the so-called living room. They did their living in the den.

Now, we did have living room furniture, including Joan’s childhood piano on which she taught lessons to neighborhood kids. But we too lived mostly in the den. It and the kitchen ran across the back of the house, almost as one room. That was especially convenient early on. Joan could watch our two young children while preparing meals. All that divided the space was a kitchen table. And the tiny furnace room placed conveniently mid-house, since the home was built during the energy crisis of the mid-1970s.

The den furniture was from “This End Up,” a brand of “crate” furniture popular at the time. It was so sturdy that the heavy wooden sofa, chair, and foot stool survived for decades, and is probably still being used somewhere today. A fireplace provided winter comfort and warm ambiance between two built-in bookcases filled with a pastor’s library and some pleasure reading as well. We were told that the “old brick” used for the fireplace, as well as the decorative brick along the exterior foundation, had come from an old demolished downtown Richmond building. We liked that it was rescued brick.

The lower bookcase cabinets held the 19″ color TV on one side and my turntable, amp, and reel-to-reel on the other. Large wood cabinets held the 12″ tri-axial Utah audio speakers. And when we tinkered with house plans, we asked the builder to wire some headphone jacks into the wall between the den and living room. I liked lying in the middle of the living room floor late at night, listening to music plugged into those audio jacks. Some nights, from the upstairs bedroom, Joan would hear the record “stick” while I had fallen asleep during side B. She’d have to wake me up to change LPs. Yes, she, upstairs, had heard the music from my headphones. It’s a wonder I have any hearing left.

Our two kids spent hours each day in the den. Watching TV, reading, playing games. Wendy had her dolls and Jim his Legos. Birthday parties, family visits, and just day-to-day living happened there. And at Christmas, we put a Chrismon tree in the living room, but the den was home to the bigger one with the kids’ presents, and stockings tacked under the fireplace mantel. On one wall at the back of the room was a large corkboard, complete with the kind of things magnets now attach to fridges. Plus a map of the U.S. Or, was it the whole the world?

So, there were the four of us lounging on This End Up or lying on the striped carpet floor. Plus, soon, the fifth member of the family: Ivan the Terrible. The green monster. Our mini-Godzilla. Ivan came from the pet store a four-inch, very green, iguana. By the time he or she (never really knew….only suspected) went to lizard heaven, that 18 year-old pet was well over three feet, head to tail. If it were not for the size of the cages through the years, we suspect Ivan might have been even longer.

It was Jim’s creature, and he was a responsible caretaker. Oh, the stories we could tell. About the lizard’s diet, about how she/he didn’t like to be handled, about that love of collard greens, about how infrequently she/he pooped. About once a week, I’d guess. So our den surrounded that cage, its heat rocks, sunlamp, climbing logs, etc. For a pet you couldn’t actually, well, pet–we loved that thing. And when an Asian exchange student visited once, she was fascinated by how Ivan just sat there and stared. And stared. “Just like the Buddha,” she said.

When we look at the photos of our two children in their early years, the chances are very good that the picutres were taken in that den.

I have no conclusion for you about this personal history of ours. A couple of readers have told me that my “rooms” have prompted memories of their own. I hope they are happy memories. Ours certainly were. Are!

{Lent 2024 brings me the opportunity to devote some time each day to write. It’s my Lenten discipline, such as it is. My theme this year (if you haven’t already guessed) is room(s). Today, try to stay awake.}

I recall writing a few years ago about a Julius LaRosa song I have on one of those compilation LPs, a demo record of sorts, spotlighting a variety of recording artists on a certain label. The song was “I Love My Bed.” Without taking the time to do a search of my previous mention of it, let me start afresh by connecting to the room in which most of us spend the majority of our time: the bedroom.

“I love my bed. I’m so happy when I’m in it; I love every lazy minute, in my bed.”

Joan’s heard me sing that as I get under the covers (that quilt!) at night. Or, sometimes, as I just consider getting out of bed in the morning. I don’t sing the whole song, but I could. And I’d mean it. We human beings are meant to spend a third of our lives in bed. Eight hours is generally best for most of us, though like any “rule” it doesn’t apply equally to everyone. But I like to aim at eight. There’s a coziness, a sense of security under the covers, mashing up the pillow ‘neath our heads, stretching out in an extra-long mattress (to accommodate what used to be my six foot length. (At my age, like the wicked waxing witch, I’m shrinking!!)

I used to be one of those we refer to as a “night person.” At least in my adulthood. In childhood, I had a firm bedtime, and recall those summer nights when this seven year-old was put to bed while hearing the neighborhood kids still playing outside in the setting sun. I complained, but I know now that Mom needed us three boys in bed so she’d have some time to decompress before her own bedtime.

But as an adult who often stayed up too late (too late for what?), there was no usual bedtime.

I still think about the nights I would be recording radio shows beyond the wee small hours of the morning, a situation dictated by available studio time in borrowed production rooms. I couldn’t get into the studios until the station personnel had left the building, and with the normal technical glitches one expected in recording studios, my work might carry me through the overnight until Alden Aaroe entered the station at 5 a.m. to read the hog futures on his morning show farm report. “Morning, Alden!” “Good night, Jeff.”

And there were those Saturday nights in parish ministry. It’s not that I let sermon prep go until the last minute. Honest! I’d begun the scriptural exegesis and study earlier in the week, contemplated the meaning of the text, considered how to structure the “proclamation of the Word,” and look for affective/effective illustrations. But sometimes the actual writing took me well past midnight Saturday night. I’d hit the bed thankful for the few hours rest I might get before the jangling alarm called me to attention and moved me to the shower.

But now, I thank God — literally–, that most nights I look forward to that slumber, that “I love my bed” feeling, whenever I feel like it. 10:30 p.m.? Midnight? Whenever. And I can sleep until my body says, “Enough, Kellam. Time to rise and shine. Or at least glow a little.” And then check the sleep app and see how I did. Yeah, a sleep app. We now have a smart bed. (Hey, at our age, it’s the last bed we’ll ever buy, so we got one, OK?) And every morning since we got that thing, Joan checks her app and I check mine to see how the night went. Silly, huh? We thought the novelty would wear off, but there’s still just this tiny bit of competition. When I announced at breakfast that my “Sleep Score” was 88, Joan said hers was 89. Drat! (When I told a medical pro about the smart bed and how it tracks even heart rate and something called “Heart Rate Variability,” he asked if the bed tracked the more intimate things a bed might be used for. I haven’t seen any evidence of that.)

I really do dislike the idea of setting an alarm to wake me from the bed I love. But life goes on and sometimes we do have to be sure we’re up at a certain time. We have a small digital clock that has a variety of sounds we can choose from, so we are awakened gently by birds: chirps, calls, and songs. I still don’t like it.

One more thing about the bedroom. It is the scene of dreams. I dream every single night. And many times. Now, our memory banks erase most of those fantasies, so that there’s room for the memories of our waking life, but I do recall bits and pieces, sometimes only the setting or the people involved. Certain themes repeat, but mostly I wonder at where these nightly dramas come from. Sure, something glimpsed the previous day might feed the subconscious “dreamweaver” (thank you, Gary Wright, for the term) an idea for a REM-produced vision. But other times, my gosh, where did that come from?!

One more thing about the room. There are, admittedly, some restless nights. Despite the cozy quilt, the desire and need for rest, the comfort of the mattress and pillow, there are times when, for some reason, we just can’t sleep. Restless legs? Anxiety about the next day? A simple itch? The room is dark, the bed encouraging, the quiet sufficient. But sleep escapes us. I’m rarely insomniac. But when I am, like everyone else, I toss and turn, and my app goes crazy. Ugh.

I suppose I could have added to this “room” essay some details about the furniture, the TV we never watch, the walk-in closet too full, or the portable audio players I listen to when going to bed earlier than usual, a Sony Walkman in the mix! Or, the prayers I say at bedtime as I recount the day and look for the sunrise. Sunrise? Ha! As if. But enough.

Sleep tight. Be at peace.

I’ve just closed my eyes again
Climbed aboard the dream weaver train
Driver take away my worries of today
And leave tomorrow behind

Ooh, ooh, dream weaver
I believe you can get me through the night
Ooh, ooh, dream weaver
I believe we can reach the morning light

(Gary Wright)

{Lent 2024 leads me to write each day about the topic of room(s). Yes, 40 days, 40 reflections on those spaces where we live, move, and have our being. Or sleep.}

Our retirment home has a small second bedroom. There is a bed in there, a trundle, and two guests can sleep uncomfortably there. But the main use of that room is for cloth art. Specifically, quilting. Amid family portraits on the wall and other photos and paintings, there is a large drafting table our son-in-law Jeff refitted for Joan’s use. Next to it, at the window (source of perfect sunlight) is the quilting machine, a Bernina. It’s not one of those too-huge-and-too-expensive long arm machines, but it does have a brain. Sometimes the computer chips inside give Joan fits, but that’s what they’re for, right? And all around the area are the gadgets, devices, trinkets, doodads, and mechanical stuff that must have official quilting union names, but to me look like, well, gadgets, devices, trinkets, etc. They all contribute to the art.

Here in my collection of 1,002,567 old slides, there is a picture of Joan quilting during the first year of our marriage. It’s a lovely portrait of a novice quiltmaker at work. Today, she is a master of her art. And the evidence hangs on our walls, over furniture, and on our bedtop. (The word “quilt” may come from the Old French, a connection with a cushion or mattress: coilte. You’re welcome.) That bed topper makes for the coziest wrap as we cuddle up in our cooler-than-the-rest-of-the-house bedroom. Another quilt makes a drab sofa come alive in brilliant colors. And the wall hangings brighten up the plain white walls the builder left us. Table tops are decorated too.

One particular quilt tells the story of our family, with all four of us represented by symbols of our talents and interests, as well as embroidered illustrations of the homes we’ve lived in. As is the case with every single quilt here, it is an heirloom. Now and then museums and galleries showcase centuries of quilting. The quilts on display were crafted generations ago (or last month) by individuals and quilting circles. Someone imagined a design, found scraps of cloth, used a needle and thread to sew it all together, and then gifted the result to maybe a daughter’s hope chest or a son’s bed. Many, many decades later, that quilt is carefully preserved and lives to share the love that went into every stitched pattern. An heirloom.

When one is into a particular art, that art grabs one’s attention wherever it apprears. It’s one thing to go to the Lancaster Quilt Show and be overwhelmed by the kaleidoscopic spectacle there, but we might be touring a windmill home in the Netherlands or a store in Oslo and we’ll go (to each other), “Look! A quilt!” We stop and admire the effort and the result, and then Joan might find inspiration for the next one.

That second bedroom in our home is so full of the raw materials of colorful artistic talent. I love the first glimpse of the sometimes hand-drawn pencil designs and how Joan imagines the final quilt will look, once the fabrics, threads, and backings come together…if the Bernina agrees to cooperate. See, the fabric art depends to some extent these days on modern technology. The machine has a screen! It’s not my Mom’s old treadle Singer. But as Joan masters the cutters and scissors and needles, so she is mastering the Bernina and showing it who’s the boss in this cottage industry.

I used the word “industry.” Maybe that might hint that Joan sells her quilts. No way. These are all for the family, or gifts for other special folk. She did do one quilt “on commission.” She really didn’t want to, but the person offered to barter some work around the house. Quilting isn’t cheap. If you add up the cost of materials and the amount of time it takes to finish one quilt, well, we couldn’t afford to buy one. So, no. Joan’s work is not for sale. It’s just to be admired. And adored.

I believe that every person has a talent or ability that, if not overlooked or stifled, can develop into some form of inspiring creativity. What is your gift? Your passion? Your contribution to the beauty of all the room you have on this planet called to new life?

{Each day in Lent 2024, I write of a room or just “room” itself. Today, a creative space within what was once “A Graduate Center for Educational Ministry.” I worked there.}

I graduated from the seminary, and eventually worked at PSCE. Looking back, I realize I had many roles on that campus. Early on, the school provided me an office for my media ministry in radio. But later I became the Director of the Video Education Center. And while in that position, I was asked to teach Youth Ministry a couple of years, as well as co-teach a Media and Values course with my very good friend and colleague Dr. Chuck Melchert.

PSCE was a very special place. Yes, it was a graduate school. Classes in education, theology and ethics, recreation, and church leadership were stimulating and rigorous, plus the small student body made for a tight community of folk committed to stengthening the educational ministry of the wider church, including a global reach. (I remember how our professors and staff were so diligent in learning to pronounce the names of our international students. When one new international student student told us his name, he said, “But you can call me by an Amercian name [i.e., Tom], the prof said no, we want to learn and know your “real” name.)

On the basement floor of the central building on campus, PSCE had developed a “Teaching Lab,” a large room adapted for countless uses during the years I was there. It had been established primarily by two nationally respected educators, Locke Bowman and Donald Griggs. I wasn’t on campus at the time the project was intiated, so my facts need checking. {And they were! See below.} But Bowman came to PSCE as the past Executive Director of the National Teacher Education Project, a program funded jointly by the Lilly Foundation, the National Presbyterian Board of Christian Education and an anonymous donor. Don Griggs came to the school as a well-respected Presbyterian educator, author of several books (including Teaching Teachers to Teach and Generations Learning Together: Learning Activities for Intergenerational Groups in the Church), and a well-deserved reputation for cutting edge teaching/learning practices in church education.

The Teaching Lab was in use day and night as space for microteaching, learning centers, continuing education events, simulation games, video and technology training, and small group experiences. One student wag told me later that the name of the school should have been the Presbyterian School of Small Groups. The technology ranged from the days of Kodak Carousel projectors and overhead projectors to U-Matic video, video projection, and satellite feeds. The work in the room was as practical as it was theoretical, with students easily finding handles on how to move their learning in that laboratory to the classrooms of the local church.

When I came to PSCE to be Director of Video Education, Don Griggs was my educational mentor and also my “boss.” My department was called an “extended ministry” of the school, and Don was the Dean of Extended Ministries, as well as a tenured professor. The school’s adoption of video, when the equipment was just becoming practical and affordable for local churches, meant that PSCE could produce educational video programs to carry the school’s resources beyond the campus. One of our first projects was creating a Griggs-produced video called “The Art of Asking Questions,” helping teachers help students…to be more fully engaged, and to freely offer thoughts and ideas that may well enrich the whole class. We also produced Pat Griggs’ “The Art of Storytelling,” as well as a documentary we shot at seminaries around the U.S. about “The Pastor as Educator.”

The other purpose of our video ed program was to teach our students how to use the medium in local church settings. So students became familiar with camera work, video recorders, and some basic production and editing techniques. Remember, this was way before everyone had video cameras in their pockets!

But I digress, don’t I? This is about the room. Two memories stand out. I taught courses there in how to use video in the local congregation. And I was blind for one day’s class. As a volunteer in a Richmmond program to teach community leaders* about disabilities, I was blind-folded for the day and led to the campus and my classroom by an unsighted young man. Using our white canes we entered the Lab and I explained to the class that we’d go on as usual so we wouldn’t miss a day’s work. Someone thought the project for the day should be the students videotaping an interview with me and our guest. With blindfold removed for the next class, we could all critique it together.

I also think about teaching youth ministry in that Lab. Having space and technology there helped us explore the many facets of youth work that church educators would encounter in local churches. My co-teacher one term was an experienced educator from Australia, Christine Gapes. She was a delight to teach alongside and helped this novice build a thoughtful and creative syllabus, while adding her fresh perspective to the class. Having had many practical experiences in youth ministry, I hadn’t actually taught theory and concepts before, so Christine’s presence was personally reassuring.

I know I’m selling the Lab short here. But it’s enough to say that what graduate students learned in that environment made a lasting impression on their own ministries of education, whether in the context of the local congregation, running church camps and retreats, or even teaching in seminaries on the other side of the globe. It’s gone now, with the closing of the school. But I wouldn’t say that it will be a room full of memories, so much as it is still one of continuing influence, educational integrity, and life-long learning.

*Yes, I was deemed a community leader…just because I was on the radio!

{I knew I needed some facts checked, and Don Griggs read the above and clarified the story of the founding of the lab. Here’s part of what he just wrote me: “The lab was in fact, originally, a partnership with the National Teacher Education Project, founded by Locke Boman. However, the director of the Teaching Lab at PSCE was Donald MacInnes who was employed by PSCE and NTEP…Both of us were associated with Locke Bowman as consultants, writers, and occasional workshop leaders. Don was invited to be the first director of the PSCE/NTEP Teaching Lab…Don was very influential in me being called to PSCE as the first Director of Continuing Education and Associate Professor of Christian Education. (That’s another interesting story.) I arrived at PSCE on January 1, 1978, and Don left in June that same year. He felt the lab was in good hands after my arrival and knew its mission would carry on after his departure.”

I must add: It’s mission does carry on decades later as PSCE alums continue their roles as church educators.}

{Born of privilege, most of us spend our lives in all sorts of rooms, from bedrooms to offices and many, many other spaces surrounded (or not) by four walls. Today I write of a large room where music is made and preserved, where creativity explodes from inspiration and…engineering.}

When I was in radio in Richmond, I had invitations to do “voice work,” that is, narrations and commercials, recorded at a well-respected studio called Alpha Audio. You may recall my voice hawking the “Shirt-Tie-and Socks Box” from S&K Clothing, the perfect Father’s Day gift. Just kidding. But I do remember it. Alpha Audio was a state-of-the-art recording studio for way more than voice work. Local and nationally-known musicians recorded demos, singles, and albums there, including an old friend Steve Bassett (“Sweet Virginia Breeze”). When Steve was in the studio for another gig, he helped record my “Celebration Rock” jingle, singing with the Volunteer Choir and playing the studio’s Hammond B-3 organ. Listen here:

It was all those years ago…but I still remember being impressed with the live sounds coming from the performance studio, as well as the complex audio mixing console that a genius named Carlos commanded in the control booth. Magic happened there.

More recently, and with more regularity, I’ve encountered such wonder and admiration in another studio, this one in the Poconos of Northeastern Pennsylvania. Red Rock was built from the ground up by Kent Heckman. He designed the structure, the technological innards, and runs the place like a digital sherpa, guiding even the well-known pros into the highest elevations of their best work. All so it can be recorded and shared with millions of listeners.

Who are the pros? The Red Rock website lists scores, but here are a few: Keith Jarrett, Phil Woods, Pat Metheny, John Abercrombie, Rufus Reid, Leon Redbone, Randy Brecker, and my piano-playing, jazz composing pastor friend the Rev. Bill Carter. It was Bill’s recording sessions that took me to Red Rock four times over almost a decade. Bill’s Presbybop bands have occupied the big room and the surrounding smaller isolation booths to record several CDs, and I’ve recorded “The Making of… [albums]” for short videos you can find on YouTube. (I’ll post a link to the latest one below.)

Watching musicians gather for a session, catch up and share stories, then enter the room and unpack instruments, tune up, and rehearse…and then launch into the music…while Kent is adjusting mics, then doing his magic (that word again) with the massive (and beautiful) console — well, the whole thing is a wonder to me. I’m no musician, and no engineer, so I just gape. And focus my cameras on the whole scene. Someone just a bit flat? Kent can fix that; no need to record the whole thing again. Even the seasoned pros might need a little advice on what might make the tune just right, and they’ll trust Kent to know. His thirty years of experience build that trust the minute they enter the studio.

Bill Carter and Presbybop were recording Bill’s “Jazz for the Earth” CD, and in walks NEA Jazz Master David Liebman to add his soprano sax. Very cool. Or, maybe “hot?” Rad? Or, when Bill recorded his Jazz Requiem “Lux Aeterna” the instrumental tracks were recorded that morning, and the eight singers of the area’s “Lyric Consort” spent the afternoon singing the vocal parts. Then in the blink of an eye, vocals and instrumental parts were mixed into a master recording and the result is a stunning and inspiring musical remembrance of ones we’ve lost. Watch the video below and experience the (here it comes again) magic.

So that’s another of the music rooms I enter and thoroughly enjoy. Some for creating and some for listening. All adding to the celebration of life.