My Fourth Value

As hard as it has been to choose among my values, I cannot possibly omit the value I place upon my family. 

My Dad & Mom, who died 30 and 35 years ago, are still vivid in my memory and were crucially important to me. I often hear stories of unhappy, even abusive, relationships with parents. I could never have imagined such behaviors from my parents. They had, of course, reasonable behavioral expectations and hopes for preparation for a chosen career—which they expected to “come from above.” I believed that I did, indeed, have a “divine call,” but later came to a broader understanding of what “a call” could mean, which came to fruition when I applied and was chosen for a teaching position at Mars Hill College, where I eventually served for 35 years in both teaching and administration. My first year in college had begun ten years of increasing distance from my parents—from Shawnee, OK to Louisville, KY to Mars Hill, NC—from 150 to 800 miles!—and yet, they were unbelievably supportive of my career choice, my marriage(s), and my (adopted) children. I could not have asked for more or better!

My Sister, Betty,my only sibling,was 7 years younger than I. Her friends tended to be younger than she was, and mine older than I was. So, while we grew up together, ate meals together, and associated with our parents together, that gap between us widened even greater. I left for college when I was 17 and she was just 10, so over the years I had, sadly, even less association with her. I returned home during my doctoral studies to perform her private marriage ceremony. Unfortunately, she lived through an unhappy and difficult marriage which ended eventually in separation and divorce. One good result was her son, who is now pastor of a church, married, and with several children of his own. Betty is still working but is able to spend many weekends with her son and grandchildren. She and I have refreshed our relationship and for a number of years have had lengthy conversations every other week.

My relationship with my maternal and paternal Grandparents was good and very different! My Mom’s Dad had died when I was an infant so I never knew him, and her mother lived in Danville,VA, almost 1,000 miles from Ft. Smith! The trips I most remember were during and just after WW II by passenger trains. Those trips enabled me to know my maternal grandmother who, in my memory was a kind and caring mother and grandmother. But my visits with her were few and far between. By contrast, my Dad’s parents lived very near us in Ft. Smith. I often spent weekends with them in a relationship that was warm and comfortable. My grandmother bought for me my first car–a 1954 small Plymouth sedan –to provide transportation for the 100 mile drive to and from my first church job, as Youth Director and “general flunkie.” It was a huge gift! I spent more time with my Grandad over the years, because he owned a garment factory where both my Dad and my Uncle were employed. I worked part time during my high school years, sweeping and cleaning up, especially on the second floor, which was filled with an “assembly line” arrangement of sewing machines where all the garments, awnings, and other products over the years were made. I recall my relationship with him as a kind, patient, and loving man. He lived to be 90 years old and while he was still able to travel, he spent several days with me and my family during my doctoral studies and pastorate in Louisville, KY.It was a very special and memorable time!

Moving on to my Aunts, uncles, cousins, etc., my closest relationships from childhood on were with my Dad’s sister, Martha, and her husband, Howard, and their three children. They lived just outside of Ft. Smith and we visited with them often. Much later in life, I have developed a close relationship with those cousins and their families, especially one of them with whom I correspond regularly. They are very faithful conservative Baptists—which I, of course, am not—and we have had numerous “disagreement” conversations, but have been able to find some important common ground, to respect each other when we don’t, and remain very close. This is a relationship I cherish.

My three children were all adopted, after my first wife, Sondra, had several miscarriages. We loved them and raised them, of course, as our very own. Our first, Deborah, was only 5 days old when she came to us in 1965 from Social Services in Louisville, Ky., where we lived at the time. Chris, in 1969, and Melissa, in 1971, were each a few months old and also adopted through local Social Services after we had moved to Mars Hill, NC. As soon as they were old enough to begin to understand and process it, we informed them that they were adopted. Although one cannot know what all goes on in a child’s mind or even after they are grown, we never knew of any strong need on their part to learn more about their birth parents, but we would not have been troubled if they had—or did! Even after my first marriage ended, as noted below, I was able to keep a close and frequent relationship with my children, since I left our house to them and Sondra, continued to pay the mortgage, and moved into a small garage apartment near the campus. When she later moved to a city some 90 miles away, contact with the children became much more difficult, but I kept up with them as best I could. By then, Deborah, the oldest, had skipped her senior year in high school and started to college at Mars Hill, so contact was easy. After finishing college, Deb married and over the years had four children, all of whom are now adults with whom I have maintained a relationship. The closest one has been with her only daughter, since she attended and graduated from Mars Hill University and, therefore, was very accessible. My son, Chris, who had a very tough time with the separation and with girlfriend problems, dropped out of high school. Eventually, he earned his GED and started to college, but soon decided it wasn’t for him. He eventually found the work that suited him and since he was and remains very proficient at client/customer relationships and knowledge of his products, he was recruited and hired by competitor companies several times. He finds his work personally satisfying, and has been very financially successful. He and I remain close and in touch on a regular basis. Melissa, my youngest, started to college at Western Carolina University, but dropped out to return home and marry her boyfriend. Early in her marriage, she had a son, her only child, who is now grown with a child of his own. The sad conclusion to my relationship with my daughters is that both of my girls died this year, less than three months apart, Melissa in late March, Deborah in early June. Melissa’s was sudden and unexpected, attributed after autopsy to complications from Multiple Sclerosis. Although there is, of course, no cure for this insidious disease, she had been under what we thought to be successful treatment for a number of years. Deborah died, after a couple of weeks of an unacknowledged urinary tract infection that turned into sepsis, which in an advanced stage is often fatal. She was hospitalized, never regained consciousness, and passed away after seven long days! This has been the most unbearable grief I ever could have imagined. We’re not supposed to outlive our children!! I have maintained a close relationship with their husbands and with my grandchildren, who also experienced this heartbreaking loss.

My wife. My first marriage, in 1959, had its good times, especially in its early years with the joy of adopting our children. But it became eventually full of difficulties that led to counseling, individually and together, over a number of years.  Having been raised with the commitment that marriage was for life, I stayed in it longer than I should have for either of us. The actual separation in 1981, after 22 years together, was the most difficult and agonizing experience of my life! But in the spirit of the unexpected, that summer became a pivotal point in my life. SART, the professional summer theatre program, was offering Fiddler on the Roof and I was to play Tevye. The musical director of the show was Cathy Adkins, whom I had met earlier when she was dating a friend of mine. Long story shorter, she was, and is, an accomplished accompanist and we continued to work together on a number of musical productions at SART—thanks to our friend, Jim Thomas, its founder and executive director—along with a dinner theatre group, called “Bits and Pieces,” for several years. During this time Cathy and I became close friends until, after about 3 years, we realized it was more than just friendship, as important as that was.

As a result, I chose to seek a divorce from Sondra, who did not object and would soon remarry. She remained in a congenial marriage until, sadly, she developed dementia, was in a nursing facility for the past three years, and died shortly after the girls, mercifully never knowing that they had passed.

In 1985, I married Cathy, my best friend, as she has continued to be for 37 years! Our marriage relationship has been loving, congenial, warm, and caring, strengthened by our ability and interest in communicating—especially in conversations of consequence about “things that matter.” She has just retired after a 35 year distinguished career at Mars Hill University. Her creatively effective teaching skills are enviable; for most of her career she was accompanist for the choirs and, for over 35 years, for the annual Choral Festival (both of which she is continuing to do in retirement), with noted guest conductors and 300 high school students; has served as the college/university organist for over 30 years; and as Dean of the General Education program, which she guided through several creative “rebirths.” She was, is, and will always be my best friend!! And now, with the time we have left, we will learn to enjoy the new relationship of two retirees!

While I have not directly spoken much about values in this overly long post about my family, it has been an important—and, for me, heart-touching—reminiscence about all the ways my family relationships have affected my life in both happy and sad, positive and negative ways. And that is why it is such an important value—I have learned and profited from my family relationships. They have in many ways made me who I am!

The final post in this series will address the last two values I have chosen to reflect upon. I hope you will have the fortitude to stay with me.