Four Years Ago Today - August 22, 2021 - Rest in Peace

 

Christina posed with LCA President James Crumley.

 We helped at the Crystal Bridges Museum - Walmart funded - and Alice Walton got a hug from Christina for helping. I was later asked to take a photograph of the Waltons on another day.

 Christina was at the bedside of an ALS patient,
like many pastor's wives in ancient days.

Christina was delivered by a not-so-good midwife, in post WWII Germany.

The Swedish Crown at Augustana was used for weddings.

Engagement.

 Erin Joy loved to laugh, especially when someone was acting up and in trouble.

 Bethany Joan Marie loved and squirmed.

 Bethany's favorite nurse could barely speak,
but she  knew the language of love best of all.

Bethany glowed for the camera on Christmas.

Fifty Years Ago and Year Two.Bells for the Campanologist

Campanology is the scientific and musical study of bells. It encompasses the technology of bells – how they are founded, tuned and rung – as well as the history, methods, and traditions of bellringing as an art. It is common to collect together a set of tuned bells and treat the whole as one musical instrument. Wikipedia

 Campanologist - someone who loves and studies bells.

 

I was pushing a wheelchair today and later watching the use of IV antibiotics for a dangerous circulation problem. Surgery and procedures saved one or both legs.

Everyone talks about medical advances so I thought about 50 years ago, when Christina and I were both working at Yale Medical School. She was a researcher for a well known professor and writer of children's books, on the staff of the Yale Medical Child Study Center. I was a lowly xeroxer for the Yale Medical School Library. Researchers asked for journal articles. I went into the dark basement stacks and found the journal for xeroxing. 

We were great friends with Bruce and Betsy Wenger, not realizing he graduated at the top of his class at Yale Medical. 

Christina and I took the Yale shuttle bus over to the medical campus, sometimes together, sometimes solo. One stop was at Baskin Robbins, when they still made real ice cream. 

People would say, "The time will run so fast, you will not believe it." Those people have passed into eternal life, including my favorite professors and the pastor/bishop who helped ordain me.

Two years ago today, Christina transitioned to eternal life. That makes me think of many Yale episodes, trivial but fun, all adding up to the best of memories. Her professor, Joan Fassler, died young from cancer. Joan's husband, Leonard, lived until 2021. 

Leonard was the surprise person on the sidewalk in Chicago when Christina and I found ourselves walking behind him and two other businessmen. She was sure it had to be Lenny. I whispered, "He is a New York lawyer!" I conceded it was possible, so I yelled, "LENNY!" He turned around and mutual recognition lit up. Christina hugged him, and his friends said, "Lenny. Strange beautiful young women run up and hug you! What a gift!"

He helped in the legal battle to break up AT&T. He also kept us up to date about his dear wife.

Math-Science Breakthrough at the University of Water, Ontario - Where Christina Jackson Earned Her MA in German Literature

 

When we went to Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario, in 1970, I enrolled at Martin Luther University Seminary, whose legal name is still Waterloo Lutheran Seminary.

Christina soon got a job at the University of Waterloo, a short walk or bus-ride away. It was the spin-off of Waterloo Lutheran University, where John Warwick Montgomery and our brother-in-law Kermit Way (physical chemist) taught. UW called WLU "the little red schoolhouse down the street." 

UnitWat, as they call it, was a collection of beautiful new buildings with underground tunnels to reduce frostbite. We loved to stop by the computer center and watch the new priesthood, mainframe computer minders, silently managing the giant IBM 360 as we watched reverently through a glass wall.

If you want to look down on UniWat, they were known for computer advances decades ago. Not knowing about a school does not remove it from advances, eh?

Christina quickly went from research librarian to graduate student in German literature. All her professors were German born, except one gentleman. Her only lady professor was Gisela Brude-Fernau, PhD Yale, who was impressed with Christina's original paper about the Wandering Jew in literature.

Canadian-American Border

My Funny Valentine

 

The only way to get Erin to hug her bear for the photo was to tell her not to. That was a major effort, and she grinned about it.

My friend from many years back lost his wife recently. The loss of Christina is very much with me, so I thought I would mention a few things I have learned.

Red-haired "Lucy" with her sister Maria

Christina was a genius researcher and a constant source of encouragement.

We went to an LCA national communication conference in Seattle. Christina posed with James Crumley, Lutheran Church in America president.

My Funny Valentine

As a widow from our Moline class said, "The first year is the hardest." Acute grief is a time of extraordinary pain, because marriage is the only relationship where two become one. The loss is much greater than anyone can imagine.

I expected to be in a fog for a year, because my mother's death was like that. The fog lifted because my Moline classmates kept reminding me of how much she meant to them as a teacher. More than one said, "She saved my life."

My congregation and Christina's family helped me in my grief, in countless ways. Kermit Way and Maria Ellenberger Way drove straight through to get to the parsonage. The last two-way conversation Christina had was with Maria on the phone, when she said "I love you Maria." The last voice Christina heard was "I love you Grammie Chris" from California. She grinned from ear to ear, though not able to speak, and grinned the same way as she slipped into sleep.

I am going to list a few things that lifted me slowly from the Slough of Despond. I could list dozens, because dozens were needed, but these are the individual ones that a husband would know best.

• I realized the encouragement Christina gave me was not lost in death but kept alive and intensified by the fact of us being one flesh. Our oneness was not lost but shifted heavenward by 50%. She said, "You still have work to do."
• I improved when I began recalling the wonderful memories we had, from meeting at Augustana at the age of 18 - when I was still 17 - to 55 years later.  
• Chris was dubbed Lucy by her father for her red hair, her crazy ideas, and her laughter. She was shocked at first by my polemics on the blog, but she offered comments that left me breathless with laughter. She never realized how hilarious her observations were - especially when she described synodical staffs. "Am I that funny?" I said wheezing, "Yes."
• We went to a lot of movies at first, then to as many live performances as possible. We saw Vincent Price, Peggy Lee, Katherine Hepburn, and others, live in Chicago.
• Her favorite actress was Hepburn, and we both loved "Bringing Up Baby." Chris was even zanier in real life than Hepburn playing a role in the "madcap comedy." 
  
• Medical appointments often led to eating lunch at restaurants where we engaged the staff in various ways - favoring our favorites. One regular Red Lobster waiter asked me to perform his upcoming marriage. It was in a beautiful setting in Fayetteville, overlooking the valley.
• We did most things together, so she got to know churchly villains and valiant ones as well as I did. We realized that dastardly behavior was a benefit in getting us into an independent congregation with the rapidly growing computer and Internet media.
• After the funeral, I gave away tons of things others might use or pass along. My favorite creation now is the Happy Corner, where I have pinned the best photos of Christina with Bethany Joan Marie and Erin Joy. I look at the Happy Corner every day and smile, remembering those times, not lost welded in my memory.
  
• All three girls are now with Jesus Christ, the Son of God, born of the Virgin Mary, Miracle Worker then and now, atoning for our sins, rising from death and ascending to heaven - Our Good Shepherd. 
• I pointed out to Chris, just before she died, "We will not be separated, but with the Savior on one side of the gates or the other."

Try Not To Smile

Someone Noticed This Screen Grab

Christina and I were enjoying our time together, late last summer. The symptoms were obvious but managed well with medicine. When I went to the chapel - across the hall, the spare room in our rented house - I said, "Do not walk over. I am afraid of you will fall."

Christina nodded solemnly and said she would stay there. She was especially prone to falling. I shut her door and the chapel door to keep the broadcast sounds from clashing. Everything was all set.  A bit later, I was seated when the chapel door opened, Christina grinning from ear to ear. My stomach was doing cartwheels and round offs, and she enjoyed my shock.

At the hospice, not long after, she said, "I LOVE you Maria!" to her sister. I phoned Andrea's parents and gave Chris the phone. Andrea said, " I LOVE YOU! Grammie Chris!" and my wife grinned just as wide as at the chapel. Christina was not talking anymore, but she fell asleep that night with that same enormous smile. Andrea's parents drove from California to let Christina enjoy time with them, Andrea especially. 

 Sassy thought the ice cream treat was for her. Andrea's father was impressed with the freezer full of Schwan ice cream, Easter 2021

The time has passed quickly, as many have mentioned on Facebook. I am thankful to God for our life together, 55 years from the first day of freshman English class at Augustana, when I told my brother I met a redhead I wanted to date and maybe marry. That got enormous laughs from everyone years later, so when she bragged to store employees that we were married "over 50 years," I said, "Please stop complaining in public." 

No matter how evil the apostates were, Christina never wavered in her faith in Jesus Christ. Doubtless the great and important (in their minds) were especially peeved that she spent so much time and energy with the sick and disabled. They forgot the overturned Thrivent table in the Temple (Surfer Dude New Testament) and - "Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal." Matthew 25

 

One Year Ago

Bethany Joan Marie loved resting in her mother's arms. Once she had a tantrum because her mother was not there. I said, "Is that how you get your way around here?" Bethany stopped crying and grinned.

We went out to the cemetery today. I packed two vases with Enchanted Peace roses. 

Enchanted Peace

Today the Rose Garden was bejeweled with rose blooms. Christina said, "Grass is boring. Turn the front yard into a rose garden." So I did.

 Erin Joy earned her middle name, bursting into laughter for jokes, spills, nurses cussing, and family members "getting into trouble." 

Blooming today were Enchanted Peace, Queen Elizabeth (for Bethany and Erin), Fragrant Cloud, Veterans Honor, and Rugosa. A praying mantis, having breakfast, rested on one rose bloom, so I let it hop onto a new bush to finish the meal.

  Nurse Ida and Bethany adored each other.

Some Photos

Bethany is just above the other photos, the Bulletin Board of Happiness below.

I wanted these photos where I could see them many times each day. Upper left is Bethany grinning for me, on the couch, Sturgis. In the middle - Christina and I graduated early from Augustana in 1969. Upper right - Erin Joy burst into a huge smile with her mom holding her. Lower left - Bethany is in the arms of Christina, about one year old. Lower middle - Erin Joy loved her swing. Lower right - I took this photo of Erin and developed it.

This is the beautiful book stand crafted in Spain, sent by Alec Satin, the Lutheran Librarian. The beautiful facsimile KJV Bible is on the right, donated by a couple in the congregation.

 The reluctant lilies began to bloom this year.

 Joe Pye Weed is slowly budding and the butterflies have arrived to check out their paradise.

Another Creation powerhouse - Mountain Mint was mistakenly covered over with cardboard and mulch, soon bursting through to develop its own pollinator paradise.

 If you like big hips, try Rugosa rose, known for its raggy leaves and big, bright seed pods (hips) full of Vitamin C, used in chewables.

 This may be a red-tailed hawk, perched on the main bird feeder. I wonder why. He always looks at me fiercely, suggesting "You're next."

 A leftover glad from last year bloomed perfectly and went to church on Sunday.

 The entire garden was filled with a ginger-like aroma, which changed into heavy perfume. This lily is enormous.

 Crepe Myrtle is planted for showy flowers and for Cardinal food later. They love to nest at their fast food condo. Robins also love this plant.

 Ranger Bob arranged this memorial. The orange flower is Butterfly Weed, related to Milkweed. Many of my favorites are in the weed family.

 Christina loved Caladiums, which some call Elephant Ears. Slugs also love them.

 Butterfly Weed blooms a long time and attracts a bright orange beetle.