Birthday Party!

“You get to go to your friend's birthday party! He's going to be five years old! You're going to have cake and play games; and you're going to give him a present! Doesn't that sound like fun?”

Well, most of it sounded fun; but I had to weigh the pros and cons carefully. Even at four years of age, I knew that there is no such thing as a free lunch. There was a cost hidden in that allegedly happy announcement – a big one; and I had a hard time believing that Mom was so excited about it. Of course, adults are strange creatures. You can never tell how they're going to react. I sat down and thought carefully, and decided that I would be willing to do it because he was one of my best friends. It was a hard decision, though.

What do you give your friend for his 5^th birthday? You can't give him some baby toy. Five is a big birthday – just ask anybody - so it's got to be a really good toy. I was a little reluctant; but I opened the lid to the deacon's bench that served as my toy chest and began to search. I took out all of the things that were broken. Those were clearly not good enough to give him. I took out all of the things that had pieces missing. Those weren't good enough, either. The little toys were eliminated because my present had to make a splash. After ages of searching, and a lot of internal struggle, I finally chose which of my toys to give him for his birthday.

Mom looked into my bedroom and asked what I was doing.

“I'm picking out which toy to give him,” I said.

“No, son. You don't have to give him one of your toys. We'll go to the store and get him a new one.”

Why didn't she say so to start with? Let's go!

Kindergarten - The Anchor Holds

Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding. - Proverbs 4:7

Recently, I was at West Huntsville Baptist Church talking to the pastor, who has been a friend of mine since I was 13 years old. We were in his office when he asked whether I had gone to Kindergarten at West Huntsville. I said yes, but thought it was an unusual question. I don't often get asked about my Kindergarten credentials. He pointed behind me. I turned around; and there was a very old sign for West Huntsville Baptist Kindergarten, hanging on the wall. I looked around the office and realized that, due to the vagaries of remodeling over the intervening 46 years, I was standing in the very room where I attended Kindergarten.

Years don't slip away in life like they do in novels; but my eyes briefly stopped seeing things as they were in 2014. The well-decorated office slipped away and the walls moved to their proper places. I looked out the window and a house with a giant shade tree replaced the parking lot. The walls were industrial green cinderblock again, and the floors were green-flecked asbestos tile. I couldn't feel 1967, but I could see it clearly enough. This was the room that had begun what was to be over 20 years of education in elementary schools, high school, and a variety of universities. My church introduced me to school, as it introduced me to almost everything else of value in life. If everyone had an introduction like mine, education would be a lot more popular.

I didn't know I was being introduced to Education (Capital E). I went to Kindergarten on Monday in the room that, on Sunday, was my Sunday School room. I didn't know I was Being Educated, because I couldn't separate what I learned during the week from all of my other education in that room on Sunday mornings and evenings. Adults that I loved, and that loved me, taught me to see God, the world, and others with an appreciative eye. There was much to learn from the world, much to learn from books, and much to learn about one another. Language was particularly important to me, because it held subtleties that weren't always obvious. One of the things that I remember learning in Kindergarten is how the words “nephew” and “niece” work. It turns out that they are governed by one's own gender, not by the gender of one's parent's siblings. Ergo, I am my aunt's nephew, not her niece. This was amazing.

Did I receive a religious education in my Baptist Kindergarten? No. I had already learned by the time I was 5 that there was no such thing as “religious” education and “secular” education. Whenever I learned about God, I was enabled to see His creation in a new way through the lens of my new knowledge. Whenever I learned about the world, or the people in it, I was able to understand Him better by understanding the new information that I had gained. As a result, I have always approached academic pursuits as attempts to understand both God and His creation. Some of my most significant spiritual realizations were made much later in the Physics department as I studied quantum mechanics and relativity.

With an anchor in education that digs as deep and holds as fast as that, it's little wonder that I have never stopped learning.

War! The Invasion Of Mimosa Lane

We left the BatCave behind when I was about four-and-a-half (Don't forget how important those “and-a-halfs” were). We departed for a house on Mimosa Lane in the northwestern part of town. I thought it was so cool! Not the house – the fact that there was actually a mimosa tree at the end of the street, as you turned off of Mastin Lake Rd. The synchronicity, to a 4-year-old, was staggering. I thought it the most improbable occurrence in the world that a street named Mimosa would also have a mimosa tree on it. The mimosa tree was the most exotic sight imaginable to me. The seed pods looked like beans, and let us pretend that we were farmers. With serrated green leaves protecting ethereally wispy, pink flowers, the mimosa tree was a gift of beauty from another world; and it seemed a harbinger of peace in our new home.

It was not to be. The kid two doors down from us opposed both the idea and the fact of me landing in his neighborhood. In order to live in peace, I had to declare war and take my my new land from the hands of a rapacious enemy by force of arms. Since we weren't allowed to leave our respective yards, we had to conduct our warfare with long-range projectiles fired from our home bases. We deployed along the battle lines defined by the property of the intervening house and threw rocks at one another for two days. After unremitting warfare against a clearly inferior but inexplicably intransigent foe, I declared a truce. With a ceasefire agreed upon, we settled our differences and became good friends.

Later, when he smashed my head into a brick wall, I didn't even tell on him. It only cost me two stitches, and hardly seemed worth ruining a good friendship over.