Daily Wisdom 06-14-2006 When Dad "Worked" on Sunday

What memories do you have of your dad? What is your own lasting legacy as a father? We think about these things around Father's Day.

This is my first Father's day without my dad and I had to think about one of my favorite memories/stories about him. It also involved my government teacher, Mr. Dickens, when we were living in northern Florida in 1969.

I was the "Yankee new girl in school" and we had a required government class called "Americanism versus Communism." Every day Mr. Dickens and Mr. Berry would spend most of the class ranting about "g'vment," religion, freedom, the fortunes of University of Alabama football, and tales about hunting with their dogs.

Not only was I new and freshly imported from the North, but I was immediately categorized as a "Mennonite." Everyone knew that Mennonites were different. Some were different in dress but others like me were different mainly because of our beliefs.

Moreover, Mr. Dickens in particular had a chip on his shoulder when it came to all religious people; mostly he felt they were a bunch of hypocrites. "Fine Bab-ptists on Sunday morning, but who do you find drinking and driving home from Joe's Bar on a Saturday night? Whoohie!" Mr. Dickens would exclaim.

Still, as a new southern transplant, I was fascinated with his stories. What high schooler wasn't content to listen to tall tales and loud opinions for an hour, rather than buckling down to discussing the assigned reading? At times his logic and opinions made sense and we realized his mind went deeper than huntin' dogs and 'Bama football.

Mr. Dickens picked up early on my faith background and would at times buttonhole me with questions about "How would Mennonites keep communists from taking over our country if it ever came to that?" I remember my face feeling hot as I stumbled for answers that I was just finding myself, and feeling sometimes like not only my faith was on trial but all of Christianity, in his eyes.

My father was a diehard Christian, and one of the firm rules guiding our lives was that Sunday was a day of rest; we only did the necessary chores of taking care of the animals on our farm, (and of course "women's" work of cooking and washing dishes).

In that community, hunters like Mr. Dickens would frequently take their dogs out on Sundays and go scouting for deer. On one Sunday afternoon in the fall when the ground was soggy from the hurricane season, Dad could hear across the fields a vehicle stuck in the mud. He went out quietly and got his tractor, fetched some sturdy chains, and went rambling down the paths between fields until he reached the source of the sound. Who did he find there but Mr. Dickens and his dogs, with his truck stuck up to its axles.

Dad was able to quickly pull Mr. Dickens out of the mud, who then returned profuse thanks. I don't know if Dad worried about whether neighbors would think he was working on Sunday when they saw him on his tractor, but Dad did tell me that he'd found and freed my government teacher.

On Monday morning, Mr. Dickens began class with "I was out huntin' with my hounds Red and Rowdy yesterday," and we settled in for what we hoped would be a long diversion from government and religion. "Well I was out near about the Miller farm," he said with a nod to me. "And then Whooohie! Plump. The ole' truck jes mired down and wadn't going nowhere, no way. I rocked it back and forth. Of course it jes' made the mud worse and I knew that, but what was I to do? I was eight miles from town. And then I looked up and who did I see puttin' across the fields but Mr. Miller, on his tractor, on a Sunday. And he commenced to putting his chains on my truck and had me out of there in no time at all. Now that's a fine Christian man who don't ker what his neighbors will think; that he's disobeying the rule about not working on Sunday to help this poor old teacher out of the mud."

He turned to me. "I'll never forget that, Miz' Miller. You've got a fine father. If everybody who went to church was like that, we'd all be better off. Now that's what Christian love is all about. You tell him thank you agin for me now, will you?"

And he never did forget my father's simple act of kindness, bringing it up often in our discussions of religion the rest of the year. I felt less "on trial" and less suspect in my faith tradition. Somehow Dad's kindness created a bridge to soften the opinion of one curmudgeonly teacher. I doubt Dad thought of himself as a peacemaker that day, but Mr. Dickens' ideas about Christians and pacifists would never be quite as hardened.

Whatever you do this Father's Day, if your dad is still around, make sure he knows just what you appreciate about him, or get him to tell you one of his stories. You never know when it might be his last Father's Day with you.

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Contributed by Melodie Davis: MelodieD@MennoMedia.org Melodie is the author of eight books and writes a syndicated newspaper column, Another Way