As long as I can remember I’ve been
searching. What I was searching for I couldn’t say for many years. My search
was passive and almost invisible until my Sunday school teacher shot holes in
my simple faith the fall I turned thirteen. This marked an initiation into a
totally secular way of life, a turning away from the little awareness of Truth
I’d gleaned. That year our church class of eighth graders was filled with high energy,
every class was a chance to socialize with all my best friends and my new
boyfriend, LeRoy Nutting. But that youthful simplicity and joy in my faith
ended on a fateful Sunday in 1954 as Mrs. Decker launched into her
“enlightened” teaching on the debunking of the Virgin Birth.
Now up until that day, I wasn’t any Bible expert. I hadn’t memorized more than
two psalms and no bible verses. I had no opinion on other religions or who was
in or who was out, what was acceptable and what was heresy; I just loved my
little white bible with my name engraved in gold leaf—Nancy Lee Watson.
My childlike assumption about what that bible contained was that it was full of
good stories from a long time ago, and these stories were fun to enter into in
my imagination. I could picture Daniel
in the lion’s den, and I hoped my faith could stop the mouths of lions. I
cheered at David conquering the giant, Goliath, with God’s help, and wondered
if I could be so brave. I loved the baby, Jesus born in a stable in Bethlehem, and hoped that
my family would love and help each other more.
Whether these stories were
literally true or legendary, or inspired by God but not literally true, or
something else didn’t enter my thoughts. I simply believed them as they were
written. What was important and essential was that these stories inspired a sense
of radiance, revealed a sparkling cosmos bigger than the one I lived in
day-to-day, stirred a sense of wonder that drew devotion out of my inner soul
for this God who mysteriously became involved in lives and accomplished
miracles. Sunday school, the bible, hymn singing all pointed to this
light and luminous other world; and my undiscriminating heart resonated to its
numinosity.
Enter Mrs. Decker. Mrs. Decker was
an overstuffed, middle-aged woman who wore tweed suits and had an attitude that
said, “I am so very informed and modern in my thinking!” During one
class, she launched into her version of the birth of Christ, “Now the bible
says that Mary was a virgin, and that God gave her Jesus in a miraculous
happening; but we don’t have to accept this ancient and superstitious
tale. Mary could easily have been a virgin, but contained within herself
both male and female parts which could produce the child quite easily. We
can see this in nature. Many plants have complete flowers with both male
and female parts….”
Growing up in a ranching and
farming community, you would think that I was well acquainted with the
reproductive process, but I was a town kid, and the only sexual sight I had
witnessed was the castrating of the male calves at branding time when I visited
Sandra Galeppi, a school mate who lived on a ranch. Oh, another classmate
and I had sneaked a medical book from my parents’ bookshelves, had perused
various genital diagrams, found them disgusting, and decided we would never
have intercourse, but just swim in a pool with our husband and get pregnant
that way, like fish, no physical contact necessary. (I have no idea how we arrived at this.) That was the extent of my
sexual thinking. So with Mrs. Decker tying the Virgin Mary to a plant which
could reproduce itself sexually my mental acuity began to fade. My mind kind of
tried to wrap around her words, but I couldn’t make sense of her lesson.
What really punctured my faith-filled
heart was that God didn’t do miracles; it was all ancient superstitious stuff,
something out of the wilds of time when the inquisition burned people at the
stake for being witches. Some beliefs like the virgin birth were for these
dark ages, and the bible stories were nothing more than stories. For
several years I kept my religion on a shelf marked “Antiques.”
In this crisis of faith, my
relationship to the “numinous,” to God, would go underground in my psyche for
years. Yet, the truth of supernatural events occurring in everyday life like I
learned about in Sunday school became a holy bubble in my soul, and one day it
would resurface. Perhaps if I’d been in a family that respected thoughts and
feelings, I might have talked it over with them. I didn’t. I never went back to
Sunday school. I gave up believing in miracles…for a season.
I am stunned at what serious harm
was done in that few minutes. Mrs. Decker had absolutely no idea how her ideas
could affect a preadolescent whose faith was simple and literal, quite normal
for that phase of development. Because I
dropped out of church then, it left me vulnerable to cultural biases without
the balancing influence of faith.
How important it is for churches to
train their teachers rather than accept warm bodies to show up and “deal with
the kids.” But the Spirit of Life didn’t
leave me there. The faith still breathed
in me and only waited for a kinder season to re-emerge.
*********
Summers in middle school were
filled with 4-H, a youth organization that taught the farm and ranch kids about
raising animals and the town kids about cooking, sewing, and crafts for the
girls like embroidery, crochet, and knitting. At the country fair we would show our handiwork and get assorted colored ribbons depending on
the excellence of our work. My mom was really “into it,” and pushed me to do
and redo my work repeatedly, so I could get a blue ribbon, or even better, a
purple ribbon. I boiled under her perfectionism.
One 4-H leader, Lena Neddenriep, a
German woman who tolerated no nonsense, hand picked me along with three others
and her daughter to be a select group of students. Because I two of my friends were included, I continued to attend,
even though it was exhausting trying to be faultless. We learned to knit the
German way, which Lena felt surpassed the
American technique by far. We learned to crochet and embroider, with She Who Must
Be Obeyed looking over our shoulder. I
didn’t appreciate it then, but when I wanted to entertain myself during a long
illness years later, because she was available and shared her expertise, my
life was filled with quilting, knitting, crocheting and embroidering which
helped me feel useful and created beauty and comfort. Sometimes it just takes years before we reap
the benefits of an unpleasant experience.
Another 4-H leader was Mrs. Scossa
who knew how to make bread and anything made with yeast. Various moms took turns driving us out to her
ranch and dropping us off for the afternoon.
We learned how to knead the bread with just the right wrist motion,
pushing and pulling the dough toward us and away, when to stop adding flour so
the dough wouldn’t be too stiff, how long to let it rise and how to punch it
down. Everything from cinnamon rolls to
a braided pineapple Christmas bread got baked in her ample kitchen.
During one class, her large
container of fat drippings was knocked off the stove. At least a quart of old fat splattered all
over the floor, chairs and wall paper.
Expecting the worst, a good bit of yelling and shaming, I cringed as she
came into the kitchen to see what all the fuss was about. She did the most surprising thing. With only
the words, “Well, you’d better get to cleaning it up,” she turned and left the
room. Not a word of condemnation. No yelling.
No shaming. She must have known
we felt bad enough as it was. Instead of
the usual condemnation my mother could heap on me, I felt relief. I was pardoned. I felt respected, a novel
experience. Within just a few minutes we had it all in hand and called her in
to see. Our lesson went on as if nothing
had ever happened.
Toward the end of the summer we
had the chance to compete in demonstrations of our bread making for a $50
savings bond. I practiced and practiced
making a Swedish tea ring with cinnamon, butter and raisins as filling. Needing
some patter to go with the demonstration, I studied the theory behind why we
combined the ingredients in a certain way, like adding the yeast before the oil
so it would continue a quick rise.
When my turn came, I stepped up
boldly in my green 4-H headband and bleached white apron, began my story of
yeast dough making, adding the various ingredients as I talked. There were several stages of the dough, the
dough I’d just made; the dough after the rising which I punched down and rolled
out to fill, shape and cut; and the browned and decorated Swedish Tea Ring all
browned and frosted with a white vanilla icing, maraschino cherries and pecans.
Everyone applauded, and I was thrilled.
It wasn’t until later when I was
cleaning up that I discovered I had forgotten to add the egg. No one else noticed either, and I won the $50
savings bond. To this day I have no idea
whatever happened to that bond. My best
guess would be that Mom figured she’d earned it buying all the ingredients over
the summer, not to mention the gas to drive us out to Mrs. Scossa’s ranch. What I was told, was that it took a number of
years for the bond to mature, and by then I’d forgotten all about it. I would have preferred some kind of celebration when the bond matured, like, "Nancy, guess what? That $50 bond you won is ready. We were so proud of you! What would you like to do with it?"
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