Camp Matigua: The Lost And Forgotten

by Allison Greer

  Then and only then did the baby cast aside the curtain laughing and running to her Grandpa throwing her arms around his neck to be embraced in his strong, permanently-tanned arms. It delighted her so when he exclaimed over how cleverly she had fooled him. Then, he picked her up, carried her outside to the washstand and sat her there while he scrubbed the day’s toil off his arms and hands. He enfolded her little hands in his, lathering them down for supper.

  “Poppa Short did something that got lost down through the years.” Clarence continued to apprise Maggie somewhat apologetically. “He blessed his own children. Put his hands on each son’s head one by one and said a prayer over him, addressing individual needs and qualities. It must surely have had a remarkable affect. And, he and Mama Deanie knelt beside the bed every night, taking their turn at prayer. Poppa Short, then, took up his kinsman redeemer relationship with his wife and blessed her.”

  “Ah really had no idea how ta pray till ah married Shortie.” Mama Deanie told her sons before the man’s open casket in the tiny church chapel. “Ah thought ah did, but, then, ah heard yer father. He grew me in mah faith.

  “When Darby died, it looked for a long time like Shortie’s heart would never mend—he loved ’is brother so fierce. Then, we found consolation in each other and, one day he took mah han’ in his, looked into mah eyes, smiled ad me. That was all it took for us both ta move

  on, set our grieves aside.”

  They hitched the mules to the wagon and moved all Deanie Annie’s things out of the house she had with Darby down the road—the little house Reidz and Lillie lived in and eventually passed on to their children—into the homestead house with Short. They were married and, soon, their boys started coming. Darby’s prostate cancer had kept the couple from having children of their own.”

  7

  “Meggie, what brought you to suspect the charger in the monkey’s bowel?” Darlene was asking.

  “Oh! It was not I but your own husband who first noticed the canister. Started to pick it up off the floor. Mr. Babb warned him not to touch it. Remember, Ken? And, it was Mr. Babb who decided to give it to forensics . . . ‘an object of interest’ as they say in the business.

  “I believe that entire event, however, had its preparations years and years before its occurrence when Clarence, our little boys and I were temporarily transferred to Salt Lake City. I was grocery shopping, happened to make the acquaintance of a mysterious and very sad man. From his behavior he appeared to be a serious alcoholic . . . in some stage of inebriation as we approached each other. He kindly made his greeting, said he was ‘feeling no pain’.

  “Oddly, I became violently ill that very evening with a stomach virus, so miserable, and his words returned to me. I thought it’d be nice to be, as he had said, ‘feeling no pain’ . . . wished I could have stepped back into his shoes for a time.

  “And, as well, I was reading Papillon. I had picked it up off a carousel rack while waiting in line at the cash register. The man, the novel, my dreadful illness . . . all became interconnected in my mind . . . and, an unwelcome feeling of aloneness since Clarence had to go out of town, was not able to help me and we knew no one in the city. I could have called for an ambulance, but what would I have done with my little babies? So, I put them to bed, then went to bed myself.

  “I would never justify or condone the actions of those mothers who take their children’s lives . . . better to put them into an orphanage or up for adoption, give them to grandparents . . . but I can have some understanding of the dynamics playing out in their lives which place them in such terrible undercurrents and downdrafts, pulling them into that blackest of holes for it is so very unnatural for a mother to kill her own children. God placed into the female psyche a great and tender bond for her offspring. The most remarkable example of this is in the Old Testament when King Solomon offered to slice an infant in half when two women argued over rightful parentage. In his great wisdom Solomon knew the true mother, and, certainly, the one most deserving, would choose to lose her child rather than see him murdered.

  “They are her finest creations and for a mother to destroy those fragile and helpless lives proves what a despicable position she finds herself in. That she can see no other acceptable option is the hugest of nightmares.

  “When I hear of a woman who’s taken her children’s lives, my first thought is ‘Where was their father? And, then, ‘Where were the grandparents?’ for they should all have been giving the mother support. Society has lost sight of the importance of grandparents in children’s lives. Grandparents help maintain balance and perspective, often sheltering, nurturing, even enriching the young ones’ lives.

  “Each case, however, is different affected by unique happenings. And, sometimes the mother refuses every avenue of assistance which usually means she’s placed her own interests above those of her children. The old adage, ‘You can’t go home’ . . . oftentimes, you not only can, but you must!

  “I have great admiration for the good men of this nation for I believe they, on various levels, understand the awful, awful place in which those mothers find themselves and so choose not to render the ultimate punishment . . . that judgment being left to Jehovah-God. Yet, ironically, it’s usually a man who puts the woman in that place . . . between the rock and the hard place where no good and decent remedy can be found. Each case is different, however. Would that justice came with its own cookie cutter.”

  And, such a woman should not be left in society free to conceive, again . . . or even to take care of children . . . men, too, for that matter.

  {“But, that’s a loose cannon more difficult to constrain.”}

  “Selah.” Clarence would say, if he could.

  8

  Margaret Katherine O’Casey spoke often to her sons about maintaining their own integrity—that’s what she would have admired greatly about Rosie, her inner will to run true, her deep determination to maintain her own integrity, what psychologists include in the multi-faceted term executive function, regardless of what life was doing all around her. So, when her mom was certain beyond doubt that the child was pregnant and informed her husband the next seven months would be his responsibility, Rosie saw the matter as a blessing more than misfortune. She was, finally, able to do what the little child had long dreamed of, so desired to do—live with her father, work with him in the garden, don her straw hat and help carry vegetables down the road to Favored Acres Assisted Living the old folks’ home, listen in the evenings while he played his mandolin, pass out tracts explaining their faith.

  His was not a large backyard—a limited expanse of thick, verdant San Augustine grass which received regular applications of cow manure, a concoction kept continuously steeping in a large barrel of water, straw and

  patties behind the garden that grew between the turf and a tall, wooden fence encompassing the entire backyard, covered solid with blooming trumpet and morning-glory vines. Even then, so strong was this bovine brew that it had to be further diluted lest it burn the tender plants. Such an alluring fragrance of honeysuckle wafted over the yard on a gentle, summer breeze to comfort the taffy-haired child while she baked her chocolate cake. Poppa set the tea. Sun tea, he called it . . . Texas cowboy tea.

  {“‘Why Texas tea?’ one might ask. Who else is known for its cowboys? Ok . . . now that we’ve settled that, let’s proceed.”}

  So, there in the center of his diminutive kitchen table—white, rectangular oak, sufficient for four—sat her cake, its layers slipping and sliding under a thin icing. One of her first endeavors, it was a yellow cake, chocolate icing—imperfect but very tasty and ice-cold, sweet tea. Setting his garden work aside for the moment, he entered the kitchen with the customary creaking of the back porch steps, a slam of the screened door and perspiration clinging to his face, freshly tilled earth under his fingernails.

  With, practically, every appropriate and timely sensibility addressed on her da
ddy’s property, Rosie sat with him on the white-painted oak chairs for an afternoon repast. The girl could barely contain the intense feeling of spiritual bliss for the child she carried within, the deep dread that it would end and life as it had been would begin all over, again. Momma wanted her back.

  Rosie’s daddy’s preacher had spoken to the

  conspiracy of silence endured by families because of a number of factors—embarrassment, fear of loss: loss of position and esteem in the community, within the extended family, loss of the child to authorities and into a foster care which too often is poor care, loss of money to take the matter to court. Rosie’s teachers had learned the hard way that their best intentions seemed only to make matters worse. At least, it made all that mattered in Rosie’s life worse. Rosie’s liberator was her father and the faith he shared with his daughter in Jehovah God, their Lord Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit. He was all she needed; that loss was her great tragedy.

  Try as she might she could never quite get her feet planted on solid ground as her uncle’s specter hovered about her in her waking hours and nightly dreams, if not in the flesh, definitely in memory. While people saw a patient and steadfast girl, Rosie worked with hands that seemed always to shake, a heart that skipped beats and trembled, a mind that would not, could not settle upon a task and see it to completion. On her jittery days, she jumped from one project to another, bringing things just to but never quite achieving proper conclusion. Fortunately, she did have good days. Then, she made the loop back around and finished that which she’d started the day before, so that people—everybody but her dad—saw an accomplished and capable young person.

  Her dad had a pretty good idea of what his daughter’s days were like. He watched her, had lived both his and her pain from her birth and feared that, as the girl grew into womanhood and, then, mature age, all factors and symptoms would grow progressively more intense,

  perhaps someday rendering her emotionally inept. The good minister said that was sometimes the case . . . each incident of abuse shocking and searing the engaged nerve cells, jarring them onto new and different, most inappropriate journeys which, eventually, congeal and, as the brain ages, gelatinous electrical tracks solidify, no longer fluid and flexible . . . that she might have a weakness toward hysteria—unable to cope with crises. He could not see his daughter growing mean or cruel to others but he could see her turning more and more inward, less and less secure within herself.

  How he set his mind to arranging her life for the present and second-guessing the future. Already, he searched the youths in the town, the church for a nature that could best support and uphold his Rosie.

  *

  Maggie found her Clarence a most insightful man for a man not university-bred. It was he who detected the parallel between the Bible’s staunch requirement that humans come to God with a “broken and contrite heart” and the Alcoholics’ Anonymous saying that, so often, the alcoholic must hit rock bottom before she understands she needs help, before she can pull herself out of her addiction. It’s difficult for an alcoholic to be in a rock-bottom place without being ‘broken and contrite”. The Bible refers to the dog that returns to his vomit.

  22...“. . . it has happened to

  them according to the true

  proverb: ‘A dog returns to his

  own vomit,’ and ‘a sow, having

  washed, to her wallowing in the

  mire.” NKJV ™

  2 Peter 2:22

  “What can be more self-deprecating,” Clarence continued to counsel, “than finding oneself wallowing on a dirty floor with her own throw-up saturating her clothes—unless it’s the awareness that those she cares most about might discover her in that position. Since God made us, He knows most well what it takes to startle His creation, cold and wrong-headed, hard-hearted, out of that concrete mental state into a being who is, once more, malleable. After all, isn’t that what electric shock, insulin shock is all about?

  God does His best work in pliant, circumcised hearts. Broken and contrite . . . rock-bottom. Why would anyone choose addictions, shock treatments when our great Creator has His ways and means already worked out, ways that are not at all expensive or physically detrimental, ways that enable us to maintain our human dignity since His ‘broken and contrite’ is nothing like AA’s ‘rock-bottom.’ And, this ‘broken and contrite’ is for His eyes only. What other people see is its manifestation—our good works and words, the good things we choose to do and say for Him out of our love for Him and His great love for us.”

  The first time he brought that Bible verse to Maggie’s attention, her feathers ruffled. She was young, still a bit rigid in pride and subjectivity when Clarence read it to her and she exclaimed,

  “Why would God want that state of humiliation for me?! Broken and contrite. Indeed! I’ll never go there. I’ve never committed so despicable a sin that I need to reach such depths of spirit. I refuse to even entertain such a necessity for myself!”

  She even got a bit testy, suggesting maybe Clarence had sinned badly enough that he needed to be broken and contrite since he had done some smoking and drinking in his adolescence, but not her.

  “He’ll just have to take me as I am, ’cause I have no intention of coming anywhere near broken and contrite.”

  Then, Clarence over their first several years of time together proceeded in his calm, patient, loving, generous, forgiving way to show Margaret that God doesn’t “just have to” do anything. And, this would become definitively clear when her life on earth is complete and she stands—or falls prostrate—before Him. Clarence loved to use Apostle Paul’s conversion and life as his example, referred to it often.

  “You see, ole Paul—well, actually, he was quite young at the time—considered himself, in his own words, to be amongst the best—Jew of Jews, Hebrew of Hebrews. He, strictly, followed all the rules and regulations of the Jewish faith, so convicted that he was

  justified in tracking Christ’s followers down, tearing them out of their families’ arms, dragging them off to prison in chains, torturing them, taking their property, their lives. It was no less than what his Jewish faith of the day required of him. Christians were heretics, blasphemers. He prided himself in creating havoc in the Christian Church. And, he was very good at it and greatly compensated.

  “Then, he made a near-fatal mistake necessitating months of recovery. He took it upon himself to ask the high priests for letters which he intended to give the synagogues in Damascus, requesting their permission that, should he locate any Christians within their city, he be permitted to arrest them, take them back to Jerusalem for punishment. He obtained those letters,” Clarence, as so often before, captivated his junior Sunday School boys with the old, old story, “and as he journeyed down the dusty road, a lightening bolt hit him. He fell involuntarily, instantaneously, to his knees.

  {“Clarence always snapped his fingers at this moment. It sounded like a small tree cracking.”}

  “And, out of what some observers heard as a huge, indecipherable noise came the most distinct words to Paul’s ears:

  4...“. . . ‘Saul, Saul, why are you perse-

  cuting Me?’” NKJV ™

  Acts 9:4

  “Of course, Paul had never witnessed God communicating with mortals in such a way as this. He did not recognize Jesus Christ who had already upon His death on the cross identified with all humans who believed and trusted in His deity and Godly Sonship. Paul could not understand that, when he tormented them, he tormented the Christ. Paul asked the voice:

  5...“. . . ‘Who are

  You, Lord?’ Then the Lord said,

  ‘I am Jesus, whom you are

  persecuting. It is hard for you

  to kick against the goads.

  6...“. . . ‘Arise and go

  into the city, and you will be

  told what you must
do.’” NKJV ™

  Acts 9:5-6

  “Paul’s companions, those who heard but could not discern, took him by the hand and led him away for he was quite blind.”

  Clarence chuckled at his beloved and impetuous wife, for he heard her more than once state that “God will just have to . . .”, knowing that she was exhibiting the very reason God made the “broken and contrite” requirement in the first place.

  “We have to know that we know that we need His Savior. And, who can be more in the know than that person who, for whatever reasons for being in the place, recognizes she’s hit rock bottom . . . broken and contrite. And, why does the Bible speak of a ‘circumcised heart’? Ask any man who’s been circumcised . . . it presents the penetralia mentis, sensitive and susceptible to the slightest touch. A circumcised heart is readily accessible, accepting and freely available to God’s slightest direction. God knows what He’s doing . . . or saying, as the case may be.

  “One day you’ll be before God Almighty and, instead of hearing yourself say, ‘God will just have to . . .’ or ‘You’re gonna just have to . . .’, you’ll hear God say, ‘Just do it . . .’ and—binko—every cell in your body has acknowledged its Maker, instantaneously, and bowed before Him and you’re saying, ‘Ok, Ok, Ok . . . whatever you say.’ Just like Paul as he was being led away.”

  Clarence, also, noted that an alternative could most easily and justifiably be placed in Christ’s parable of the camel, the needle, the rich man . . . “It’s easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven.” Clarence decided that, in this Information Age where knowledge is power and king, “intellectual man” is just as applicable . . . “It’s easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for an intellectual man to enter heaven.” Clarence’s primo case-in-point was those people confident in their superior knowledge who advocate a reality and credibility of evolution over creative design engineered by God Himself . . .