The Messy Mix

It is Tuesday and time to write a 'Slice of Life." 
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This is the way I always heard it.

Preacher Jim shared the word of the Lord with all who would listen, and never could make enough money for his family through his sermonizing alone. He’d preach here or there in small country churches throughout Georgia and he had a brief tenure as church pastor in a couple small churches, but each of these had only a very few (and poor) congregants and the donations were scarce. Preacher Jim’s dear family was  a large one, with thirteen children born over the course of twenty-five years – many mouths to feed, many bodies to dress, and a house to take care of and keep warm in the wintertime. So Preacher Jim took on any additional good job that he could find. He was a hard worker and skilled, a ‘jack of all trades.’ He worked as a tenant farmer for several years, in a couple different locations, growing and harvesting corn and cotton. He worked for a time in a mill. He was a pretty good carpenter and worked at a cabinet shop, and for a short (and non-lucrative) while, he had his own cabinet shop. Throughout all these gigs, his main work was preaching, with a multitude of Wednesday evening services and long Sundays in the pulpit. 

One of the very best jobs he worked was at a local construction site. Preacher Jim was responsible for creating concrete forms – pouring the concrete, letting the concrete set, removing the form, and moving the finished piece across the yard onto railway cars or trucks. The work was grueling but it paid well, and it was good for the family to have dependable money. 

Preacher Jim was able to get one of his sons (Keith) a summer job there at the construction yard. Newly graduated from high school, turning 18 that fall, Keith was so excited to have this work. He was living the dream: a girlfriend, a car, and a little money in his pocket. Life was good.

That day in August, one of the concrete forms was being moved across the yard, tied up with cable, and attached to a small lift or crane of some sort, when all of sudden, the cable snapped.

The concrete form hit the high school grad in the back of the head. 

His dear father, Preacher Jim, was right there as it happened. How to describe witnessing such a horrendous scene, to see his own son killed in this freak accident?

The family. Oh, how they mourned.  

The owners of the construction company sent a huge wreath to the funeral. They made a personal visit to the family, too, promising to keep Preacher Jim on as an employee and asking him not to pursue a lawsuit. In all probability, OSHA safety regulations were broken at the yard that day, for such an accident to occur. A lawyer or two came by the house, with the promise of big money if Preacher Jim would simply agree to hire them, to have them file a lawsuit in pursuit of money for his son, killed in the prime of his life. 

Preacher Jim responded, 

“No. No amount of money will ever bring our boy back.”

This is the way I always heard it. 

I only know my brother-in-law Keith through these stories, 
through his siblings sharing aloud about that tragic day. 
I’ve watched the way this pain lingers in my husband Tony and his siblings. 
The family has grieved deeply over this one unexpected and tragic loss, 
the grief is always.

Tony was two years younger than Keith; they were the best of friends. Marrying into the family so many years after Keith was killed, never having met him and only knowing ‘of’ him, I see clearly how lives – so many lives – were affected by the trauma of his one life lost too young. Even now, so many years later, there is a soft sadness every autumn, at the time of Keith’s birthday; he would be 73 years old.

An ache that never completely goes away.

I’m humbled by Preacher Jim’s commitment to life – his desire to not seek payback, to say, instead, enough is enough. 

Will we ever get to a place where we say, as a society, enough is enough? Might we seek something other than retribution? What would happen if we leaned into the messy mix of love and grief and somehow created a way forward with one another?

Must hurt people hurt people? 

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