Chapter 10: 1985-1987, An end and a beginning

Lonnie had already started taking classes to become a teacher at the college in Athens, Alabama. “Nanny played on the steps of Founders Hall when she was a young girl,” he thought to himself. He knew that Clip and Mittie and Press and Mary had lived in the city many years ago. Moreover, the families of his Great Grand Uncle Tollie and his Great Grand Aunt Pansy continued to live there.

2 Lonnie had chosen History and Political Science as his majors, of course; and he was enrolled in a class which covered the colonial and revolutionary period of American History. The class was being taught by the Department Chair, Dr. Mildred Caudle, and was attended by one of the most interesting creatures he had ever met in his life.

3 She sparkled. She sat on the other side of the classroom, but her presence filled the room. Darlene was pretty, smart and charming; and Lonnie would have to have been deaf, dumb and blind to miss her. He didn’t.

4 “As Washington faced his mutinous officers, he waved before them a letter of support from Congress,” Professor Caudle began again. “Then he paused, pulled his spectacles out of his coat pocket and said something like, ‘Gentlemen, you must pardon me, for I have grown gray and blind in the service of my country,’” she continued.

5 Lonnie and Darlene were both smiling. “Isn’t that wonderful?” the professor asked. “Some of the officers wept, and the rebellious spirit was gone from the room,” Dr. Caudle concluded. “He used their personal loyalty to him to dissuade them from their animus towards the Congress,” Lonnie commented. “Exactly,” the professor smiled.

6 After class, Lonnie approached Darlene who was busily talking with another student. She was obviously excited. “Yes, Handel’s Messiah!” she exclaimed.

7 “What’s this?” Lonnie asked. “In two weeks, I’m going to see a production of Handel’s Messiah at the Von Braun Civic Center!” she repeated. “Mind if I tag along?” Lonnie surprised himself and asked. “Not at all,” Darlene smiled. Although her friend bowed out a few days later, Lonnie and Darlene resolved to go ahead with their plans to attend and thoroughly enjoyed the performance and each other’s company.

8 That turned out to be the first of many dates over the months that followed. Darlene was introduced to Lonnie’s grandparents, and he was introduced to her mother and father.

9 Nevertheless, Lonnie felt guilty for dating someone outside of his church and decided to inform his pastor of the relationship and the seriousness of his feelings. “I don’t want to lose her,” thought the painfully shy young man.

10 Pastor Tucker, however, was not pleased to hear that Lonnie had violated the church’s rule that members must date and marry within the church. “Lonnie, you know that the Bible says that we are not to be unequally yoked together with unbelievers,” he told him. “But she is not opposed to my religious beliefs; and she is a good person, and I love her,” Lonnie explained.

11 “You are trying to reason around church teaching on the subject and justify your sins,” the pastor persisted. “You will have to end the relationship and repent,” he continued. Tears welled up in Lonnie’s eyes, and there was a knot the size of an apple in his throat. “And you can’t come back to church until you do!” the pastor finished.

12 Lonnie was devastated. He was being forced to choose between his church and Darlene – between God and an unbeliever. He was in anguish. “This might be my only chance for happiness and a family,” he thought. “But God must come first,” he told himself.

13 He called Darlene and told her about what had happened. “I don’t think that we should see each other anymore,” he told her. Darlene was bewildered and flabbergasted and didn’t know what to say. When Lonnie hung up the phone, he was shaking and sobbing.

14 He wrote to his father in Ohio and explained the situation to him. Wayne’s response would change his life. As Lonnie read through the letter, he could feel the weight being lifted from his shoulders.

15 “No one can put you out of God’s Church,” he read. “God calls people to be a part of His church, and only He can withdraw that invitation – and He’s not going to do that! I am also sure that Darlene is a wonderful girl (she must be to have captured your attention and heart). If she is meant to be a part of your life, God will reveal this to you in time.” The letter concluded with a strong assurance of his father’s love and support, and that God would never abandon him.

16 When Lonnie had finished reading it, he jumped in the car and headed to Athens. He had to see Darlene. Needless to say, Darlene was surprised and dismayed to see a breathless Lonnie running toward her. She grabbed his hands when he came within reach.

17 “What is it?” she asked. “I love you,” he declared. “I’ve decided that I cannot live without you; and, if you’ll still have me, I want us to be together.” “Are you sure?” she hesitated. “Are you absolutely sure?” she repeated. “I have never been more certain of anything in my life!” he exclaimed.

18 In December, Lonnie asked Darlene to marry him, and she consented. They quickly announced their decision to their respective families and began planning for a March wedding.

 19 “We very much want you to be there,” Lonnie told Darlene’s grandmother. “Well, babies, I don’t usually attend weddings and such, because I like to wear my overalls,” she protested. “I don’t mind overalls,” Lonnie told her. “Well, I’ll think about it,” she replied.

20 “Oh, Maw, I wish you would!” Darlene added. Daisy laughed and shook her head. “We love you,” they both told her. “I love you too, and Jesus loves us all!” she exclaimed.

21 A few months later, they were married on campus in the parlor of Founders Hall. To Lonnie’s delight, his Uncle Tollie and Aunt Pansy were in attendance. Wayne and Sandi came from Ohio to be there. Terrell and Pat drove from South Carolina. Clayton’s sisters came over from Huntsville. Darlene’s mother, brother and sister were also there from Brindlee Mountain. And, to everyone’s delight, Darlene’s grandmother showed up in her overalls and was given a front row seat at the affair.

22 For their final semester at the college, Lonnie and Darlene did their student teaching at Athens High School. Lonnie was given the eleventh grade U.S. History classes of three separate teachers and quickly adapted to the different styles and paces of each class. The experience, however, also knocked down some of the romantic notions which he had harbored about teaching.

23 He was sitting in the teacher’s lounge one day when a clearly frustrated Math teacher entered the room. “What does a fifteen-year-old have to talk about?” he demanded. “They haven’t lived long enough to have anything interesting to talk about!” he declared.

24 “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them drink,” one of the ladies reminded him. “Yeah, but you can hold their head under till they drown!” he shot back. Everyone laughed.

25 In the meantime, Doodle and Clayton had decided to leave Alabama again and return to Ohio. As graduation approached, it was now clear that Darlene was pregnant. Nevertheless, she reluctantly consented to move north with Lonnie and his grandparents. Many loose threads seemed to be coming together all at once, and the young couple needed a distraction.

26 They went to see The Color Purple at the movie theatre in Florence. Darlene cried so much during the showing that Lonnie’s shirt was wet with tears when they emerged from the darkened room.

27 “That was wonderful!” Darlene sobbed on the way back to the car. “It was a powerful movie,” Lonnie agreed. “Whoopi Goldberg and Oprah Winfrey did a fantastic job.” The movie had touched them both deeply, but it had specifically reaffirmed Lonnie’s belief that everyone’s story was connected and inexorably moving in a direction that had profound meaning and purpose.

28 At the end of the summer, Darlene, Lonnie and his grandparents moved to Elyria, Ohio (a few streets over from where Wayne and Sandi were living at the time). There were, however, no openings for a history or civics teacher in any of the local schools. As a consequence, he was forced to serve as a kind of full-time substitute in several of them. Darlene’s rapidly expanding belly prevented her from working, and the couple continued to live with Clayton and Doodle.

29 That fall, they all prepared to enjoy their first Thanksgiving together. Steven and Angela, along with their two small sons, joined Lonnie, Darlene, Wayne and Sandi at Clayton and Doodle’s house for dinner. Everyone contributed to the meal, and they set up a long picnic table in the family room so that everyone could eat together.

30 Before the meal, Lonnie told the story of that first Thanksgiving enjoyed by John Howland almost three hundred and seventy years before that one. He also read his traditional quote from Abraham Lincoln and read from the eighth chapter of Deuteronomy.

31 When that was finished, he prayed: “Almighty God, thank you for this opportunity to give thanks together. Thank you too for each person here with us today – especially the little ones, and the little one on the way. And thank you for Nanny and Poppa, and the home which they have shared with all of us. And thank you for permitting Nanny to see her great grandchildren – that is a special blessing that we all appreciate.”

32 When he was finished, everyone said “A-men;” and they began to eat the feast spread out on the table before them. Little did they know at the time that that would also be their last Thanksgiving together.

33 Darlene had a little girl that December, and Doodle rejoiced to have yet another great grandchild placed in her arms. Still, Lonnie knew that Darlene would feel isolated and cut off from her own mother at such an important time. Her mother (Marie Little), however, did not drive, and no one had the money for plane fare. As a consequence, Lonnie decided to drive to Alabama over the Christmas break and bring her mother to Ohio.

34 At that time of the year, travel was a risky venture at best. Even so, Lonnie set out for Brindlee Mountain in Darlene’s old Monte Carlo. Although he made it to Alabama without incident, the return trip was plagued with plummeting temperatures and frequent snow flurries. Moreover, as the car’s defrost was not working, Marie had to periodically wipe the windshield off with an old towel so that Lonnie could see the road ahead of them. Thus, when they finally reached Elyria, Lonnie and Marie both breathed a sigh of relief.

35 Darlene was overjoyed to see her mother, and Marie was equally delighted to see her new granddaughter. Still, when the time came for her to return to Alabama, although she had been grateful for the opportunity to share this experience with her mother, Darlene was sad to see her go.

36 As a new year dawned, Doodle’s health began to suffer almost immediately. Indeed, over the months that followed, she grew weaker and weaker and was finally admitted to the local hospital.

37 “She has a massive tumor in her heart,” the doctor told them. “What is the prognosis?” Wayne demanded. “She can’t survive this,” the doctor replied. “We don’t have the ability here to even begin to deal with this,” he continued. “It is my recommendation that we take her to the Cleveland Clinic immediately.”

38 “Will she survive the move?” Lonnie asked. “She won’t last much longer here,” was the answer. “She’s scared, we don’t want you to tell her about this right now,” Wayne told him. They all agreed.

39 Doodle survived the trip to the Cleveland Clinic, but she died a few hours after arriving there. Lonnie and Steven were devastated. The woman who had meant so much to both of them was dead. The woman who had raised them, and who had loomed larger than life for all of their lives, was gone.

40 “Why?” Lonnie asked himself. He felt numb and lonely and sobbed all the way home. That night, there was a violent thunderstorm, and rain poured down from the heavens. The wind violently shook the limbs of the trees and swirled around the house. It was almost as if her passing had caused a great disturbance in the cosmos.

41 Lonnie was exhausted and felt empty inside. “God has given me Darlene and my daughter to see me through this,” he thought. And then there was blackness.

42 He could not remember when he had finally fallen asleep, but the sun was shining now. It was morning. The world had not ended last night. Life went on.