“SNORTIN IN THE BUSHES”
©Rev. James A. Campbell D.Min.
“Unless we become as a Child”
“And When I became an adult I put away childish ways”
Until the age of 12 I was a Presbyterian.
That meant that I could not take holy communion
until I had reached the age when I was ready.
That meant I had to study with due seriousness
what communion meant.
I had to be confirmed into the faith
to receive the bread and wine
because bread and wine time was
serious, somber, quiet adult like business.
God wanted me to become religious
like the relatives in those old pictures
who were so religious
that if they ever smiled
their face would crack.
.
It was time to grow up……
Put aside childish ways
so I could more fully become child like.
It was a riddle and to solve the riddle
I needed reverence.
Still, there is only so much reverence you can digest.
There comes a point where one must discover reverence,
find one’s own hunger for broken bread.
***************
It was June……the ordeal, the punishment of education
was nearing its moment of ecstatic release.
The summer was before me,
before me and my best friend, “Ralph Lucino”.
That final ring of the bell…praise the Lord.
NOW THAT!!!!
was purest reverence to my soul…
“No more pencils...no more books..”
Define the meaning of “Reverence”
Okay…reverence is the feeling of the last day of school
and the first step into summer…..
That is the
kingdom of
God.”
Well….that and having a best friend.
To have real reverence you need a best friend.
You need an accomplice.
My best friend was “Ralph Lucino”.
“Ralph” accepted me for me and I accepted him for him
And we both accepted the basic central truth of life:
Reverence was laughter….
Laughter was my basic religious principle in the sixth grade.
Warped, off the wall, zany laughter.
Laughter was sacred
Laughter was freedom
Laughter was the purest form of play
Laughter in practical jokes was my religious experience….
Laughter was truth to me.
At the time of my first communion
when I was suppose to be putting away childish things
and become an adult
I was worshiping at the high altar of Candid Camera.
And somehow even then I sensed the connection.
Laughter was prayer…sort of.
And it was for the sake of pure communion of the wonderful
that “Ralph” and I devised our own communal sacrament.
With that I ask your indulgence
to revisit with me, shear pre-adolescent joy,
as “Ralph Lucino” and I went to a corner of
17th street
and hid in the bushes that wrapped around a really nice house.
We waited until a car would halt at the stop sign
in front of the house with the bushes.
And then we would let out a howling whine,
A loud abhorrent blast of crass agony
That sounded like a cross
between an elephant in distress
and Tarzan on an off day.
We called it “snortin in the bushes.”
HuuugggHHHHHHHHHIIIIIIIIIHHHHHHIII!!!!!!!!!
(actual demonstration)
“Ralph Lucino” and I had perfect harmony in our shared snort.
We were the Everly brothers of the Serengeti.
People in the cars would turn around
and stare with quick glances at the house.
“Mabel what the heck was that??????”
Ohhh it was wonderful,
Pure play, holy play….
I laughed so hard I cried….
Why does that happen……????
Why……. when we really laugh to the depths of our being ...
do we cry……?????
And why is that so purifying even to the point where
it can cure illness?
By the time “Ralph” and I had snorted a half dozen cars
I was so healthy with laughter I was sick.
What is the meaning of reverence????
Really????? Truly??????
REVERENCE IS:
“snortin in the bushes!!!!!!!!!!!”
When I was confirmed,
when I took my first communion,
I said the words people told me to say
as reverently as I was able to look serious
with the eye of one putting away childish things.
Then when the ordeal of reverence was over
I put my blue jeans on and hid in the bushes.
One time a man got out of the car and came over to us and said.
“You guys belong in the nut house.”
OHHHH that was choice. That was beautiful…..
That was pure reverence for being alive…
That was holy communion.
Oh my…..
If someone had asked me then…..
What is your life about?
Are you out for sports?
What is your favorite subject in school?
What is your heart’s desire????
I would have said…..
“I like to snort in the bushes…..
Its my religion, and someday
I am going to be a United Methodist clergy.”
And that was true….
Really……… very early on in my life,
I felt this wonder in ministry,
I should say……
I felt at home in the church
as much as I felt at home in laughter
even though the two seldom came together.
Church had a lot of putting away the foolishness
… but not much of the childlike.
No sooner was school out than the
Colorado heat
became over powering.
There was no air conditioning except swamp coolers
and in our family we just sweated it out.
Long hot quiet days waiting for evening
and waiting for the mail man.
It doesn’t mean the same any more…..
not like it did back then.
To a preadolescent kid,
at least this kid,
the mail man’s gifts were the
high point of the day.
I would search through magazines for anything that was free
especially travel advertisements that said
“send for more information.”
I would,
And nothing was so wonderful
as getting brochures from far away places.
I loved brochures…
I collected brochures…..
Brochures were gospel to me.
They called to me.
I would steal away in the afternoon to an imagined voyage’
to these place of intrigue and adventure.
In the late afternoon, sometimes,
“Ralph Lucino” and I would walk to downtown
Pueblo
And if we had 50 cents
we would go to the Colorado Theatre…..
a run down left over
from the great movie houses of the 1930s.
We would watch the latest stupid movie
Like
“Martians Invade the Nursing Home.”
But you didn’t go to the Colorado Theatre for the movie,
you went for the spectacle of the gathering
of kids with nothing to do
and they would throw water balloons from the balcony
And some would throw popcorn high in the air
Attacking the Martians with popcorn shadows
Now that was neat.
And finally this old man,
an usher at the theatre, would come out and shout,
“You kids stop this or we’re shutting the movie down.”
Going to the
Colorado theatre was our version
Six Flags over
Texas.
It was an “event.”
After the event “Ralph” and I would go to whatever was open
as I searched for more brochures….
“How to build a bomb shelter….”
“How to raise Onions” from the CSU extension service.
After gathering brochures,
we would walk passed the Ursick Meat Company
(That WAS its name)
and out back of this custom slaughterhouse
there were fifty-five gallon barrels of guts and ooze
that made you wonder.
It gave you pause…..
a reverence all its own.
And then “Ralph” and I would wander the railroad tracks
and we would talk of important things
like how to further refine snortin in the bushes.
Oh the deep, deep reverence for life that came in the sacrament
the prayerfulness,
the communion of
walking the railroad tracks with your best friend.
************************
It is now 45 years later,
New Years Day, 2003.
I was raising money for the work in the Russian Far East and
January 1st found me in
Pueblo, Colorado….
My old stompin ground.
With the afternoon free I called
the Robert Lucero in the phone book
that I hoped was my best friend.
BINGO….!!
What a great afternoon.
The joy….. the bliss of the remembered ecstasy of
snortin in the Bushes.
Oh what sacrament it is to remember and laugh
at the child that we once were.
As they day went along and the passage of years were discussed,
so were the heart aches and for “Ralph” there was a big one.
His twenty-two year old daughter
went to have her wisdom teeth extracted.
Nothing could be more routine.
From the procedure the daughter developed a blood clot
that went to her brain and in two days she was dead.
Oh my…..I couldn’t believe it.
Death from tooth extraction?????
I hurt for my friend and his family and the grief
that would not go away.
As we parted I thanked “Ralph” for the wonderful afternoon.
It was so good to see him.
“Yes….he said….it was good to laugh…..
I needed that…
Snortin in the bushes.
We don’t have a lot of laughter these days.
It was nice to start out
the new year with laughter.
I’m glad you came by.”
I thought about that.
I thought about the need for laughter,
for childlikeness as we grow older.
When Jesus said we must become like a child,
……the words come so easy.
But the truth doesn’t….
at least not on our own.
Our greatest blessing is to have each other……
a shared hunger for fellowship
in the sacrament of wonder and laughter.
If we are fortunate as we age
we walk along the railroad tracks of the kingdom
in a most holy communion,
echoing with those we love
until the day we die
the holy childlikeness
of
a most divine reverence
first discovered
in the
snortin in the bushes.
O God, let it be.
