Dear Shirley...

I suspected that my Sunday School teacher had lined up the small, plaster statues on the windowsill while we were singing in the big room.  This was the last session of the year so they would be her parting gifts to us, her 4th grade students.  I can’t remember all of them, but I do remember the one that would become mine — a polar bear.  Even as I balanced it gingerly on my lap during the car ride home, I wondered what this had to do with the Bible.  Maybe Noah’s ark?  Hmm…I was skeptical.  Nothing to do with Jesus.  Or Mary or Joseph.  Or Father Abraham.  Or Moses.  A polar bear made me think of snow – but in June?  Looking closely, I could see that he had sculptured fur as chalky white as my teacher’s hair.  Maybe it was a reminder of her?  

Or was he more like me?  What I remember most about my bear is that he didn’t fit in.  He was an unfinished ceramic piece, neither painted nor kiln-dried.  His pudgy body was an awkward shape to carry around.  Nevertheless, he moved in with me and spent the next few years gazing out from my bookshelf as if trying to see into the distance, into the future.  I liked him.  I have no idea what became of him, but the incongruities still fascinate me.  I guess it's hard to predict what you might take away from Sunday School.  



I did all the regular Sunday School things.  I memorized bible verses to earn my bookmark.  (The bible was a gift, like Grace.)  I was Mary in the Christmas pageant one year.  (Mom told me to sit still and definitely not to scratch anywhere!)  I liked to sing.  I paid attention.  I wondered about a lot of things, most of which were eventually explained to me.  But one of the best things that happened in Sunday School was taking home a weekly magazine called Junior Life.  When I was ten, I sent in my name and address with some information about myself, and — wonder of wonders — it was published!  From that time on, I had penpals!



What follows may seem as unlikely an outcome from attending Sunday School as coming home with a polar bear.  One by one, penpal letters also moved in with me, crammed into a letter rack on the wall or the drawer in my bed stand.  They came from boys as well as girls and from far away as well as close to home.  My little red spiral notebook held addresses from Endwell, New York; Dallas, Texas; Mayville, New York; Woodston, New Jersey; Ashville, New York; Firestone, Colorado; Milford, Illinois; Busselton, West Australia; Fort Smith, Arkansas; Essie, Kentucky; Taranaki, New Zealand; Detroit, Michigan; Frandon, Illinois; Oil City, Pennsylvania; Perkin, Illinois; Ventura, California; Rouseville, Pennsylvania; Soldiers Grove, Wisconsin; Fort Pierre, South Dakota; Fort Smith, Arkansas; Woodstown, New Jersey; Lamar, Missouri; Longmont, Colorado; and a couple from Accra, Ghana.    



Because of these letters, I saved my allowance for stamps; I put stationery on my birthday wish list; I spun the globe on my desk tilting my head to hunt for place names on colored shapes; I curled up on the porch swing with friends I’d never meet; I improved my handwriting; I decorated envelopes with slogans like “Friends-4-Ever” or “2good 2be 4gotten.”  And I joined the world, so loved by God.  



Some correspondences were short-term.  I don’t remember how they ended, much the same way I don’t remember the last time I played with my Terri-Lee doll or put a cassette in the tape deck.  Yet, Sherry and I corresponded for fifty years.  I met her only once when my family was traveling through her area on vacation and her mom and dad invited us for supper.  We were thirteen, I think.  I’d recognize her anywhere though because I have her school photos stashed away in a box along with newspaper clippings she sent me of the Beatles' first visit to the USA.  As we grew up together, our letters grew up with us.  Topics changed from “What have you been doing?” to “What do you think about…?” or, “Have you ever…?”  We got to the heart of things.  We both became teachers, she in elementary, me in secondary, and we exchanged notes about that – literally.  And about the boys we dated, the men we married, the uncertainties that came with pregnancy, parenting, relocating, celebrations, and sadness.  Surprisingly perhaps, we were able to be there for each other without physically being with each other.  I wondered if maybe Jesus felt the same closeness when sending the Holy Spirit to keep in touch.

Penpals have each other’s full attention simply because you can’t read a letter with your eyes wandering.  Sometimes you can’t read a letter from a friend without them tearing up either.  When she knew she was dying of cancer, Sherry sent me one last email: “Meet you in paradise.” She didn’t have to say anything more.  



You probably don’t want to get me started on Sunday School gifts.  (But I’m glad someone did!)