Chapter 13

Terry

12/24/2012
11:33:44 PM

Terry Carson wondered for the fourth time in ten minutes, how he could run late every night. His shift at the plant started promptly at one AM and he never got out of the house in time to stop at the diner, enjoy a leisurely early breakfast and still be on time. His father had indoctrinated him on Lombardi Time as a teenage and it should have taken root but Terry always seemed to run late. He could remember his dad reminding him that Super Bowl Winning, Coach Vince Lombardi expected everyone to be ten minutes early as a sign of commitment. Ten minutes early was on time; On Lombardi time, to be precise.

He glanced sadly at the warm bed and tousled covers where he had recently slept. He’d been having a dream. In his imagination he was older, married and settled into a perfect life with his perfect girl. They lived happily in a nice but modest home, with their favorite things around them, coexisting with neighbors, fellow workers and the world at large. In his dream Terry cuddled with his dream girl, make believe wife, as she gazed at him with total devotion and utter trust, an experience he loved, even in his dreams.

Their dream world was startlingly realistic. So real that Terry could have described almost every detail of their home, the clothes they wore and the world around them. It was uncanny but warm and wonderful. He sighed as he awoke, trying to hang on to the gossamer threads of the dream, as it fled with the cold and snow.

The bed seemed ever so much better than the cold night air but work was work, and his father was right. A man should always give his employer his best effort. Not just on the assembly line but by being on time and on the ball and always trying to do a little better. So it was with a certain degree of longing that he left his apartment, double checked that he had locked the door and walked down the hill towards Last Chance Diner.

The cold air hit him hard enough to make him wheeze and wince. With his collar turned up and his arms pounding against his chest to get his blood pumping, he walked steadily up Elm Street, towards Pembroke Road. Last Chance was located at the intersection of East Goepp Street and Linden Street, not far from where Goepp became Pembroke Road. It was a busy intersection, even though quite far from Wal-Mart and the rest of the shopping district which was north of down town, toward Highway 22 and Linden. There were a lot more restaurants over on Broad Street and East Raspberry, a few blocks south but Terry liked Last Chance and they were open all night, with a bunch of folks that kept it lively all night. The places on Broad and Raspberry seemed to cater to kids from Moravian Academy and other local schools. At the least there were always school aged kids hanging around those places.

Terry loved living close to work. He hated paying high gas prices. If he left his old beater at home and walked to the diner and work each night, he could save lots of miles and money. He often went a week without using the car. When he did, it was mostly to see his parents over in Whitehall. It was an easy drive, even staying off Highway 22. He could run down Easton, which was a right out of the parking lot of his building, take Union west until he hit Fullerton and go north right to their home.

Because it was Christmas Eve, he had his folks on his mind. They were in good health but stubborn in their refusal to go to church. “Two Lapsed Catholics,” is how his father described their spiritual condition. Terry couldn’t shake the thought that they were missing something magnificent by aggressively avoiding any kind of church activity, including their church friends.

It started over ten years earlier when the parish priest retired and a much younger, more focused priest took his place. Kyle Carson didn’t tolerate the modern church as much as he sparred with it. When the Pope allowed mass to be in English, Kyle railed for weeks, threatening to become a Protestant. When the new priest changed things to suit him better, Kyle was ready for war.

Terry found himself in the middle of a war he had no interest in fighting. After drifting away from Catholicism as a teenager, he spent several years with no church affiliation, preferring to simply skip the whole thing. He referred to those years as the time he spent in God’s Waiting Room.

Rather than hardening him against religion, his sojourn made him aware of the presence of God in his life and the power of God in the world. The hard places in his soul, instead of getting beaten up, were being beautifully bruised by God’s gentle, loving touch.

Three Christmas Eve’s ago he was walking home from the three to eleven shift when the recorded bells of a store front church caught his attention. The eleven o’clock Christmas Eve Service was about to begin and Terry, without a thought about what he was doing, found a seat on the side. The church was small, poor and struggling but the message was beautiful. He listened, rapt with a renewed heart and suddenly hopeful spirit to the most powerful sermon on Love, Joy and Peace, he had ever heard. As the candles were lit, one by one, off the Christ Candle, the meaning of Christmas came fully alive for Terry that night as he felt the ice break up inside him. In the collected glow of Christmas Eve candles, Terry knew he was no longer in God’s Waiting Room.

When the shift manager informed Terry he would be working the night shift on Christmas Eve this year, he accepted without question. In the economic times, having a job was a wonderful, comforting thing. The little storefront church had a six o’clock service Christmas Eve and Terry attended, knowing it was a poor substitute. Sad but determined, he was there at six and again at seven-thirty, needing two helpings of the Son of God’s miracle birth to make up for missing his favorite time to worship.

This was another disappointing Christmas Eve when his family wouldn’t be going to church together. Terry wondered if it was possible to convince his dad to go as a family in the morning but gave it up as a bad idea. Kyle Carson never, ever gave in and was proud of his perfect record.

Terry called his parents before turning in for his pre-shift sleep and assured himself that they were well stocked for the storm, would be careful about clearing the walks and driveway, and prepared to stay in out of the weather, until he arrived for Christmas dinner with them and Beth’s family. His mother always asked about potential suitors but Terry never had any “news.” It was an almost embarrassing ritual that he wished was not part of their every conversation.

Because sister, Beth had provided grandchildren, Rhonda Carson thought Terry was somehow shirking his responsibilities by remaining single. He never thought her “gentle” urgings were cruel, or hurtful. If asked, she was sure Terry loved the teasing as much as she loved dishing it out.

Married right out of high school, Rhonda and Kyle grew up together. The products of strict, Catholic upbringing, neither engaged in much “dilly-dallying” with the opposite sex. Rhonda knew her mother would be shattered if she came home and announced she “had” to get married and Rhonda Cunningham would never have disappointed her parents that way. Their marriage had its share of ups and downs, but their love was the long term, stable kind of love that would last until death did they part.

Kyle Carson was the second son of an old Bethlehem family. The offspring of an insurance agent, Kyle inherited a facile mind and quick, sharp wit. He excelled in school, married and worked his way through insurance school, working nights at the foundry.

The two children came between two unsuccessful pregnancies and Kyle fiercely protected his children, partially as a result of Rhonda’s fragileness following each of her miscarried children.

Terry, as the oldest, was welcomed with equal parts adoration and amazement. Kyle couldn’t quite grasp the “whole person” he and Rhonda had made. Night after night, he came home from night school and carried the sleeping Terry through the house in one arm, while holding the assigned reading text in the other. Rhonda would awaken and realize that her husband was up pacing the floors and find him talking quietly to their sleeping firstborn about life, work, love and a man’s responsibilities.

She never scolded him. Terry was their miracle baby and he was as much entitled to hold and care for him as her. When Terry needed a fresh diaper, Kyle simply shifted his book to the changing table and took care of his little man without loosing his place. The tenderness and overwhelming kindness displayed by her nearly still adolescent husband never ceased to amaze her.

Terry never lacked for love, or attention, even after Beth’s birth. Kyle and Rhonda simply gave more of themselves instead of dividing their time between children. By the time Beth was a toddler, Kyle was through school and working for an insurance agency. His boss was sweet, kind, patient and intent on grooming Kyle to buy him out one day.

That’s exactly what happened. After a mild heart attack, Mr. Bogardus asked Kyle and Rhonda to his home for dinner and a discussion about the future. They drove home with a plan to take over the agency and buy out Mr. Bogardus over ten years. The agency prospered and Mr. Bogardus died two years later, forgiving the remaining portion of the debt in his will.