First United Methodist Church, Birmingham, Michigan
Scripture: Luke 12:1-7
July 27, 2001
Everybody loves a good family reunion story. I mean a “real” family reunion story. I am not talking about those annual gatherings where everybody brings a dish to pass and there are games for the youngest, ice-cold watermelon for the oldest, prizes for those who came the farthest, and the “annual reading” of those who have been hatched, matched and dispatched “since we assembled last.” To be sure, those reunions are lovely. My wife comes from a family that does one every year…. down Springfield, Ohio way. And we go every few years, whether we need it or not. Because whether we know it or not, we do.
But those are not the kinds of reunions that interest me today. Instead, I want to talk about the coming together of people who have been apart a much longer time….some by choice, others by accident. War came, and they got split up. Conflict came, and they split themselves up. They lost touch with each other. Then they lost track of each other. They didn’t know where the other one lived. Then they didn’t know if the other one lived. May have cared. May not have cared. Who can say? Then one day there was a reunion. Orchestrated or accidental. Painful or tearful. Brothers, reunited after 50 years. Parents and children who hadn’t seen each other since birth, seeing each other now. A strange voice on the phone. A strange face at the door. “I bet you don’t know who I am. And after hearing who I am, if you tell me to go away and never come back, I will. But I’m ….”
I like reunion stories. I suppose, because I hear so many of the separation variety. I heard three in the last week. I heard of a son, living in the same town, out of contact with his mother for more than five years. A daughter who hasn’t seen her daddy since the day of her wedding. A brother who didn’t come to the funeral. Could have. Should have. Didn’t want to. Flat out refused to. I hear such stories every week. I hear them from you….although these three didn’t come from you. Trust me.
None of this is without parallel in the Bible. While the people of Israel preached family solidarity….and while the stories of Israel undergird what we commonly refer to as “family values”….the Bible is full of families that went their separate ways and may (or may not) have gotten it back together before “time and chance happened to them all.”
Abraham and Lot. Jacob and Esau. Joseph and his many brothers. Amnon and Absolom (David’s boys). The brothers in the Prodigal Son story. They all took off and went their separate ways. As did lots of others. To be sure, there are fewer Bible stories of women splitting up and taking off. But, then, there are fewer Bible stories of women, period. What’s more, economic dependency in a patriarchal society tended to keep women closer to home….and closer to each other. Still, stories abound of the first wife forcing the exit of the second wife. And who can forget the older sister who stole her younger sister’s husband on her wedding night (with the aid of a conniving father and much-too-much wine). I can go on. But to what end? Inch for column inch, there is more in the Bible about family squabbles than about family values. It has never been easy to care for kin….at least, some kin. For while blood may be thicker than water, it is not necessarily sweeter than wine.
Kindly allow me to illustrate. I do not come from a large family. Neither do I come from a particularly close family. My mother was an only child. My father was one of four. But all four are dead. And the other three never had children. Meaning that I have no cousins. My only sister died, a few days before I came here. But she did leave me with a pair of nephews. Fortunately, I married into a larger collection of people. Otherwise the “family” portion of my Christmas card list would be satisfied by buying one box every three or four years.
Which brings me to Wilbur. An unusual name, really. I haven’t baptized a Wilbur, ever. I don’t know any Wilburs now. And apart from the TV actor with the talking horse (Mr. Ed), I can’t say that I ever recall many Wilburs.
But Wilbur was my uncle. Let me explain. Earlier, I said that my father was one of four. Fred, his oldest brother, was born in 1900 and died (still living at home) in 1946. I was six years old. I remember Fred’s dying. But I do not remember Fred’s funeral (leading me to suspect that I didn’t go). Which was a bad decision on somebody’s part. Six year olds should go to funerals. But that’s not the way things were handled then.
Wilbur followed Fred, born in 1906. And in 1909, there came the twins, George and Marion. George was my father. He died in 1967. Marion died shortly thereafter. And from everything I knew….or thought I knew….Wilbur was long gone before either of them. Meaning that I haven’t had a reason to use the word “uncle” or “aunt” for a long, long time. As best as I can recall, I last saw Wilbur in 1953, when his father…. my grandfather….William C., died. I was all of 13. And by that time, I was deemed old enough to go to funerals.
Until the late 1940s, Wilbur, like Fred, remained single and lived at home. Then, for reasons long buried in history, he took off for the Upper Peninsula where he met an older woman in Negaunee and married her. Her name was Pearl. And the only two things I remember about Pearl were that she had a loud, shrill laugh and that she cooked every summer at our Methodist camp in the Upper Peninsula….the one called Michigame.
Wilbur and Pearl reappeared in Detroit at the time of his father’s funeral. Whereupon they moved into his mother’s house, overstayed their welcome (in the mind of his younger sister, Marion), got into it with somebody (probably Marion), and left in a huff, never to be seen again. When his mother died, six years later, Marion simply informed the rest of us that she had attempted to locate Wilbur and that Wilbur was dead. Which everybody accepted….and nobody questioned. Truth be told, nobody really missed him. Wilbur was a loner….an odd loner. His father used to call him “the governor.” When I once asked my grandfather why he called Wilbur “the governor,” my grandfather said: “Because he knows everything and thinks he’s always right.”
This spring….48 years after I last saw Wilbur….my wife was on the Internet doing ome genealogical research. Suddenly, a dangling thread of information danced across the screen. Following it, she learned that Wilbur died….not in the ‘50s….not in the ‘60s…..but in 1992 in Iron River, Michigan. Which first surprised me. But then saddened me. Clearly, I never found him. Largely, because I never looked for him. But, in part, because he had no interest in being found. So what to do?
This spring, we made a few phone calls and researched a few records. We got Wilbur’s death notice from the Iron River paper. We talked to the fellow who arranged for his funeral and the lawyer who settled his modest affairs. Then, on the day before the Fourth of July, Kris and I left our vacation house in Elk Rapids and crossed the bridge into the Upper Peninsula.
Iron River is at the far end of the peninsula….past Manistique…past Escanaba….past Iron Mountain….past Crystal Falls. It is a town that mining left behind….but that Wilbur found. Why he went there, I don’t know. But he settled in there. Initially he lived at the county fairgrounds where he mowed the grass and handled the maintenance. Eventually he bought a house. Then another. And a third. And in 1992, following Wilbur’s death, those three houses (combined) sold for the grand total of $2,500.
Early on, Wilbur put Pearl in a nursing home and walked to see her every day until she died in 1968. Then, for 24 more years, he rented out his houses….delivered the Iron River paper….sold a few Watkins products….and made lawn ornaments and windmills out of orange crate wood that he salvaged from the local supermarket. While at the market, he met Tony Fittante, who stocked the shelves (as one of the three jobs that kept him going). In Wilbur’s declining years, it was Tony who gave him rides, delivered his groceries, kept him company, and ultimately arranged his funeral.
Kris and I had lunch with Tony and thanked him for the attention he paid my uncle. Tony said: “I wish we had known more about him. We never knew he had family….never knew he once lived downstate….never saw a picture (or heard a story) of anybody from his past.” It hurt to know that he never acknowledged us. I can only surmise that he never missed us. I suppose you could say that he disappeared. But the word “disappear” would imply that somebody, somewhere, took note and gave search. Sadly, we never did.
Upon learning that I was clergy, Tony told me about one of his other jobs which involved cleaning the Catholic church in Caspian. Then Tony added: “Your uncle used to stop by and talk with the priest from time to time. And I know he said his prayers. But I don’t think he was a Catholic.”
Then, as we were leaving lunch, Tony added: “Have you gone to Joe’s? You’ve got to go to Joe’s. Most every day, your uncle stopped by Joe’s.” So I said to Kris: “Do you think we should go to Joe’s?” “Why not?” she said. So we did. As you have probably surmised, Joe’s is a tavern. You can find it on a street of houses in an old, old section of town. Joe is dead now. His widow, Katie, runs the place. She lives upstairs. Every day, she opens up about noon and closes between six and six thirty. Katie is well into her eighties and is missing more than half her hearing.
There are a few tables and a few stools. There is also a black and white TV (which “the regulars” say last worked in 1961). And there is really nothing for Katie to sell except pop in cans and beer in long-necked bottles. But of the ten people there at 2:00 on the Fourth of July, at least eight of them knew Wilbur. Except they knew him as Bill Ritter (his father’s name….my name). And they got a big kick out of one Bill Ritter coming to look for another Bill Ritter. They told more stories about my uncle Wilbur. I learned about the only luxury he ever had (a Chevy Impala he drove when he first came to town). I learned about the wagon he pulled on his daily rounds, once the Impala was history. I learned about the school kids who made fun of him, not so much because of his beard, but because of his rigidly erect posture that made him look like Abe Lincoln. And I learned that some folks thought he was secretly rich because he mistrusted banks and was known to carry his savings in his sock.
In appreciation for all those stories, I bought a round for the bar….pushing a twenty dollar bill in the general direction of Katie. I figured I’d have to supplement it some. But after serving ten bottles to ten guys on ten stools, she gave me a ten and five back as change. When I pushed back the five, she told me I could come back anytime I wanted….which sentiment was roundly echoed by “the boys” as Kris and I bid farewell and walked out the door. As for going back, one wonders if we ever will.
So why tell you? Three reasons. All of them short. As for sweet, you tell me.
First, I guess family is where you find it….where they know your name….tell your stories…. recognize your wagon….buy your papers….deliver your groceries….arrange your funeral….and inform your preacher/nephew (when he shows up 40 years too late) that you said your prayers. I left, feeling as if Wilbur had been adopted by an entire town. And while I didn’t have the faintest idea why he had decided to become an orphan in his middle years, I am glad that, in God’s great providence, there were people who took him in. Could it be that “blood” is vastly overrated?
Second, blood does count for something. So if there is anybody who is as lost from you and yours as Wilbur was lost for me and mine, look for them. Make an effort. Pick up a phone. Write a letter. Activate the Internet. Do something. I know you’ve got a million reasons not to. And if you tell those reasons to the guy on your right, the gal on your left, the usher in the narthex, the person pouring punch in the parlor….even if you tell them to me at the door….we’ll listen to your reasons and find them compelling. But I have this funny feeling that God will listen to your reasons and find them stupid. How do I know that? Because my understanding of the gospel is that “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, and entrusting to you and me this ministry of reconciliation.” Which means that every reason we offer for sitting on our hands, probably strikes God’s ear as a little bit stupid.
Third, if God really knows names….if God really numbers hairs….if God really takes note of falling sparrows (which is beyond my comprehension, but what do I know?)….then no one ever completely falls through the cracks. I forgot Wilbur. Wilbur forgot me. But I suspect that God remembers us both. And in God’s good time….if not in either one of ours….I think there will be an opportunity to get it healed. So I’ll just keep an eye out for somebody pulling a wagon who looks like a governor….or, better yet, President Lincoln.
