My long lasting memory of Tucson Arizona was one cold day in November around 1991, the day after Thanksgiving and walking along Stone Street to my job in a nearby office building, Stone being the old main street of the downtown area. Out of a deserted cityscape at 8 AM in the morning I saw a tumble weed something like six feet in diameter blowing along the street.
Many people were not working that day. I, a city boy from back east, had to wonder if this was a normal occurrence and then had to wonder where it came from. Likely source was along the Santa Fe Railroad tracks about two blocks from where I was standing. Over time, I would come to realize how a once small cow town like Tucson kept it's cows and cowboy past a bit here and there as Malls replaced a downtown already with many storefronts boarded up from its glory says as an economic hub of the region of border area near Mexico.
Along this theme some few years later I ran into a piece of Tucson current history. In a thrift store I came across a four inch by eight inch silver plated tray with ink invitation to the official grand opening of the United Bank building downtown. This from the grossly obscene days of the boom before the bust of the Savings and Loan fiasco that nobody learned from mainly because of the cover up by the Keating Five in the Senate covering their paws and tracks in that criminal enterprise. That scandal being a small scale training package of the bigger R/E mortgage scandal that went bust nationally in 2008.
That the United Bank Tower still stands having have many banks and owners since then. Next to it is a large boarded up eyesore that looks like it should be hiding a would be fountain of a plaza next to the building which is in fact the boarded up foundation of a Twin Tower to the United Bank Tower that never got built.
That the whole economy of Tucson, Phoenix and Arizona in general is a boom and a bust economy that over time has seen mining come and go and modern businesses as well.
Friday June 13, 2008
Many people were not working that day. I, a city boy from back east, had to wonder if this was a normal occurrence and then had to wonder where it came from. Likely source was along the Santa Fe Railroad tracks about two blocks from where I was standing. Over time, I would come to realize how a once small cow town like Tucson kept it's cows and cowboy past a bit here and there as Malls replaced a downtown already with many storefronts boarded up from its glory says as an economic hub of the region of border area near Mexico.
Along this theme some few years later I ran into a piece of Tucson current history. In a thrift store I came across a four inch by eight inch silver plated tray with ink invitation to the official grand opening of the United Bank building downtown. This from the grossly obscene days of the boom before the bust of the Savings and Loan fiasco that nobody learned from mainly because of the cover up by the Keating Five in the Senate covering their paws and tracks in that criminal enterprise. That scandal being a small scale training package of the bigger R/E mortgage scandal that went bust nationally in 2008.
That the United Bank Tower still stands having have many banks and owners since then. Next to it is a large boarded up eyesore that looks like it should be hiding a would be fountain of a plaza next to the building which is in fact the boarded up foundation of a Twin Tower to the United Bank Tower that never got built.
That the whole economy of Tucson, Phoenix and Arizona in general is a boom and a bust economy that over time has seen mining come and go and modern businesses as well.
Friday June 13, 2008
...Which leads me to the story of my next door neighbor in Arizona. Perry had a remarkable life. Left home and dairy farm in Minnesota when he was fifteen in the middle of the depression and headed west. He wanted to be a cowboy and that he became for some years. Then when World War II broke out he went up to Canada and joined the fight. He hit Juno beach on D-Day as a lieutenant in the Canadian army. He married a Brit, brought his war bride home and settled into life in Arizona B.A.C. (before air conditioning).
Perry joined the post office and then worked his way up to postmaster before retirement. I got to talk to him over the fence as a neighbor. Good stories. Went into his house a few times and vice versa. All in all, he was a great neighbor.
Then one day his wife came to us to tell us that Perry had skin cancer, that they did some necessary surgery but that the disease may have spread. I am not sure how all this got started. Perhaps my neighbor’s wife was talking to my wife and then the topic came up about me being an elder in a local church. Apparently Perry had no religious ties. I would have assumed that he might have attended church in his youth in Minnesota. His wife asked if I would talk to him.
I went over to the man in his house and tried to give comfort. I don’t think he wanted me there. Perhaps he was in denial of his own mortality. No doubt he sensed how green I was in giving comfort. I admit it. I couldn’t do him any good. Between his resistance and my inexperience, I did not serve his needs very well sad to say. Perry died suddenly about two weeks later while working in the garden. We went to give comfort to the wife next door that night and then we attended a graveside service a few days later.
This is where I get some reality checks put into my little bubble world of beliefs. I met Episcopal nuns at the graveside. I never knew such an animal existed. They had educated Perry’s children. There were lots of neighbors, relatives and co-workers from the post office. The most interesting person I met was a female Rabbi. Perry was Jewish?
I was a bit taken aback. I had heard the story about how Perry and his war bride had built the second house in this desert housing community in 1948. When I closed on the house next door, I got my deed of title or whatever and included in the paperwork was a covenant of restrictions set on the property when it was built.
That covenant was of course stamped with a label “Null and Void under Federal Civil Rights Act of...” The nasty thing about that covenant was the few pages that made it quite clear in a long range of specifics that no ...”Jews, negroes or dogs...” were allowed in this housing development etc.
As it turned out, Perry had no religious affiliation. His wife was Jewish. I chuckled about how a man like Perry, this cowboy, this war hero, this postmaster must have laughed at the WASP covenant of restrictions. Here was a real individual. Here was an old fashioned American. Here was a man.
Perry had made arrangements with the rabbi to be buried in solidarity with his wife’s belief system. Was Perry a believer, an atheist, an agnostic? I don’t know. In retrospect I don’t care. I knew the man. He was good ethical man. I prayed for him.
Part of being a cultural Christian is that you can embrace people of other beliefs, respect them and still retain you basic feel for yourself and not compromise your basic faith.
America’s greatest strength is and has always been its diversity.
Amidst this eclectic graveside audience, I had an epiphany. I also think that that paradigm shift thing happened.
It was fascinating to hear the twenty third psalm read in Hebrew. I am not certain that the Kaddish was said there but I realized something about my own belief systems. Christianity is wrapped up in a lot of layers of traditions, sacred tradition, faith, grace, propaganda, love, hate and on an on.
There under a blistering Arizona sun, prayers for a Jew were said in the desert. Were these the similar prayers that Joseph of Aramathea read over Jesus’ broken and lifeless body on Good Friday at twilight, eve of Sabbath?
You could be surrounded with stone cathedrals, and stained glass and the gospels could be read from a Gutenberg bible and the minister could be wrapped in gold cloth. But could you get any more from prayers at the end of your life than my neighbor got that day or when Jesus was interred and they rolled the stone in front of the tomb?
It makes you think. It made me think.
Perry joined the post office and then worked his way up to postmaster before retirement. I got to talk to him over the fence as a neighbor. Good stories. Went into his house a few times and vice versa. All in all, he was a great neighbor.
Then one day his wife came to us to tell us that Perry had skin cancer, that they did some necessary surgery but that the disease may have spread. I am not sure how all this got started. Perhaps my neighbor’s wife was talking to my wife and then the topic came up about me being an elder in a local church. Apparently Perry had no religious ties. I would have assumed that he might have attended church in his youth in Minnesota. His wife asked if I would talk to him.
I went over to the man in his house and tried to give comfort. I don’t think he wanted me there. Perhaps he was in denial of his own mortality. No doubt he sensed how green I was in giving comfort. I admit it. I couldn’t do him any good. Between his resistance and my inexperience, I did not serve his needs very well sad to say. Perry died suddenly about two weeks later while working in the garden. We went to give comfort to the wife next door that night and then we attended a graveside service a few days later.
This is where I get some reality checks put into my little bubble world of beliefs. I met Episcopal nuns at the graveside. I never knew such an animal existed. They had educated Perry’s children. There were lots of neighbors, relatives and co-workers from the post office. The most interesting person I met was a female Rabbi. Perry was Jewish?
I was a bit taken aback. I had heard the story about how Perry and his war bride had built the second house in this desert housing community in 1948. When I closed on the house next door, I got my deed of title or whatever and included in the paperwork was a covenant of restrictions set on the property when it was built.
That covenant was of course stamped with a label “Null and Void under Federal Civil Rights Act of...” The nasty thing about that covenant was the few pages that made it quite clear in a long range of specifics that no ...”Jews, negroes or dogs...” were allowed in this housing development etc.
As it turned out, Perry had no religious affiliation. His wife was Jewish. I chuckled about how a man like Perry, this cowboy, this war hero, this postmaster must have laughed at the WASP covenant of restrictions. Here was a real individual. Here was an old fashioned American. Here was a man.
Perry had made arrangements with the rabbi to be buried in solidarity with his wife’s belief system. Was Perry a believer, an atheist, an agnostic? I don’t know. In retrospect I don’t care. I knew the man. He was good ethical man. I prayed for him.
Part of being a cultural Christian is that you can embrace people of other beliefs, respect them and still retain you basic feel for yourself and not compromise your basic faith.
America’s greatest strength is and has always been its diversity.
Amidst this eclectic graveside audience, I had an epiphany. I also think that that paradigm shift thing happened.
It was fascinating to hear the twenty third psalm read in Hebrew. I am not certain that the Kaddish was said there but I realized something about my own belief systems. Christianity is wrapped up in a lot of layers of traditions, sacred tradition, faith, grace, propaganda, love, hate and on an on.
There under a blistering Arizona sun, prayers for a Jew were said in the desert. Were these the similar prayers that Joseph of Aramathea read over Jesus’ broken and lifeless body on Good Friday at twilight, eve of Sabbath?
You could be surrounded with stone cathedrals, and stained glass and the gospels could be read from a Gutenberg bible and the minister could be wrapped in gold cloth. But could you get any more from prayers at the end of your life than my neighbor got that day or when Jesus was interred and they rolled the stone in front of the tomb?
It makes you think. It made me think.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tales of Tucson Arizona
No comments:
Post a Comment