Roots – A Southern Story

A family can sometimes be a bothersome thing. They know you better than anyone else, and they quite often have no problem sharing the most embarrassing stories about your childhood misdeeds and antics. Occasionally they’ll spin a yarn that’s more fabrication than fabric of your life, but it’s all done in love.

It is in those cases, those times when your grandfather refuses to shut up whilst chatting with your prom date, that you learn the fine art of storytelling as self-defense. You learn how to observe the nuances of a person’s individual character, the phrases they like to use and re-use, the stories that they love to tell as illustrations or conversation starters. You learn how tempo and pitch, timing and humor, volume and tone can each strike a different chord within the listener throughout the entire tale. You learn, in moments like these, that the Southern way of life is stories.

And so it is that every generation passes their favorite elements of story on to the next generation – either by didacticism or observation. My grandfather’s both have instilled in me the love for stories, one by teaching me how to tell one, the other by just making stories a central part of his life. I have applied my education to good use, and desire to expand it beyond its current usage into the realm of publishing. So, I endeavour to work at the craft, hone my telling skills, and make the heritage of my youth useful. With that in mind, a story:

We were sitting on the carport in the early fall, when the wind is cooler without causing shivers, and as the cars trickled past the house on their way to who-knows-where, the old man rubbed his chin and turned to me.

“I want to tell you something,” he began, his face drawn and serious. “I don’t think I’ve ever told this to anyone before, but I want you to know and remember.”

I sat up in the rocking chair, suddenly determined to imprint every last moment of the conversation on my memory. What was he going to share? Where the family’s secret fortune is buried? That he once killed a man and no one ever found out how? My grandfather was usually a wide-open book, even if he was cautious about which pages he showed you. The notion of a long-held secret made me quite excited. I leaned forward, waiting as his breath rattled around in his chest.

“A long time ago, back before you, or even your mama, were born, I felt like God spoke to me and told me something very specific.”

My grandfather was a religious man, without being pushy or preachy. He was a deacon, a Sunday School teacher, and a regular church-going man, but he had never sat down with me and shared something like this before. In fact, I couldn’t recall when he had ever said anything like this to anyone. Was he going to confess a sin? Share a prophetic revelation?

“When God spoke to me, I knew what He said was what was best for my life, only I didn’t want it to be best. I wanted the best to be something different, something more in line with what I wanted, so I rejected what God told me and went my own way.”

“What did God say to you?”

“Listen to me – when God speaks, you better listen. Do you understand?”

“Yeah, I got it, but what did God say?”

“That He wanted me to be a preacher.”

His brother had been a preacher before he died of a heart-attack at age 55. I had recently told people that I felt a calling to that vocation, and my grandfather had supported me wholeheartedly. In fact, he had been almost forceful in his encouragement. There wasn’t really any doubt in my mind as to whether or not to obey, but he was dead-set on making sure that I was obedient. At the time, it had seemed strange. Now…

“Do you regret not listening?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Do you wonder what your life would have been like had you listened?”

He paused. “Sometimes.”

I let the silence hang in the air. He had something else to say, and I wanted him to have room to say it.

“Jason, I guess I wonder if I would have gotten sick if I had obeyed. If all of my heart problems and health problems would have gone away.”

“I don’t think you got sick because you didn’t listen to God, Pop,” I countered.

“I’m not so sure. Do you think I’ve brought all this misery on the family because I wanted something else for my life?”

I paused. “I don’t think God works that way. I think that life happens, and sometimes, we take paths different than the ones God wanted us to take. And that means different consequences for having taken those paths. But I don’t think He’s punishing you.”

He turned to me, tears in his eyes. “You promise?”

“Yes, Pop. I promise.”

With that we both turned back to the road in silence, content to let the truth hang there in the autumn air until it settled in our hearts.