The first Sunday of April rolled in an hour early—the day Chicago and most of the rest of the country switched to Daylight Savings Time. One less hour of sleep. But I made sure we changed our clocks this time because I didn’t want to show up an hour late at Adele’s church. Not that that could happen, since I rode with On-Time Stuart the next morning—though when we pulled up a few car lengths from the square brick building, I felt a little embarrassed at the thought of climbing out of her sporty Celica in a neighborhood that seemed like a photo op for urban blight.
“Uh, why don’t we park around the corner and walk back?” I suggested.
“ ’Cause I want to keep an eye on my car, that’s why! C’mon.”
The church sign said, Paul and Silas Apostolic Baptist Church. Huh. There it was, just like Adele said. “Uh, do you see any other Yada Yadas?” I peered anxiously through the windshield at the assorted people gathered around the entrance to the compact church building. Several older men—older than me, anyway—in black suits, white shirts, and narrow black ties stood on the steps and in the double doorway, shaking hands with people. Little boys chased each other in dark pants and button shirts—until a nearby adult cuffed the closest scamp upside the head. Frilly dresses and last year’s Easter hats adorned a bevy of little girls. All the women, young and old, wore dresses. And hats. Not a pantsuit in sight. Not a white face either.
Oh, dear. Adele had given us the “dress code,” so at least I was wearing a proper skirt. But I didn’t have a single hat to my name, and I didn’t think one of Denny’s handkerchiefs pinned to my head would pass muster.
“There’s Adele and MaDear . . . Avis and Florida too.” Stu locked the car and hustled across the street to the cluster of Yada Yada sisters. I had to wait for two low-slung cars to rumble by, their sound systems so loud my teeth rattled, before I caught up to her.
MaDear, shuffling behind her walker, peered from under an ancient black hat wrapped in netting and sequins with a puzzled frown. “Do I know you?” she said, squinting at Florida. “Bessie’s girl, ain’tcha. Girl, you gotta quit runnin’ around and get yo’ behind to church mo’ often. An’ where’s yo hat?”With a shake of her head, she allowed two of the black suits to assist her up the steps to the door of the church.
“Bessie’s girl, hmm?” Avis stage-whispered. “Been running around, my my.”
“Watch yourself, now,” Florida came back.
Adele smirked. “Come on; I’ll run interference.”
Didn’t know what she meant by “running interference” till we got to the inside door. A greeter holding a basket smiled at us. “Welcome to Paul and Silas. This your first time? Bless the Lord! Just help yourself.” She held out the basket, which was full of small, lace head coverings with a hairpin stuck in each one.
“That’s all right, Sister Berry.” Adele waved her off. “These are my guests . . . I spoke to Reverend Miles.”
My bubble of relief was immediately pricked by Avis’s effort at unity. “It’s all right. I don’t mind.” She took one of the lacy circles and pinned it on the top of her neat French roll.
Oh, thanks, Avis. But I, too, dipped into the basket, just as glad Denny and the kids had elected not to come. I’d never hear the end of this.
“Can’t say I didn’t try,” Adele muttered and led the way into the sanctuary.
I started to follow Adele and Avis, then realized Stu was heading back outside. I started to call after her, but saw her heading toward Chanda standing at the bottom of the outside steps and wearing a stunning pink suit and wide-brimmed matching hat. Thirteen-year-old Thomas—Tom—looked quite manly in his suit and bow tie; Cheree and little Dia wore matching coats, white frilly socks, and black-patent Mary Janes. Stu said something to Chanda, and Chanda waved the three kids inside while she stayed behind, one hand on her tailored pink hip, to hear what Stu had to say.
Lord Jesus! I sent up a quick prayer. Pour some grace on that conversation.Wasn’t sure what Stu intended to say, but hopefully it would be oil on the troubled waters stirred up the last time those two had talked. Had to admire Stu taking the initiative before we all tried worshipping together. Thank You in advance, Lord, for what You’re going to do. I smiled to myself. Definitely a New Jodi prayer.
The sanctuary was not large, maybe room for two hundred with two aisles dividing three sections of padded pews. A row of older women wearing white dresses and wielding cardboard fans sat in a front pew on the right. Must be the “mother board,” though I wasn’t clear exactly what that meant. Should’ve asked Adele to brief us white folks a little more.
Chanda and Stu slipped into the pew behind us just as a young man in a blue and gold choir robe sat down at an actual piano—no electric keyboard—and pounded out several strong chords. As if on cue, the congregation rose, a flower garden of multihued hats and clumps of brown male heads. I took the opportunity to glance around. Nony, wearing an African-print head wrap, sat a few rows back, along with Delores, Edesa, and a wide-eyed Hoshi, “doilies” on their heads. No sign of Ruth or Yo-Yo.
No sign of “Dia’s daddy” either.
Two lines of blue and gold choir robes started down the aisle, stepping slowly to the music, swaying side to side, filling the room with the proclamation: “We’ve . . . come . . . this . . . fa-ar by faith! . . . Leaning on . . . the Lo-ord!”
The words of the old spiritual still echoed in my heart as the service progressed. (“Can’t turn arou-ou-ound,We’ve come this far by faith!”) Two hymns from the pew hymnals were interspersed by two choir numbers (A and B selection), and a testimony time that went something like, “I praise God on today for my salvation, because He’s brought me a mighty long way!” and “I coulda been dead, sleepin’ in my grave, but He woke me up this morning in my right mind, praise Jesus!” and “I want to give honor to God who is the head of my life, and I’d like to say I’m glad to be in the house of the Lord one more time.”
The elderly Reverend Arthur Miles III, wearing a black robe with a white stole, came in from a side door halfway through the service and sat in an oversize chair, nodding his head to the B selection and the testimonies. But when he got up to preach, I was surprised at the strength of his voice. His sermon, titled “The Blood’s Cleansing Power,” required two glasses of fresh water and a dry hand towel for mopping sweat off his face and neck. I was fascinated by the old-time preaching, the singsong voice, as he preached from the book of Leviticus about the “sin offering” required—a blood sacrifice—when a person broke God’s law. The sermon crackled with electricity between the pulpit and the pews—practically after every phrase. “Preach it, pastor!” “You said it!” “My Lord!”
An impassioned altar call for “salvation, rededication, repentance, or church membership” closed out the service, while the choir swayed and sang softly, “Just as I am without one plea . . .” Oh my. It’d been a long time since I’d heard that hymn. We didn’t have altar calls at Uptown Community, though Pastor Clark had his own ways of inviting sinners into the kingdom. “Just as I am without one plea . . .”
Why had it taken so long for me to come to Jesus “just as I am,” without a lot of excuses?
I had a sudden, un-Jodilike urge to shout, “Thank You, Jesus!” that God had brought me this far, even though it had taken a terrible accident—an accident that had taken my spleen and the life of a young boy—to open my eyes to a basic fact: I was just a sinner, saved by grace. But I kept my mouth shut and my hands clasped in my lap. Didn’t want to find myself swept to the mourners’ bench, surrounded by the deacons.
I’d come this far by faith—but not that far.
After the service, we stood in the foyer, shaking hands and ignoring the stares of giggling children who seemed quite puzzled why a mishmash of beige and brown visitors had come to their church with “Sister Skuggs” and “Sister George.” I must have been asked ten times if I enjoyed the service. I nodded and smiled and said yes, which was mostly true—though I’d gotten pretty rattled when a woman started screaming and jumping and crying during the B selection, prompting the “mothers” to surround her in a protective circle, fanning judiciously.
“Oh girl, that took me back!” Avis said, as she and Florida walked Stu and me across the street to our car. “I cut my teeth singing A and B selections in the choir. And the mother board—mm-mm. Still anchoring the black church.” She gave me a sly smile. “Maybe we need a mother board at Uptown Community.”
“Girl, ain’t nobody old enough at Uptown,” Florida snorted, “ ’cept you.” She grinned at Avis. “You got a white dress?”
“Now you watch yourself, girl,” Avis warned, but she and Florida walked off laughing.
As Stu and I piled into her Celica and pulled out of the parking spot, I couldn’t help feeling trapped in my own skin. Paul and Silas’s service didn’t take me back—except for “Just As I Am.”Wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to “get down” with my black sisters. Or Latina sisters either, for that matter. Not really.
But the processional song (“Traditional Spiritual,” the bulletin had said) kept running through my mind, edging its way into my spirit:
We’ve come this far by faith
Leaning on the Lord!
Trusting in His Holy Word
He’s never failed us yet! We’re singing . . .
Ohhh-oh-oh-oh-ohhhhh-oh-oh-oh-ohhh!
Can’t turn around
We’ve come this far by faith.
Now that was true. True for me, true for Florida, true for Hoshi, true for Stu—true for all of us in Yada Yada.
Can’t turn around
We’ve come this far by faith.
DENNY AND THE KIDS had already snagged some lunch by the time we got home, Josh had gone off to play some basketball, and Amanda was on the phone in her bed-room. “Good time?” Denny asked, leaning against the doorjamb between dining room and kitchen as I put together a fried-egg sandwich.
“Yeah. Interesting. Pretty traditional Black Baptist, I think—except for wearing that doily on my head.” I gave him the eye. “Do not snicker; do not pass go; do not collect two hundred dollars. The old guard takes the head-covering thing seriously.”
I took my sandwich into the dining room and slumped into a chair. Wasn’t sure I felt hungry. Maybe I needed a nap instead. But I dutifully bit into the wheat bread.
“Oh!” I mumbled, my mouth full. “One really good thing. Stu apologized to Chanda before service. Said God was dealing with her about the sin in her own life, and she had no business pointing fingers.”
One of Denny’s eyebrows went up. “Really? Stu did that?” He nodded thoughtfully. “Amazing.”
“I know. It takes guts to own up to your own sins.” I swallowed a bite with difficulty and put down my sandwich, my own words ringing in my ears. It takes guts to own up to your own sins . . . to ask forgiveness of the person you’ve sinned against. Guts I seemed to lack when it came to facing Geraldine Wilkins-Porter, the mother of Jamal Wilkins and Hakim.
“Jodi? Jodi!” Denny’s voice cut into my numb thoughts. “Are you okay?”
“Uh . . . yeah. Sorry.” I pushed the sandwich away.
Denny looked at me funny. “Ohmigosh, Jodi. I totally forgot to ask about your appointment with Dr. Lewinski on Friday.What’d he say?”
I hesitated.
“What? What’d he say?”
I smiled gamely. “Don’t worry. I’m okay. He did some blood work, stuff like that. Says I’m kinda run-down, but nothing serious. Yet. But he’s not surprised I’ve been sick a lot this spring. I don’t have as much immunity with my spleen gone, you know. Thinks I really need to be careful with all the SARS cases cropping up in the U.S.Told me the surgeon general just issued a quarantine for all SARS patients to keep it from spreading.”
Denny’s brow puckered. “Which means?”
I sighed. He wasn’t going to like this. “Which means he doesn’t want me to travel to New York over spring break. Told me to stay home, avoid big crowds, get lots of rest.” I could read dismay registering on my husband’s face. “But I’ve been thinking about it all weekend, Denny. I think you and the kids should still go.Without me. Really!”