To get where you want to go, you must keep on keeping on.
—Norman Vincent Peale
FOR EIGHTEEN YEARS CLARICE Pitts seamlessly raised me by combining a fierce demand for discipline and an equal measure of love. With the balance of a high-wire acrobat, she would dish out punishment with the same hand she used to hold her children when they needed comfort. Clarice was born with long limbs, but they could not stretch easily from East Baltimore to Delaware, Ohio. The miles between us now created distance and difficulties. My grades were suffering, and I was on the verge of flunking out. In her own way, she still needed to wage the fight for me, just the way she did when I was a kid. She had appealed to Dr. Lucas by phone and was left frustrated. She was not in the habit of being ignored. So perhaps in order to stay connected and still yield a high level of influence, she resorted to writing letters. She is not a casual woman; thus, these would not be casual letters. School was tough. Clarice was tougher. It was her way of being supportive. To her, support meant brutal honesty. But now the opponent was my own lethargy and intellectual paralysis. If she had to punch through my soul to knock out the enemy, she’d do it.
While it may be hard for my children or many of their generation to believe, long before e-mails, text messages, or cell phones, people communicated regularly by handwritten letters. During my four years in college in the late 1970s, my family and I rarely talked by phone. It was too expensive. There was a pay phone at the end of the hallway in my freshman dormitory, but phone calls were sporadic. A roll of quarters would give me a few minutes on the phone with my mom, a call to my grandmother, and maybe a few minutes on the phone with my sister or girlfriend, Kim. But I could always count on at least one letter per week from my home. Between my freshman year and graduation, my mother must have written me at least 152 letters, one for every week I was in school. Included with each letter, in every envelope, would be a Bible verse typed on an index card. Occasionally, a second index card would hold some encouraging quotation she’d picked up somewhere. Things like: “It is not your aptitude, but your attitude that determines your altitude.” She got a lot of these pithy self-help bromides from her new collection of books. Her dozens and dozens of letters became a minor sensation among many of my friends. Especially Pete. He jokingly began referring to my mother as Mother Clarice (as in Mother Teresa) and Colonel Clarice. He found it amusing that this black woman hundreds of miles away seemed to have so much influence over my life. A small circle of friends who were estranged from their own parents seemed to take real joy in her words. Her typed index cards often wound up tacked to the corkboard wall in someone else’s room. I’ve kept many of them. I wish I’d kept them all.
Of all her letters to me and my siblings, the one that’s taken on near-legendary status in our family was the one that came in the midst of my struggles with my freshman English professor, Dr. Lucas. My confidence had slipped as much as my grades, and in a few of my phone calls I started dropping hints that maybe OWU wasn’t right for me. My mother was not a quitter. She wasn’t having it.
Clarice had a unique system for identifying the purpose of her letters even before you read them. Black ink meant all was fine with the world, and there might even be some humor in her correspondence. Blue ink meant she wanted to discuss some difficulty in her own life, which she was more likely to share as her children got older. But if a letter from home came in red ink, that meant the recipient was in serious trouble. Red meant anger. So when the envelope arrived in my dormitory mailbox with my name and address written in red, I knew I was in for a verbal assault, a linguistic beat down. Her first line cleared up any doubt. Clarice Pitts has loved the Lord nearly all of her life, but she’s always had great affection for profanity when it served her, especially when it came to making a point to her children.
Dear Mr. Brain Dead,
Have you lost your fucking mind? You went to Ohio Wesleyan with the expressed goal of graduating, going on to live your dreams and God’s purpose for your life. At the first sign of trouble you want to give up. Fine! Bring your ass back to Baltimore and get a job. Maybe if you think you’re up for it, enroll in Bay College. There are plenty of places in the city for dummies. Yep, come home with your tail between your legs and get some half-ass job and spend the rest of your life crying about what you could have been. Maybe all you’re cut out to be is a meat-cutting, cab-driving underachiever. Maybe I was wrong about you. Maybe you have worked as hard as you can, as you claim, and your best isn’t good enough. Is that what you think? Here’s what I know.
You are a gift from God. The Lord I serve does not make mistakes. You did not get to Ohio Wesleyan because you are so smart or worked so hard. You got there because of prayer and faith and God’s grace. Yes, you worked hard in high school. But you only did part of the work. Every time you took one step, God took two. Is college harder than high school? It better be, as much as it cost. So what’s that mean for you? Work harder than you think you are even capable of working. Pray longer than you’ve ever prayed. That’s what I’m doing. That is what we always do. What has your grandmother told you? You can’t climb that mountain without some rough spots. Maybe you’re in a cave on the other side of your mountain. Don’t get scared or lazy. Don’t just cry. Figure out what God is teaching you, then get your ass back on that mountain and keep pulling hard and looking forward.
Son, you know your momma loves you. I believe in you. I pray for you. I know you better than you know yourself. And I know a God who is able. You’re not coming home. You’re not going to give up. You’re not going to fail. You are going to endure.
Love,
Mom
Whew! That’s my momma summed up in a single letter: angry, passionate, relentless, unbending, unedited, unforgiving, immovable in her faith, and unwilling to give an inch or give up on her son. Regardless of the times, whether or not the experts, the people around her, or even I doubted what was possible, she stood like stone. Thirty years later, it still makes me laugh a bit, even tear up every time I read this particular letter. She never simply pushed—she lifted. I know that now; I sensed it then. As I recall, back in 1978, I had three reactions. As I was reading the letter, I was crying, for obvious reasons, because it felt like she was piling on. It was symbolic of the tension between a kid growing into manhood and his mother. She didn’t understand that I was trying.
Then it made me angry. Oftentimes my mother’s tough love brought us together. This time it pushed us apart. I understood her point, but she was wrong about the particulars. Up until that point in my life, she had been right about everything.
I remember reading the letter again and finally it made me laugh. It reminded me how intense my mother is. As I read the letter over again and again, it was like looking in a mirror. I too was tough. It was okay to get angry, perhaps even curse a bit, then settle down, refocus, recommit, remember not simply who I was but whose I was. As always, included in the envelope was an index card with Scripture. Psalm 37: “Fret not thyself because of evildoers . . . For they shall soon be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green herb.” I wasn’t sure if that biblical threat was aimed at me or Dr. Lucas. Mom would later explain that negative thoughts and pessimism were like “evildoers.” She was saying don’t worry about things. Her bottom line was always, let God fight your battles.
Maybe it was the training that came with being a social worker or the innate skills of a good parent, but even when she was at her harshest, Clarice always seemed to know what was needed and when it was needed. She made a compelling argument. Did I want to return to Baltimore and cut grass on the interstate? Was I giving up? For weeks Clarice continued to write letters of encouragement while I wrestled with the decision to withdraw from school.
My mother was appealing to the dream of who she thought I could be. But Dr. Lucas spoke directly to who I believed I was. “You’re not Ohio Wesleyan material,” he had said.
My mother was being hopeful. But, in my mind, he was being realistic, more honest. Finally, I was exhausted and wanted to escape them both. If I left school, I would be done with him, and if I went back to Baltimore, I couldn’t stay in my mother’s house. On a chilly February morning I walked over to University Hall to pick up the forms to withdraw from Ohio Wesleyan.
Sitting on a bench outside, I had my book bag on one shoulder and blank forms in my free hand. Somewhere between sadness and anger, my emotions provided insulation from the winter cold. I didn’t seem to notice the temperature or that I was now crying. Not small tears, mind you, but nose-running, lose my breath, shoulders-shaking tears. How pathetic I must have looked. I guess that’s why a plump woman with long brown hair and a heavy coat stopped in front of me.
“Young man, are you okay?” came a slightly accented voice.
“Yes, ma’am, I’m fi . . . fi . . . fine.” It was almost guaranteed that whenever I was overcome by emotion, the stuttering would start.
“You don’t look fine. Please tell me what’s wrong,” she insisted. By this time my spirit was broken, and I was too emotionally spent to make up a story, so I just started blabbing. I must have talked for several minutes because the woman in the big coat interrupted me and said, “May I sit down while you continue your story?”
I continued to ramble on for at least twenty minutes. This round-faced stranger just kept smiling and listening. Her body language assured me that what I had to say was somehow important. First I told her what Dr. Lucas had said, that I wasn’t college material. I was failing his class, and it was his recommendation that I leave. “I guess I’m just stupid,” I told her. “I was fooling myself to think I could make it here.” I told her that I was tired of being embarrassed in class. But I knew that if I dropped out of school, it would embarrass my family. I told her I didn’t feel as if I had any choice. All the while I was crying, sniffling, and stuttering.
Eventually she interrupted me and said, “I’m so sorry, but I must get back to work now. But can we continue our talk tomorrow. And promise me you won’t drop out of school before we talk?”
“Bu . . . bu . . . bu . . . but I’m just stupid. I don’t belong here,” I mumbled.
Then she flashed a part of her personality I would come to see plenty of in the years to come: “That’s just nonsense. Stop it. Stop that right now! Now give me your word you will speak to me tomorrow before you make any final decision on school! Give me your word! Look me in the eye and give me your word!”
Confused about why this stranger would be raising her voice at me, I simply said, “Yes, ma’am.”
“Well, good,” she answered with a reassuring smile. “My name is Ulle. My office is on the second floor of Slocum Hall. Can you come see me at around eleven?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Then it is settled. Go on with the rest of your day, and we will speak tomorrow.”
I welcomed the chance to delay what seemed like the inevitable. Clarice was always big on going to bed and allowing trouble to rest the night as well. Somehow I felt a bit relieved and finished the day. The next morning I made my way to Slocum Hall. Perhaps because of my own emotional state or her odd accent, I wasn’t sure I caught her name correctly. Ohio Wesleyan is a small and friendly campus, and most people could put a name with a face. She did say second floor. Inside Slocum, I asked a student, “Do you know a lady who works in this building—she has long brown hair, friendly round face, a bit on the plump side . . .” (There are a number of plump women in my family, and “plump” was always the preferred description).
“Oh, you mean Dr. Lewes,” the student responded.
I smiled. She must be mistaken. “No, this lady isn’t a doctor.” I thought to myself that maybe she was on the University staff in some capacity. Perhaps administrative or something clerical. Professors, I believed, looked and acted like Dr. Lucas.
“Well, you just described Dr. Lewes. Around the corner on the right. I gotta go.”
With that, I was alone in the hallway with directions to a professor’s office who couldn’t possibly be the woman who listened to my sad and lengthy story the day before. Since I had nothing to lose, I walked to the office as directed, and there to my surprise on the door was the name DR. ÜLLE LEWES. Inside the office, behind the desk, was the plump woman with long wavy brown hair, her face buried in a book. With a knock at the door, I asked, “Dr. Lewes?”
“Good morning, young man,” she answered with that familiar smile. “Please come in.” It was a greeting that would change my life. The remarkable Dr. Ülle Lewes. If ever I doubted that angels really do exist, those doubts were now cast aside. In time, she didn’t simply change my life—she saved it.