A SHADOW WITHIN A SHADOW [R, 6-1-23]

CHRIST IN WINTER: Reflections on Faith & Life for the Years of Winter—A SHADOW WITHIN A SHADOW [R, 6-1-23]

 

I have always been aware of this, but as my days “dwindle down to a precious few,” it is rather startlingly clear: I have lived in two directions at once—both forward and backward. It is what Jaber Crow calls “a shadow within a shadow.” [Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry]

When I first began to think in stories, what some people call writing, I had hardly any stories of my own, and my generation had even fewer. The stories we grew up with were WWII and The Great Depression, the stories of the generation before us. As the years went by, living forward, I added in The Korean War and The Silent Generation, then Civil Rights and Viet Nam.

But as I added each decade from the future into the present, I also added the one from the past that mirrored it. The Roaring Twenties became part of my story along with The Quiet Fifties, The Horseless Age with the Activist Sixties, The Gilded Age with The Me Generation, finally even The Civil War with The Days of Greed.

Now as I have pushed almost 90 years forward from my birth, I have pushed 90 years backward, also. My story goes from 1847 to 2027, from the end of the Mexican-American War to the end of The MAGA War. [Yes, it will end, because all such eras contain the seeds of their own destruction.]

I first became aware that students could “major” in a subject along about 7^th grade. But as I heard it, I wasn’t sure if the word were “major” or “measure.” I think that confusion helped me to do this living both back and forth at the same time. I majored in history in and theology. And I was measured by history and theology.

In my soul, in my history and theology, I am almost 200 years old. “Through many dangers, toils, and snares, I have already come. Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home.”

John Robert McFarland