ὕψιστος

Galilee and ὕψιστος

Summer 1984 we sold our house on the Conodoguinet Creek in Pennsylvania and relocated from Harrisburg to Apalachicola, and “we’re on our way - - - to Apa-lach-i-co-la F-L-A” I sang all the way home with Bing Crosby and Incredible Joy, Relief, Escape and Release. No longer would I be Mr. Yoyo on the end of a string, popping out to wherever the Navy assigned me, then back home to the Florida Gulf Coast at every opportunity including every occasion of PCS and military leave; then after Navy retirement the University of West Florida flying me down to teach as adjunct professor half a dozen times a year. All our twenty Navy years we had agreed, and I had clung to my unshakeable determination, to move home at the opportunity. Now, God had presented it in the form of the altar and pulpit of Trinity Episcopal Church, Apalachicola, Florida, and I had to go. Striving to be other, I had to go, though the decision process left me better understanding Jacob's night alone on the banks of the Jabbok.

Back “home” in Pennsylvania we had been -- called is the word we use in the business -- to a parish a half hour west of Harrisburg, had intended to accept and move to their beautiful setting. Parishioners who were faculty in the school system had arranged for Tass to be enrolled in their gifted program; several times Linda had driven over to admire their charming old stone rectory and measure for rugs and draperies and furniture placement; and basically she had set down roots with many friends in our Central Pennsylvania community and diocese; so the moment of decision was tense and long. The -- I still say it was divine -- intervention to place Trinity and Florida in front of us came as a surprise, and honestly something of a shock, but as an ultimatum in my life as it was at the time. With all the crying and struggle at home it looked for a bit as if I would be coming alone, or just -- as I threatened in frustration, but Linda who does not hold on to the bad moments will not remember, and Tass who was upstairs asleep never knew, and frankly my bluff was never called on it -- just me and Tass if it comes to that. My exact words at the crisis moment: "Tass and I are going, and I hope you will go with us." But I “centerpieced” the marriage-long commitment to returning home to the Florida Gulf Coast, and our creekside home sold the first day it was on the market, and the divine call seemed -- indubitable is our Southern term. And also because “God helps those who help themselves”, I promised, “If you will go, we will buy you that new minivan, and when we get there we will buy you that beach house.” 

To any extent God meddles in human lives, I still believe and know that God has meddled in my life, and did then, and still seems to. And I’m the one who knows, because I’m the one who’s been here, inside looking out through these blue eyes from my moment of birth to this moment of Sabbath morning gazing out over the Gulf of Mexico and east into the sunrise.

Not long after moving home, and needing under the rules at the time to reinvest our Pennsylvania home sale proceeds in another home, and needing to keep my promise, we bought a beach house high on pilings, east of Carrabelle, round the bend and out the spit on Alligator Point. It was lovely and peaceful and we drove out there many times in Linda's new minivan, and we named it Galilee. Everyone names their boat, and lots of people name their abode or vacation spot or laughing place, and we named it Galilee.

I was 48 and 49 years old. Thirty years on, a shelf life computation I did recently said “best if used by 86.8.” I rather like that. The October sunsets are better than they were even in April when I got the call to Trinity. If I were naming my present outlook, which is even better and higher than Galilee, it’s ὕψιστος.

Highest.

Here was the closing sunset last night. Believing the Incredible. ὕψιστος

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