<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1">
</head>
<body text="#000000" bgcolor="#ffffff">
Sam and John Doe #24<br>
<br>
Peter, his helper, tells me that Sam has double joints, which accounts
for the oddity of Sam's elbows and knees but does not, I think, account
for his dowager's hump. Sam's spine is so curved that he has to peer
up at you by turning his head, like an arthritic little old man. I
don't think he's so old, though, even though he seems shrunken and
wasted in his overlong swim trunks -- well under 5 feet tall and
fragile to look at, although Peter says he can be surprisingly strong.
Hard to tell how old Sam is, but I doubt he's even middle-aged.
<br>
<br>
I don't see Sam often -- it depends on whether we both show up at the
pool at the same time -- but nonetheless, I'm very fond of him because,
like so many Downs Syndrome people, he exudes a sort of fresh
sweetness, the sweetness of almonds or really, really good vanilla ice
cream, an uncomplicated dearness like the best toast with honey. Oh,
he's not perfect: he can be very stubborn and compulsive, and I've seen
him flap with helpless anger. But he's shy and friendly and easy to get
along with, in the pool.
<br>
<br>
He's easily scared, and so concern for him tends to make me move
slowly, gently, thoughtfully and keep my voice quiet and warm: a
spiritual exercise of the first order. He may laugh when someone in the
pool splashes him, but it's a frightened laugh and he really hates the
shock of water in his face. One of his helpers splashed him a few times
"just for fun," and now Sam has to be tempted into the pool, praised
for his courage when he finally creeps down the steps and into the
shallow end.
<br>
<br>
But today the pool was empty except for me, Peter, and Sam, and I felt
gentleness hovering over the water, and a sort of friendly intimacy.
Peter works with the profoundly handicapped, and that brings out either
kindness or cruelty, and in him it has brought out a kindness that I
can feel and that relaxed my own self-protective guard. Sam nodded and
babbled sotto voce as we talked about Downs Syndrome and Fragile X and
Sam's loving mother, who died five years ago, and other quiet subjects.
I turned off my music and simply moved in the water, keeping my body
busy without trying actively to work out.
<br>
<br>
I can't tell you what we talked about because it wasn't that sort of
conversation. It was about Sam even when it wasn't. Sam made the
occasional contribution in English and then returned to his own private
language, Peter keeping half an ear tuned, the way you do with small
children, monitoring the babble for something that might need a
response.
<br>
<br>
After a while, Sam got cold, and the two of them retired to the hot tub
and I got back to my workout and turned on my private music: the
Wailin' Jennies, the Dixie Chicks, the McGarrigles, Paul Simon, the
Beatles. The guys were still in the hot tub and peace was still
brooding over the water when I came to the end of my workout hour and
started to cool down and stretch.
<br>
<br>
And then through my earphones I heard a much-loved quiet guitar
noodling, the intro to Mary Chapin Carpenter's "John Doe 24," and I
found myself swamped by memory.
<br>
<br>
I first heard this lovely meditation years and years ago, late one
Saturday night in Washington, DC, driving back from a dance with a guy
whose understated, sustaining affection had kept me afloat through a
very bad time, the way my swim belt now keeps me upright (and my iPod
dry) in this blue water. I thought blessings back at him as Carpenter's
thoughtful amber voice, pierced through with love and tender
imagination, wrapped itself around the soul of a deaf-mute black man
called John Doe #24, judged to be a half-wit and institutionalized for
almost 50 years in Illinois until his death, still unidentified.
<br>
<br>
I lay back in the water and watched the blue dusk deepen as the guys
left for the changing room, and thought to myself that this really is
the love of God: this willingness to be completely present with those
whose lives are so stripped bare of all pretension and ambition.
People like Sam and John Doe #24 can do so little by this world's
standards; they can only <b class="moz-txt-star"><span
class="moz-txt-tag">*</span>be<span class="moz-txt-tag">*</span></b>
-- Sam babbling quietly in the water, John Doe playing the harmonica
and dancing with the nurses in a state institution. I've known people
like little Billy Bly who could do even less, who really were "only"
just <b class="moz-txt-star"><span class="moz-txt-tag">*</span>being<span
class="moz-txt-tag">*</span></b>, but whose whole existence was poured
into the essential business of being soul.
<br>
<br>
Jean Vanier has it right: we serve our own souls by serving those who
are little by this world's worth. They are the people to admire and
give worth to, because they show us what it really all comes down to:
vulnerability, gentleness, hopefulness. He followed Jesus' clear
example in pointing us in their direction and in joining them himself,
wrapping them round in the thoughtful amber of love.
<br>
<br>
The blue dusk closed down as lights came on. Chapin's singing ended,
and Brantford Marsalis's wistful sax lifted John Doe's soul up toward a
God who would open his ears and loosen his singing tongue, as God will
add strength and freedom and fullness of being to Sam's sweet
generosity when Sam comes before God, perfecting what needs perfecting
and bringing to fullest fruit all this lovely promise.
<br>
<br>
-- for Allen Stairs
</body>
</html>