[Continued from Part I]
A Lot of Teachers Along the Way
At the end of the day on which I began my 67th orbit
around the sun, I found myself awake late that night. As I lay in my bed
surrounded by the soft snoring of Andy, my beloved life partner of 46 years,
Oscar, our dachshund and Saidy, our beagle, I found myself looking across my
room at the family tree bearing photos that looms above the family altar I have
assembled below. It includes family of birth as well as family of choice. And
in all honesty, I ran out of wall before I could include all the faces that I’d
love to place there.
Others I have known and loved since first grade in that elementary school in Bushnell and our friendships continue until this day. And then there are my non-human companions without whom my life would have been incomplete. And finally, I have had loving relationships with several people in my life, male and female, all of them leaving an impact on my life.
I treasure them all.
What occurred to me as I began to drift off to sleep was
what a rich life I have been privileged to live. And here I wish to express my
gratitude for that richness.
Through no merit on my own, I was born into a very bright,
thoughtful and loving family matrix. I grew up under the guidance of two college
educated parents who would travel the world, literally, before they died, and encourage
their children to do the same. I have two siblings who are equally bright,
thoughtful and educated. A black nanny, Henrietta, was also an essential part
of our family. Her love and wisdom shaped me amidst a segregated, bigoted
society. And I was the beneficiary of a tight knit family that extended to grandparents,
aunts, uncles and cousins who played major roles in my life.
For my family of birth, I am grateful.
Like my parents, I, too, have been able to travel the world, now to
four continents (still missing Australia, Africa and Antarctica) and all 48
continental states (still missing Alaska and Hawaii). It has been a vital part
of a life-long love of learning and I have been fortunate to be able to pursue
the education I have always cherished all of my life.
That began with a stellar two years at Lake-Sumter State
College in nearby Leesburg – a great relief after the time I labored in a high
school dominated by future farmers, football and hunting where kids like me had
no place. That was followed by an undergraduate degree in history, secondary
education with minors in political science and journalism at the University of
Florida.
Those areas of study foreshadowed the shape my life would take.
There would be a brief career as a public school teacher. Many of my students
would be poor kids in special ed programs. That would be followed by a law
degree again at UF and several years of practice, mostly with poor people.
Then there would be a divinity degree for which I’d cross
the country to study at an Episcopal seminary in Berkeley that allowed me to
become an ordained Episcopal priest (I still have a hard time believing this
sometimes). I would also begin a long period of visiting Latin America and engaging
liberation theology as a result.
All of that would come together in my doctorate in
Religion, Law and Society at Florida State University. The fact I was able to
get admitted to all these schools and to find funding for them, most of which I
paid back in the form of loans, also speaks to my good fortune if not my privilege.
I have had wonderful teachers in all of the schools I have attended. I am
grateful to them all.
But the school of life experience has also been at least as important as the formal education in which I have spent most of my life as either student or teacher. A child of the 1960s I watched rockets blast off to the moon from just across the state and lived through the desegregation of schools. My work history began in the pepper fields of Central Florida and would extend to serving as a consultant for nationally published college textbooks. I have served in the halls of Congress as an LBJ intern and as an international election monitor in war-torn El Salvador.
The Buddha is purported to have said that “When the
student is ready, the teacher appears.” Apparently I have been ready to
learn all of my life. And I have had a wonderful assemblage of teachers.
But I also am in the debt of teachers who bore no credentials but who had wisdom to impart to me simply by sharing their daily lives. I learned much about the value of hard work and the gratitude we owe the working poor who ensure that we all have our daily bread from those I labored among in the agricultural fields of Sumter County.
I owe much to my students at every level who may well not
have known that they taught me as much I taught them along the way. I often
called my college students at Valencia and UCF my Jedis. I still believe they will change the world. It
is one of my life’s greatest pleasures to watch their lives as adults as they make
their own impacts upon the world.
I learned much as a public defender from my impoverished
clients who opened my eyes to the life of the working poor and my own
privilege. And I will always be indebted to the village of Las Guabitas in the
middle of the Panamanian countryside where I lived for a summer. It was a life
changing experience that taught me about generosity, community and the value of
the human person in the context of deep poverty, war and societal
deprecation.
Perhaps most importantly, I have learned from a series of difficult lessons from the suffering I have endured in my life, some of it unmerited, some of it self-inflicted.
My parents had always encouraged me to dream boldly. But the doors did not always open for me to say the least. A dogged but hopeful persistence arose from that reality.
I didn’t get accepted to law school my first application and I had to take one part of the Bar Exam twice. I had substantial rewrites required of me during my comprehensives in my doctoral program. And my path to ordination as an Episcopal priest was long, harrowing and the result was never a given right up to the very end.
With each disappointment – and there were many - I picked my hurting soul up, dusted it off,
and began working for the next round of challenges. I learned early on that
what was worth attaining required perseverance.
I learned a lot about “good ole boy” politics along the way
and the values of the white professional middle class, a place within which my
educational attainment had secured for me even as I found that lifestyle to be largely
alien to my deepest values. I learned first-hand the dehumanizing impact of
homophobia. Dealing with the irrational prejudices of others would be a
constant throughout my life starting with the bullying I endured in public
schools. I also learned the costs of pointing out the elephant in the room, speaking
out about racial and class injustices. The costs of that outspokenness would be
extracted from my very soul in my darker days lived out in places with names
like Inverness and the Orange County Juvenile Justice System.
In the process, I have endured a lot of self-inflicted
harm, suffered through a lot of hangovers, periodically teetered on the edge of
taking my life and more than once finding myself in situations in which I
barely escaped with my life.
And yet, I am here to tell about it, all of it.
I am a believer in the miracle of grace. And I am a case
study in the power of redemption in virtually every sense of that term. For
that I am deeply grateful and I am very clear I was never entitled to any of
it. I also have a sense that the squad of guardian angels that has protected me
for all these years is going to want to have a little talk with me when I
arrive at the Pearly Gates.
“I am brave, I am bruised
I am who I'm meant to be, this
is me”
It has taken me all of my life to own all of who I really
am. Loving who I am is still a work in progress. But I am a lot closer to it than
I’ve ever been. For that I am profoundly grateful.
Deepest Gratitude for a Rich Life
At the end of the day September 1, as I was about to drift
off to sleep, a couple of thoughts occurred to me. First, while I’m not totally
sure what my soul desired in coming to this life, if it was life lessons that
would allow my soul to grow, I think I’ve done a pretty good job of finding those
opportunities. While my life has never been devoted to amassing of material
riches or power, I have had a very rich life nonetheless.
And that led to the second realization. Should I die today,
I would have lived a very full and purposeful life. It has been an unusual
life, unpredictable and unorthodox from the start. It has never been free of
pain. But always rich. I could die tomorrow without regrets.
That said, I should hasten to say that I am in no hurry to die just yet. I love retirement. I have no obligations to anyone or anything that I cannot ultimately say no to. Retirement gives me time to tend to my beloved jungle, read the hundreds of stacked up books I’ve promised I’d finally read, and I even find some time to write. I am happy I finally have a chance to function part-time as priest in my parish. And the myriad of projects I attend to from commemorating the Ocoee race massacre to engaging in Jungian depth psychology keep my mind stimulated. For all of that I am grateful.
But I feel I still have some things to attend to before
taking my leave. Indeed, I sense that all of the life I have led up to now has
been preparing me for something yet to present itself. I recently heard a quote
from Carl Jung that seems to sum this up:
“To this day God is the name by which I
designate all things which cross my willful path violently and recklessly, all
things which upset my subjective views, plans and intentions and change the
course of my life for better or worse.”
Whatever that G-d might have in mind, as I begin this 67th year of a very rich life, I await it.
For now, as I begin this 67th revolution around
Brother Sun, I simply need to express my gratitude for the rich life I have
lived and for the many people who have played a role in it. I pray that I will
prove ready for what may come next. And I thank those who have taken the time
and trouble to read my reflections herein.
I understand that a saying popular among 12
Steppers is “More will be revealed.” Of that, I have no doubt.
* The solar return chart is an astrology chart that's
calculated for the exact moment the Sun returns to its "natal" or
birth position.
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Harry Scott Coverston
Orlando, Florida
If the
unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it
religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things worth considering do
not come in sound bites.
Those who believe
religion and politics aren't connected don't understand either. – Mahatma
Gandhi
For what
does G-d require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk
humbly with your G-d? - Micah
6:8, Hebrew Scriptures
Do not
be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief. Do justly, now. Love mercy,
now. Walk humbly now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither
are you free to abandon it. - Rabbi Rami Shapiro, Wisdom of
the Jewish Sages (1993)
©
Harry Coverston, 2020
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