Sixty-eight degrees and heavy rain…it feels like a portent of Maine. My pleasure is sublime with the onset of much cooler temperatures. Now when you combine a steady rain with cool breezes…it is to die for. Labor Day Weekend snuck up on me. It has been so blistering hot that the calendar moved faster than anticipated. Yesterday we were at a winery with Ira Kaye and Ron and the server responded when I mentioned that it seemed very busy…she responded that she had expected it to be so due to being Labor Day Weekend.

My mind reflects on many past Septembers. I recall the DuQuoin State Fair and attending on Labor Day, which was the last day of the extravaganza, and looking at the many crafts and animals. I was not much of a carnival ride participant…but I did like the Ferris Wheel. I still enjoy the ‘high ride’ and a few years ago we enjoyed the London Eye, which is a massive Ferris Wheel with enclosed cars that are a bit like those that you would find at a mountain lodge. They hold several participants and from the Eye’s Zenith you can see the entirety of the city of London.

September means a slower and less frenetic pace. It possess the plan for the upcoming fall and winter. It holds the promise of hot chocolate and Pumpkin Spice coffee. September whispers that everything is going to be alright. The hands of Gods time clock are functioning well and it is time to reflect on where we have been and where we are going.

We humans tend to not do so well in the milk of human kindness department if we are overheated. September affords us the opportunity to cool down and consider what matters. Our lives are a series of small things…that when put together…create a major accomplishment. We Baby-Boomers and generations prior to us…were taught that we had to learn to crawl before we could walk. Climbing the ladder of success in carer or life consisted of stepping on every rung. There was no easy money…there was no shortcut to a life well lived. Every day counts….each day matters. A cool down and a good rain…makes me think these thoughts…not by Saturday Nights Jack Handy…but by Jay Brooks…

We Brooks have enjoyed several cruises in our time. We have cruised to Alaska and the Caribbean and the Mediterranean and around the United Kingdom. It takes awhile for an ocean liner to turn around…think Titanic… Nevertheless the university community and the entire Southern Illinois region received some great news yesterday when we read the fall enrollment numbers. We have the largest freshman class in several years. We have been hemorrhaging students to the tune of around 1,000 per year…now only 100 down.

Kudos to Chancellor Lane and his staff who have…finally taken hold of the rudder and are turning our great University around…before it strikes the massive iceberg. I wrote recently about my seeing more students on campus than I have in several years. I walk the campus daily.

For 32 years and 2 months and 3 weeks I saw SIUC at its zenith…and the beginning of its diminution. I recall when Chancellor Beggs was so happy and told me with great joy that the fall enrollment in the latter 1990’s had a 4 student increase. This is the last fall enrollment student increase that I can recall. I was closely involved with more than one chancellor due to my being a member of 2 Chancellor Search Committees and my role as president of the Civil Service Council. Also my friend and former president of the Southern Illinois University System, Dr. Glenn Poshard, asked my advice on many occasions. I was appointed to a plethora of University Wide Committees that were charged with ascertaining what our school needed to do to recruit and retain our most precious University Citizens…our students.

Throughout my career in Building Services I was convinced that our staff could make a profound difference in the most important aspect of our duties…the recruitment and retention of students. Often the new student is looking for someone who represents SIUC and it is the civil service staff that they encounter on a regular basis. Our full time staff of 140 worked with our student staff of 200 on a daily/nightly basis. Among our 30 custodial crews our wonderful student staff found a home away from home. Sub-foreman and Building Service Workers brought their student colleagues food to eat and invited them to their home for holidays. We had a department wide Thanksgiving dinner for our student and full time staff that was a joy to be a part of. The look of joy and the feeling of home was throughout the auditorium and illustrated on the face of each grateful student.

Compromise is the oil that makes the engine run. Each of us have to stand on our fundamental beliefs of right and wrong…good and bad…ethical and unethical…but the normal rhythm of success in life and the promise of accomplishing worthy endeavors is anchored by compromise….and watching out for icebergs…

The beginning of my favorite third of the year is finally here. Autumn and early winter have been my nirvana since I was a child. I purchased Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Coffee today. The entire rhythm of the season engulfs me…and I enjoy the immersion. I am annually amazed at how quickly the time passes from September 1 until January 31. We shop at Sams, which is Walmarts giant wholesale store that is named after the founder of Walmart…Sam Walton, and I mark the season according to the retail displays. Christmas Trees will be appearing shortly…if not already…at Walmart and other retail establishments. This troubles many people…but is welcome by me…I am a Christmas guy throughout the entire year. I think that my mental acuity is better and I am definitely more focused from now until the end of the year. September 1 signals for me the beginning of the fun time of the year. Our family has 2 birthday celebrations during the fall, mine on October 24 and Aarons on November 16, as well as Halloween and Thanksgiving and the big Kahuna…Christmas.

For my birthday…at one time I had 4 to 5 celebrations. MJ took me out for a birthday dinner, usually at our favorite restaurant, Cunetto’s House of Pasta on the Hill in St. Louis, and there was another dinner on the day of my birth. Also, our good friends, Jo Ann and Peter, hosted us at a local restaurant for Peter and my mutual October birthdays. And often my wonderful staff at SIUC would have a recognition of my birthday at our offices. Spoiled you say…you are correct…

MJ’s and Aaron and Jonathons Christmas celebration was of paramount importance to me throughout their childhood. I wanted each year to be a memorable event. We began, early on, taking them to the headquarters of Famous-Barr in St. Louis to see the animated Christmas Bears. These were robotic bears that were dressed in holiday regalia and were busy trimming their Christmas Trees. Almost an entire floor of the massive Famous-Barr building was devoted to this Christmas extravaganza. The line for viewing the Christmas Bears was long…but it moved fast. My mother-in-law, Fernie, enjoyed the Bears as much as her grandchildren.

Christmas at First Presbyterian Church in Carbondale is a major event. The first Christmas Season at First Presbyterian was a revelation for me. I had been a christian and a church goer for nearly 30 years…but the churches that I was familiar with had not made a big deal about Christmas. Christmas to me is the big event in the Christian Calendar. I took note that our church trimmed the Christmas Tree and purchased gifts for children who were members of families who were not financially secure. The Christmas Eve Service seemed to be taken directly out of Charles Dickens famous book…A Christmas Carol.

Cool and brisk temperatures…inspire me. As nature draws in its life force…I feel comforted and secure and renewed for the year that is on our doorstep. Halloween was much fun for me as a child. I enjoyed Monster Movies and my cousins monster masks. There were even Monster Magazines in those ancient days of the early 1960s. I had put together Monster Models of Frankenstein and Dracula and the Wolfman…and the Creature From the Black Lagoon. They sold them with the model cars. I was proud of my work. I made an 8 millimeter movie with my cousin. I was wearing his full head and face covering of the Creature from the Black Lagoon, Universal Studios, Mask. I was also wearing the Creature’s hands. We filmed it at the Eldorado Spillway. It was a work of art!

On one of the boys earliest Christmases we purchased a Fischer Price Farm for them. I was so proud of this purchase as I knew that Fischer Price produced a good and safe product for young children. Later when we bought a Teddy Ruxpin, which was a talking bear, for Jonathon, he did not last Christmas Day. We had scrimped and saved to afford Mr. Ruxpin…and we had succeeded in acquiring one. As the early sun set on our revelries …Jonathon came to me and asked if I could fix Teddy Ruxpin…as he had ceased to communicate. Now Teddy had a moving mouth that slightly corresponded with a cassette tape that fit in a compartment in his back. Jonathon had been unhappy with the speed that his Bear was speaking and had subsequently removed his bottom lip. There was no hope for the loquacious bear.

Tara, our nice, wanted a Cabbage Patch Doll. They were rabidly popular and we could not find one anywhere. We went to our local K Mart and participated in the Blue Light Special. The announced that there was 1 Cabbage Patch Doll available and that it was first come and first serve. The struggle was incredible. Clothes were torn and fists were felt and running and jumping and screaming…and no Cabbage Patch Doll for us. We traveled to St. Louis and finally succeeded in obtaining the Christmas Doll for our nice.

Have you ever watched a Locomotive from a long way off? At first it seems so far away and that it might never arrive at its destination. Many years ago, when I was a lad…my friend, Dennis, and I would attend movies at the Orpheum Theatre in Eldorado, Illinois on Sunday. The Orpheum had served as my church for several years…and after watching whatever flick was showing at least a couple of times…we, at certain select times, made our way to the Dairy Queen to purchase a pack of Marlboro Cigarettes for the old gentleman who took and tore the tickets. One day as we were walking to the DQ we had the brilliant idea to buy a pack of Marlboros for us as well. We further ruminated that to mask the odor of the pungent tobacco…we would each get a pack of barbecue potato chips. There was another old man who waited on us at the store where we usually enjoyed Dilly Bars…and he smiled in a wicked knowing manner when he took our order…and we were sore afraid… So we dropped off our friends smokes and then proceeded to the train tracks where we Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn wannabes could enjoy the full impact of our forbidden pleasure. The plan was to each smoke 20 cigarettes as rapidly as possible and then return to the theatre and wait for mom to pick us up in about an hour.

‘Smoke curled around our heads like a wreath.’ My stomach churned and Dennis took on a most interesting a lemon yellow glow. There were Little Egypt Mosquitoes and birds and squirrels and a train whistle in the far off distance…almost like a whisper… We were at the height of our smoking adventure and in the middle of a train trestle. The jump from the trestle was about 20 feet. We began to run as if our lives depended on it…and they did. We threw the Marlboros so they would not be found on our crushed bodies…and coughed like the steam from the coal fired furnace of the runaway train. When we reached safety and off the trestle of death…we hid in the poison ivy. No train came. We returned to the movie…a bit ill and scratching.

Holidays are a bit like waiting on a Locomotive. Due to our Pandemic we have waited on a trip to Maine for 16 months. It has seemed so far off and then we heard the phantom train whistle…but it was a specter…so we continued to wait. Once the train arrives for holidays or happy occasion I have discovered that I had better snap a photo…as it will be over almost before it starts.

Life is fleeting.

And if you’re ever distressed, cast your eyes to the summer sky when the stars are strung across the velvety night.

And when a shooting star streaks through the blackness, turning night into day…make a wish and think of me.

Make your life spectacular.’

Robin Williams

As I launched on my magnificent Monday I first stopped at our church office to obtain a book for MJ for her participation in the Presbyterian Women Group. There was our Administrative Professional, Barb, to greet me and help me look for the hiding book. Each time that I think about going to the office…I am happy…because Barb is there. Also, Pastor Kerry was present with his sunny disposition and genial good humor. After spending some time and a text to MJ…and waiting for additional information…I left for a little walk on Campus before retrieving the Walmart groceries.

In the popular movie, The Sixth Sense, the youngster that was portrayed by the actor, Haley Joel Osment, had a secret that was not revealed until almost the conclusion of the movie. He whispered to Bruce Willis’ character…’I see dead people.’ Now this statement had weighty meaning as Bruce Willis character was dead…and did not know it… So, since the beginning of fall semester at Southern Illinois University @ Carbondale…I have seen more students on Campus than I have witnessed for the past few years. Mark Twain said regarding a rumor that had arisen while he was in London that he was dead, ‘The report of my death was an exaggeration.’

An old saying that I love is, ‘The world is your oyster.’ We may think that certain opportunities are dead to us. It may seem that our ship has sailed…and we were not on it. It is somewhat easy to believe that life’s road is irreversible and thus our fate is already written… Not so…says SIUC!

As you may be aware…I love Southern Illinois University @ Carbondale. I have spent much of my life there. I arrived as a young man of 20 years old…with the knowledge that I could do better if someone would assist me in accessing the tools that would enable me to increase my abilities. The University became my home. My mother had suggested that I become a barber and offered to pay my tuition to barber school. Now I respect barbers…but I never had a desire to become one. SIUC taught me that the sky was the limit…and that I could become anything that I desired to be. I thought that I was limited. I had been told that there were limitations. I accepted that there were smarter people and more gifted people and people who were earmarked for greatness…but not me. I had so many thoughts and plans and intentions…but wondered if I would ever fulfill the dreams of my heart.

After a 43 year association with Southern…I love it more than when I first began! I realize, at my almost 64 years of age, what SIUC gave me. It afforded me, a boy born in Chicago and reared in Southern Illinois, an appreciation for the diversity of Gods Creation. I was always a thinker…but I learned to question what was told me…at University. I learned to not accept what was told to me as truth…without research and never at Face Value. I found that all humanity is beautiful…and that travel is essential to read and understand…Gods Book…

The Great Spirit created us equal…we have made ourselves…unequal. The fleeting and gossamer wings of perceived power and prestige and importance is a ‘snake oil sold us by a carnival barker,’ that we are special and better than our…lessers. Committees…programs degrees…and resources…have convinced us that somehow we are the rulers of the less fortunate and the needy…when in the stark reality…’We are of all men…most miserable.’

Chin Water is not all created equal. I have waded in the clearest of emerald green water at Miramar Beach, Florida…and I have waded in my childhood neighbors pond…that was brown. The murky and troubled waters of our Pandemic and the rabid insurgence of the Delta variant…has altered many of our post-pandemic plans. I find myself wanting to, through force of will, force the Pandemic back into Pandoras Box. The threat that we are facing, once again, seems a bit like suffering double indemnity or being found innocent once…and then tried again…with new judicial rules. We did not think that it was supposed to be this way… We wore our masks…we social distanced…we eschewed restaurants and bars…we physically shunned our extended family…our friends…

Our 100 year Pandemic did not care about the sacrifices that we religiously kept. It did not care about our political affiliation or our creed or color. We find ourselves, in Little Egypt, in dark water that is up to our chins…and the only real answer is prudence and a circumspect realization that we are at the mercy of a world wide catastrophe and humility is in order. Because we can speak loudly and portray passionate emotions on both the ‘Wear a Mask’ side…or the ‘Don’t Wear a Mask side,’ our rhetoric will not produce the reality that we feel justified in asserting.

Pastor Kerry spoke in christian boldness and from his heart today as he noted that one of our sister Carbondale churches may be considering the temporary closing of their physical buildings doors and renewing their all Zoom Worship due to the Pandemic Crisis that is occurring in our county and our city…and the plain fact that our local hospital beds are full…thus…where will go if we become ill… Kerry went on to suggest that if he were making the decision he would return to Zoom worship and consider having outdoor worship services once the weather becomes cooler. I served until recently on the governing board of our local church…the Session. If I were still a member of this group I would call for a meeting today to vote on doing exactly what our pastor suggested.

A friend suggested to me that I would never find a perfect church. Thank God for that truth…as I am among the most imperfect christians that I know. After 23 years…First Presbyterian Church @ Carbondale is my home…

A friend asked me a pertinent question regarding a blog that I wrote recently. I often write about the need for change in several of our human institutions. Among those is one that I have been a member of for the past 52 years…the church. He inquired if I desired change in the church…should not the change begin with me…’Christ in me?’ The inquiry is so thought provoking that I have pondered it for several hours. First, I think, that each of us who are christians are the church. The building is only where we gather to meet. Indeed, our church has met for the entirety of the Pandemic by Zoom…and yet had a thrilling faith experience. When I consider the church…I consider the founder of the faith…Jesus Christ. What did he visualize to constitute his community of disciples? What have we, subsequently, translated the plan of Christ…as our institution that we fondly call the church?

During my half century of attempting to follow Jesus…I have been changing from the beginning in 1969…until today. I have been a member of 4 separate churches…2 non-denominational and 2 denominational. In each of those churches I was both humbled and honored to be asked to be involved in church government. I continue to have a stone in my shoe and sadness at my inability to affect positive change. This is not an inditement regarding my christian colleagues…as they are the inspiration that propels me forward. In fact I think that each of them have the same ‘stone in their shoe,’ when it comes to being satisfied at living the faith that Christ left for us.

If we believe and accept that the comfort of faith and the vision of Gods love is not high on the suffering masses of our world…we are of all women/men…most miserable. If we do not inspire the person who is contemplating suicide due to their extreme life reversals and their abject mental suffering…we have missed the mark. If the countless millions of human beings who are suffering under our Pandemic and the economic downturn of our nation…and the fear of uncertainty…do not have checking out a church and its message of love and inclusion and safety in the midst of the storm…what are we doing?

Actually…when I write of the need for change in our churches and the renewal of desire for hurting people to want to attend…I am writing to myself…

It feels like 102 degrees in Mr. Brooks Neighborhood. It is uncomfortable for sitting and miserable for working. With the aid of my ceiling fan and the powerful flow of my floor fan…I am climatized and surviving. As Global Warming progresses each year…when will be our human breaking point? The politicization of the change in our Earth’s climate as well as the COVID 19 Virus…has resulted in devastation for our species and our planet. While we fiddle…Rome burns.

Sunny days and cloudy ones visit us all. Often our reactions to each… chart our course of life. Much of life is reaction. In stormy times we can choose to either throw rocks at God…or learn to make lemonade out of lemons. We can feel that the world is set against us…or we can identify with our mutual struggle.

Our Pandemic seems to have no end. Yet our reactions to it are a bit like the person who maxes out all of their credit cards and rails at no one in-particular regarding their massive debt. If we continue to ignore science and common sense…perhaps we will be fighting about wearing face-masks for the foreseeable future.

We mourn and debate the causes of the diminishing of congregants in our churches. We wonder, aloud, if we need new programs and classes…finally we say in exasperation that people seem not to be that in to church…anymore. I finished the excellent Netflix Series ‘The Chair’ in the early hours of this morning. The wonderful actor, Sandra Oh, gave a speech in the last episode that described The myopic view of universities in todays precipitous decline of enrollment. She noted that the only class in the English department…which was not suffering from declining enrollment…was the class that a brilliant female African American Professor was teaching that utilized ground breaking instruction that involved all of he students in her class. She cautioned that Academia was going to have to stop worrying on their endowments and change their teaching pedagogy or suffer the obliteration of the Academy.. So it goes for our churches…we are going to have to change and embrace new forms of worship and fellowship and ministry…or stay firm in our intransigence and hope that the organization does not die…before we do…

Shadows fascinate me. I think that they are illustrative of our time in this life. One of the most interesting cinematic experiences that I had lately was watching the movie ‘The Night House’ and its use of shadow in depicting what the main character perceived as a ghost. Each time that Rebecca Halls character saw the malevolent silhouette…the camera would back away and show that what she had seen could be explained by cut outs in the wood of the house and a combination of them with other physical features of the dwelling. Often what we see is an optical illusion of what our mind tells us that we are seeing.