I met Lacy when I was about 24 years old.
I had heard the term ‘free spirit.’ I had a sense of what it meant. But when I met Lacy, the definition became something I experienced. Lacy did not seem to care what other people thought of her, at least not enough to let it shape her thoughts and actions. I grew up in the South, where how you came across to people was important. I grew up in the Southern Baptist Church, where ordering your life according to a certain understanding of the teachings of scripture was important.
None of those things seemed important to Lacy. It’s not that rejected them; they just didn’t seem to have a big place in her life. So Lacy was someone to whom I should not be attracted; she was someone who should not be a part of my life. And yet, I delighted in her presence. She was full of life. She laughed and smiled and danced her way through life.
She talked about the big dreams she had for her life. The things she wanted to see and hear. The places she wanted to visit. The people she wanted to meet and the person she wanted to be.
The way she spoke of what she wanted for her life was very different from the way I thought of what I wanted for my life. But as I listened to Lacy, I began, like her, to dream and imagine and play with ideas about my life in joyous and boisterous ways.
My Southern Baptist upbringing had led me to seminary and working as a youth minister. From those perspectives, I knew that the only feelings I should have for Lacy was to worry about the state of her soul, because her life was so different than how one ought to live.
But I could not deny the force of her spirit. I knew what she had was very different from what I had, and it was her spirit and joy of living that I wanted. How could that be? I was a Christian. I was in relationship with one who was way, truth, life. I followed one who was fully God and fully human. And yet, here was a person who embraced none of those things the way I did, and she seemed to know a deep reverence and joy for life.
I left that church to attend a seminary in California. Lacy and I stayed in touch as much as we could. In the late 70’s, there was no email, only letters through the mail. And phone calls were long distance with a charge. But I thought of Lacy a lot. The seminary I attended was in the San Francisco area, and free spirited and differentness and otherness were everywhere. She would have loved it. And because Lacy had become part of my life, I loved it and welcomed it as well.
I graduated in 1980 and took a job at Methodist Children’s Home in Waco as a chaplain. About 3-4 years later, on the Monday of Holy Week, I got a call from Lacy’s parents. Something was going on with her health-wise, and she was in the hospital. They called again the next day to say that she was in ICU. And then, on Wednesday, I got a call that Lacy had died.
The life of Lacy, her free spirit, was gone. Or was it?
In one of the most powerful and surreal moments of my young life, on Holy Saturday, the day between Good Friday and Easter, the day when Jesus’ body lay in his tomb, I was standing by the grave of my dear friend Lacy.
Up to that point, resurrection was something that happened to Jesus on Easter morning. Resurrection was something to believe about Jesus. But if resurrection and the story of Holy Week and Easter did not have something more to offer to me and that group of people gathered around Lacy’s grave on Holy Saturday, then what, really, did it offer?
I have come to know that part of resurrection is the way Lacy lives on in me. She is not someone I just remember or reminisce about. The way I move into life, the way I welcome otherness and differentness, the way I dream and imagine a new heaven and a new earth. All of those are expressions of Lacy in me.
Lacy taught me about freedom. Freedom is far more than doing whatever I want. Freedom is realizing that there is so much life in the world and in the people around me; my calling is to embrace that life and enjoy it and give expression to it. My call is to do what I can to create a world where others can enjoy that kind of freedom.
Earlier I spoke of how my religion taught me that I should be concerned for the state of her soul. On that Holy Saturday, by her grave, I realized that I knew her soul. I had experienced it. I loved it.
My religion taught me that I should work to save Lacy. In many ways, Lacy saved me.
To all who will be standing by the graves of loved ones on this Holy Saturday or any other day, don’t just remember or reminisce. Give expression to the wonder of resurrection by how you allow them to continue to touch and shape your life.
Thanks for sharing this. It is insightful, and thoughtful in all the ramifications of those words. And for me, not at any grave right now, these words provide a way of looking back at lives gone but well remembered and allowing those lives to touch and shape mine again. I appreciate the words and you. A blessed Easter to you.
Thank you Lynne. And I blessed day of Resurrection for you my friend.
I have a friend like Lacy who thankfully is still with us. She has the soul of a servant and I am grateful for her friendship and the difference she is making in the world.
Good to know that there are others who have a Lacy as well.
Gary, a poignant reflection, perspective and vantage point from which to view, focus and and reflect with. As we engage in such, “truly”, as we are advised, the kingdom is more nigh, at hand and around and within us than we often may recognize. May these special seasons continue to remind us, each and every one, if we but reflect and listen for them to speak to us. Thanks for posting, my dear friend. May peace abide. Randy
More nigh, at hand and around us and within us. Well said. May peace abide with you my friend.
Loved this! Sounds like Lacy embraced who God made her to be instead of what the world might want to form her to be. It may be hard for some to believe that religion could be the very thing that made us feel so unworthy and separate from God. The world ‘out there’ does plenty to tell us we are not young enough, pretty enough, rich enough, that we don’t have enough followers on social media, that we don’t live in the right area or drive the right car or run with the cool people. At the very same time, religion can make us feel not good enough, not devout enough, too independent and free thinking. Ask too many questions. BUT, those feelings are often the very things that cause us to turn away from the world out there and go inside of ourselves where we find that God and all of his love and acceptance lives. We stop judging our own desires and dreams, and we learn to stop judging everyone else’s lives and paths. Here’s to Lacy who was a light that lived that self-love and acceptance and by example showed other people that joy in that!