My Sunday Feeling

I don't know why I continue to get waylaid occasionally by news of a death.  It's not like I don't well know that none of us are immortal.  Although it is true that Earl "Uncle Earl" Long famously used to address the possibility of his post mortem with the phrase "when I die, if I die," all of us know better.  And I suspect Uncle Earl did too.

I was in Conway watching a Hendrix football game when I got the news that my friend and mentor John Churchill died last night.  The only way that setting could have been more perfect was if the Warriors had been playing Rhodes. Because that's where John played back when it was Southwestern of Memphis.  And he played pretty well as he made the "Little All-American" team as it was called back then.

He arrived at the Philosophy Department when I was a Junior.  He was handsome, burly and loud with a laugh that could be heard in the adjacent county.  He didn't so much lecture as he imposed the force of his personality onto the classroom.  If anybody was a natural born teacher it was John Churchill.  I can see him now writing stuff on the board at 90 miles an hour with his back to the class yelling about the stuff that was going up.  He would then face the class and poke the chalkboard behind him for emphasis while his glasses slid down his nose.

Boy he was something.   

But even though he was nine kinds of brilliant as any expert on Wittgenstein would be, he was no egghead.  We watched many a basketball game together and sometimes late in the afternoon we would shoot the bull about sports in his office instead of discussing my academic progress as any other advisor would have done.

He became my faculty advisor when I busted out of music.  Well, that's not exactly true.  I tried to keep the beloved voice teacher Harold Thompson as my advisor because Harold didn't give a shit.  But Dean Raymond caught on eventually and sent me over to the Philosophy and Religion department, which was, after all, the acreage I was treading in the Grove of Academe.   

John's major contribution to my education was suggesting that I take more history courses after I decided that I was going to law school instead of seminary.  He had a hand in that decision as well because it was he who introduced me to David Hume.  Who raised far more damn good questions than damn good answers.  And so off to the law I fled where hypocrisy is more easily overlooked.  

John left Hendrix, as I recall, to become the Secretary of Phi Beta Kappa which is a pretty sweet gig.  He held that job for the last 20 years or so and retired as Secretary Emeritus of that organization as well as Professor and Dean Emeritus of Hendrix.

My last email conversation with John was in October of last year.  At the risk of inducing a stroke I advised him in writing that I had indeed gotten married.  He wished me much happiness and told me with no small measure of evident pride about his kids and grandchildren.  He told me that he and Jean had retired to Dickson, Tennessee because it was within easy visiting distance for most of his kids.

"I'm working on a book," he wrote. "Wittgenstein and liberal education---also reviewing philosophical books for Choice Magazine.  And reading.  Just plowed through Hardy's major works and now Lawrence Durrell."

He closed with the following:

"Right now I'm sitting on our big patio surrounded by Japanese maples.  We're a couple of miles outside Dickson so it's pretty peaceful.

With warm best wishes,

John"

That sounded like a John Churchill way to retire.  Unlike me who plays golf and hangs out with knuckleheads at Catholic High he read big damn books and wrote high falutin' articles about Wittgenstein.  

I know everybody dies.  That's why life insurance is so expensive.  Death is the one certainty the insurance industry can't quite game.  But there are some departures that catch you unawares or hurt more than others.  This is one of them. If for no other reason than here's more proof that I am no longer the boy that I was when we first encountered each other.  .  

So thank you John for not letting me cut corners, for your kindness to my mother and me when Buck dropped dead, for patiently looking over some of the stuff I used to write for the religion section of the paper and for always being up for a talk about sports.  Oh.  And thank you for not expelling my brother.  That night you called me on the phone was the only time I ever heard you yell.  I don't remember specifically what John had done to raise your ire but I remember Jon Guthrie, the campus minister, was high pissed too. Which I didn't think was even possible.  So thanks again. You were really hot.  

I hope that wherever you are you find yourself surrounded by Japanese maples.  And that you have some large damn tome in your big hands. You are still in my head.  And that's a good thing.  

Warm best wishes,

Paul