Mitchell Way
“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for God is with you wherever you go.” Joshua 1:9
Summertime on the Nooksack River, sitting in an inner tube, floating mile after mile in the warmth of the sun. On any hot weekend in July and August the river is spotted with hundreds of floaters drifting as singles or bunched together in groups. When you are young and haven’t many responsibilities, the river is the place to go.
A peanut sat on a railroad track; its heart was all aflutter. Along came a choo-choo train, choo-choo, peanut butter.
I really hate to use the term “band geek” but I guess that is exactly what I was. I think the term was conceived by the football players who hung out in the jock hall at high school. They had nothing better to do than to whistle at the girls and polish the pins on their Letterman jackets. They would huddle in groups like a band of jackals and label students as they walked by:
The flying insects were still active as we crouched in the tall grass. A horse fly circled my head and I swatted at it for the 30th time. My best friend, Chuck, was squatting next to me, a piece of field grass hanging from his mouth. We stared at the commissary building, two hundred yards away. I looked at my watch.
“9:30. No activity spotted at the building,” I whispered.
“Roger,” Chuck responded.
“It’s Marty. It’s Marty, I’ve told you. Sheesh!”
It was 1970 and Chuck and I, and the rest of Troop 23 were spending the week at Camp Bonaparte Boy Scout Camp on Bonaparte Lake in Eastern Washington. It was a rustic camp and lacked the amenities which many scout camps held.
For instance, instead of sleeping cabins, the boys put up tents in clearings in the woods. Instead of a dining hall, the troops received a cooking crate from the commissary each meal for the preparation of their own food. Instead of bathrooms, the scouts ran up single path trails to strategically placed pit-toilet latrines. Bathing was done in the lake. We shared the camp with mule deer, elk, black bears, and rattlesnakes. It was a wise idea to follow the Scout Motto to “Be Prepared” since you didn’t know what you would find behind the next tree or under the next bush.
Troop 23 brought ten kids and two adults 247 miles from Bellingham for a week of scout camping. In all my years of camping, this was the closest to what scout camp should look like, that is, boys covered in mosquito bites and legs torn from thorn bushes.
Quite out of the ordinary, we brought a senior scout who was trying to finish his Eagle rank. His name was Dave Blotto. He was two years older than Chuck and I and was given the job of keeping the younger scouts in order.
“All right Tenderfeet, line up at attention in front of the flagpole. Mitchell and Bland, raise the flag. . . Attention!”
Chuck, with his severely bent bugle, began playing Reveille. My mind immediately jumped to Corporal Randolf Agarn on F-Troop who would regularly get an arrow shot into the bell of his bugle, although the local tribe denied they would ever do such a disrespectful act.
As Bland and I raised the flag, the scouts began snickering. I thought I heard the scoutmaster mutter, “Oh brother!”
Looking up the flagpole, I noticed that pinned to the flag was a pair of very well used underpants. . . My underpants.
“Hey Mitchell, I got you,” Dave snickered.
You’d think an average guy would lower the flag and unpin his underwear, but that would require an extra-long rendition of Chuck’s Reveille, so we sent the underpants to the top of the pole to air for the day.
Big Dave Blotto was, by looks and definition, a hillbilly. He was a head taller and thirty pounds heavier than any of the rest of the boys. His pants were too short, and his toes peaked through his tennis shoes. The buttons on his shirt were stressed beyond the manufacturer’s recommended limits and his belly fat poked through the gaps between the buttons the way Pillsbury dough pushes out through the broken seal of its container. He rarely removed the felt, broad-brimmed black hat from his head, but he washed it every time he took a shower. Currently, the headband was stained gray from sweat.
I don’t think that he had anything against us, he just chose to be obnoxious so we would know who was boss. We were forced to put up with his pranks for the week, and his pranks did continue.
He swapped out the sugar and salt containers. This made for tasty eggs but awful coffee.
Strange coincidences also happened: plugs were removed from the row boats, and a large Sasquatch type beast suddenly appeared on the trail to the outhouse in the darkness of night and chased terrified scouts through the woods. After each encounter, with a cackling laugh we heard, “Gotcha!”
“This has gone far enough!” Chuck yelled as apple sauce dripped out of the bell of his bugle one morning during Reveille.
There was no question as to who had poured sauce into the instrument because he laughed uncontrollably from the base of the flagpole.
From that point on, the tables were to be turned on David Blotto. We waited for an opportunity.
It was decided, on a Thursday night, that Chuck and I and two other scouts would move our sleeping bags further out into the woods onto the archery trails. Unfortunately, big Dave insisted on joining us. Our reasoning for moving away from the rest of the troop was that we were planning a late-night raid on the commissary.
The commissary was the building where all the food was stored, and the mess kits were put together for each meal. Inside the building was a chest freezer which held boxes of ice cream bars. There was a bunk room attached to the storage area for the adult in charge of the commissary to sleep and guard the supplies. Strangely enough, the commissary must have never been raided before, because the main door was never locked.
We all took our sleeping bags out into the woods and laid them down on the trail. Big Dave, having had an unusually busy day of tormenting the boys, took off his hat, crawled in his sleeping bag, and fell asleep. This gave us the perfect opportunity to begin our raid, and the rest of us crept back through the woods to the commissary.
We crouched in the brush watching the building as the evening light grew darker. The lights inside had been turned off and the commissary supervisor had gone to bed.
Sneaking to the edge of the building, we listened for any movement inside but only heard the snore of the single occupant.
“Flashlights,” I whispered.
We each turned on our personal lights.
Chuck slowly turned the knob on the door. It wasn’t locked. A quarter inch at a time he pulled the door open, stopping each time the hinges squeaked. Once it was opened wide enough, we crept inside.
There was only one goal on our agenda, ice cream bars, so we slowly and quietly moved to the freezer. I tugged on the door which when opened turned on an interior light. Something we weren’t expecting. The snoring stopped and I heard a loud snort. I stuck my arm inside the door and depressed the light switch with my finger, shutting off the light.
“Cripes,” I spit out.
There was movement in the bed in the next room and the tinkling of liquid on the floor around our feet.
“Lights!” Chuck whispered. We each flipped off our light and waited in the darkness.
More rolling in the bed. All it would take to foil our evening would be for the man in the other room to stand up and flip on the commissary lights. The realization struck me that breaking, entering, and robbery added to our resumes was not going to help us get our Eagle ranks but of course, we were all now totally committed to completing the task.
Another roll in the bed and the snoring began again.
Letting my finger off the light switch, I found two boxes of the ice cream bars and I grabbed them both before quietly shutting the door. Holding up the two boxes of the ill-gotten booty, I pointed to the main door.
“Go!” I spoke.
“Roger,” Chuck whispered.
“Marty, it’s Marty, how many times?”
We began creeping back in the direction of the man-door. It was on the way back through the commissary shelves that we passed the dry goods. Chuck shined his light on the length of the shelves.
“Wait!” he whispered. We all froze.
He quietly crept to the shelf and grabbed a box of Chocolate Jello Instant Pudding.
“We need some milk,” he whispered to one of the boys, who crept to the milk cooler and carefully absconded with a half-gallon of 2%.
Getting out of the commissary was as terrifying as going in. There was the chance someone was passing by outside of the building and would catch us. Luckily, the snoring continued, and we all safely left the building and ran into the woods.
Once safely back at the sleeping bags, we found Big Dave snoring loudly, his hat lying on the ground next to his head. I broke open the ice cream bar boxes and we feasted ‘til we were sick. Chuck decided that before crawling into his sleeping bag he also needed to make his pudding, so he poured the powder in the container, added milk, and stirred it with a stick, leaving it to set up for the morning.
It was then thought to be in our best interests to move our sleeping bags back to the main camp to sleep the night.
It was 7:00 am, and the sleepy-eyed boys stood around the flagpole. Big Dave was nowhere in sight.
“Where is Blotto?” the Scout master asked.
“Must be sleeping in,” I answered.
“Blow Reveille, Chuck. Scouts . . . attention!”
It was an especially pleasant Reveille that day. The flag was nearly to the top of the pole when we heard a loud scream emanate from the depths of the forest.
“Sasquatch!” one of the boys yelled. And though that was as close to a Sasquatch that I have ever heard, what stumbled from the woods looked much worse.
Out into the clearing came big Dave. We shrieked from the horror of the sight. On his head he wore his black felt hat, but dripping down from the headband, running down his face, back, and all over his shirt was what looked to be Chocolate pudding.
“Gotcha,” Chuck smirked.
But the excitement didn’t end there. It was realized that the commissary had been raided. After a thorough search of the camp sites, the staff found Big Dave’s sleeping bag, the ice cream boxes and chocolate smeared sticks on the archery trail where he had spent the night by himself.
Paybacks are brutal.
Nine months later, Big Dave and I received our Eagle Scout ranks on the same night. The senior Scout Master called us both onto the platform: “I would like to introduce our new Eagle Scouts, Marty Mitchell, and our little puddin’ head, Dave Blotto.”
Faith Family Life Getting Older Growing Up Misadventures Music Patriotism Pets or Pests? Snips Tributes
I never wanted a horse. To the best of my knowledge, my mom, my brother and my sister never made mention of wanting one either, and yet we had a horse. He was an American Pony and his name was Starfire.
The old man who lived behind us when I was a growing up was fond of reminding me that I was two drams short of having an ounce of common sense. I imagine this all started when my best friend Chuck and I were camping in the woods behind his house.
Believe it or not, when I was 18, my muscles were well built in the chest and arms. This came from spending most of my free time swinging on rope swings with the other guys in the neighborhood. After a while, with long shaggy hair and a decent tan, my wife said I began to resemble Tarzan. And so, that is how I looked when I went to my first quarter of schooling at Northwest Nazarene College in Idaho. I just mention that so I can better mentor young men in the fine art of showing off.
Mrs. Darlene Valum lives at the same assisted living facility that my mom lived in. During my years at Bellingham High School she was the girls’ PE and Health teacher as well as the Cheerleader advisor. Today as I pass her in the hallway, I turn my head and hide my face in fear that she will recognize me even though I know that after 50 years the statute of limitations has lifted and there is no chance she could go back and change my grades.
“You need to get some new undergarments,” Cheryl commented as we walked through the Men’s department at Penney’s.
“These briefs will last another year. Don’t you never mind,” I shot back.
“They look like fishnet underwear. How long have you had them, ten years?” she asked, although she knew full well because she was probably the one who bought them.
The hallway in front of the nurse’s office at Alderwood Elementary School was lined with whimpering children and one moaning adult. The principal, Mr. Alan Thon, looked out of his office door and shook his head.
“Well, there are five less than yesterday,” he noted to the school secretary, Mrs. Lingbloom.
** As with all of my inspirational stories, I am writing from my Christian perspective. If this offends you, please return next week for a satire story.
As a Christian, two of the hardest things I have had to learn in my life are: 1) to stand with my hands held open and, 2) not be in control.
Matthew 6:25–27: Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?
I’ve got this hummingbird who hangs out at my feeder. His name is Larry. He has an oversized gut.
When he sits on the feeder, it tilts under his weight and the nectar drips out. I can’t understand how a hummer who uses so much energy to fly could get so fat. When he flies off the feeder, he skims across the lawn trying to gain altitude. I don’t know if his wheezing is what I am hearing or the beating of his wings.
Cheryl asked me, “What mix are you putting in the feeder?’
“One part water to four parts sugar.” I answered.
“Well, no wonder. The mix is supposed to be one part sugar with four parts water. You turned him into a sugar junkie.”
You know, I was thinking about it, and I don’t believe that I have ever seen a fat robin or any other fat birds. This is because God provides all they need, not what they want.
Matthew 6:28–30: And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith?
31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
In my life, my desire has been to be the controller of my destiny, the creator of amazing things, the self-made man. But what I have come to realize is that my life is a continuous series of gifts God gives and God takes away. An amazing list of gifts that He gives to show what He can do through me. He created me as a Jack of all trades and a master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one.
You see, in my life God has opened doors. I have misunderstood what He was doing and assumed that an open door was an opportunity which was forever, but almost every time God has said, “It is done. Now you are to move on.”
I say to him, “I’m not ready to leave yet.”
To which he answers, “To bad. It’s time.”
My response is, “Well what now?”
He always leads me to the next destination.
Let me walk you through my life. We will go back to when I first started believing that my destiny was exactly where I was and what I was doing at the time. These are examples of why I was confused.
I also went through a period in my life when I was sure that being an inventor was the way to make my place in the world. These things I applied for patents on:
Of course, I made a prototype but before trying to market it, I needed some advertising brochures. So, to get some advertising photos, I took my good buddy, John Zylstra with me up to Abbotsford airport. John did photo art for his exhibitions at shows and I needed his camera.
A week earlier, I had gone to the airport and had spoken with the owner of the helicopter and told him that I wanted to have some photos taken of me in my sling being suspended under his helicopter. We agreed on a price and set a date for the following Saturday.
When John and I showed up the next Saturday, the owner wasn’t there. Instead, there was another pilot there who said that he would be flying for the job.
There is a hook under the helicopter which opens with a solenoid when the pilot pushes a button on his cyclic. I clipped my strap into the hook and closed it. I then told the pilot that I had brought some chain and I wanted to chain the hook so it couldn’t open. His response was “No”. If I started swinging under the helicopter, he wanted to be able to drop me.
This should have been a warning to me, but I said, “Okay.”
I said. “I want you to hover me to eight feet so John can get underneath and photograph me in the sling under the helicopter.” I figured, what could go wrong at eight feet?
The pilot started the helicopter and I clipped myself into the bosun’s chair and pulled the strap to its full length out in front of the helicopter. As he lifted the helicopter off the ground, he rose until the strap was tight and he began lifting me into the air. Once I was eight feet up, I saw John beginning to take photos. Then I realized that the helicopter was moving, and we were moving faster, and the faster we moved, the higher he lifted me off the ground. Suddenly, he was flying 40 mph and climbing. He climbed the length of the Abbotsford runway and then he flew to pattern altitude – 800 feet.
Now, here is what happens when you are in a bosun’s chair under a helicopter flying 60 mph at 800 feet hanging by an unsecured hook. You begin worrying a bit.
The first thing that happened is that because my feet were hanging below me, the wind caught them and weathervaned me so that I was facing backwards. This is an uncomfortable feeling because if I drop from 800 feet going backwards, I am going to land on my back, which would hurt. If I dropped facing forward, I could possibly do a front roll and not get hurt.
I began looking for places that I might want to land if I fell. For instance, there was a ditch full of water. I could do a cannonball. It wouldn’t be pretty, but I would survive. I also noticed the top of fir trees, rows of raspberries, even the roof of a hanger . . . all possibilities.
I noticed a seagull that was flying the same direction as I was. (Although he was flying forward, and I was flying backwards). He looked at me and went, “AWK!”
I shrugged my shoulders and yelled, “I know, right?”
The pilot only went around the pattern once. As we flew past the control tower, I noticed the tower operator standing at the window watching me through his binoculars. I waved. I can’t imagine what he was screaming into his radio to the pilot.
As the helicopter lowered me to the ground, John was still shooting pictures. He ran up to me and asked, “Did you intend to do that?”
When the pilot got out of the helicopter, I ran up to him and screamed, “What were you thinking? I asked you to hover, at eight feet.”
“Yeh, sorry,” he said. “It kind of got away from me.”
As it turned out, he was a student pilot who was building his hours so he could get his license.
This verse came to me as I was flying through the Abbotsford skyline like Peter Pan:
Matthew 10:29–31: Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care. 30 And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. 31 So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.
The title of this story is: With Hands Held Open
Each of our lives are different, but for me I have found that God gives me my blessings, gifts, and encouragement. I believe that every good and creative thing in my life has been a gift from God.
Psalms 116:12,13 says: “So now, what can I ever give back to God to repay him for the blessings he’s poured out on me? I will lift up his cup of salvation and praise him extravagantly for all that he’s done for me.”
James 1:17 says: “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.”
But those blessings may only be for a time and then he removes them and moves me on. Why, I can only guess.
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 says:
There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
2 a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
3 a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
4 a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
6 a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
7 a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
8 a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.
I also know that I can misunderstand what I think God’s will is for my life, which is confusing.
James 4:13-15 says: “Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you don’t even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.’”
God loves us and has a wonderful plan for our lives. God blesses us and wants us to know that he is the giver of those blessings. The hope is that we will realize that the Father desires us to recognize his blessings and that we draw closer in relationship with Him as the loving God that he is.
Alistair Begg wrote: “You will never know Jesus Christ as a reality in your life until you know Him as a necessity.” As the giver of everything.
I think that it is best to keep my hands held open. To be able to receive what God has for me, and to be able to release it when it’s time to be taken away. It is always better that I do not hold tightly to anything that he is planning to remove because he will only tear it out of my hands. Who can fight against God?
Jeremiah 18:4 says: But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.
It is painful being reshaped into something better, but I keep going back to the song that started me in Gospel music. It was written by Andrae’ Crouch and was entitled, “Through it All.” I listened to it over and over. The chorus goes:
“Through it all, Through it all, I’ve learned to trust in Jesus, I’ve learned to trust in God. Through it all, Through it all, I’ve learned to depend upon his word.”
There is no way to learn of faith except through trials.
Lastly, a familiar story found in Job 1:6-21:
6 One day the angels came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them. 7 The Lord said to Satan, “Where have you come from?”
Satan answered the Lord, “From roaming throughout the earth, going back and forth on it.”
8 Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil.”
9 “Does Job fear God for nothing?” Satan replied. 10 “Have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he has? You have blessed the work of his hands, so that his flocks and herds are spread throughout the land. 11 But now stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face.”
12 The Lord said to Satan, “Very well, then, everything he has is in your power, but on the man himself do not lay a finger.”
Then Satan went out from the presence of the Lord.
13 One day when Job’s sons and daughters were feasting and drinking wine at the oldest brother’s house, 14 a messenger came to Job and said, “The oxen were plowing and the donkeys were grazing nearby, 15 and the Sabeans attacked and made off with them. They put the servants to the sword, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!”
16 While he was still speaking, another messenger came and said, “The fire of God fell from the heavens and burned up the sheep and the servants, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!”
17 While he was still speaking, another messenger came and said, “The Chaldeans formed three raiding parties and swept down on your camels and made off with them. They put the servants to the sword, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!”
18 While he was still speaking, yet another messenger came and said, “Your sons and daughters were feasting and drinking wine at the oldest brother’s house, 19 when suddenly a mighty wind swept in from the desert and struck the four corners of the house. It collapsed on them and they are dead, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!”
20: At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship. (Did he curse God? No, he worshiped. Did he question God? No, he worshiped.)
21 Then he said: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.”
I have found that as God removes me from one adventure, he places me in another because He is always in control.
Consider living before God with your hands held open.
** All scripture verses are from the New International Version Bible
Faith Family Life Getting Older Growing Up Misadventures Music Patriotism Pets or Pests? Snips Tributes
From the top of a tree, we clung to the remaining trunk which we could wrap our hands around.
Standing on branches below us which strained under our weight, we looked out over the forest treetops. We were at the same height as the giants. We were one of them.
I am standing out on the Meridian High School infield next to the pole vault pit. It is a multi-school track meet. The weather is absolutely atrocious. Quite possibly, this is the end of the world as we know it. Roars of thunder, flashes of lightning, sheets of rain followed by hail the size of marbles which are trying to destroy my umbrella, and yet, the track meet goes on.
“Don’t go off half-cocked!”
Have you ever wondered what that means?
Elwood K was the old man who lived in a small self-made home behind our house when I was growing up. I never had a grandpa after I was four so I adopted him. Everyone knew him as “Swede” which was interesting since the name is Scottish and English. He was known by the white Popeye cap he always wore. His house was full of them. Taking his lead, I wear a black Army Ranger cap which my house is also full of.
Swede was fond of four things: guns, Canadian Mist whiskey, both of which he had hidden all over his house, his yellow half ton Dodge Ram pickup and his mutt dog Digger Odell. Several times a week you could see his old Dodge driving ten miles under the speed limit using both sides of the road. Old Swede was returning from a trip to the liquor store to get his “medicine”. On the seat beside him would sit Digger, head and tongue hanging out the open window. Sometimes Digger was the designated passenger and sometimes he was the designated driver; it all depended on how Swede was feeling.
It was a time after the Vietnam War but before Operation Eagle Claw, a failed attempt by Delta Force to end the Iran hostage crisis. The years 1974 through 1978 when the average American thought the wars were over, but wars are never over. It was a time that at an undisclosed, seemingly insignificant spot in Washington I was trained to fly high risk helicopter missions and was considered by the US Government to have a license to kill. And though, some 40 years later I can now talk about it, it still haunts me of the death and destruction I caused.