Thoughts of Siouxland roots remain close during world travels
By Rev. Matthew C. Harrison | Posted: Tuesday, March 31, 2009It hits me more often as I press past life’s midpoint. I can hardly believe the journey life has taken, from Sioux City to Sri Lanka days after the tsunami, to East Africa, Sumatra, Central America, the Baltic, India and many other places.
I was sitting in a rural home not so long ago. We were discussing challenges in that place. ESPN (basketball) was on the TV. There were familiar Bible verses on “kitsch” plaster plaques hanging on walls. The small rural town is declining, children are moving to other places chasing jobs, commodity prices are in flux. Grandma slowly entered. “She’s rather upset. She’s had to give up her home and move in with us," I was told. It was all remarkably familiar, but for one thing. I was in a very remote village called Marsabit on the Kenyan-Ethiopian border. Like so many other journeys, the 17-hour-drive back to Nairobi through a barren and beautiful Kenyan desert (complete with three flat tires) provided long periods of silent reflection about where I was, and, moreover, where I’m from.
Were there space I could recount instance after instance where I have come face to face with the values I learned in my parents’ home on South Cornelia, a block from Glenn Avenue, or at Washington Grade School, East Junior and High Schools, or a hundred other places around Sioux land. Wherever I go, my thoughts are cast back to Sioux City. Walking through the Nairobi slums or standing on the Straits of Mozambique in Madagascar, or on a street corner in Chennai, I’ve suddenly found myself thinking, “I’m a Sioux City kid.” And I will always be thankful for it. It was in Sioux City that I learned the values of family, work, community, civic responsibility, and faith.
I regularly come face to face with people who at first glance would seem radically different from the average person from Northwest Iowa. In many ways they are very different. I work with organizations, which strive to give tangible expression to basic human values. I regularly see AIDS orphans scavenging garbage for a few cents' worth of plastic, or women making clothing, or disabled persons with little no medical or social assistance, striving to live honorable lives in the midst of grave suffering and disadvantage. And it’s not all a matter of giving, not by a long shot. I’ve received. I’ve been the recipient of tribal hospitality among Woodlands Cree in Ontario and Massai tribesmen on the edge of the Great Rift Valley in Kenya. In both the giving and getting I come face to face with the blessings of where I’m from. From Washington Elementary to Morningside College, the education received opened an endless world of challenge and opportunity. In the giving and receiving I see more clearly than ever what a blessing Sioux City was to me, and continues to be to so very many.
I had little inkling of what was being handed on to me as I detasseled seed corn, or “walked beans” in relatives’ fields near Sioux City. Little could I have realized the incomparable blessing of learning to work and find meaning in simple and honorable vocations. We made the weekly trek on Highway 20 east to Lawton, to that great oak table in my grandparents’ farm house for great helpings of Iowa’s finest rural produce, and rural intangibles, which have been the mainstay of life since. What I am is the result of family and community, distilled on century farms, passed on from immigrant great-grandparents. It all happened over time in a place called Sioux City.
I contemplate regularly, especially as they are now passing from this life, the countless decent and service-minded people who helped make possible for me, and my family, a life of joy, and joy in service. I could mention so many. Walt Fiegel (East High), exuded honor, purpose, decency and humor with every high-pitched bark on the football field. Farrel Hanson (Boy Scout Troop 208 at Morningside Presbyterian) taught us to respect others, to love our community and find joy in service. He had that magic ability to set firm boundaries for young men, and yet allow the freedom to grow and explore, and fail occasionally. I shall never forget that glorious grin which came over his face as he shook hands with each boy who advanced in rank, or earned another merit badge. Redeemer Lutheran gave me Christ and the faith that real religion involves service of neighbor. Jobs at Johnson Hardware, Morningside Country Club, and Missouri Valley Steel, all of them together with family, taught me something of a life worth living.
I’m proud to be from Sioux City, and more thankful for it every day. The further removed I am from Sioux City, the closer it comes to me.
Reverend Matthew C. Harrison (a 1980 graduate of East High School and a 1984 graduate of Morningside College) is the executive director of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod’s World Relief and Human Care, a multimillion-dollar domestic and international aid organization of the nation’s second largest Lutheran denomination. He and his wife Kathy (Schimm) and their two sons live in St. Louis. Harrison will preach at the Missouri Synod’s Easter Sunrise Service at 6 a.m. at Sioux City's Eppley Auditorium.
I was sitting in a rural home not so long ago. We were discussing challenges in that place. ESPN (basketball) was on the TV. There were familiar Bible verses on “kitsch” plaster plaques hanging on walls. The small rural town is declining, children are moving to other places chasing jobs, commodity prices are in flux. Grandma slowly entered. “She’s rather upset. She’s had to give up her home and move in with us," I was told. It was all remarkably familiar, but for one thing. I was in a very remote village called Marsabit on the Kenyan-Ethiopian border. Like so many other journeys, the 17-hour-drive back to Nairobi through a barren and beautiful Kenyan desert (complete with three flat tires) provided long periods of silent reflection about where I was, and, moreover, where I’m from.
Were there space I could recount instance after instance where I have come face to face with the values I learned in my parents’ home on South Cornelia, a block from Glenn Avenue, or at Washington Grade School, East Junior and High Schools, or a hundred other places around Sioux land. Wherever I go, my thoughts are cast back to Sioux City. Walking through the Nairobi slums or standing on the Straits of Mozambique in Madagascar, or on a street corner in Chennai, I’ve suddenly found myself thinking, “I’m a Sioux City kid.” And I will always be thankful for it. It was in Sioux City that I learned the values of family, work, community, civic responsibility, and faith.
I regularly come face to face with people who at first glance would seem radically different from the average person from Northwest Iowa. In many ways they are very different. I work with organizations, which strive to give tangible expression to basic human values. I regularly see AIDS orphans scavenging garbage for a few cents' worth of plastic, or women making clothing, or disabled persons with little no medical or social assistance, striving to live honorable lives in the midst of grave suffering and disadvantage. And it’s not all a matter of giving, not by a long shot. I’ve received. I’ve been the recipient of tribal hospitality among Woodlands Cree in Ontario and Massai tribesmen on the edge of the Great Rift Valley in Kenya. In both the giving and getting I come face to face with the blessings of where I’m from. From Washington Elementary to Morningside College, the education received opened an endless world of challenge and opportunity. In the giving and receiving I see more clearly than ever what a blessing Sioux City was to me, and continues to be to so very many.
I had little inkling of what was being handed on to me as I detasseled seed corn, or “walked beans” in relatives’ fields near Sioux City. Little could I have realized the incomparable blessing of learning to work and find meaning in simple and honorable vocations. We made the weekly trek on Highway 20 east to Lawton, to that great oak table in my grandparents’ farm house for great helpings of Iowa’s finest rural produce, and rural intangibles, which have been the mainstay of life since. What I am is the result of family and community, distilled on century farms, passed on from immigrant great-grandparents. It all happened over time in a place called Sioux City.
I contemplate regularly, especially as they are now passing from this life, the countless decent and service-minded people who helped make possible for me, and my family, a life of joy, and joy in service. I could mention so many. Walt Fiegel (East High), exuded honor, purpose, decency and humor with every high-pitched bark on the football field. Farrel Hanson (Boy Scout Troop 208 at Morningside Presbyterian) taught us to respect others, to love our community and find joy in service. He had that magic ability to set firm boundaries for young men, and yet allow the freedom to grow and explore, and fail occasionally. I shall never forget that glorious grin which came over his face as he shook hands with each boy who advanced in rank, or earned another merit badge. Redeemer Lutheran gave me Christ and the faith that real religion involves service of neighbor. Jobs at Johnson Hardware, Morningside Country Club, and Missouri Valley Steel, all of them together with family, taught me something of a life worth living.
I’m proud to be from Sioux City, and more thankful for it every day. The further removed I am from Sioux City, the closer it comes to me.
Reverend Matthew C. Harrison (a 1980 graduate of East High School and a 1984 graduate of Morningside College) is the executive director of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod’s World Relief and Human Care, a multimillion-dollar domestic and international aid organization of the nation’s second largest Lutheran denomination. He and his wife Kathy (Schimm) and their two sons live in St. Louis. Harrison will preach at the Missouri Synod’s Easter Sunrise Service at 6 a.m. at Sioux City's Eppley Auditorium.
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1 comments:
I had little inkling of what was being handed on to me as I detasseled seed corn, or “walked beans” in relatives’ fields near Sioux City.
I too detasseled seed corn and "walked beans" in Iowa. What a great way to learn about work and the theology of the cross.
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