On Texas, Mom, and the Nazarenes
Posted July 13, 2006
My mom, Jeannie Lockwood, was born in French Camp, Calif. on July 13, 1944, but she spent most of her early years in the housing projects of El Paso, Texas. It was a miserable childhood. Jeannie's parents worked sporadically, but fought constantly. My grandparents, Doug and Alma Clifton, battled mental illness and each other all of their lives.
For a time, mom lived in an orphanage. She also had polio, which ravaged her right arm. She struggled in a sea of misery, but she had a few things working in her favor. She was smart and hard working and stubborn. She also had an adopted family -- a Church of the Nazarene congregation in El Paso. A woman from the church would come to the housing project each Saturday and teach the kids a Bible lesson, using cut out felt-board pictures of Jesus to illustrate the gospel stories. On Sundays, the woman would round up the kids in my mom's neighborhood and take them to church, providing them with dinner after the service was over.
In the summers the congregation would send my mom to church camp, allowing her to escape the inner city.
The Nazarenes provided stability and hope for my mother. El Paso First Church of the Nazarene was an oasis, a community, which enabled her to dream. Her goal was to get out of the projects and into a college as quickly as possible -- and she did.
Jeannie graduated from high school at age 16 and from North Texas State University in Denton when she was 19 years old. She left Texas soon thereafter and found a better life in Oregon, teaching adults who were working to earn their General Equivalency Diploma.
Mom never lost her passion for the Lone Star State, but she loved it from a distance. The last 30 years of her life, she only visited the state one time -- riding a Greyhound bus 1,500 miles from Oregon to El Paso in 1988 to see her father. It was a wasted trip. Douglas, unable to face the daughter he had mistreated for so many decades, refused to open his door or answer his phone while she was in town. So she climbed back on the Greyhound and headed home.
Over the years, my mom had prayed a thousand times for her dad -- too stubborn to abandon him to whatever spiritual fate awaited him. Before emphysema claimed him in 1990, Douglas finally called his daughter on the phone and asked her to lead him to the God of the Nazarenes.
Today would've been my mom's 62d birthday and I'm in Fort Worth taking a theology class at Texas Christian University. Someday, I hope to travel to El Paso, 600 miles west of here, to visit the church she loved so much.
COMMENTS:
AUTHOR: Don Walter
EMAIL: dwalter@nazarene.org
URL: http://www.pbusa.org
DATE: 08/21/2006 12:04:37 PM
Mr. Lockwood,
Thanks for the story about your mother. As a Nazarene, it was encouraging to be reminded that our regular, faithful service makes a difference.
May the Peace of the Lord be with you.
Don Walter