"CELEBRATING SUSAN"

CELEBRATING SUSAN”

 

            This week brings our daughter Susan’s birthday, and I want to give thanks for her and for her life and witness and power in our lives and in the lives of so many.  So, today’s blog is dedicated to her!  She was born in Nashville, and she was ready to come out of Caroline’s womb.  Two hours after we arrived at Vanderbilt Hospital’s birthing room, Caroline said that she did not think that she could birth this baby without some drugs.  I went to get the nurse, and the nurse looked at the situation and said “No wonder you’re in distress – the head is crowning – hold on, Dr. Betty Neff wants to be here for this first birth in her solo practice!”  Somehow, Caroline held on, and out came baby Susan!

 

            We moved to Oakhurst Church and Decatur when Susan was six months old, so Decatur was her home until she left for college.  She was very shy as a young girl, and indeed the rumor spread in the church that she had some sort of impediment because she would not talk at church.  Her big brother, David, was incredulous and defended her, saying “She can talk – she talks all the time at home!”  Her verbal debut at the church came while Dr. Lawrence Bottoms and I were officiating at the wedding of Christine Johnson and Charlie Callier – she called out from the pew: “Da-da, Da-da!”  When people turned and looked at her, Caroline replied:  “Well, at least you know that she can talk!”

 

            It was perhaps the beginning of her drama career, which she continued to develop.  In the first grade, she was given the lead part of a young granddaughter in the elementary school play, and she had many lines to memorize.  We went to her wonderful teacher, Debbie Miller and expressed our concern for someone so young having so much to learn.  Ms. Miller replied:  “Are you kidding?  She not only has her own part down – she has memorized the entire play, everyone’s part – she gives cues to her fellow actors!”  So began her directorial career also.

 

            She joined Oakhurst as a member and became part of the youth group, and she began to move theatrically during one of our famous Christmas pageants.   Under Caroline’s leadership, we had begun to develop themes for the Advent season.  The theme that year was “Legends of Christmas,” and we had emphasized both plants and animals involved in the tradition.  Susan’s middle school group was asked to portray the plants, which they dutifully did.  After the pageant, Susan complained that having to act as a plant was boring.  Our reply was that if she thought that this year’s pageant was boring, maybe she and the youth should write the one for the next year.  She said:  “That sounds fine,” and it began a 25 year tradition of the youth writing and producing the Christmas pageant every year. 

 

            David went off to college after her first year in high school, and she thought that it would be great to get a bigger room and to have her big brother out of her hair for awhile.  What she didn’t reckon with was the fact that now both parents would be focusing on her rather than on her and David.  So, she got her driver’s license as soon as she could, and from then on, we would have “Susan sightings” at our house.  But, she used her time so wisely and creatively – with Lauren Gunderson, she co-founded “Life Is Sacred Campaign” seeking to limit the accessibility to guns.  For this work, they won the Metro Christian Council’s  Andrew Young Award for Faith and Public Policy and got to meet Andy Young himself.   By the time that she graduated from Decatur High, she won the AJC Cup, awarded to the most outstanding senior in each high school in the metro area.

 

            She received many scholarships for college, and we tried to get her to go to my alma mater Rhodes or to Guilford.  But, she had had enough of the South (it is always with us and in us) with its overt racism and sexism and general repressive approach to life.  She headed up to cold Minnesota for Macalester College, where she learned theater in a deep and powerful way and saw more snow in her four years there than she will probably see for the rest of her life!  But, she blossomed into a great human being!

 

            Since then, she has become our teacher on many levels.  She has vastly expanded our limited theatrical horizon, including her work in Americorps in Albuquerque where she was a drama teacher for developmentally disabled adults.  After getting her MFA in theater at Towson, she has settled in Baltimore, where she is a partner in an immersive theater company called “Submersive Productions.”  As an artist in America, she has to work other jobs to support herself, but fortunately she has found work in theater-related areas, teaching part-time in various colleges and working with drama teachers in high schools and middle schools.  She also joined Brown Memorial Presbyterian Church, and to no one’s surprise, she is now chairing their worship committee, as they seek more inclusive and welcoming worship for people of all cultures and backgrounds.  She sings in their choir too!

 

            I could obviously go on and on about our great daughter, but for now, it’s “Thank you, Susan,” and “Happy Birthday!”  You are such a powerful gift to us and to so many others!