El Roi: God Sees!

© 2016 Jaye Sawyer. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 02/25/2016

ISBN: 978-1-5049-7314-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5049-7336-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016900459

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Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved. [Biblica]

CONTENTS

Foreword

Preface

PART ONE

Chapter I Introduction

Chapter II On The Move

Chapter III Stuck In The Middle

Chapter IV Time Of Soaking

Chapter V Moving On Up

PART TWO

Chapter I Rude Awakenings

PART THREE

Chapter I Exposure To The 'Ropes' Of Ministry

Chapter II The 'Perils' Of Closed Groups.

Chapter III From My 'Egypt' To The Promised Land

PART FOUR

Chapter I The Good Shepherd House

Chapter II Kiwanis Shelter

Chapter III Paths That Opened To The Lbolem

Chapter IV Necessary For Completion

PART FIVE

Chapter I A Higher Calling (?)

Chapter II The Beat Goes On

Dedication:

This book is dedicated first to my mother who had the greatest influence on my life. Secondly, to my children whose constant questions about how I became who I am today. Thirdly, to the wonderful people who are members of the Polk County Retired Teachers Association, who helped with editing, and encouragement.  Finally, to all of the persons in Norwalk, mentioned and unmentioned in this autobiography that God used to allow them to prove that cerainly, El Roi!

Dreaming

Keeping dreams alive;

Does it mean sleep and never wake?

Keeping dreams alive;

how much can one take?

For dreams are shattered

as if they were not meant to be.

Just an illusion;

for when asleep you can only see.

Dreams are to be beautiful,

thought about and sought,

pondered and cherished,

grasped, until caught.

Gina M. Sawyer Hayes-Pollard

FOREWORD

The Rev. Dr. Jeanette Olmstead-Sawyer has never hesitated to step forward to offer her assistance when she sees that it is needed.

She has reached out and touched many lives, first as a teacher in the Norwalk school system and later as a minister.

When she was volunteering at the Norwalk soup kitchen, the Rev. Jaye realized that many of the people stopping by for meals also needed to speak to someone about spiritual matters. This prompted her to start the Living Bread of Life Evangelistic Ministries, a chapel and learning center aimed at putting the homeless back in touch with their faith while also helping them to regain their identity.

As a copyeditor and the editor of the Faith Page in The Hour, the daily newspaper in Norwalk, I would talk with the Rev. Jaye from time to time when she would stop by the office or call us with an idea we could develop into a story.

In 2001, the day arrived when I was to turn to the Rev. Jaye as a minister and not simply as a news source.

On the National Day of Prayer & Day of Remembrance, the Friday following 9/11, I knew I wanted to stop at a church before going to work. Although I was a churchgoer while growing up in the Midwest, I was not attending any church regularly at the time. As I drove to Norwalk, I decided to to go to the First Congregational Church on the Green because the Rev. Jaye was a minister there. When I arrived, the Rev. Henry Yordon, senior minister at the church, was speaking to the people gathered in the church sanctuary. The Rev. Jaye was working quietly nearby. Seeing her and listening to Yordon brought me the comfort I sought. I don't know if the Rev. Jaye even knew I was there. What was important to me was just being in her presence.

I now regret missing the opportunity to become one of her parishioners at the First Congregational Church on Green.

A few years later the Rev. Jaye was honored at a ceremony at Calvary Baptist Church after receiving her doctorate in ministry. I was in attendance and had to reach for a tissue to wipe away tears of joy. I felt honored to be sharing the occasion with her family and friends. I did not spend much time at the reception that followed because I wanted to go back to The Hour's newsroom to write the story and make sure that it was in the next day's edition of the newspaper.

Few people are going to be surprised that the Rev. Jaye has added the title of author to an already long resume. After all, she balanced her personal life as a wife and mother with her professional life as a teacher and as a minister so well that she also was able to find time to be elected to three terms on the Norwalk Common Council.

No wonder Richard Moccia, then Norwalk's mayor who described her as the voice of reason on the Common Council, made the comment at the the 2007 doctoral award ceremony that if the Rev. Jaye had decided to run for mayor, he could be in trouble.

Preface

Life for me has always been like a dream. I think of the words of a popular song during the '70's that the Harptones used to sing: Life is but a dream; it's what you make it. Always try to give, don't ever take it (Harptones: Life Is, But a Dream). I do not recall that I have ever thought of 'taking' it. 'Giving' has always been the center of my life's ambition, my dream. Therefore, coupled with those aforementioned lyrics.

My life seems to also mirror the thoughts found in Psalm 90:9: "We live our lives as a tale that is told." I wanted to tell my tale now, just in case, I die before I awake from this life, that has certainly seemed to be dream, filled with happiness, sadness, horror, disbelief, joy, vexation and grief. But through it all, and with it all, God has been good!

At first my tale appeared so difficult to begin, since my present memory of past events, conveniently, or inconveniently, often led me into areas wherein they became more like dreams that needed interpretations. I had the strange feeling that perhaps, just perhaps, my past mind was producing ideas that my now, more mature mind, was being flooded with so many experiences to draw upon. Experiences that were trying desperately to share the tales with the participants involved in all of the storytelling. However, this is the sharing of memories, wherein events and participants are difficult to separate.

Webster's Collegiate Dictionary defines memories as: Reproducing and identifying what has been learned or experienced; the time within which past events can be or are remembered. I prefer the latter part of the definition, wherein using the time frames of place and my own chronological age, I decided to attempt to reconstruct the events that ordinarily would have been forgotten.

I have to remind myself that this is the way memories or dreams are evoked. Some are best to be forgotten for the sanctity of the mind. I call these nightmares. Some of these rush to the forefront eagerly to be shared and flaunted. Like the photos in an album, some bring joy and the strong desire to linger on the page. They cause smiles and feeling of well-being. Remember, these are dreams and memories, wherein the dreamer may not want to disturb too abruptly, since the implantations may expose situations that have caused the character flaws that are now exhibited in one's life.

These dreams, these memories, are selective and can be very treacherous. They tease us in with smiling faces, beautiful scenery, or seductive music. However, we are the dream gate keepers; although there appears, at times, as if we have no control over the content. This is one of the times that these reflections can become nightmares.

For these reasons, since I have lived in Norwalk, from birth to late adult years, I count it a privilege to be able to watch the ever-changing landscape. I have coupled this with the memories of schooling to help with the framing. Not only was this a good device for me to test the occurrences of events that transpired in my earlier life, but it also allowed me the opportunities to understand the impact of the people, the place, as well as, the events.

As I stated earlier, there are family participants and others who have attached themselves to my life's dreaming. Some of the events will be mentioned, but not elaborated upon for obvious reasons mentioned. Actually my mind just refused to involve them, due to the pain or tremendous sorrow they might invoke. However, others will be relished for the joy they bring. In either case, some names have been changed, though they may resemble persons that had similar stories, because of the small size of the City at that time.

Regardless of how hard I struggled, I am certain that there will be those who will think that they are aware of who is being referred to due to the situations described. The main thing to remember is that this is an autobiography, which means that it is about me! Yet, I realize that many who really knew me, are the ones that helped mold me into who I am. Therefore, since You have been such a tremendous impact, large or small, in presenting Christ in my life, I will take this space to say, "Thank You!"

PART ONE

EYES WIDE OPEN SHUT

(film, Stanley Kubrick, 1999)

Do you have eyes, but fail to see, or ears, but fail to hear? And don't you remember (Mark 8:18).

Chapter I

Introduction

Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you; before you were born, I set you apart (Jeremiah 1:5).

The Formative Years

One of my grandsons, Elijah, asserts that he can recall his life in the womb. To me, that seems so unheard of, especially since I have difficulty reviving even the first two years or so of my existence! At this point in my memoire, much of what I relate to comes from what has been handed down to me by my mother. I do know that my older brother, George (Sockie) and I were the first siblings of the family, and that we were only ten months apart in age. Coupling this fact, with later learned biological knowledge about birthing, it became evident as to why, as a premature baby born two months ahead of time, I was tiny enough to fit into a one pound -size Jack Frost sugar box! Yet, it was also amazing to me, that in the early 1930s, there was enough medical information to support and assure life, with so many odds against a premature baby.

Nevertheless, again as a participant of this dream, I recall the words of David, the psalmist, which come to my mind: For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb (Ps. 139:13). Therefore, this prematurity was not by accident, wherein my grandmother, Janie, consented to remove me from the hands of these young, inexperienced parents. Nor was this action only due to the love that my grandmother had for me, that I was shipped off to live in Virginia for two years. Life during that period has been a complete blank page in my memory. We called her 'Mama' and my grandfather, 'Papa'. I can't even muster up a dream as to what the details of that life were like for me, no matter how frantically I try! However, I find it easy to speculate as to how I survived to tell this tale.

I determined later that Mama was about a fourth generation or so, African-American and a devote Christian. Therefore, she probably prayed much and left me in the hands of the Lord. I envision her earnestly praying and vowing as Hannah, the mother of Samuel promised the Lord, that if I were given life, my life would be dedicated to God's service. I am not ruling out the special southern cooking and the medicinal knowledge that her African heritage had afforded her. But, where there may be some dreaming about that, there is also the strong point forward in remembering, dreaming, wherein my path seemed to be one of being called, ordained, and predestined. Although these words are now blending in meaning for me, they later make up the script that produces the dream. They drive the purpose of my existence.

Was it any wonder that by the time that I returned to my parents in Connecticut, they could not believe that I was that same prematurely-born, Jack Frost box-sized child? Glory to God in the highest! God was already beginning the work of doing great things in my life!

Ann Street.... First address of fear and sorrow

Earlier, I mentioned the surprise concerning the medical status for treatment of premature infants. This was emphasized when Alphie, my younger brother by one year, had his adenoids removed. Again, my recollection of this whole sequence is foggy, at best. But, the hushed whispering, the sobbing and crying in the kitchen on Ann Street, all seemed to invade my dreams. Ann Street, however, became the scene of many ventures for other years.

The darkness of the Raymond's Funeral room on South Main Street, which is now, Baker's Funeral Home, brought back the crying, clothing fear in my mind. Fear; perhaps because of the misunderstanding of the scene, have affected me even in my mature years. However it has all turned into a learning lesson for me as my life has unfolded. Again, the psalmist David says, "Even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is light to you" (Ps. 139:12).

That thought has sustained me even now, whenever I am confronted by problems or situations that seem to be too difficult, with no light at the end of the tunnel of darkness. The darkness will soon be over. I would find myself repeating my childhood prayer that Mama taught me before going to sleep, Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul will keep. And if I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul will take (Children's Prayer). Lord, do not let me die during this dream of darkness. But, if I do, please take my soul to be with you; and the darkness will be over. "For the night shines like the day with you" (Psalm 139:12b).

Onto Water Street

"Let both (the wheat and the tares) grow together until the harvest" (Matthew 13:30).

Part of most of what I learned in this life can be summed up in that pronouncement. The bulk of my experiences, much of what I did not appreciate until my latter years, came as they do for most of us, from what my eyes and ears witnessed and their impact on the dreams and/or nightmares that followed.

My father, George, Sr., played the piano in so many places in the town of Norwalk, as well as surrounding areas, as far as New York City. He was one of those gifted musicians who had no need for the printed page of music, for he had what one called, a good ear. His favorite haunt was the Silent Four, a 'speak easy' on Water Street, where quite a few of the famous musicians and actors would frequent after their sessions in New York City.

For the most part, as far as religion was concerned, my father never played in a