“Maybe it's Cincinnati,” she said.
“No,” I said, “It's not
Cincinnati.” It was Cincinnati.
When I meet people I like to guess
where they're from based on their accents. Wisconsin, Chicago or
Michigan? I never miss. Once I
detected that our English motor coach driver came from Manchester. A
certain well-known choral director from the Western side of Traverse
City thought I had set it up by slipping the bloke a fiver.
Yesterday I met a woman with a mysterious
accent. I thought I heard Philadelphia or South Jersey. It
clearly wasn't New York City. Boston maybe, or even the Maritimes in
Canada. She was confident I would never get it right. “I will
tell you befoah you leave,” she said. That “oah”
instead of “r” interested me. But I had to surrender. With a
broad smile she explained: “I was classified deaf as a child. So I
have some of the pronunciations usual for the deaf.” (She pointed
to the industrial-strength hearing aids in her ears.) “My parents
were Jewish refugees from Germany. They did not speak English. I
learned it from a German lady who had gotten her English in England.
But I grew up in Cincinnati and I still call it home.”
Well no wonder. Normally I can spot a
Cincinnatian a mile away. It's the distinctive “ou” for “o”
and the sprinkling of Dixie. But how could I expect to identify the
accent of a nearly-deaf woman taught English by a German who had
learned the language in England?
She calls Cincinnati her home. We met
in our church kitchen because she had brought food for a bunch of
people who have no homes. Our congregation takes its turn housing
the homeless this week. They come from all over. The other morning
I drove two of them into town. The tall one, called Tree, came north
from Florida two weeks ago. Why, I asked. “Because my real dad
kicked me out and my step-dad won't let me stay with him and my mom.
I have anger issues,” he said. (I had detected his north Florida
accent.)
Friends sometimes ask whether I think
of northern Michigan as home. We have lived here 16 years, the
longest I have stayed in one place my whole life. But I have no
answer. I have two homes: here and Indiana, where I (mostly) grew up
and where my family (mostly) lives. The people staying at our church
this week have no choices.
One young homeless guest went ballistic at check-in. The man staffing the homeless program for a
community agency kicked him out for the week. We are basking in
temperatures between zero and 35, with at least a little snow each
day. Our church is three miles from town. This young man, after
screaming at us for a while, began the long walk. It happened just
as I prepared to go home. I passed him walking, leaning forward into
the wind. It felt totally wrong. So I circled around and caught up
to him again. I told him I was from the church and could I give him
a ride into town? He got in, a puppy whipped by his loss of a place
to sleep and the harsh weather.
He actually meant to walk to a homeless
shelter about eight miles away. I knew there
was no room in that inn. I asked if he had anyplace else to
go. Yes, he said, he had a cousin who would take him in for one
night, no more. I took him to that house, and they took him in for
the one night.
Lord, how did I get so blessed as to
have been born to people who loved each other, and me, and who worked
to build a family and a life, and who gave me a solid foundation?
Thank you.
