A (Religiously) Mixed Couple

David and I met Sandy and Harvey in the living room of their home in Caledonia, a suburb north of Racine.  Their home is on a wooded lot with an inviting, neat front yard. As we arrive we meet Sandy on the front stoop sweeping away the rapidly falling fall foliage, colorful leaves, off the walk.  The large living room has a comfortable couches and chairs and a reclining bicycle exercise machine.  On the walls are a variety of artwork including some black and white photographs of San Francisco from the early 1900’s.  Harvey is sitting in his powered wheelchair, Sandy in a corner cushioned chair with ottoman behind him to the right.  Over Harvey’s shoulder is a photo of Ocean Beach, with the Cliff House in the background, and the bathers in their fine Victorian black dresses.

Harvey and Sandy in their Living Room

Harvey and Sandy have been married for over twenty years.  Pastor Jerry, our Evangelical Christian friend arranged for our conversation with them over email and introduced them to us as a “mixed” couple -- meaning mixed in their religious beliefs.

Harvey's Background Story

Growing up in the 50’s - Wisconsin and visits to the South

Harvey is an only child raised in the Racine area.  His mother was was one of 13 children raised in Appalachia SE Virginia. His father was born in Wisconsin to Danish immigrants.  His parents were working class, and in the 50’s he recalls it being “kind of unusual to have both parents working;” his blue collar father in a number of industrial factories and his mother as a secretary.  Harvey recalls, When his family would visit his mother’s family every year in Virginia.  “The racial attitudes at the time, as you guys know, were pretty despicable,” Harvey recalls. “I discovered that my dad was probably a racist and my mom was probably, but they were closet racists, they weren’t obvious about it.”  Annually they would vacation in the Carolinas and “I would see white-only wash rooms and drinking fountains and that would impact me quite a bit.”  Harvey recalls an incident his mom would tell about “walking along a sidewalk in Baltimore.  A black woman was walking toward her the other way.  They ran smack dab into each other.”  His mom told the story recalling her shock, “because [she] fully expected the black woman to step down into the gutter.”  Harvey continues, “I had lots of black friends growing up. My family thought it was so unique.  They used to laugh at pictures of me at track meets rolling around on the ground with my black friends.”

College in Madison in the late 60’s

American Experience Film About UW-Madison Vietnam Protests in 1967

Harvey attended UW-Madison. “I was totally against the war.”  He was ready to go to Canada but “luckily I drafted 328, so I did not have to worry.”  When we arrived, Harvey was describing a documentary, "Two Days in October," he had recently watched which chronicled the  unrest in Madison in 1967 between the police, administration and students. “The cops were basically working class people.  We thought at the time that they hated us to death.  Now listening to the interviews a police officer who was beating the hell out of students.  We didn’t know how much they hated us.”  He continues reflecting on our reading about some Wisconsinites’ resentment toward Madison, “I think things have become slightly less polarized in Madison proper [since the 60’s] but I know that the conservatives look at Madison and how some of them will never visit there because they look at it as too liberal.”

Religion, Beliefs and having too much fun in the 70’s

Harvey: I went to a Lutheran Church [growing up].  I was in Lutheran League.  When I got away from Racine [however] I got very disillusioned with the hypocrisy of the people with whom I was associating with in that church. From about 1969 until I met [Sandy] in 1987 I did not go to church.

Peter: Harvey, what was your relationship with God before you met Sandy?

Harvey: Not much.  I know He was there. We talked once in awhile.  But not very close. I had all sorts of other things going on. I was married in 1974. I got divorced four years later. I was a free man, on the east side of Milwaukee, which was marvelous. I was having too much fun being a musician, a coach...I loved the social life.  And I was just too busy.

Career: Teaching, Coaching Track, IT and Music 

Harvey taught middle school and coached High School track for 37 years.  Sandy adds proudly, “They won three [State] Championships. And [the high school] named the field for him.  He was a very successful coach.”  We learn Harvey is an avid photographer. And Sandy adds that Harvey became the “computer guy for the last six or seven years of working for the school.” She adds in evidence of his “geek” credentials, “He has October 27 for the iPhone X all set to order it at 12:01 am”  Harvey corrects, “2:01am I will be ordering it. It’s 12 California time.”

Standing next to us in the living room is Harvey’s banjo.  He plays in at least one band with a group of friends.

Sandy Background Story 

Sandy was born in an affluent suburb of Minneapolis.  Her parents were both college educated and teachers although her father concluded “there was no money in teaching” and became “a successful businessman.”  She started at Hamline College in St. Paul but then transferred to Colorado State to follow the man who became her first husband. They loved Colorado and thought they would return some day.  They had two boys. One is now a real estate developer outside Chicago and the other is an architect outside of Asheville, North Carolina.  She has eight grandkids.

“My first husband developed schizophrenia and took his own life when I was 29.” Sandy was living in Illinois at the time. She moved to Racine because her sister was living there and she easily found a teaching job and joined a church.

Opposites attract, and a loving marriage results

In 1987 Harvey and Sandy met.  “So I met this woman playing volleyball and I discovered that she was very conservative but I loved the way that she looked and we had fun together.” Harvey recounts.  “So she got me going to a very, born again church.” They each recount how they had “terrible disagreements” (Sandy) (“enormous” Harvey adds) as their religious beliefs and personalities collided.  They enjoyed each other's intellect and friends, “Some of her best friends are as liberal as I am,” Harvey points out.

First shared church and Wedding

Harvey joined Sandy’s church.  “Well it was a little legalistic.” Sandy say, in explaining why it eventually didn’t work for them.

Peter: What does Legalistic mean?

Sandy: I would say adhering to a lot of the rules, whether they are biblical rules, not commandment type rules, but more the [rules] that humans have laid on.  The Bible message is pretty simple and yet people through different religious denominations, I think Catholicism is an example, have layered on all kinds of things that are not biblical. [They think] you can’t be given salvation as a free gift you got to be working, you got to be doing these other things you know, you got to be listening to this kind of music...there are just so many layers of rules some of them are you know, up here (pointing to head?) but you can tell when you go into the environment [of] the church I was going to during the 80’s and 90’s.

Harvey: The pastor did not believe in man or woman could be a Christian unless they were a teetotaler.

Sandy: And that is not biblical.

Harvey: After we were married we had a reception and he said, “Harvey, if I had known there would be alcohol at the reception I would not have married you."

Sandy: I didn’t know they had that conversation.  So you can see that kind of stuff. But the people I hung out with were not like that.  [The rules] went in tandem with a solid Christian faith too.  It was ironic and disappointing, but when you are in that environment you are a prisoner.

Together they Found Grace Church

Sandy’s sister attended (Pastor Jerry’s) Grace Church and Jerry’s wife, Jane (See Blog An Afternoon with Pastor Jerry and Jane) substitute taught at Sandy’s school. “I got to know her and learn a little about [Grace], she never pushed me,” explains Sandy.

Harvey: I had known Jerry for 20 years.  His daughter had gone out for girls track at my high school.  He was affable. There was not an air of legalism about him.  So I carefully dipped my toes in that water, that Holy Water.

Marital Roles

Sandy explains, “He’s way more romantic and all that ‘what are you going to do for our anniversary?’ And I’d say, ‘oh yeah.’”  They recall “one of the Christian bible studies” about healthy marriage:  “It was so stereotypical, Women do this and men do this and we were so reversed and it was so annoying to me.”  At another point she describes for us, “He has always been a talker. Kind of like the reverse of most couples. I’d come home from work and he’d just want to be talking and I’d say ‘Give me an hour here, I’ve been talking all day.’”  And she adds, Harvey is one of those types of people who would say, “‘So let’s say we won the lottery’... ‘if we won the lottery’ and I say, ‘would you stop with that?!’  He’d dream, ‘I would really like to get a house in dat dat dat.’”

Asheville, NC

Asheville, NC -- Madison in the Mountains

Sandy and Harvey both describe how they love visiting Asheville, NC, where they are heading for a several week vacation later in the Fall.

Peter: What do you enjoy about Asheville?

Harvey: It is Berkeley or Madison in the mountains.

Sandy: He sees that, I see other things.  But we [go] because we are very different and we both find things that we enjoy.  I see beauty, I see my grandkids who live there. The whole south has a religious undertone to it.  Asheville is probably atypical for the area, it’s way more mixed, and I enjoy mixed, that’s fine with me.  I’m strong enough in who I am that I don’t have a problem with variety in things.  They have a Baptist church on every other street. Wonderful art.  Sheer beauty; beautiful nature.  Because he likes it I like it too.

PLS, God and the hereafter

Six or so years ago Harvey started limping.  At the time he was riding 6000 miles a year on his bicycle.  It turned out he had PLS, Primary Lateral Sclerosis, a progressive neurological disease on the ALS spectrum which Sandy says, “is not fatal and it is way more slowly progressing.”  But as Harvey describes, the last few years have been more than just the PLS and being forced to a wheelchair.  

Two years ago Harvey “get[s] hit with open heart surgery.”  “Earlier this year,” Harvey continues, I was diagnosed with prostate cancer. And the PLS did not like me being put under.  I was stiff as a board in the hospital for ten days.  While I was there they thought I should have a swallow study done.  Well it turns out that [now] I aspirate when I swallow.  And after all that time I am still aspirating.  That will likely mean that I’m drinking thickened liquids for the rest of my life.  I love craft beer. I put myself in another place when I’m drinking a craft beer. After my swallow study I went to see my occupational therapist and I broke down and bawled for about 20 minutes.  After all this time I have been stoic and strong and cheerful.  Now the last thing I’m dealing with is I was visiting my speech therapist and she said, “let’s talk about quality of life.”  She proceeded to tell him that he could be kept alive with tubes but people who want a better, tube-free quality of life will take chances with developing pneumonia.

Sandy: That’s what they are afraid of; aspiration pneumonia.

Harvey: You know I don’t want to die, but the taste of the [thickened] water is awful.  So I am on the edge right now.  It is like the final chapter.  Everything else was out of my control. This last thing is in my control.  The more active I am with walking on that thing (he points to the exercise machine), lifting weights, the less chance I will have with the aspiration.  Most of the people who develop [pneumonia] are pretty immobile.  I’m still out and about.  

Sandy adds, “So you are getting us at the beginning of a different stage.  The voice wasn’t an issue until a few months back.”

Harvey’s strained relationship with God

“So I have been pissed off at God a lot in the past six years.” Harvey summarizes.  “But we are still  on speaking terms.” Later he adds, “So I am puzzled how a loving God can let something like this happen to one of his children. So I am questioning a lot more than I did prior to this.  It makes no sense. Why?”

This leads Sandy to reflect--

Sandy: And the hard part is that anyone who has a significant crises or whatever in their life ...can they still have faith despite the fact that He has allowed this to happen?  This is a sign of the need to, in my belief system, connect more with God because you are so much more in need of having that support. You know we’re not going to know the “why now,” the “why this.”

She gives a couple of examples of inexplicable deaths: recently that of a friend's grandchild who was thrown from a horse in Mexico and that of her first husband’s suicide.  “Why that?” she asks.

I just put it in a box and put it on the top of the shelf and I think that someday I hope that I’ll have an answer to that but even if I can’t I’ll be okay.  I know that things are true and asking “why” is understandable but if you stay there you stew in your juices, with very little benefit.

Harvey “doesn’t,” she acknowledges, “mostly because he has a glass-half-full personality.  His doctors think of him almost like the poster child of how you have a disease like this.  Because we like to travel, we go out to eat we do a lot of things, we’re going to Asheville for a few weeks next month; we just went to Traverse City Michigan, which is a beautiful area. He’s been an inspiration to people and people have said that to him.”

Despite it all, a Happy Guy

Harvey: Basically, with all this shit that’s going on I’m a happy guy!

Sandy: Yes, look at this goofy sweatshirt. You know what that is? The mascot of the for Xavier College, our oldest grandkid's school.

Harvey: But the only reason I’m able to have fun and laugh at things is because of my family, her and especially I have such a great support base with my friends. Yeah, and God is in there.  But there are, I call it the three “F’s:” Faith, Family and Friends.

Questions...but not about Faith

Sandy points out, “[Harvey] has a lot of questions.

At the end of a sermon sometimes he will pick out, not the main thrust or theme or whatever, he’ll be focusing on this little thing over here. And he just keeps burrowing in over here, and I won’t say wasting his time, but diverting so much of what can be gotten because he’s focusing on something he doesn’t understand.

Sandy: I get to the point where some things I don’t understand.  [I believe] at some time it will be revealed to me.  Or it won’t.  But I’m willing even if it is not revealed to me there is a truth there.  Maybe I don’t have that truth yet, but… sometimes the truth is super simple and other times it is very complicated.  Oh, it’s just huge.  Sometimes I have a clear understanding and sometimes I’m just confused.  But it is never about that basis; faith. It’s never about that.  I don’t have any confusion about that.  But I think [Harvey’s] confusion is pretty much all the way through.

Harvey:  It is interesting not just with sermons but I would go to track conferences and the presenting coach would speak on and on...and I would ask “why are you doing this?” When I listen I’m able to pick out little things and asks “why did he say that?”  I can listen to the overall message but I want to know.  I’m a trouble shooter, and [Sandy] is not a trouble shooter.

Peter: But she has the benefit of that foundation, faith, that she never has to ask questions about.  And you don’t have that benefit.

Harvey: It’s part of my personality.  I always ask.

Sandy: Yeah, but are there some things that you have faith in?

Harvey: yeah.

Sandy: So you’re not constantly questioning everything?

After life 

Peter: What’s after the end of our lives? 

Harvey: My consciousness goes somewhere, heaven? Wherever heaven is.  I’m a problem solver.  If I have a problem I get in up to my elbows to try and figure out why. So as far as heaven and the afterlife is concerned I try to dissect it and make sense of it, see if I have faith in God. And when I leave this earth I will go to heaven whatever that is. But I ask a lot of questions. 

Peter: Are you [Sandy] confident Harvey is going to end up where you are going to end up?

Sandy: Good question.  Um. No. Based on what he just said.  I hope by the time his life is at an end ...he will be in that place.
 

Prayer - the mundane and the sublime

We talk about prayer and Bible study.  Harvey is giving another example of how he notices the little things and looks for “hypocrisy.”

Harvey: I was at our bible study and someone said, “I prayed for the Packers to win.” I went, “Why?  What about the other team?  Would you pray for them to miserable?”  I said, “I’ve never pray[ed] in my life for someone to win.  I’ve always prayed for them to do the best they can.”  That is part of picking up the little things.

Peter: Are you popular in your bible study?

Harvey: They love me. (laugh)

Sandy: Actually, the more sick he’s become, the more they love him.  It’s the truth. Because before he would talk a lot more and they would be... it would be kind of annoying sometimes.  But now you’re going through some really significant things their compassion comes forward, and they are caring, and so that softens some of the views.

Peter: Do you feel the power of the prayers of the people around you … those people in the Bible study?

Harvey: Yes.

Peter: How do you feel that?

Harvey: Sometimes I question the power of prayer.  I love the fact that I have Catholics praying for me.  I have Unitarians praying for me.  One night in our Bible study they were talking about a mission trip, and they were having trouble with a truck; the thing needed to haul some things up a hill.  But of course it wasn’t working and they prayed to God.  Miraculously the truck made it up the hill.  They said that was an answer to prayer. I said “Stop!”  You don’t understand that when you talk about trivial things, like that, among friends, how that impacts the ones like me, who have people praying for them all the time.  I pray all of the time that something good will happen and it doesn’t.  So that can make me feel like it was just a coincidence, that the truck made it up the hill. What the Hell. Harvey can’t walk, he can’t talk; all of this stuff.

God can say “No”

Sandy: Harvey, do you accept that God may say “no.” or “not now.”  When God says “no” or “not now” it is a tough thing.

Harvey: ...and that came up.  And I said if it was just one thing, I could accept “no.” But when I keep getting hit left and right...
Sandy: You are! But He’s bigger than what this is.  Bigger than what your issues are. Sometimes you get so distracted by the humanity of the messenger, of the people...he (Harvey) just gets so focused on that, and gets so concerned. He focuses so much on that that he...has a lot of problems with having a Christian faith because of that.  So, that is going to keep him from being able to believe. And he’s stuck.  He’s stuck with that. For whatever reason, God is saying “no.” And that is a tough thing.  It’s tough for you, and it is tough for me too.  I’m more and more a caregiver.

After a pause Sandy adds, “I can see why he is upset. God can handle all of that, but [Harvey] is not availing himself of all of the that.”

Harvey responds, “If it weren’t for God I would be standing on the edge of a wall contemplating jumping off. And I’m not. So right now, I’m a little pissed off at God but [eventually] we will be friends again. But not right now. I’m living with a lot of crap.”

Climate Change

Peter: I wanted to go back to Climate Change, Global Warming.

Sandy: I think it is real, based on what I am seeing in general, the scientific information, and what the meteorologists say.  I have no reason to doubt it.  I just don’t understand why Christians doubt this. Is it because it is science? For me science and God are, at some point, going to be the same. That truth will prove itself, to be true. And climate change is, or is not going to be, in contradiction with that.  I don’t get it. Sometimes they (Christians) believe it (is true) because all of these other Christians are saying it. Otherwise it is not Christian. It is viewed in the Christian circles as not being Christian to say that there is climate change.  It's like unquestioning.  You are not a good Christian if you believe in climate change.

Harvey: The vast number of Christians don’t listen to any other viewpoint.  And when it is reinforced on a daily basis, you are not going to trust anything else.

Sandy: I think some of the people who you will be interviewing are intelligent people, and yet they are going to be saying some very hard things.  And you are going to be asking how can someone be thinking this without questioning it?  It’s just this rote belief, and you believe the Bible but that is a “Faith” thing and this is a “What” thing.  It is somehow being connected to faith.  And I don’t get that. 

She also said that God was strong enough to deal with science and the facts.  She wondered why others did not trust God to be capable of dealing with it.

Advice for a divided nation

After listening to them talk about a twenty seven year loving and respectful marriage overcoming different views, I ask Sandy and Harvey if they had anything to share with the rest of our divided society.

Sandy said she recognized Americans have moved into their “Tribal” corners.

Harvey claimed, “[Sandy] is more liberal now, more toward the center than she was when she first met me.

Peter: Do you take credit for that?

Harvey: (smiling) Absolutely.

Confident in yourself and what you believe

Sandy: I think we’ve not only come to respect the other’s point of view but come to accept some aspects of the others point of view into who we are.  She continued, I think you have to be comfortable with who you are, and what you believe, and not feeling threatened.  I think when you are not quite sure what you believe you get threatened,  you build up defenses, and you take generalized things and apply them.  Yeah, you've got to be comfortable with yourself.  

Referring to Harvey she adds,  “It’s not like ‘you’re not going to change me.’ It’s not like that. It’s gradual.”

Listening and civil discourse

Harvey says, “I think you need to listen and find common ground which I have.”

Sandy: And we have agreed to not go there. One of the shows we like to watch in the morning is “Morning Joe.”  They have civil discourse with a variety of people.  They’re turning out to be too much about what it wrong with Trump, because he is every other minute tweeting something.  So I think they are focusing too much on that, but it is still the most literate political conversation.  So we can watch that together we can disagree sometimes and say, “We’ll just disagree.  We’ll just leave it.”

Trust

Harvey: So, how we face things is trust.  We trust each other.  I don’t know how you get people out of their tribes.  I’ll watch MSNBC and I’ll go over and watch Fox for a while just to find out what is going on. Most of the extremely polarized people will never, ever, look at the other side.

Voted for Hillary

Sandy: And we’ll bring up things we’ve heard during the day.  And we’ll often disagree. … I’m thinking a ¼ of the time we’ll agree. The other times we don’t.

Harvey: the one thing about her is she did not vote Republican.

Sandy: For the first time in my life.

Harvey: She voted for Hillary Clinton.

Are these the end days? 

The conversation has now grown dark.  Harvey is reflecting on the social divisions of the late 60’s and believes today is worse.  “It’s tough to find a solution.  I don’t know if there is one.  You (Sandy) have talked of the the demise of our country. She has said that this is the beginning of the end.”

Peter: [Sandy] tell us more about that, what does it mean.

Sandy: Well, I think you know that you’re talking about the end days.  There are so many different signs that are there, with the incredible climate change, the chaos from all the different things that have gone on with nature.  It seems like what is in America is part of the end days. It seems like we’re disintegrating, and the tribalization is part of that.  Having an erratic leader doesn’t help.  It ads to (the problems that) we have.  Yes, I think that our best days are over. I don’t want to see it and don’t want to give in -- I will do things in the community.  It’s a depressing thought but the proof is every day, when you see what is happening.  It will become more so, lot less.

Harvey: Of course, if I was a black in the south in the first sixty percent of the 20th century I would have to say... I’m sure people thought the US needed the social unrest, and it was the end of times.  I don’t know if it is [now], however, I see a situation where it will take a long time, generations perhaps, if we ever get back to trusting each other.

If you had a wand and one wish

We conclude our ninety minute conversation by asking each Sandy and Harvey, “If you had a magic wand and could wave it to change one thing to make things better, for you, the city, country, world...what would you do?”

Sandy comments that this is the type of hypothetical question Harvey loves.  So, while he is thinking she jumps in to answer.

Sandy:  I would like to see something that has to do with God. With God being revealed for who he is. For everyone.  People have blinders and [have been] taught misinformation, and what is now would be gone, and the truth of all would be there for people to see.  Because everyone would embrace that.  Because they wouldn’t have any reason not to.

Harvey:  People would lower their defenses and listen to the truths from the other side I think we would be much better off.

  

Thickened Wine

We wrapped up our conversation.  Dave and Sandy walked out to the RV for a tour and to retrieve our present to them of a bottle of California wine.  We expressed concern that it might not taste very good thickened.  But Harvey graciously said that, "No, we would enjoy it very much."  We shared heartfelt gratitude.

-- Peter