Shield the joyous from those whom they disturb

[Louie Crew <lcrew@andromeda.rutgers.edu>]

Ernest and I met when he stepped off the elevator on the sixth floor of the
Atlanta YMCA on Labor Day weekend 36 years ago. We courted for five months
and then married.

God is good all the time, but sometimes She is especially good.

Joy to absolutely everybody!

Louie, Newark deputation
Louie Crew, 377 S. Harrison St., 12D, E. Orange, NJ 07018 973-395-1068
http://queereye4lectionary.blogspot.com/  Queer Eye for the Lectionary

from lcrew@andromeda.rutgers.edu Mon Sep  7 16:18:02 2009
Date: Mon, 07 Sep 2009 16:17:53 -0400
From: Louie Crew <lcrew@andromeda.rutgers.edu>
To: bishopsdeputies@hobd.org
Subject: Re: [HoB/D] Shield the joyous from those whom they disturb

Thanks to the many who have written offline and here to congratulate us.   I
feel I'm cheating celebrating every year both our marriage in February 1974
and our meeting over Labor Day weekend in 1973.   I am much blessed.

After I told Mother and Dad that Ernest and I had married, they wrote the
most painful letter I have ever received, and likely one of the hardest for
them ever to write.  In it they rejoiced in our union and wished us great
happiness.  They asked that I please continue to come to see them but not
bring Ernest with me.  They explained that many of their friends would not
have trouble but they did not want to discover which ones would have
trouble, that they were retired and that we did not have to live in
Anniston.

I handed the letter to Ernest and then asked him to pack so that we could
drive the 250 miles to see them.

"Didn't  you read the letter?" he asked with a wry smile.

"But they don't know you," I explained.  "Once they meet you and see how
kind you are -- just like Mother -- they will fall in love with you."

"Louie, they have every right to a quiet retirement.  But you pack; you are
going to see them."

"I'm not going without you!"  I insisted.

"Dear husband, you are," he replied.   "Don't you understand?  You are able
to love me only because they loved you, and if your love for them ever dies,
something most precious that you give to me will be threatened.   Besides, I
have the best of all worlds -- nice in-laws whom I don't have to see.  So
get packed."

For the next six years I visited them just as regularly as before, and
always alone.   The more he came up in conversations, the more they clearly
liked him.  Mother would always send packages of her frozen cakes and bits
of her fine silverware.  At one point she sent him her engagement ring made
into a pendant.

When either set of parents would call, they had trouble distinguishing us.
Apparently Ernest and I have the same style for answering the phone; even
today few friends can tell us apart until farther into the conversation.

About a year into our marriage, Dad said, "As an Alabaman of my generation I
don't understand a person of my flesh and blood loving a black person as an
equal.  I feared you would have loved him because you thought you were
inferior, or that he was.  Either would have been so terribly unhealthy for
both of you.  But I have listened.  Nothing you say has confirmed my fears.

"Son, I have always loved you, even when I saw you the first time at Dr.
Seller's hospital.   But something about you has always been incomplete.
Since you and Ernest have been together, that has not been so.   You must
tell Ernest that even though I cannot yet see him, I have to love him
because he has given my son back to me whole."

Six years into our marriage, when I answered the phone, Dad said, "I'd like
to speak to my son, please."

"Dad, this is your son," I replied with a chuckle.

"No, Louie, I'd like to speak to my other son."  I handed the phone to
Ernest.

Dad said to him, "Ernest, this is Erman Crew.   Lula and I have called to
apologize.  We are Christians, but we have not behaved like Christians to
you.   We want you and Louie to visit us this weekend, and we beg you for
your forgiveness."

We had a great weekend together.  They had invited many friends to visit
according to a schedule so that all would have at least some private time
with us.

One of my favorite parts of the creed is "I believe in the Holy Spirit."
Paraphrasing Mark Twain about baptism, I not only believe in the Holy
Spirit; I have seen the Holy Spirit happen.

Another of my favorite parts of the creed is "I believe in .... the
Communion of Saints."  That's what's going on with this letter, and I
rejoice to have you a part of it.

Recently security personnel at airports began warning me that soon I would
no longer be able to check in with one name  on my ticket and a different
name on  my passport and driver's license.    Ernest and I went to San
Francisco on Saturday for the 14-course wedding feast of a former colleague
at Chinese University in Hong Kong.   It was a splendid evening, and I
believe that in heaven Mother and Dad were pleased to have me pass the
airport security check known again as

Erman Louie Crew, Jr., Newark deputation