Back to the Beginnings

Pursuing Portage Path

(Writer's note: First in a series.)

In a few days I will ring in retirement with a headlong dive.  Like the first time going off the high diving board head first. Well here goes nothing, "GERONIMOOooooooo!"  Less than a week after my last day at work,  -or at least the work to which I have grown accustomed-, I will hop on a plane to Boston where I will meet my brother Hal.  Promptly we will travel by car to places that will put us face to face with our origins.  More importantly this trip will place two brothers -the last two remaining Bosworth siblings- together in close quarters for a complete week.  It just might be more time together than we have spent in our entire adult lives.  Certainly potentially the most quality time if we are up to the task. (Prayers needed here please.)

First Mementos

It just so happens that a fellowship to which I belong is holding an annual celebration in conference called "Founder's Day" in the city of it's origins. The city, Akron, Ohio, also happens to be where I and my brother were born.  As a family we moved from Akron in 1955.  Hal has been back. I have not.  I am seeking to find where the origins of this worldwide congregation and my own beginnings intersect. Certainly the paths must have crossed long before I joined the program in November 2008. For I believe there are no coincidences; only the large and small miracles placed in front of us by our Creator.

Bosworth Family Akron (circa 1952)

But first, two brothers have an appointment in Delhi, NY.  We will visit our mother Jeanne's grave site.  It will be my first  trip back  since we buried her 24 years ago.  I hope someone reminds us to pack a box of Kleenex for the trip.

Oh how rich is this life we live if we just let it be.  In spite of myself, I am still here to witness and accept the Love that is offered up and available in all moments, especially the most painful and heart wrenching.  I  will go back to Mom's resting place and share with my brother memories which are woven into the fabric of our souls. The Love of a mother, a most lasting, eternal thread forever part of who we are.

Amen Nana Jeanne

June2017

Young Boy Boogie

Can Am Jammin

It was spring circa 1978 and I was employed by Charlotte Motor Speedway in Concord, NC. My job was as assistant PR Director working for legendary promoter H.A. "Humpy" Wheeler. I will always view him as a modern day P.T. Barnum.

This particular spring we were hosting an SCCA (Sports Car Club of America) racing weekend with the feature race a stop on the Canadian American Challenge Cup. These exotic race cares were reverently referred to as Can Am's.  At best this event was considered minor league for a facility that would in a few short weeks be hosting the World 600- a part of NASCAR's figurative triple crown- where 125 thousand folks would show up to take part.

Being the "assistant" I was in charge of promoting the minor league events. We promote to attract the paying spectator and in this part of the south where love of stock car racing flows in the veins, exotic sports cars were a tough sell, so to speak. With "Humpy's" nudge we decided to couple a headline music act with the race and bill the spectacle as "Can Am Jam!"  It just so happened that an aging music legend was touring through the area and we were able to book the legendary Chuck Berry at a bargain. 

As I look back from the perspective of forty years, I remember Mr. Berry a humble gracious man who in his early fifties and past his prime was having the time of his life.  Parents had brought their children. There were lots of dads with their boys. When Mr. Berry performed his classic "Johnny B. Goode", he invited the boys to come on stage and boogie with him.  It was a grace filled scene.  One of our Speedway photographers captured the image in black and white.  It has been hanging in my home(s) forever since.  Every time I look at the smiles on those boys faces I know our Creator smiles just as wide and those boys- probably now fathers- have told their children the day they boogied on stage with the great Chuck Berry!

A few years later I went to see "Back to the  Future", a movie that ranks in my all time top 10. There is a great scene in which Chuck Berry makes an implied appearance in conjunction with Marty McFly's performance of "Johnny B. Goode."  For more on that: Back to the Future

Amen Brother Chuck RIP

Bradford Bosworth

March, 2017 

Leprechaun Promise

Break the Cycle

 There once was lonely leprechaun named Roe. He was born into a typical Irish family tucked away in the craggy hillside of the north mountains. In the years of his youth the times were difficult for his father who was struggling to make it to the level all Leprechauns of his family had striven for. It was a lofty place of fame and fortune. But Roe's father struggled with the grog which soured the disposition and many times the boy leprechaun would race to the outside to greet his father only to be cursed and rejected and sometimes beaten.

The young Leprechaun soon left home and began following the pattern of his household. Soon he had a family of his own.  The hurt he had held inside for years turned into resentment and he took to the same grog to ease the pain and followed the lead of his father.

Soon the older Roe was in demand as the Lonely Leprechaun at the big people's grog parties with fame but not much fortune. He found no pot of gold at the end of the rainbows and then the rainbows disappeared completely and he realized he was losing the love of his little boy.

One day he stumbled on a group of men meeting together to share their experience, strength and hope.  These men shared a common purpose and lived by a set of instructions and promises that they had all found in a book.  They were all living comfortably in their own skin for the first time in their lives. They did not carry their resentments any longer and brought the best of themselves to the world they lived in.

One day Roe's boy,  Loe, asked him if he could come to the school on St. Patrick's Day as a happy joyous and free Leprechaun so all the kids could see what a real Leprechaun was like.  And on this day Roe succeeded in breaking the cycle.

"As we felt new power flow in, as we enjoyed peace of mind, as we discovered we could face life successfully, as we became conscious of His presence, we began to lose our fear of today, tomorrow or the hereafter. We were reborn."

"The Big Book" How it Works pg: 63

'Jesus replied, "Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again." '

"The Good Book" John 3:3

Amen Brother

Bradford Bosworth

St. Patrick's Day 2017

Roan Roamings

Roan Mountain Rhododendrons

I have recently been reading "Bonhoeffer, Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy," a chilling yet enlightening biography of one of the 20th centuries most influential Christian figures, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. The book, authored by Eric Metaxas, paints an alarming picture of how Adolf Hitler and his Nazism took hold in a largely Christian nation and spread like a cancer in Europe in the decades of the thirties and forties. Bonhoeffer played a critical role in alerting the world outside Germany of the impending doom before the point of no return was reached.

   

During the summer of 1934 there was a statement of opposition drawn up by a group of theologians and pastors of which Bonhoeffer was an influential member. That document became known as The Barmen Declaration.

During the lead up to the signing of this stark revelation, Bonhoeffer wrote in a letter to his grandmother about an experience he had on a field trip while in England. It is an experience in stark contrast to the dark nature of what was happening in his homeland. " I was greatly surprised to find wild rhododendrons in the woods, a whole lot of them, hundreds of bushes growing close together." This book passage immediately brought memories to this writer, memories which had been dormant for decades. They were the memories of a twelve year old boy.

In the summer of 1964 while at Camp Rockmont for Boys in Black Mountain, NC,  I was part of a small group invited to hike an 18 mile stretch of the Appalachian Trail.  We started in North Carolina and over the course of the next few days we found ourselves in Tennessee on one of the most beautiful places on this earth! As a boy who lived and grew up in south Florida the flora I was witnessing here atop Roan Mountain was unlike anything I had ever experienced. It was stunning and I was awestruck. This piece of heaven on earth was my first encounter with rhododendron.  The pervasive color of purple I recall certainly delineates for me the presence of God I encountered in this special place. It was a both literal and spiritual mountaintop experience for a young boy who did not even know the meaning of those concepts.

The 12 year old boy still lives in this man and along with storied accounts of the Saints and Angels like Dietrich Bonhoeffer reminds me that our Creator lives with us both in the spectacularly beautiful as well as the morosely dark places on this earth.

Amen Brother Bonhoeffer

Bradford Bosworth

January 2017

Tooth Fairy Innocense

None to Blame

Is it possible that in all the travails of our existent life no one is to blame?  It is just our human nature to stumble and fall, to become self centered and through our exclusion of other in our calculations we will hurt people along the way. Though in reality we can only hurt someone else if that person allows us to. Yes there are extremes of behavior that manifest physical violence and that is never acceptable except perhaps in instances of self defense.  In nearly all cases, when we hurt someone emotionally we have hurt ourselves first. Our culture and society draws the inference that if someone is hurt there is a guilty party and therefore someone to blame.  The minute we take victimization out of the equation there becomes no need to blame and find a guilty party.  This is called innocent acceptance, a childlike quality. The great Teacher talks about this place in the good news of Luke 18:16-17.

In these first few days of the new year, with a torrential and cold downpour it becomes a natural behavior to reflect upon the past and boy there is a great tendency to find a comfortable place in guilt and self loathing about all of the missed opportunities and failed relationships strewn in the wake of one's past. At least it is a default position for this writer anyway.  So I decided to open up some boxes  that have been taped shut for about five years and I found some objects that reached inside my heart and soul, wrenched and pried open a deep reservoir of emotional memories that spilled out as if an open artery. 

These objects were crafted by the hands of my two daughters. School art projects formed by the determined effort born of pure innocent acceptance of their assignments; free from self doubt that has no home in an innocent heart and mind of a child. As I studied these pieces of art, I noticed their names signed in their own hand on each and I wanted to hold them to my heart.  I wanted to retreat to my default position of feeling guilty for not being the best father I could to them. And I remembered that I  can only be the best father I can for them NOW.

Among the objects was a Tooth Fairy Box.  And I thought to myself that there could be no greater symbol of childlike innocence than this wonderfully beautiful gift of the new year!  I believe now my new year resolution will be to ask my good good Father daily for  increased childlike innocent acceptance. When I opened the box there were baby teeth of my children neatly wrapped inside, very innocently.   As I am firmly entrenched as a senior citizen now, I have learned we loose our teeth too!

Maybe I can get one of these boxes also and instead of finding money under my pillow in the morning, I might an additional measure of innocent acceptance. Father may it be  so.

Amen my beautiful girls.

Bradford Bosworth

January, 2017