Journey to Lubbock

“You’ve always wanted to go to Lubbock, Texas, haven’t you?” My sister, Valerie Bell, was inviting me to travel on what she was terming “a Thelma & Louise excursion.” Some people of a certain age will remember that film starring Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis.

Meek housewife Thelma, played by Davis, joins her friend Louise, played by Sarandon, who in the film is an independent waitress on a short fishing trip. This venture turns into a nightmare (I’m certain my sister was not alluding to the plot but to the general idea of a two-gal road trip). In the film, the journey turns into a flight from the law when Louise shoots and kills a man who tries to rape Thelma at a bar! Louise decides to flee to Mexico, and Thelma joins her. On their way, Thelma falls for the sexy young thief J.D., played by Brad Pitt. The sympathetic detective Slocumb (Harvey Keitel) tries to convince the two women to surrender. All this, of course has nothing to do with a journey to Lubbock, but since my sister kept referring to our “Thelma & Louise excursion,” I thought I might like to remind myself of that film’s plot line.

It appeared that Christ in the Arts, a not-for-profit in Lubbock, was mounting a full-scale ballet performance of my book Tales of the Kingdom, and she thought this would be a good sisterly excursion. And in truth, though Valerie and I live within 25 minutes of each other, we have not seen much of each other recently. Valerie has been appointed the CEO of Awana Ministries, a worldwide outreach that provides clubs in churches for school-age children with an emphasis on Bible memory. My sister has used her indubitable gifts for organization and strategic planning to realign the mission of this ministry so that its stated outreach is compatible with the needs of children today. She has written a book, Resilient, that addresses the importance of raising resilient young people with an emphasis on equipping the next generations to be able to successfully face the contemporary culture with a faith-based worldview.

What better way to catch up than to spend time flying on United Airlines down to Texas, drive to my older son’s home in Wills Point (where he works for Gospel for Asia as a development guru), then haul ourselves through sagebrush, scrub and mesquite territory, on through the Texas hill country on a six-hour journey going to and coming from Lubbock? We certainly were in Texas—the landscaped verified that. Johnny Miguel’s Restaurant’s home-printed menu verified our location. Dinner with my son the evening before we began our cross-state excursion included Cajun dishes. Red beans and rice. Mardi Gras pasta. Louisiana shrimp étouffée. Boudreaux catfish. Snow crab legs (by the pound). Boiled crawfish (by the pound). I ordered the gumbo.

Lubbock is the home of Texas Tech University, and it is also famous for the musical acts that hail from there—acts like Buddy Holly and Waylon Jennings. Fine dining is a hallmark along with a rich arts-and-culture scene. Its population is noted for its friendly, hospitable atmosphere.

In truth, I’ve attended many stage adaptations of the Tales. Most are well-meaning dramatic efforts—and some I’ve seen so far are unsurprisingly amateurish. And that’s OK. Amateur performers, absorbed in the drama of the King and Princess Amanda and the Caretaker and Mercie and Scarboy (who really is Hero—but doesn’t know it yet)—that’s all just great. The months it takes to mount a performance, attend rehearsals, learn lines, practice stage movements and to read and re-read the book, certainly pays off in a deeper understanding of the Christ figure the King represents. It doesn’t matter how amateurish the dramatic ability or understanding of the participants in these undertakings. The learning is still immeasurable.

I assumed our journey to Lubbock would land us in another well-meaning but less-than-professional effort. I did think twice about the unusual approach of mounting a ballet performance: What in the world? That has never happened before in the 45-year print life of the Tales of the Kingdom book. And also, in addition: Lubbock, Texas? Wikipedia informed me that Lubbock was the 11th-largest city in Texas.

Well, everyone should make a journey to the “Lubbocks” of the world.

We all need to be surprised and amazed at what can emerge in the far-off corners of places we have never heard about and have never planned to visit. (And isn’t that what sisters are for?—dragging us into journeys and conversations and meetings and greetings we wouldn’t normally plan for ourselves?)

Simply put, the full ballet performance involving some 150 participants was stunning. There were no spoken lines. An off-stage narrator introduced a few scene notes, but the ballet performance was exactly that—a full-scale two-hour dance extravaganza that included small children, expertly turning and timing, through grade-schoolers and high-schoolers and with their parents taking on some of the Ranger roles. It was NOT—let me repeat—this was not an amateur anything.

The exquisite costumes, all designed and sewn by local Lubbockers, rivaled anything my husband and I have seen on stage at the Shakespeare Stratford Festival, or on Broadway, or during any of Chicago’s highly touted theatre seasons.

How has this happened? I wondered. How has all this super creativity emerged?

It appears there is one family with seven children (all now grown) that has been the center of this creative energy in Lubbock, Texas. The Hinds family, headed by the parents Randall and Dana, who started the not-for-profit organization Christ in the Arts, has supplied the vision and the imagination and the organizational energy and the fundraising dedication that has enabled such a performance.

Valerie and I spent time before the performance meeting the family, but I was really blown away by what God has done with and through this familial unit in what some would consider a little out-of-the way Texas town after I sat through the evening performance. It all started with a vision of a ballet school and with a family dedicated to seeing Christ represented in the arts.

The dramatic Lubbockers are mounting this same ballet performance next year. “David,” I said to my husband. “WE HAVE TO GO! You will not believe what this one family has accomplished.” So, not only are David and I planning to return to Lubbock, I am highly encouraging our extended family to join us. That would mean Randall, our eldest son, who has kept the Tales of the Kingdom Trilogy in the marketplace when no other publisher would pick it up. That would include Melissa Timberlake and her husband Doug, who have their degrees in drama and directing. That would include Joel, our son who has been awarded five Emmys (maybe it was six) for documentary directing and producing. And that would also mean Angela Mains, widow of Jeremy, our son who died at age 41 from lymphoma. The whole crew.

If one family from Lubbock can create something so remarkable, what could the Mainses from Chicago, with all its creative possibilities, do for Christ and the arts?

One never knows what one will discover (or who one might meet) when one makes a journey to the Lubbocks of the world. No place on earth is so little or so unknown that God can’t do a mighty work in the lives of those who dedicate themselves to Him.

And if you visit Johnny Miguel’s restaurant on the journey, order the gumbo. It was the tastiest I’ve ever eaten. I think I’ll try the Louisiana shrimp étouffée when we travel there next year.

And—oh, yes—if you can, go with a sister.

Karen Mains

Reminder!

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Karen Mains

BOOK CORNER

Write Better: A Lifelong Editor on Craft, Art and Spirituality
by Andrew LePeau

When I was working on the InterVarsity Christian Fellowship board of directors, Andrew LePeau was associated with InterVarsity Press, and that is when I first became acquainted with him and with his work. Write Better is a helpful, if not necessary, handbook on the topic that would be writers would all benefit from reading. Though most published writers have attended the proverbial writer’s conferences, have a stack of books on the topic in their bookshelves, the learning process on how to communicate through the written form continues for as long as the conscientious communicator keeps working. The back-cover copy summarizes one of the highlights of Write Better: “One aspect pf wrote that rarely receives attention is who we are as writers and how writing itself changes us. Self-doubt, fear of criticism, downsides of success, questions of authority, and finding our voice are all a part of the exploration of our spirituality as writers found in these pages. Discover how the act of writing can affect our life in God."

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