Connected While Apart
Meet Mathilda

Water Dog

Dear Mayfield,
Meet Mathilda.  Actually, you met her before in web note 45; I didn’t know her name then.  All last week the weather was wet, cold, gray, and windy.  There were beach alerts every day with warnings of 6 to10 foot waves and dangerous rip currents.  I love being by the lake when it is all riled up like that.  The wide retaining wall that keeps the lake in place in my neighborhood has six concrete tiers of varying widths. When the lake is calm they are covered with walkers, runners, sunbathers, fishing rods, bike riders, yoga enthusiasts, those who are meditating or reading a book, and a variety of people enjoying snacks and meals. Last week the waves were crashing as high as the third tier up; the small number of us out had to be careful where we walked.

I hadn’t seen Mathilda for weeks.  Her human wasn’t busy on the phone this time, so I was able to inquire about her name and age.  Mathilda is ten, and facing the turmoil of high, choppy waves, she is as energetic as a young puppy.  She barks.  She jumps.  She only remembers to shake dry after she has been soaked three or four times.  And then she is right back at it.  She is an icon of finding joy no matter your age.  I was thrilled with her name since she reminded me of a Mathilda I once knew and a Matilda whose story I read with Amanda and Molly when they were growing up.

I came face to face with Mathilda Schwink just days after I arrived at my first church in July 1978.  She lived in the house her grandparents had built decades before in the neighborhood.  Actually, she lived in the ice house out back, now converted into her city home and rented the large front house to a Mexican family.  When she died a few years later, she would leave the home to them.  She was strikingly progressive on racial issues in Saint Louis, still a border city as it had been in the Civil War.  Her garden was fruitful, and she only used organic means to keep critters from chewing up her flowers and vegetables.  Early on she told me all I had to do on Sunday morning was to give her one thing of substance to ponder during the week ahead.  Years after her death, when I finished preparing for Sunday morning, I would stop to ask myself if Mathilda were still here, what would be the one thing she would take home from worship this week.  A retired elementary school teacher, she knew who she was and lived comfortably within her own skin to a degree I have seen in few people.

Matilda Wormwood is the title character in a book by Roald Dahl.  Like his other children’s stories, it is a bit quirky, somewhat dark, fantasy-rich, and incredibly appealing to children not unlike Charlie in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James in James and the Giant Peach, and the giant in The BFG (The Big Friendly Giant).  Matilda is a precocious, clever, small child, with idiotic parents who ignore her and a school principal, Miss Trunchbull, who bullies children and adults with the same determination that once made her the hammer-throwing champion.  In coming to terms with her parents, Miss Trunchbull, and other seeming obstacles in life, Matilda discovers interesting internal powers that she puts to use for herself and others.

Mathilda the dog, Mathilda the urban elder, and Matilda the fictional child live or lived life with gusto, fully aware of who they are or were, and able to grow strong in the challenges faced.  It’s good for me to remember and talk about them now when we’re wearing down in the swirl of crises, uncertain about what’s next and about what we may have to muster later on.  Enjoy their stories full of strength.
Peace, Martha