Bow Tie o’ the Day shines right along with my Hat o’ the Day, which I found in the AR store where I bought my cowboy boots. They were both good travel companions on that particular day trip.
The itineraries for my vacations have consistently morphed into shorter and shorter “must do” lists, no matter where I visit. Oddly, we travel more often now, but we find ourselves seeking out fewer of the “sights” the guide books tell us we must see.
To gander at a place’s churches is always on my travel “must do” list. I can say without a doubt that the Arkansas landscape is replete with churches– mostly Baptist, but it’s well-peppered with plenty of Methodist churches hither and yon too. The churches are in shopping malls, deserted convenience stores, empty farm machinery buildings, etc., as well as their own buildings. From the speeding car, I even saw a storage unit which was being used as a church. The motto on this Conway, AR church wall in the photo is both bigly and true. Ya gotta have good roots if you wanna yield a good crop. Simple as that.
I am a fan of church buildings. I make it a point to appreciate the skillful architecture of church buildings of all denominations. Because I was born into Mormondom, I especially have watched the development of modern LDS churches over time and places. I mean no disrespect, but LDS ward buildings are not breathtaking. They are functional. Their beauty lies almost solely in their functionality. If you have seen only a few LDS ward building designs, you have sort of seen them all. In central Arkansas, it wasn’t difficult for me to easily identify Mormon churches from the proverbial mile away. They are iconic sights, with a mostly singular artistic gist.
Seeing so many churches everywhere we went in AR got me thinking about my kidhood church. Permit me to say I miss my old, long-demolished, not-up-to-code Delta Second Ward church building, which had been built by the ward members’ themselves– not just with their money, but also with their very hands. It was an original, one-of-a-kind ward building, which reflected its people.
The chapel had an entire wall of tall windows, through which you could watch the beauty of the farming community– while you learned about the beauty of the spiritual world within it. Some basement classrooms had exposed pipes a kid could climb on and swing from until your teacher wrangled you down and got you in bigly trouble with your parents. There were nooks and crannies and dead ends for playing Primary hide-and-seek in winter. And the long, dark basement hall was perfect for a kid’s illegal running. Even a toddler-age Bishop Travis donned his Batman/Superman reversible cape and flew through the basement halls of the Delta Second Ward church to save the world from the bad guys.
Heck, I can remember when the Delta Second Ward building still had tiny spittoons and ash trays attached to the backs of a couple of pews. On those same pew backs, next to them and the hymn books, you could plug in your hearing aid to listen to the speakers give their edifying lessons. Somehow, of course, my kid-logic brain connected losing your hearing to the use of tobacco.
For the record, I’ve had to wear a hearing aid for just over a year now, but I have never been a user o’ the tobacky leaf. My kid-logic brain would be so confused.
