aumdadaGospel 17: new moon waters

Next door to my Uncle Charley’s cottage sat the Upton’s summer house. Benjamin Upton owned a wood mill in Bluefield, a small mill town about ten miles south of New Moon Lake. His business was, I had overhead my parents say, a lucrative one. Besides his mill, his fortunate sons and daughters, his white Cadillac Coupe de Ville, his large motor boat with dual inboard engines, his house in town built on a landscaped hill with nothing in view but his property of meadows and woods, and his summer house of varnished golden pine with French doors and louvre windows, he was a political leader of the town, and his wife was deeply involved with the First Baptist Church of Bluefield Parish.

One early July Saturday morning, I was sitting with my aunt and mother on the grassy promontory overlooking the beach and lake. David was inside finishing his Cheerios and I was waiting for him to join me for a morning swim. Suddenly a crowd of people dressed in Sunday best gathered on the Upton beach. A man in black appeared from out of the crowd and walked right into the water, shoes, pants, and all. He held a book in his hands and began reading what was obviously Bible scripture. A heavyset woman dressed in white emerged and joined him in the lake. It was Joanne Upton.

At first her dressed flowered in the shallow waters but then it sunk around her as they walked further and deeper. She was also wearing a large straw hat with a white ribbon securely tied to her chin. Exchanging some words with the minister at first, she held her hand out to someone in the crowd. A woman also dressed in white appeared and joined Mrs. Upton and the minister in the waist-deep water. The Reverend spoke some words and lightly touched the woman’s forehead. Joanne Upton held the small of the woman’s back and then dipped her beneath the surface. I saw the Holy Spirit above the effervescent expanse of outgoing ripples, and small white doves with wings of fire descending in our midst. Our minds dissolved into the depths of New Moon Lake and we were always swimming in the youth of ten thousand summers.