A Tale of Two Pies

Day 38--It seemed like a good idea to buy a grape pie for our hostess. After all, a pie seemed to work with our last hosts.

Besides, we were in Canandaigua, New York, which someone once called "the epicenter of grape pies." 

But more important, we were on our way to stay with Kate, the mother of our daughter-in-law, Pam. 

Kate and her husband, Larry, live in a home on Lake Canandaigua. Fourteen years ago, we ate our first grape pie at their home on the evening before our children, Matt and Pam, were to be married. Kate and Larry served two desserts that evening: banket--a Dutch almond pastry--to reflect Matt's heritage, and grape pie to reflect one of Pam's family's favorite desserts.

Thursday night, when we arrived at Kate's door and handed her the pie, she laughed. You see, she had bought a grape pie for us--at the same place, it turns out, that we had bought our pie for her. 

Unfortunately, Larry was unable to be with us because he was called out of town for a few days to handle a family matter. We missed having him be part of the evening, but  we had a good time with Kate. We watched the boats on the lake and listened as the evening tour of the Canandaigua Lady stern wheeler drifted by. 

We saw the photo collages that the family assembled for Kate and Larry's 50th wedding anniversary celebration. We reminisced about Matt and Pam's wedding and our time in their home fourteen years ago. 

We had a great dinner at the nearby yacht club, where Kate knows everyone on staff after more than thirty years of dining there. But the one thing we did not order at the restaurant was dessert. 

That was waiting for us at Kate's house. When we arrived there, she served us large, warmed slices of grape pie. 

And it was even better than we had remembered. 

This Time We Gave Them a Pie

Day 37--Before we left Matt and Pam's house, our friends Ed and Carol suggested that we take a little side trip on our way to their place near Pittsburgh. As a result, we ambled through Holmes County, Ohio, which has more Amish people than any other county in the country. 

Our destination in Holmes County was Berlin (pronounced BER-lin). We stopped at an Amish cafe for lunch, which was prepared and served by Amish young women. We also bought a Dutch apple pie. More about that later.

We were told to see the Amish and Mennonite Heritage Museum, especially the "Behalt," a 10' x 265' cyclorama (mural-in-the-round) that depicts the history of the Amish and Mennonite communities, first in Europe, then in the States as well as other countries. 

The painting is an amazing wonder. The artist, who never had an art lesson, painted hundreds of people in order to share the history of the Anabaptist movement. A half-hour guided tour helped us to understand the painting and the origins of the Mennonite, Amish, and Hutterite movements. The artist named the cyclorama "Behalt," which means to remember and not forget.

(Photo courtesy of the Behalt website)

After leaving Berlin, we continued to amble through Maple Creek, Sugar Creek, and other Amish and Mennonite towns. We shared the road with horse-drawn buggies. We even saw "the world's largest cuckoo clock" in Sugar Creek.

When we arrived at Ed and Carol's house, Ed came out to greet us in a very familiar Oregon Ducks T-shirt. 

We have known Ed and Carol for at least 15 years. We attended the same church in the Portland area, and Ed and Lynn worked together on many books. Ed was on the writing team for several popular authors whose books Lynn edited for Tyndale House Publishers.

The four of us had a leisurely dinner, all the while catching up on family news and talking about books and church and death and travels. It was so good to be with these friends. We laughed hard and celebrated God's goodness and faithfulness. 

And now about the pie. 

But first a back story.

When the four of us attended the same church, we often went out after church for a slice of pie at a local restaurant. During the week of a special conference at our church, we had planned for such a get-together. However, Ed was sick and couldn't attend the conference. First we thought we might buy a pie from the restaurant and take it to Ed and Carol's house. But then we decided to buy a copy of the conference speaker's book, which he signed for Ed. 

An innocent enough gesture.

However, the book triggered a discussion that led Ed and Carol to move from Portland to the Pittsburgh area so that they could live near their children and grandchildren.

Not fair. We gave them a book, and they moved away. 

We kept muttering, "We should have given them a pie."

And this time we did not risk it. 

This time we gave them a pie. 

Birthday, Book, Bottles, and Bulbs

Days 32-37--We were able to spend a long weekend with our son, Matt, and his wife, Pam, at their home in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. 

More than a year ago they moved from Chicago, where Pam did post-doctoral research at the University of Chicago, to Cleveland Heights so that she could join the biology faculty of John Carroll University. Matt, a graphic designer who specializes in web design, is able to work from his sun-porch home office in their nearly century-old home. They are carving out a wonderful life in their new area.

If you look closely at the photo, you will see the other inhabitants of the home: three orange tabby kittens (siblings) named Koji, Bogaerts, and Fizzgig. Can you tell Matt is a Red Sox fan? The kittens are energetic, engaging, curious, affectionate, and often mischievous. Sometimes they keep Matt from getting work done on his projects.

On Saturday we drove out to Cuyahoga National Park, just a half hour from their home. It was a quintessential fall day--blue sky, warm sun, and cool breezes. We hiked to four waterfalls, explored some of the locks on the Erie Canal, walked through a covered bridge, and watched as the Cuyahoga Valley train stopped to unload dozens of bikes and bikers.

On Sunday we joined in worship with the congregation of a local Presbyterian church, which has an outstanding choir and organ. A trip to Pesti's in Little Italy for some European pastries with lots of whipped cream rounded out the afternoon.

Because we will not be with Matt on his upcoming 40th birthday in November, we celebrated with him in several ways. We gave him a coffee-table book we had created about his 40 years. We gave him 40 bottles of craft beers, each from a city in which he had either lived or visited on various travels. We also gave him and Pam 240 Dutch bulbs, both tulips and daffodils. 

The deal was that we would also plant the bulbs in their yard. A nice idea, right? But after two days of fighting our way through tree roots, entrenched weeds, and pachysandra beds, we finally finished the task. Somehow it had seemed so tame when the brightly colored tulips on the bags attracted us in the store. But it will all be worth it when the flowers emerge in the spring (we hope). That is, if they survive the deer and the squirrels. 

In addition to the European pastries (did I mention that they included a lot of whipped cream?), we had several other food experiences, including a trip to Melt, a restaurant that has been featured on both Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives and The Best Thing I Ever Ate, both on the Food Network. We even tried the seasonal clambake sandwich, which arrived at our table at four inches high. It was one of the best things we ever ate. 

One afternoon we visited Olivia, one of Alisa's childhood friends, and her daughter, Sophie. The law firm for which Olivia works graciously allows her to work a few hours from her home office, while she spends  most of her time caring for Sophie. Olivia's husband, Dan, serves as the missions pastor at a large church near their home. 

Alisa and Olivia have known each other since second grade, and it is always fun to enjoy the many memories the girls shared. Sophie is following in her mom's footsteps in many ways. She loves books. She is bright, sweet, and engaging. And she loves monkeys. 

Western Michigan Friends

Days 27-32--I (Lynn) had breakfast last week with Jayne, a childhood friend. She and I grew up "Dutch." We attended the same Christian Reformed Church, were classmates at nearby Christian schools, and attended the same catechism classes every Wednesday afternoon. We wore our Dutch costumes and marched in the Children's Day Parade of the annual Holland Tulip Festival.

In the fifth grade, we both joined the band, Jayne playing the flute, and me screeching with the clarinet. Our elementary school band marched every year in the Tulip Time parade as well.

Jayne and I still are friends. We celebrate each other's birthdays, just days apart in April. Jayne is often the first person to send me birthday greetings. Our mothers are still friends too. In fact, they used to play Skipbo together when they both could see better. 

One of the nights we we were in Grand Rapids, we stayed with our friends Jim and Mary. Our history with Jim and Mary is deep and rich. Mary and I first became friends when we were roommates on a choir tour with the Back to God Hour Radio Choir of the Christian Reformed Church when we were students at Calvin College. (On the previous year's choir tour, I became friends with one of the basses, and soon afterward started a dating relationship with Bas. The rest is history.) At the end of each of the choir's programs, we would sing the words from the Aaronic blessing: "The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord lift His countenance upon you. And give you peace. The Lord make His face to shine upon you. And be gracious unto you. Amen." 

During most evenings we visit with Jim and Mary, Mary will get out several hymnals, and the four of us will sing several hymns together, in four-part harmony. A foretaste of heaven. 

After Mary and I graduated from Calvin College's English Education department,we both taught English at Lexington Christian Academy in Lexington, Massachusetts. I taught grades nine and eleven, she grades tenand twelve. Then we also team-taught an Advanced Placement English class. Those were wonderful years.

Jim and I sang together in a semi-professional choral group in Lexington, and together we experienced what was the height of my choral experience: singing the St. Matthew Passion at a Bach festival in Harvard Square.

During our child-raising years, the four of us lived apart--we in Boston, they in Grand Rapids. We stayed in touch through letters, which Mary kept and recently shared with me. Now, when Bas and I visit family in Michigan, we always spend an evening with our "other" brother and sister, Jim and Mary.

When we left Jim and Mary's house, we had lunch with Al and Annetta. Bas first knew Annetta around fifty years ago when she was a teenager in Salt Lake City on a summer mission trip. Bas' parents hosted Annetta during her time in Salt Lake. Both Al and Annetta have had distinguished careers in education. They were outstanding, dedicated teachers who touched the lives of hundreds of students. Annetta is also an accomplished musician who plays the organ and piano for local churches and has a full schedule of piano students who come to her home.

For the past several years Annetta regularly visited Bas' mom in the care facility where she lived. At the end of each visit, Annetta would place her hands on mom's head and repeat the words of the Aaronic blessing: "The Lord bless you and keep you...." At Mom Vanderzalm's funeral in May, Annetta spoke lovingly of Mom and Dad.

Just before we left western Michigan, we had lunch with Susan at her lovely Lake Michigan home, which was built by her parents. Over homemade soup and corn salad, served from and on dishes that Susan had made in her pottery studio, we caught up on the news of our families' lives. 

Susan's husband, David, an old college friend, was not able to join us because he is in Ghana, leading a semester's course for Calvin College students. Susan has shared this experience with David several previous years, but due to her father' failing health, she opted to stay in the States for most of the semester.

Susan and David's home is filled not only with baskets and textiles from their many trips to various parts of the world, but also with original art pieces done by several art professors at Calvin College, where David also teaches. 

Susan shared with us a remarkable book her mother had created to trace a one-hundred-year history of a baptismal dress that had been worn by dozens of infants in Susan's family. The book includes the hymn that David composed for their daughter's baptism several decades ago. A rich heritage. 

Western Michigan Family

Days 27-32--From Sunday through Friday, we spent time with family and friends in Holland and Grand Rapids, Michigan. 

I (Lynn) grew up in Holland, a little Dutch girl. My 93-year-old mother still lives in her home in Holland, thanks to the gracious care that my brother, Tom, gives to her 24/7.

Although my mom has been legally blind for 25 years, she has a bit of vision. With large-print cards, our looking over her cards occasionally, and some coaching, she was able to play Skipbo with us every night. She won nearly half of the games, so she was delighted with that.

The walls of my mom's home are filled not only with photos of her life and her family but also of the paintings she did before she lost her vision. Having never taken an art class, at age 61 she enrolled in an oil-painting class and finished around a dozen canvases. 

We don't know how much time we will have with her on this earth. She is ready to die, or as she puts it, "I am ready to go Home and be with my Savior." Life is precious. 

Four and a half years ago my brother moved from Seattle to live with my mom and takes care of all of her needs. In his spare time he has designed and built two sizable windmills, one of which stands in the backyard of my mom's house. 

Bas' brother, Allen, and his family live near Grand Rapids, and we were able to spend an evening with them as well. 

For his entire career, Allen has worked in leadership positions with a Ford dealership in Grand Rapids. After working several decades for Ford, Tammy now reviews car loan applications for a major bank in Grand Rapids. They recently completely renovated a house in a lovely location on a lake north of Grand Rapids. Every night they walk a four-mile loop around the lake. 

For several years both Allen and Tammy cared for Bas' parents during the final, difficult years they were alive. Their dedication and commitment to Mom and Dad Vanderzalm had a great impact on our parents' lives. 

Allen and Tammy also spend significant time with their other three children and their five grandchildren who live in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Texas.

Our nephew Brian and his wife, Amber, were able to join us for dinner as well. For 15 years, Brian, a social worker, has worked with children's services and leads a 15-person office north of Grand Rapids. His son, Luke, is a bright-eyed, big-hearted little boy.

Brian's wife, Amber, is an early-childhood development specialist, who every day creatively invests in her children's growth--and daily shares their experiences with us on Facebook. Lindsey, who just turned three, is bright, creative, expressive, eager. A reflection of her parents' involvement.

As we were saying our goodbyes, I was able to get this photo of three of the five Vanderzalm men in my life.

A Team of Friends

Days 22-27--For the 15 years we lived in Wheaton (from 1982 to 1997), I (Bas) served in several leadership positions with World Relief. On this trip, we met with a number of former World Relief staff members who still live in the Wheaton area. 

Our staff was a special group of people who were united by a common purpose—to help churches show the love of Christ to people in need. This common purpose transformed our relationships. In many cases, we became much more than colleagues. We became close friends. We had great parties and great fellowship. We prayed together, struggled together, celebrated together.

The Lord shaped us into something precious and rare—a team of friends united in faith, committed to the same purpose, and joined together in love.

One evening we had dinner with three of my former colleagues. 

Carla and Marilyn, the two women in the center of the photo, worked with me as administrative assistants. They were not only gifted, talented, and dedicated, but their faith, optimism, and love for people also helped shape my life. Their grace set the tone for our entire international ministries team. Each was a blessing from God to me and to the organization we served together.

Barbara and her husband, Manny, also joined us for dinner. Barbara served as a staff assistant to several of our program staff.  During the time that Barbara worked for World Relief, Manny attended Wheaton College as a Charles Colson scholar.

A former inmate, Manny had plans to organize a church-based program to help prisoners succeed after their release from prison. With Barbara’s help, he founded a program that continues to thrive today in various places around the country. Among other things, Manny is currently helping to establish a seminary in a prison in Indiana, sending out regular teaching videos to prisoner groups around the country, and encouraging churches to find ways to minister to sex offenders in their communities.   

One morning we had a 7 am breakfast with Muriel and Duane. That’s early for retired people. Even though Muriel and Duane are trying to be retired, this was the only time they could fit us into their busy schedules.

Muriel helped World Relief develop our early child-survival programs. Duane, a seminary professor, led a number of workshops that enabled our staff to clarify communication, purpose, and vision for our work together.

One of the programs Muriel helped to establish was a child-survival program designed to reduce child mortality in Cambodia. This program was integrated into a new micro-enterprise community-bank effort focused on small groups of women in rural areas.

More than 20 years later, this program is still helping women and their families. Recently, a former colleague sent us some current program statistics. This program, which started with about $100,000 in loans, now has a loan fund of $250 million. In the early years, the program served a few hundred mothers; now it has 151,000 loan recipients, who have invested nearly $100 million of their own savings.

While statistics do not tell the full story of any program, Muriel and I just shook our heads in amazement when we thought of what God had accomplished from such humble beginnings—more than we ever imagined or thought possible.

Another day we had lunch with Marlene and Anna. Both women were involved in the communications and fundraising side of World Relief. Marlene and I worked together again at Medical Teams International where she served as our vice president for communications. Marlene loved to laugh, and she loved to pray. Her faith and talent were a great blessing to many at both World Relief and Medical Teams.

Anna now has her own graphic design company in Wheaton and has done design work for several Medical Teams publications. Recently, she worked with Lynn on a revision of Doing His Time, the prison devotional book that Lynn edited and helped to write with Jim Vogelzang.

It was a joy to have lunch with Marlene and Anna—to laugh about some of our memories of traveling overseas together, to remember some of the wonderful (and unusual) people with whom we worked, and to talk about how God is at work in our lives now.

Several years ago World Relief moved its headquarters to Baltimore, Maryland. The former headquarters, where we worked together, is now a training center for a trade union. Life is not static. It continues to change.

Meeting with former staff of World Relief during our time in Wheaton rekindled many memories. Parties at our house. People who stayed with us. The stories we shared with each other. The prayers. The tears.

God used many of these staff members to touch not only our lives but also the lives of our kids, who came to know and love many of them while we lived in Wheaton. 

As we continue our journey east, we look forward to meeting with others from our World Relief days.

One True Friend

"True friendship multiplies the good in life and divides its evil.... 

To find one true friend in a lifetime is good fortune; 

to keep [her] is a blessing." (Baltasar Gracian) 

Days 21-24--Have you found one true friend in life? I have. But to be honest, I think the friendship "found" me. 

Thirty-two tears ago, Bas and I moved from Boston to Wheaton. About the same time, Sue Anderson and her husband, Gordon, also moved to Wheaton from the East Coast. The following year our sons, Matt and Luke, were in a class together at the local elementary school in our neighborhood.

Through our sons' friendship, which remains close even today, I met Sue. We learned that we grew up in Dutch communities 30 miles from each other. We learned we were both graduates of Calvin College. We learned we both love to read, to visit art galleries, to attend concerts. Sue taught me about friendship, about loyalty, and about perseverance. 

For 32 years Sue and I have shared our lives. When we lived in Wheaton, we went to art exhibits together, explored gardens together, read books together. On our birthdays, we gave each other cross necklaces from around the world, tea things with tulip motifs, gifts wrapped in paper designed by Judy Buswell, and, of course, books.

When I first became Ill with a debilitating immune-system illness, Sue came to my house, sat on the other end of my couch, and gave me a Chicago Tribune article about a woman who had the same illness. It was a gamechanger for me to read the story of someone who was experiencing the same debilitation. The article listed contact information for a support group that even today is a lifeline for me. 

When Alisa and I were couch-bound for years with the illness, Sue came to our house nearly every day. She would let herself in the back door and holler, "Yoo-hoo!"  She brought us books from the library. She did errands for us. She taped more than 100 episodes of Little House on the Prairie for Alisa. She and Gordon took Matt with them to activities I was too sick to attend. She became a second mother to our children.

Yesterday Sue, Gordon, Bas, and I had lunch at Cantigny Gardens in Wheaton. While walking through the flower gardens, Sue told me that Gordon had proposed marriage to her under an apple tree in the garden. We found an apple tree, and Gordon got on his knees and said, "I would ask you to marry me all over again." Sue answered, "I will!"

Over the decades, Sue and I have remained true friends, even though we now live 2000 miles away from each other. 

In Gracian's words, Sue has "multiplied the good in my life." 

To keep her is a blessing.

A Book Is a Dream You Hold in Your Hand

Days 22-23---On Wednesday Bas and I entered the land of books at Tyndale House Publishers in Wheaton, Illinois, where I worked as a senior editor for 12 years.

Tyndale, now one of the country's largest Christian publishers, began because of one man's love for the Bible and his love for his children. 

In the 1950s and 1960s, when Ken Taylor read the Bible to his ten children every night after dinner, he found that the language of the King James Version was too formal and archaic for them. So, every day as he commuted by train to and from his job at Moody Press in Chicago, he paraphrased the passage he would read to his children that night. Those paraphrases eventually became The Living Bible. Initially, Ken could not find a publisher that would take the risk of publishing the paraphrased Bible, so he began Tyndale House. In the early 1970s, The Living Bible became the bestselling book in the country.

Every day when I stepped off the elevator at the third floor in the Tyndale building, I saw these two art pieces below, which reminded me of the legacy Ken Taylor left to all of us.

During my years at Tyndale House, I edited books by Christian counselors, by marriage and family experts, several books by Chuck Colson, Josh McDowell, Barb and Gary Rosberg, Gary Smalley and his sons, as well as Cynthia Heald and Randy Alcorn. The books included self-help books, devotionals, theological books, textbooks, and some fiction. The experience was a rich one. While I shaped the words and chapters in these books, their ideas shaped me in significant ways. 

In the morning, Bas and I joined the editorial director and my former supervisor, Dan Elliott, for an editorial meeting, and then spent several hours visiting former colleagues in their offices. 

The next night, I joined Dan for the opening session of the annual retreat of the Academy of Christian Editors (ACE), which was meeting at a convent in Wheaton. I had attended several of the ACE retreats in the past and had always found them to be a time of meaningful friendships with an incredible group of people. 

I had a chance to thank some of the people who shaped my life in many ways: Judy Markham, the editor who sent me my first manuscript to edit for Zondervan and who served as my first mentor; Sandy Vander Zicht, who directed my freelance work with Zondervan and was the editor for the first book I wrote; Steve Board, who was the managing editor for the publishing company that published my second book.

When we left Oregon three weeks ago, I had no idea that the ACE retreat would be held in Wheaton, or that I would be able to attend. My evening with the ACE people was another one of God's serendipities. What a blessing to celebrate God's faithfulness with these friends and former colleagues, some of whom I have known for more than 30 years.