Cool Water

I’ve had the opportunity to spend some time traveling with my eldest son this summer, culminating in our sharing a common birthday today in Texas, turning forty-three and fourteen, respectively. Just now we’re in Texas with a bunch of Baptist pastors and an ample supply of hot air! And while I recognize that these two often share a saddle, I am concerned here with the extreme heat that is the American Southwest, as opposed to the parched prairie prevalent in Protestant preacher-dom. Earlier in the week we were in Santa Fe with my folks and had the opportunity to hike around Tent Rocks National Monument. As my Dad, my son, and I made our way toward the end of the dusty, uphill trail with a vista surveying all the Tent Rocks, the sun was beginning to break through and the cool of morning was quickly turning to the heat of the day. As we hiked on and my thirst intensified, I kept hearing in my mind the chorus of the old Sons of the Pioneers song “Cool Water.” I’ve been asked a number of times, “What is it you’d like for your birthday this year?” While at each repetition of this question I have feigned a non-response, I must confess that I have been something less than forthcoming. Truth told, I know with absolute certainty what I’d desire if I thought it were mine for the asking. But I know what I want cannot be purchased, nor can it be acquired by any action on my part. I have two brothers and as my grandmother used to say about those for whom she cared deeply, “they’re just good people, hon.” While I love them both, am proud of both, and would give anything I have for both, I cannot provide for the one what he needs. He wrestles alcohol addiction and no one can change that for him. Hell, I’m beginning to wonder if he can change it for himself. But if birthday wishes were fairy tales, I’d close my eyes and wish for his sobriety. With considerable care I have mulled these last few weeks what it must be for him to state publicly “I will not drink alcohol anymore.” And while I cannot know the demons he wrestles, the thought of laying the bottle aside is daunting even to me. For it is part of my vernacular. It is part of fun and frivolity, fellowship and friends. But in the interest of my brother’s health and out of deep loving care for him, having another drink of alcohol for me is a price too steep and one I will not pay. Hear me clear . . . if you want to go out and have a drink, I’ll be happy to go. But I’ll be drinking water. And I’ll not judge you or anyone else who wishes to have a drink of alcohol as I find it neither evil nor sinful in any sense. What I do find is it’s insidious grasp on my own brother’s life. And while I cannot offer him sobriety, I can offer him solidarity. It’s the power of water that has occupied my mind as we have journeyed these last few days. And it is in water that I hope to find salvation in the days ahead. Water. Seemingly not enough of it clean enough to share the world around, yet here where it is mine in abundance I never seem to consume enough. So if I beat you to the bar tonight and when you arrive you see me in the corner smiling, just know what I am sipping is water. And the smile is due to my singing in my mind some paraphrased version of that old song . . . “All day I face the barren waste without the taste of water. Cool water. Old Brad and I with throats burned dry and souls that cry for water. Cool water. The shadows sway and seem to say tonight we pray for water. Cool water. And way up there He’ll hear our prayer and show us where there’s water. Cool water.” For Brad and for me. May it be so, Lord. May it be so.