This Too Shall Bypass

(Published in the Janesville Messenger, 9-15-2013)

I was in North Dakota when the word on the street reached me in the form of a Facebook post:

So, don't know if you've heard, but Milton disappeared. I was driving north on 26, same as I have for 23 years...and without turning, exiting, or noticeably merging, suddenly found myself...on [County]N. It was one of the most disorienting things I've ever experienced in my life. I expected David Copperfield...to jump out like,..."I did it!!!!"

Hearing that magic was happening in my hometown from 720 miles away got my attention. We all knew the new Highway 26 Bypass was opening, but meetings and maps just can't prepare you for actually navigating the route. My interest was piqued enough that even after a tiring 12-hour car ride, I felt compelled to drive over to the new road before completing the trip home.

Milton wasn't exactly like a vanishing Brigadoon, but I was still surprised at the view from the new route driving northbound. Depending on your level of attentiveness, your impression of the city could be little more than an ethanol plant and a grain tower. Going southbound with Milton on your right, the city is more obvious, but the vantage point feels oddly foreign. Even though Highway 59 was re-routed a couple of years ago, with roundabouts placed at the spot where the new 26 would have exit ramps, it just never dawned on me how far those roundabouts truly were from Janesville Street, the former Highway 26. In a sense, I'm surprised that I'm surprised.

Adding insult to injury, Milton doesn't even get top billing on the exit sign at Highway 59. Whitewater, 12 miles away but 9,000 residents more, is listed above the city whose boundaries you are driving through. Since neither proximity nor alphabetical order was considered in its decision, one can only conclude that in the Department of Transportation's eyes, size does matter.

I can't blame our neighbors to the north if they react with a sarcastic snort. Fort Atkinson and Jefferson have already been there and done that when it comes to rerouting Highway 26 around their cities. In fact, leading up to the opening of the bypass, Jefferson was frequently mentioned by some Miltonites as an example of what we didn't want our city to become - virtually invisible from the new route.

But is being less obvious to passing motorists a bad thing? A newspaper article earlier this year quoted business leaders from Jefferson and Fort Atkinson as saying that their downtowns have done just fine post-bypass, with foot traffic and customers increasing due to the elimination of big trucks rumbling through town. Fort, in particular, is an example worth examining because it's been nearly two decades since their big change. Sure, like a lot of downtowns, some cool stores have come and gone, but there's a lot to like about Fort. There is a great bike trail that I love to ride into the city. I've also driven there to see concerts, eat dinner, or enjoy their riverwalk. Heck, even the taco truck that once frequented Milton loves its new home there. Fort didn't die when 26 skirted past it. Bypass, schmypass.

That's not to say that some Milton businesses and residents don't have legitimate gripes about some of the decisions that were made by the DOT. Highway 26 Version 2.0 is by no means a win-win for everyone involved.

But like Fort, Milton won't disappear. Big changes take a lot of getting used to, so we'll do the only thing we can do - adjust. We'll adapt to our new route to work, our Google Maps will eventually update, and someday your GPS will stop going into “Danger, Will Robinson!” mode because it thinks you're driving crazily through a field. In other words, this too shall bypass.

If only we can figure out those darned roundabouts.

Striking Out For Jesus

(Published in the Sabbath Recorder, Sept. 2013)


“This field, this game... It reminds us of all that once was good and that could be again.” - Terrence Mann in “Field of Dreams”

There are those that claim football has overtaken baseball as America's pastime. Those people have not participated in church league softball.

And until this year, neither had I. Church league softball is an interesting concept, especially when your last experience playing organized softball was nearly two decades ago in a hyper-competitive league sponsored by a tavern.

At that time, it was difficult for us to find 10 athletic guys in their 20's and 30's to field a competitive team. But when our manager (the ever-cheerful and encouraging Neil Lubke) spread the word around church that a men's softball team was forming, he had little trouble filling 20 roster spots.

Despite thinking I was well past my prime – if indeed, I ever had one – I signed up because I thought it would be fun to publicly display my decreased stamina, combined with ineptness in a sport I haven't played since the previous century.

The good news was that I was not alone in this. Our church softball team was an interesting stew of teens, young adults, and “mature” men ranging from 18 to 56. One last participated in an organized league in junior high school...in 1971. To put that in perspective, he last played softball the year after the Beatles broke up. Being multi-generational teammates may have worked for Ken Griffey Sr. and Jr., but I didn't see either of them on our ball diamond.

If softball is baseball’s simpler, less genteel cousin, then church league softball is the kindler, gentler version of that. There were obvious differences between playing in the church league and a “regular” city league. These included:

1)  Swearing. At the beginning of the year, a rules sheet was distributed to all of the teams scolding us that swearing had gotten out of control last year and ejections would be enforced for foul language. I thought to myself, what kind of church league am I joining? I did not realize that the rules sheet was distributed to ALL city league teams, not just the church league. So unlike previous leagues I had experienced, I only heard one foul word all season long, and it came out of...ahem...my own mouth. Forgive me, Lord.

2)  Celebrations. From the Brewers untucking their shirts after big wins to guys mobbing each other at home plate on a game-winning run, teams get darned excited when they win. Except in church league. When our team pulled out a rare walk-off victory, I mobbed the kid who got the game-winning hit, chest-bumping him, slapping his back and generally hooting and hollering that he had done it. Until I noticed everyone else on the team telling me to tone it down. So I did and went politely through the handshake line, expecting that as soon as we left the field, we would be jumping up and down and whooping it up. Not really. Sure, we were all grinning from ear to ear, but the celebration was basically, “Who wants to go get custard?” Which brings me to...

3)  Postgame refreshments. A win (or more often, a valiant effort) is celebrated at a local dairy treat establishment. It was different at the league sponsored by a bar.

4)  Pre- or post-game prayer. We ARE in a church league, after all.

As you may have gathered, we were not exactly the New York Yankees of our league. If anything, we were more like the Jekyll and Hyde. At one time late in the season, the only two teams below us in the standings each had one victory – both against us. Meanwhile, the first-place team had only one loss – also against us.

While winning was a mostly unmet goal, equally important to us was fun, fellowship and setting a good Christian example. Or as Sabbath Recorder editor Kevin Butler put it, we succeeded as bearers of Good News, even though on the field, we more often resembled the Bears of Bad News. 

Four Words No Parent Wants To Hear

(Published in the Janesville Messenger, 8-18-2013)

Your child has leukemia.

I sat numb in the hospital room as the doctor explained that my 21-year-old daughter's blood test from earlier in the day contained cells that 95% of the time are an indication of acute leukemia. He assured us that the diagnosis wasn't a death sentence, that treatment had advanced in the last decade, that there were lots of reasons to be optimistic. Of course, there was still a 5% chance that her illness was an infection of some sort, so an MRI was scheduled for the next day, along with a spinal tap and a bone marrow biopsy. The bone marrow biopsy was the critical test, the one that would positively confirm (or rule out) leukemia.

Various thoughts swirled. How do we tell our son? How do I tell my mother? If she needs a bone marrow transplant, can I be the donor?

How quickly things had changed in the span of about 60 hours. Two days before, she had been at a farm in northern Minnesota, the site of her summer employment, when she suddenly passed out. It was the culmination of a week in which she progressively experienced symptoms that included headaches, fatigue, insomnia and night sweats. My wife and I dropped everything on a moment's notice and drove over 13 hours to bring her home.

Obviously something was wrong, but leukemia? We weren't prepared for that, and we are a family that's had our share of cancer. My mother-in-law lost her battle with it last fall. It also struck my children's other three grandparents, with only one surviving the ordeal. And just the week before, my wife's sister had a melanoma removed from her leg.

Leaving our daughter at the hospital, my wife and I went home, scared, tired and stressed. We stood together and prayed. I stood hand-in-hand with her as she prayed that the bad blood cells would disappear. I'm a believer in prayer, but I found myself doubting that such an outcome was possible, that we needed to be concerned now with healing. I kept those thoughts to myself as she prayed and then emailed our church's prayer chain, requesting that everyone ask for the same miracle.

The following day, the bad cells disappeared.

All of her subsequent blood tests showed no evidence of the cells that led to the initial leukemia diagnosis. We didn't know for certain until the biopsy results confirmed it, but within a day of that terrible news, several signs gave us confidence it wasn't cancer. Instead, it was a nasty virus that should have no long-term effects.

So was it a miracle? Did God answer the prayers that we and so many others had made on my daughter's behalf?

Non-Christians – and perhaps many Christians - will say it was pure coincidence; that it was simply a case of medical personnel misreading the initial blood test and drawing an incorrect conclusion. Others may say we're being presumptuous. Why are we so special that God would answer our prayers and not those of others? Only God can say why some prayers are answered with a yes, and others are not. We don't know His plans for us, but the Bible is peppered with verses that encourage us to pray and to offer petitions. Those passages are obviously there for a reason.

Some think I should be incredibly incensed that on the basis of one initial test, a doctor told us with almost absolute certainty that my daughter had cancer. It would be easy to feel that way. His explanation and his delivery of the news was not handled well. Based on what he had seen, however, that was the logical conclusion.

Regardless, what he said to us in that hospital room is not important now. What is important is that my child does not have leukemia.

And that 95 percent is less than 100.