Just Taking Tickets?
AUGUST 23, 2009
Yesterday we buried one of the sweetest, most gentle men I’ve ever known. Clyde was near the top of the list of the most encouraging people. He was a greeter at the sanctuary door of our church for decades—shaking hands and hugging necks. Even if you’d been gone for a good while, Clyde would remember your name.
Clyde Owensby—an honorary grandparent—with my son-in-law Brian Delk at our daughter Micki’s wedding.
One of his ‘ministries’ was sending birthday cards to hundreds of people. I, my wife and two daughters were recipients. We received cards from him for over twenty years—each personally signed with a hand written note of encouragement. I’ve still got a couple of the cards. Clyde said “no one wants to be forgotten” and he saw to it that scores and scores of us never were. Clyde was an ‘honorary grandparent’ at my youngest daughter’s wedding.
Clyde was an other-centered individual even though his own life had it’s challenges and misfortune. He’d received a purple heart during WWII. He was a postman for years with many of those on his rout on his birthday card recipient list. He was the premiere ticket taker at the Green Hills Cinema yet also father of five with fourteen grandchildren and fifteen great-grand children.
Jeannie and I had attended church with Clyde since 1975 where he’d attended since 1958. My special relationship with Clyde came professionally before I transitioned into private practice. He had the distinction of being the oldest client I’d ever seen which was a special relationship for both of us. As I sat there at his memorial yesterday hearing the tributes to Clyde, I was one of the privileged few to know him at an even deeper level—his hurts and his struggles. Those aspects of his life helped make Clyde the man he was even though there had been times they’d pinned him to the mat. Clyde was a saintly man who leaned on and knew the forgiveness and mercies of God.
Many across Nashville knew Clyde when I would mention that he took tickets at the Green Hills Cinema for years. His son Steve told us yesterday that Clyde was eventually fired for not just taking tickets. Clyde was let go for talking to much to the movie goers. It is rather funny for those of us raised in a denomination that at one time called going to the ‘movie house’ a big sin. Movies were big with Clyde. He was a collector of all the Academy Award winning movies since the academy began. As Steve told the story of his dad getting fired, my thoughts were, ‘what a great reason for getting fired!’ This is a lonely world. It’s very likely that some of those Clyde greeted at the top of the escalator had not been loved by anyone that day until he ‘took their ticket’.
Loving will cost us at times. More than once, we’ve had family members cut us off because we remained in touch with the person they had divorced. In those situations we loved the ‘ex‘ and wanted the relationship to continue—which it has to this day in both cases.
For Clyde, loosing his job was probably a small price to pay for the opportunities it afforded him to care for people. (There may still be some old coot in the church saying his firing was his due for supporting the evil Hollywood empire). Whatever.
Clyde knew a loving God. Did he ever wonder about that love? Yes, and who of us doesn’t? But he remained faithful for 94 years.
I was fortunate to have known him and aspire to follow his example—to never just take tickets.