WHY IN THE WORLD WOULD YOU GO TO HAITI?

In the Fall of 2003, I had been out of town for a weekend, and upon returning home, Michelle informed me that at church on Sunday morning there had been a presentation about an upcoming mission trip to Haiti and she had decided to go. My response to her was totally Biblical and supportive…”Why in the world would you go to Haiti? It is a dangerous, poverty stricken hell hole which is never going to change.”

She patiently told me that as she listened to the presentation at church by Crawford Hitt, a member of our congregation who was a supported missionary with New Directions, International, she felt led by the Holy Spirit that she was supposed to go. Haiti had never been on her radar before, but she accepted the prompting, and went up to Crawford after church and told him, with tears in her eyes, that she did not know why, but that she was supposed to go to Haiti with him. They both hugged and cried right there.

Now, I knew who Crawford was, since I was on the Men’s Ministry Servant Leadership Team, and I had been exploring possible mission trip destinations to which to take a team of men. But Haiti had not even made my short list. I told Michelle that while I was not comfortable with her going to Haiti, I respected and supported her following her heart to go there. My only caveat and condition was that I planned to attend every team meeting leading up to the trip, get to know every person on her mission team, especially this Crawford Hitt, a big bear of a man, who it turned out had been to Haiti dozens of times over the years.

Over the next few months, leading up to the Team departure date of December 27, 2003, I became an integral part of the team, despite the fact I was not going with them.

The primary reason for the trip being scheduled over the 2003-2004 new year was because of the 200^th Anniversary of the slave revolt which resulted in the independence and founding of Haiti as a free country after being a colony of France. When Haiti had been founded, the Haitians had dedicated their country to their Voodoo religion for the next 200 years. The plan was for another rededication in January 2004. Christians from all over the world were converging upon Haiti at the same time for Haiti At The Cross, a counter dedication of Haiti to God, specifically Jesus Christ. There was sure to be, at the very least, spiritual warfare. That is the context for this mission trip. You can see my concern.

As the team left for Haiti, while similar teams from all over the world also converged on Haiti, those of us left behind prayed for their safe passage there, safety during their stay and for their safe return. If you are not a student of Haiti or familiar with what happened during this time, let me give you the Cliff Notes version. Voodoo leaders from all over Haiti converged to have a rededication, and much like the fiasco of the Biblical story of the Tower of Babel from Genesis, they were unable to reach any agreement of how the rededication should happen or who should lead it, and were unable to communicate and reach any agreement…they all left without a ceremony of rededication of Haiti to Voodoo. At the same time, the Haiti At The Cross dedication of Haiti to God went off with much success, not unlike a great revival. Not too long afterwards, the corrupt President of Haiti, a Catholic priest, was run from office, and a new government, which looked to God, came into power. It is much more complicated than that, but as I said, this is the Cliff Notes version.

Michelle and her team returned home on January 5, 2004. After hearing all the stories of what transpired on their mission trip, I decided that perhaps I should consider taking men to Haiti. But before I could do that, I needed to go to Haiti and see it myself first hand. I called Crawford Hitt and told him what I wanted to do, and he asked me what I was doing next week. I went with him to Haiti on a Vision Trip, and the rest is history, with my having gone to Haiti many times since.

Michelle has not returned to Haiti and has no plans to do so. She firmly feels that the Holy Spirit led her to Haiti in order to capture me for Haiti. It worked.

DEAN TATE

William Tate, Dean of Men at the University of Georgia from 1946 to 1971. Dean Tate was an institution unto himself for generations of UGA men. If you ever met him, you never forgot him. Even if you didn’t know him, you recognized him if you were a student at UGA. He was everywhere, like the ubiquitous ladder in the road.

I certainly remember the first time I met Dean Tate. It was September of 1964 and my father was delivering me as an incoming freshman to the UGA campus. We were in the parking lot next to Payne Hall, where I had been assigned to live my freshman year. As I was unloading my possessions from Dad’s Fleetwood Brougham, I heard someone say, “Hello there, Billy.” I turned around to see a big man, almost as big as Dad, vigorously shaking his hand. He had a lanyard around his neck with a nametag attached, simply stamped with DEAN TATE. I guess that was enough. Dad introduced me to his old poker buddy. What got me was how both these men kept calling each other Billy. I had never heard anyone refer to Dad other than Bill or Mr. Reed.

As Dean Tate excused himself, he stopped and shook my hand firmly and stared me right in the eyes and said he would be keeping an eye on me for Billy. He then dashed off. Now that I think of it, he always appeared to be in a hurry, dashing here and there. I learned later that he had run track at UGA in his undergraduate days in the early 20’s. I asked Dad how he knew Dean Tate and he said it went back to when Mark Humphrey, who married his sister Gertrude, had been General Manager of the Tate Marble Company, and Billy Tate and he crossed paths in the 30’s when Dad was a little boy visiting his sister. I never did get the story about how they ended up playing poker together.

The next day during freshman class sign-up in Stegeman Coliseum, along with several thousand other dazed and confused Freshmen, I heard a familiar voice say, “Need some help, Mr. Reed?” I turned around to see Dean Tate standing there with a serious look on his face. I explained that I was having trouble signing up for classes, for every time I finally got up to the sign up table after standing in the interminably long lines, the class was full. I had been at it for hours, but still had one last five hour class left to fill. Dean Tate said, “Follow me.” He took me up to the front of a line and said, “Mrs. Barrow, here is an addition to your Contemporary Georgia class.” He turned and walked away. Mrs. Barrow, who taught Contemporary Georgia in Barrow Hall, oddly enough named after her family, smiled at me, signed me up and sent me on my way with a full dance card.

Over the course of the next five years (yes, I squeezed a four year course of study into five years – remember, there was a little thing called Vietnam going on and it behooved you to stay in school as long as you could), our paths would cross many times, and somehow he always remembered my name…Mr. Reed.

My last memory of actually seeing and talking to Dean Tate came during Winter Quarter of 1968. I was Sage (President) of Sigma Pi Fraternity, and it was initiation “Hell Week” at our house. The night before was the last event of “Hell Week” before initiation for our pledges. That event was the Scavenger Hunt. It was actually the only fun part of that week for those pledges going through it. I will not belabor you with a full list of the items on the list, but suffice it to say, it included unusual items that required some ingenuity to gather over the course of a night. The list contained many items that had been a staple of the list for years, but from time to time a new item would be added to the list, sometimes without the knowledge of the Sage.

Early in the morning following the previous night’s Scavenger Hunt, I was asleep in the “Cubbyhole.” The “Cubbyhole” was the only private room in the frat house reserved for the Sage. A brother came pounding on my door waking me from a blissful bourbon sleep. Politely I asked what it was he wanted. I was informed that Dean Tate was on the phone down stairs and wished to talk to me. I assure you this woke me totally up. I had never received a call from Dean Tate, but it could not be good news he wanted to share with Billy’s boy.

I ran downstairs to the pay phone in the alcove (this was before the day of private phones in your rooms), and answered the phone. I heard that familiar voice say, “Good morning, Mr. Reed, I hope I did not wake you.” I immediately told him, “Oh, no sir, Dean Tate, I was up studying.” I heard a snort over the phone. He then said, “I understand the Sigma Pi house is having initiation this week.” I told him that yes, we were initiating a fine new group of scholars into our brotherhood. Another snort. He then said, “I understand you gentlemen sent your pledges on a scavenger hunt last night.” Not a question, a statement of fact, to which I replied, “Oh, no sir, Dean Tate, that would be against IFC (Inter Fraternity Council) and University rules.” He informed me that he had just gotten off the phone with the Dean of Men at Emory at Oxford College informing him that a group of young men had been observed stealing the main wooden sign at the entrance to the college the night before, and in fact had identified themselves to a passing pedestrian as Sigma Pi pledges going through initiation and on a scavenger hunt. I assured Dean Tate that someone was casting unfounded aspersions on our exemplary fraternity. He told me he would be right over.

As I hung up the phone, I ran out the side entrance to the house into the parking lot. There leaning up against the side of “The Shack” (our sleeping annex behind the house) was a lovely 10’ wide by 5’ tall Emory at Oxford wooden sign. It was a really nice sign. I rushed into “The Shack” and shook the Pledge Trainer from a deep stupor sleep, and told him Dean Tate was on his way to search our house for the sign. It is amazing how fast the mention of Dean Tate’s name will sober a person up. He jumped up and made a mad dash out of “The Shack.” It was only then I realized I was dressed in only my underwear. I ran upstairs and threw on some clothes. It would be unseemly to meet with the Dean of Men in only your underwear.

A few minutes later, Dean Tate pulled into the parking lot. I was there to meet him with a schoolbook in my hand. He got out of the car and looked at my book, snorted, and said, “Studying on this nice Sunday morning, I see, Mr. Reed.” We smiled at each other and shook hands. We took a stroll together around the house, into our party room, and even down into the “Boom Boom Room” (that is another story). No sign. He shook my hand and said to tell Billy hello for him, and winked at me and then hopped into his car and drove off. That was the last time I ever talked to him.

The sign? It was tossed into the Oconee River and probably made it as far as the shoals.

WHUT CAN I SAY?

OK, let me get this out of the way right up front. This story may or may not be true. There, my attorney will be happy. He actually wanted me to change the names and say this is a fictional account, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

Many of you know that Lewis Grizzard and I were friends. We both went to the University of Georgia as Freshmen in 1964 and pledged Sigma Pi Fraternity. Everyone who knew Lewis has a story or two about him. This is one of mine.

In the early 70’s, after we had graduated from UGA and Lewis was well on his way to becoming famous and I was…well, starting in my real estate career, I helped found the Atlanta Alumni Club of Sigma Pi. Its membership consisted primarily of us Sigma Pi’s from the 60’s.

We threw a reunion party at a place long gone, but some of you may remember, Chattahoochee Plantation Club. It was located over in East Cobb County up on a ridge along the Chattahoochee River and adjacent to the newer Atlanta Country Club. One of our favorite bands from college was a group from South Carolina named The Swinging Medallions that became famous for a little record called “Double Shot of My Baby’s Love.” I booked them for our party.

Now this was back in the day when I still took a sip of whiskey from time to time, so I can be excused for the following. At some point in the party, probably in the later hours of the revelry, I found myself up front by the stage standing next to Lewis. The band broke out with maybe their third or fourth rendition of Double Shot, and the leader of the band, who I sorta knew, announced that Mark and Lewis were going to demonstrate the “Gator.” He asked the crowd to move back and give us room. Lewis’ wife at the time, not number one, climbed up on a table right there beside where Lewis and I hit the dance floor so she could see better, and watched as we started our demonstration. One quick explanation of what the “Gator” was – have you ever seen a dying fish flopping around on the ground out of water? OK, you sorta get it.

Imagine, if you will, the condition of the dance floor at foot of the stage, covered with spilled beer, whiskey and cigarette butts, and some other stuff I will not mention. I can’t remember what Lewis and I were wearing, but it was probably some preppy college boy outfit…at any rate, trust me when I say it was not clothing best suited for the circumstances.

Lewis and I were wallowing side by side on the floor giving our best efforts to do the “Gator” justice. What happened next is burned into my alcohol induced memory. We both looked at each other and smiled, and then both looked up at the same time at his wife standing on the table above us, doing her best Whisky A Go Go dance moves in her lovely mini skirt. We were not trying to look up her dress, but it just happened to be that we had the perfect angle of view. Brothers and sisters, I must report that she was not wearing any under garments. Upon viewing this vision, Lewis and I glanced at each other for a moment, and quickly looked back up to make sure that we were seeing what we were seeing, then looked back at each other. It is then that Lewis tilted his head toward me, gave a crooked smile, winked at me and said those words I will remember to my dying days, “Whut can I say?”

At that moment we both broke into hilarious laughter, which only enhanced our “Gator” demonstration. It was worth having to throw away my clothes after that party. I miss Lewis.

PS – The party photo below was from our Sigma Pi Orchid Ball at the Atlanta Cabana Hotel in 1966. Thats me second from the left with my back to the camera (next to Richard Morgan with the smoke in his mouth). Lewis is on the far right. Can you pick him out?

MARK RED

During my misspent youth, particularly when I was in High School, I had a proclivity towards climbing water towers. As it so happens, since I ended up way up there in the sky overlooking my domain, it only made sense to leave some sort of commemoration of my being there, not unlike leaving the American flag on the moon (for those of you who believe we actually did go to the moon and it was not faked on a sound stage in Arizona). Therefore, I took to taking a can of paint and a paintbrush with me (this was before spray cans were readily available).

Of course this activity was illegal. I was never caught. I have great pride in climbing and painting the old Smyrna water tower a number of times, right under the noses of the Smyrna Fire Department and Smyrna Police Department who were located nearby. My inscription of choice during this period was usually along the lines of “CHS ‘64” or some variation thereof, such as “CHS 64.” The CHS stood for Campbell High School, for those of you not familiar.

This story is about my last ascent up a water tower. It was the Spring of 1964, prior to graduation from dear old CHS. I will name no names here, well maybe a hint or two, but those involved will remember this night and will know who I refer to. Beer was involved. You should not drink beer before climbing a water tower several hundred feet tall. In fact, this story is a good reason why you should not drink beer or other intoxicants at all. It has a tendency to cloud judgment.

Do any of you remember the water tower located north of Smyrna just off S. Cobb Drive on the right headed toward Marietta? It was a virgin, at least where I was concerned. After a case of beer or so, a group of us decided that this water tower demanded that it be climbed. I just happened to have a can of red paint in my trunk, which was a little unusual because green was my color of choice (the CHS color).

We drove over to near the water tower and parked our cars and then took the short trek over to the tower. I climbed up the ladder to the narrow walkway that circled the tank, all alone because none of the others had consumed as much beer as me, and besides, this was old hat to me. I went right to work with the red paint. I guess I decided that it was time to shed my cloak of invisibility as an anonymous water tank graffiti artist. I painted my name in big, bold red letters, thinking, I’m sure, how this would make me famous. Did I mention I had consumed mass quantities of beer?

I finished my handiwork and tossed the now empty can of red paint over the edge, along with the paintbrush. I seem to remember some curse words being shouted up at me from the ground below. I started back down the narrow ladder one rung at a time. I had gone no more than a few feet, still several hundred feet off the ground, when I realized there was a guy blocking my way. He was frozen with a death grip on the rung above him. In the dark, I could not recognize who it was, but I politely suggested that he proceed downwards so we could escape the scene of the crime. It was then Skip (oops, I used a name…not his real name, I assure you) blurted out that he could not move. I suggested politely that of course he could, by just reversing how he got to where he was. He said he could not move. After an extended polite conversation, I realized that he was not moving.

My first option was to execute a descent over him and down leaving him to make the decision to finally give up the death grip on that rung above him and climb on down. It occurred to me that perhaps he would reach the point instead, where he was finally no longer able to hold on, and he would let go and plummet to his death. I liked Skip (or whatever his name was) and besides, his grandmother, who knew me well, would not appreciate me leaving him there, nor would his buddy, Q (oops another name clue…a fake one I assure you) who was waiting at the bottom for us.

As much as I did not want to do this, I realized my only other option was to climb down, hanging behind him, and help him loosen his grip, one hand at a time, moving it to the rung below, and then moving one foot at a time in the same direction. It took me five minutes to climb up the ladder to the top…it took us thirty minutes to climb down. It only occurred to me later (after the beer wore off) that if Skip (not his real name) had decided to let go at any point, we both would have likely died or suffered mass soft tissue damage, not to mention bone breakage.

As we made our way back to the cars, we giddily talked about what the red message would look like in daylight. I would like to say that it was at that moment I regretted painting my name up there, but beer still coursed through my veins, and I did not tell my buddies what I had painted in bold red letters on the side of the tower for the world to see.

Home to bed where I slept the peaceful sleep of the beer induced coma.

I awoke the next morning with a start, sitting up in bed in horror, awakened from the nightmare that I had been so stupid as to paint my name on the side of a water tower. I jumped out of bed, dressed quickly, ran out and jumped into “The Tan Turd” (my mother’s tan 1955 Chevy station wagon I lovingly named) and drove over to the water tower.

There in glaring three foot letters boldly lit by the morning sun was my handiwork from the night before…MARK RED. I gave thanks to God that he had a special place in his heart for children, fools and drunks (I qualified as two of the three). I drove home more relieved from the knowledge that I would not have to suffer the wrath of dad, Big Bill Reed, not to mention the authorities.

For some time afterwards, in local law enforcement circles, there was much consternation and alarm over what the message on the tower might mean. Did this mean gangs had come to Cobb County? What were they trying to tell us? Was it a warning? Be afraid…be very afraid.