20. Marriage and Family

© 2020 Daniel Yordy

June 1990 - August 1991

Caught in a Vice 
Graduation meant that college was behind us, and so Maureen and I asked the elders for visions to confirm our marriage. At the same time, I had been planning another trip down to Oregon. I hoped to spend a few weeks with mom and dad. I also wanted Maureen to come with me, which would require someone else as a chaperone. 

At this point of time, it seemed to me that the elders were presenting a blank face towards our relationship, and towards me in particular. It is true that I am not expressive outwardly in many situations. But at the time, I had no idea why I was receiving this blank response, nor did anyone talk it through with me. 

The evening before I was to leave for Oregon, John Austin came to me with the visions they had received for our marriage. The visions were strongly positive, but he told me that there was not a witness to Maureen going with me on this trip and neither did the elders believe that it was God’s time for us to be married. I left early the next morning by myself, in my Toyota station wagon, heading into a very lonely month. 

My own son was caught in a bit of a vice in the few weeks before his marriage last summer. When he came to me for understanding, I was able to share with him that this was God’s best time in his life to get right at things inside of him that God wanted to touch. I was able to share that with my son because that is exactly what God was doing with me.

I could not have defined then what God was after in me; if I had tried, I would have gotten it completely wrong. And so I was caught in the grip of a vice. I wanted to be married; I wanted to spend my life with Maureen. Yet that goal now seemed unreachable, even though it was so close. I did not understand.

I must mention the Pacy family, John and Carol Pacy, who lived in Aldergrove, BC, not far from the US border. I have shared how much help Lenna Pacy had been to me in befriending me and teaching me to be more at ease in social settings. Her younger sister, Ruth, also lived at Blueberry through this time. They had lived originally here in the Peace River area and then in the Yukon with their parents and older brother, where they had connected with the move fellowship. The Pacy’s had a home in a rural suburb of Abbotsford, a street of houses, each of which had a five acre lot. This is garden country, and their place was lush and green. In the back of their acreage was a goat barn with a loft above that was made into a bedroom.

I had already begun stopping at the Pacy’s on my way down to Oregon and back up, as I did this time as well. This was a quality of life that I found only inside the move fellowship, that anywhere you went, you were at home. I always felt  at home with the Pacy’s and loved the privilege of spending a day or two with them now on my occasional trips through. They were always welcoming and great fun. I was always refreshed by my time with them.

I don’t remember anything of my time at home except that I was pressed with the dilemma of this unexpected blockage in my great hope of finally being married. I will share more concerning my relationship with my mom in upcoming letters, however.

The Summer of 1990
And so I returned to Blueberry and to the summer work with nothing resolved. 

The two main projects for summer construction were to complete Sister Delores’s house so that she could move back into it and to build a small building for Mike Pelletier to have a place to process the honey.  We built the bee shop on the slope between the root cellar and the old barn. It had two rooms, the front room as the work space and the back room which contained a large piece of equipment used for processing the honey. Mike’s bee program was becoming very productive, and we were able to sell a fair bit of honey. I remember on this project my growing relationship with Dani Maldonado in the construction work.

I had designed a too-big house for Sister Delores. Through the summer, the elders decided that it should be split into two homes. We removed the stairway and added a different front entry to the upstairs where it was level with the slope, just below the Austin cabin. The upstairs would become its own separate home. The advantage, then, was that it would be much simpler to complete the downstairs first as its own unit. One problem was that the upstairs bathroom was right above the downstairs dining table. I raised the bathroom floor with a double frame and wove fiberglass between the now completely separated floor and ceiling. It worked; no one below ever heard any sounds from above.

At the same time, Don Howat shared with me that the elders were concerned about how long it was taking to complete Sister Delores’s house. Some had suggested that if it was not done by the end of the summer, then something else would have to happen. What, I don’t know, but I took that need seriously and gave myself as much as I could to finishing the downstairs. 

By the first of August, I was fed up with the indecision regarding our marriage. In talking with John Austin about it, he suggested that, if I meant business, then I should say that to the elders. And so Maureen and I went to the elders for that purpose. We told them that we believed it was time for us to be married. When they saw our resolve, they agreed. Nonetheless, their faces still seemed blank towards us.

Now, I suspect that part of their hesitation was that they thought that I would run rough-shod  over Maureen. They thought that because they did not know Maureen. In spite of her true gentleness and kindness, Maureen is a fierce lioness. People who don’t know her, give her their full respect immediately. The idea that I would “control” Maureen is absurd, neither has there ever been such a thought in my heart.

I don’t remember exactly what Maureen said, but she had had enough. She told them that our marriage was and ought to be a happy occasion, and that they should be excited. I could see that some were a bit taken back by her fierceness, but it was Don Howat who saved the day. He rose and applauded us with joy, allowing the other elders to smile as well.

And so, even though there was much contending with God and He with me through these weeks of impasse, in the end, what God wanted of me was that I be definite, a very good thing.

New People and New Places
In order for the remainder of the summer to make sense, I will include the families that were moving to Blueberry at this time, and the many moves being made by different families from one living place to another in the community. 

I do not know who came when, through this summer, or the year before or the year after, so I will start at the top and work my way down the hill. First, David Randolph and Lenna Pacy were married and they had a small wooden home trucked in. Maureen tells me that it was Lenna’s parents’ first home in Buick, BC. It was put into a little hollow just above the Clarke cabin. Then, across from them, on a flat spot just above the Austin cabin, a single-wide mobile home was placed for Philip and Carolyn Bridge and their two school-age daughters. Carolyn Bridge was the sister of Barbara James.  

Another family moved to Blueberry from Smithers BC through this time, Jim and Shirley Mancha and their son, John, and three daughters, Rebekah, Michelle, and Stephanie. Rebekah was enrolled in the college where she would be in the courses I taught, and I had John and Michelle in my high school classes. The Mancha’s would eventually move into the upstairs of Sister Delores’s house as their home. Where they stayed before that, I don’t remember.

Meanwhile, we turned two of the rooms in the upstairs of the Tabernacle into living spaces. Roger and Bertie Henshaw felt that taking care of a large home filled with young people was becoming too much for them. They moved into one of those rooms, and Sister Edie Dwyer moved into the other. Don and Pat Deardorff had agreed to become the caretakers of the Henshaw’s large house and so they moved up there with their children. That left their cabin between the shop and the Blueberry River available to Don and Martha Howat, and so they were preparing their move into it.

Because our marriage was confirmed and Maureen and I were free to set a date, we were given a large room in the back corner of the Austin’s downstairs as our first “home.” Since that room was now empty, I moved up to it as my living place, having spent four good years as part of the Raja family. Not long after that, however, Sister Nancy Raja announced that she and her daughters, Freda and Ruth, would be leaving the community and moving to Fort St. John. This was overwhelming to me, for I believed strongly in community. I still do, but not as the fetish it had become to me then. I remonstrated with her, but they were quite set. 

When Brother Victor had been killed, Nancy had received a decent insurance settlement that had allowed her to buy some nice furniture for our cabin and then that made it possible for them to move comfortably to town. She soon found a job at the health food store in Fort St. John, where Maureen and I were customers whenever we went to town.

Before the Raja’s left, however, a seemingly minor incident happened that marked a deep shadow against my heart. You see, we had begun discussing the need for a new washhouse and shop to replace the old building, which was nearly derelict. Because Don was the oversight of the construction, not all the elders knew how much of that responsibility actually came out from me. Sister Nancy had been the oversight of the old washhouse, and so Brother John Clarke wanted to meet with her in the upstairs of the Tabernacle, in the little sitting room just above the spiral stairway, along with someone from the construction crew (he probably thought Don Howat) to discuss what the design of a new washhouse might be.

As I arrived for this discussion, I overheard Brother John say, regarding me, “What is he doing here?”

At the time, of course, these words were just another nightmare entering into my confusion. But let me answer his question now. “I am here, Brother John, because I love this family as much as you do and because I carry their needs in my heart just as much as you.”

This was the simple truth, but I could not have said or even thought such a thing then. I did not understand. 

Another incident with Brother John happened several weeks later, in the preparation time for our wedding. Brother John asked to visit with me to discuss the actions and responsibilities of being married. I highly respected Brother John, but I did not know what he wanted of me. He asked me several times if I had any questions, but no thought could enter my mind, no matter how hard I tried. We spent awhile in awkward silence. I suspect this was one of many autistic moments that was interpreted as “conceited pride.” 

The Raja cabin was then opened to Martin and Rebekah Lincecum to prepare it as their new home. That meant that the “Lincecum” cabin, just above the school, was now open to another new family to Blueberry, William and Charlene Brown. William was African American. He had been a fine chef in top-notch restaurants, and he also loved to garden. He soon took oversight of the food production in the Blueberry gardens. William had lots of good ideas, and he was given much liberty in his approaches to gardening. One of these things was that, through this time, Blueberry became certified organic. A number of the elders, including John and Nathel Clarke, were natural-health conscious, something unusual in the move fellowships. 

Some singles moving to Blueberry through this time whom I also want to mention (I cannot bring in everyone), included Donovan Van Gorkom from Smithers. His dad made high quality custom hiking boots in a shop in Smithers. Donovan soon went to work with the NorthStar logging company. Then, Sir James Barlow came to Blueberry from northern Ireland. He was a proper English gentleman and a great friend to Maureen and me. Lester Flowers, originally from Peru, also came to Blueberry as a college student.

In late August, then, new building projects were added to our already large obligations for that summer. The Lincecum’s wanted their cabin remodeled before they moved into it. This was very disconcerting to me because I had done a lot of work remodeling it already while I still lived there. All of that was to be torn out and replaced. It’s not that I was not willing to bear that loss to me, but my difficulty was that it was not really necessary. I was laboring under the “threat” concerning Sister Delores’s cabin being finished even while all my crew was pulled away to work on the Lincecum cabin. But Martin worked out with North Star and thus brought in tangible money to the community, and Sister Nathel was his mother, so that’s the way it would be.

At the same time, Don Howat had begun work on his new cabin to get it ready for their move. Meanwhile, I continued plugging along by myself trying desperately to get Sister Delores’s house finished under the obligation I had perceived. 

One day, I was working on the table saw which we had set up in the upstairs as our “shop.” Don Howat came up and stopped me. I had felt some friction towards my refusing to drop this job and to help with the two new jobs. Please understand that this is part of Asperger’s. When I see an obligation as I felt then, I wear blinders in my pursuit of that obligation. It is very, very difficult for me to “switch paths,” one might say.

Don stopped me and said, “You know, Daniel, I would like it very much if I could sit in my living room and look at the shelves on my wall and say to myself, ‘Daniel built those shelves for us.’”

Don’s open honesty and regard won my heart. I relinquished the need to finish Sister Delores’s cabin and spent several days working with the others on the Howat cabin. I even helped some on the Lincecum cabin. 

Finally, another mobile home was set up just to the west of the Brown cabin, just below the Deardorff house. This was occupied by Lloyd and Colleen Green just moving to Blueberry with their school-age son and daughter.

Our Wedding 
Maureen and I were very happy in our planning for our wedding together; nonetheless, many difficulties continued to press against us. As I watched my own son going through his pre-marriage dilemmas, I thought how glad I am that such a time, nine years for me, is long gone into my past. 

After communicating with my brothers and sisters, we hoped that we could set a wedding date in the first part of September since that was the best time for them to break with their obligations to come up to northern British Columbia. Dave Smillie and Kay Wallace were planning to be married that summer as well, however, and they preferred mid-September. Weddings are a big deal in community, and Blueberry was having lots of them through these years; so a couple of weeks were needed between. We submitted, putting our own needs second. Somehow, all my brothers and sisters were able to arrange things. They would all be coming with all their families. Lois lived at Blueberry and Jessica came up from Lubbock, Texas where she now lived. Claude and Roberta would be driving up from Bowens Mill.

I had waited so many years for this, and having all my family come to visit me inside of community was a big deal to me. We both wanted our wedding to be a memorable time, a family time, a time filled with community. We wanted a morning wedding, so that we would have time in the afternoon for family and a non-stressful exit before the evening was late. 

And we wanted a wedding in which most everyone had a part and where the Lord Jesus held the place of honor. 

Let's go straight to our wedding day, exccept for one thing. To prepare for our new home, I asked Terri Miller if he would build a bed for us to my design as his wedding gift. He readily agreed, and it was in place when we returned from our honeymoon.

Maureen and I were married on September 29, 1990, a Saturday. 

All my family was there. Franz and Audrey, with their four children; Frieda and Tim with their two, Ryan and April; Cheryl and Dave with their three children; Jenelle (Jim did not come thus she was by herself); and Glenn and Kim with their first little girl. Even more than that, Mom had hired a nurse to take her place full time for a week, and so this was the only time in seven years that she left dad to another’s care. 

On Thursday evening, two days before our wedding, we had a pre-wedding sharing service. My own family were all there for this. Different ones got up to share about our lives and to bless us. As I look through our wedding pictures, I see so many sharing and even dancing in joy. I then got up and shared about the word God had spoken to me nine years before, that Maureen would be my wife, and how the fulfillment of that word had seemed so impossible for so many years. I concluded my sharing with this statement, final and absolute in my heart. — “Now I KNOW that God does what He says He will do.”

Our wedding began at 10 AM on Saturday morning. Freda Raja sat behind the guest-book table. Richard was there as my best man, along with my brother Glenn. This was the first that I began to see Glenn as I should have always seen him, as a brother highly regarded. We stood at the front with Brother John Clarke who was to marry us. 

Ken Geis and Mike Pelletier were our main ushers. Then once everyone was seated, all the high school boys and young men sang a choral song together up front.

Patrick Downs played his violin and another sister a flute, while Howard Wallace played the piano as Jessica, Maureen’s maid of honor, and then Lois, came down the aisle to stand opposite us. Once they were up front, Laura Weitz joined them as they sang a song of praise. [I will not apologize for all the details; this is my story, and this was the best day of my life.]

Then Donovan van Gorkum stepped forward to play “Come, for the Spirit cryeth, ‘Come’” on his silver trumpet as Maureen came down the spiral stair case, and then as Brother Claude brought her down the aisle. 

When I walked my own daughter, Johanna, down the aisle to Matthew Schneider, I saw myself in him, and remembered the supreme joy I knew. Tears streamed down my face both times. That this precious woman wanted to be part of my life was more wondrous than anything I had ever known.

After Brother Claude gave Maureen’s hand to me, we sat down on the front row. First we had a time of praise. I had asked five to lead the praise, Jennifer Hanna, Dani Maldonado, Ken Geis, Sister Sue Sampson, and Leslie Cedeno. After that, Brother John stood and shared a good word, about fifteen minutes long (short by move standards). 

Then, Maureen and I went forward with our attendants for the first part of the marriage ceremony to the giving of rings. At that point, we had Claude, Roberta, and mom join with Maureen and me for a brief communion service of bread and wine together ministered by Brother John with Richard assisting. This was one of the ways I wanted to bring the Lord Jesus into our wedding. While we took communion, however, all the young ladies in high school and college, or of that age, had gone up front and sang a choral praise, a song of communion that Mike Pelletier had received from the Lord for our wedding. 

Finally, all the elders gathered around us to pray for us and to bless our marriage. Brother D and Sister Ethelwyn were there as well. I see Rick Annett in that picture, who would become such a dear friend to us. When the blessing was finished, Brother John Clarke pronounced us man and wife. We were married.

As I look through the pictures, I see all the wonderful people who were part of our lives and of this most wonderful day. I see such joyous giving towards us. And to see all the members of my own family there at Blueberry as well, this was truly God’s bounteous gift. 

The Wedding Party - Lois, Jessica, Maureen, me, Richard, and Glenn.


Our Families - Back row from left, Jessica, Lois, Glenn, Jenelle, Frieda, Franz, Cheryl. Front row from left, Claude, Roberta, Maureen, me, and mom.


 After our wedding we went outside for pictures while the Tabernacle was being rearranged for our wedding feast. After the dinner, there was another sharing time, with Don Howat as M.C. 

Of course, I had to carry Maureen into our new home up in the downstairs of the Austin’s. Except I picked her up too soon, going all the way up the back way with outside stairs. I did make it without dropping her. We had a quiet time in the Austin’s upstairs, opening some presents with friends and family before we changed for our departure.

We had a relaxed afternoon and were able to say goodbye to everyone before driving out in our Toyota station wagon for Dawson Creek.

Our Honeymoon 
The Blueberry family was very generous to us for our honeymoon and new home, giving us probably over $2000. More than that, actually, because more money had been given for our wedding and $400 for our rings. That was great, because I could get a $350 diamond ring for Maureen and a $50 gold band for me.

I had reserved the honeymoon suite in the larger hotel in Dawson Creek for our first night, and then two nights with a regular room in one of the better hotels in Prince George, set up inside as a tropical resort. In my mind, though, a honeymoon was an excuse to visit communities and brethren whom we would never get to see otherwise. Maureen was in agreement. Tropical beaches or exotic locations meant nothing to either of us. It is people whom we love.

On Tuesday, we drove to Smithers, BC., to the little move community there, just outside of town. We visited at the Smithers community for a week. This was where Milton and Bonnie Vereide lived, two leading ministries in the move. They were gone on a trip, however, so we were given their home to stay in. We arrived after dark. When I got up in the morning, I opened the curtains. Maureen looked out the window and said, “There’s a mountain outside our window!” And so there was, and wondrous mountains on the other side of Smithers as well, all covered in snow.

Smither’s is a picturesque little town. Dan Ricciardelli was also an elder at the Smithers community, and we had good times getting to know him and his family. We enjoyed sharing meals with the community. Brother Dan insisted that we spend three days just visiting sights in the area. We visited the town of Smithers, stopping at the Van Gorkom boot shop. We drove as high up onto the snow covered mountains west of Smithers as we could. The rest of the week we did what we liked better, I helped Dan on construction work on their Tabernacle and Maureen chatted while she cut the hair of most of the ladies in the community. Sister Janet Myers was also visiting at the time, so that was a special treat for us as well.

We went on next to Prince Rupert. I had hoped to have our one “expensive” meal in a seafood restaurant overlooking the ocean, but, strangely enough, even though Prince Rupert is a major port, its not really a sea town because several railroad tracks run right along the edge of the water all the way around. Bummer.

On our way back inland, then, we turned north and drove up to Telegraph Creek. That summer, another family had visited Blueberry, Mark Stevens from Telegraph Creek, with his three daughters and younger son. His two older daughters, Sola and Kimberley, were staying at Blueberry for school and were at our wedding. They very quickly became as daughters to Maureen and me.  

Mark Stevens had acquired an incredible property twenty miles west of Telegraph Creek on the large shelf just above the huge Stikine River canyon and just at the base of a large mountain to the north, blocking the northern winds. The deep canyon below meant that all cold air would drop down. Mark had maybe fifty acres of cleared pasture land with their newly built home on one side. 

We had a wonderful time with them. To my utter amazement, we went out to his garden and picked strawberries. This was the second week of October; Blueberry was covered in snow, and we were further north!

We drove on north from there to Whitehorse, in the Yukon, and spent a night or two with Jim and Kate Buerge. It was so great to connect with them again. Then we went on further north into the Klondike country to spend three nights and two days with Del and Virginia Buerge on a farm meant to be a community, but with only them there at that time.

I am glad we spent this time with Del and Virginia. Del was a workaholic, yes, and he had a dim view of spending one’s time as a teacher (which was not real work to him.) But they were good friends, and we had a wonderful time with them. Del had made a productive farm of his property, including a small orchard that actually produced fruit. While we were there, we helped them butcher chickens. Yeah, we got to gut chickens on our honeymoon! It’s just good to be real and to be part of other people’s lives.
On the way back to Blueberry, we went swimming in the Liard Hot Springs, with snow covering the ground all around. That was fun.

The Winter Months
When we got back to Blueberry, our first home, one large bedroom, was all ready for us.

The downstairs of the Austin cabin, was, by itself, larger than most of the other dwellings in the community. It had a large entry, three large bedrooms, a front room that included both a kitchenette and a living room, and in the back corner was a large wood furnace that heated the entire building. While we were there, the interior stairway remained in place, though the people who lived upstairs rarely used it now.

Along with Maureen and I in the back bedroom, two other newly married couples shared this home with us. In the front bedroom were Eric and Rachel (Roes) Hanna, and in the middle room were Fritz and Sarah (Gregg) Hanna. The two, of course, were brothers, and had been part of the community for longer than I. 

Our living situation there was adequate and fine. But it was not comfortable for any of us couples. It’s hard to begin a life together trying to share space with two other newlywed couples. All of us were looking forward to any other space opening that could become our own private homes. 

By November, Maureen knew that she was carrying our first child, to be born the next August. We both knew that it would be a boy. This was a very big deal to me, yet I knew how incapable I was in all my inability. 

It was a wonderful thing, though, to find that in so many areas important to family life, Maureen and I shared the same views and outlook. We were both interested in natural health, and thus began our marriage from then until now, in the pursuit of such understanding and practice. And so, I had read about barley grass, that drinking fresh barley grass juice daily would be of wonderful benefit in the healthy development of a child. Maureen claims that I said that drinking barley juice made the child smart, so if she didn’t drink her barley juice and if Kyle wasn’t smart, it would be her fault. I remembered saying something similar as a joke. Anyhow, I kept a box of barley grass growing in the one sunny window we had in the downstairs and made barley drink for Maureen every morning.

The trapping season does not start until mid-winter. There was talk of completing the interior of the cabin before the Ebright’s went back out that did not include me. This was very distressing to me because I loved that little cabin, and I had remembered making an agreement to complete it. I confronted John Austin on this exclusion, and he suggested that I take my concern to the elders. Maureen and I did, and they agreed that we would go out together to lead a crew in finishing the cabin. 

And so we made the long wintry trip by road this time up to the trapline cabin. Maureen was there for just a couple of days before returning, while a larger crew of men then came out. We did a beautiful job on the interior, putting in kitchen and bathroom cabinets, a plywood floor, and wood paneling on the walls. We sheetrocked under the sloping roof. This was another time where Brian contended with me on how something should be done, that is, that he should do the interior paneling instead of me and that I should do the outside chinking instead of him. This is one time that he won, but he was harsh, and Don Howat did speak with him afterwards. 

Because I was no longer taking college courses, I was able to teach more in the high school. More of the community children now became my students. I can best define the classes moving through by the three Austin children whom I taught. I had started with Deborah in eighth grade, and then Paul Austin in eight grade two years later. Now, I had the group in-between those two which included Rebekah Austin, David Deardorff, and Joy Ebright. The group younger than Paul Austin, (whose class now included John Mancha) became my students as well, that would include Anita Deardorff, Wendy Rehmeier, and Stephanie Ebright. I name most of my students because they were all very special to me and continue to be so. 

For the spring semester, Sister Mozelle Clark agreed that I could team teach “Learning and Evaluation” with her. Again, I can’t do anything like that without seizing it “whole hog.” I laid out the whole course. Sister Mozelle said that she took a deep breath when she saw my intense excitement and gave me great room. Thank you Mozelle, I understand now how much you gave to me.

I loved teaching college, and I loved teaching about teaching.

In March, Paul Mandry, who had been heavily involved in the school, moved to Fort St. John with his family. This became a difficulty for some in the community because the elders, and especially Brother John Clarke had instituted the typical move practice of breaking off all contact with “those who leave” and forbade any of their close friends from visiting them in town. 

That is not my story, however. The fact that Paul’s history courses now needed a teacher was, and so I stepped into teaching history in the high school as well.

Kimberley and Sola Stevens were in my classes, (with other students coming in for their final high school years as well, too many to include). This is a good ministry, however, to provide a school for the final two years of those who had been homeschooled otherwise. Always, their eleventh grade year was struggle, but their final year of high school was excellence. Maureen and I also sent two of our children to a move community school for their last two years of high school.

Through this year, I finished the construction degree program with Terry Miller so that he could graduate in the spring. I had also included Dani Maldonado and Fritz Hanna in some of the classes with him, particularly woodworking and cabinet design. One assignment Terry did in woodworking was to make a beautiful podium out of birch for the services, light of weight and on wheels, in contrast to the prior one which was heavy and hard to move. I see that Terry’s podium was there for our wedding. It was indeed a work of art.

Then, that May, the first group of students I had begun to teach at Blueberry graduated from high school, including Amos Deardorff, Deborah Austin, and Rachel Martin. Most of them had been in my classroom for five years. They were my joy and great reward.

Our New Home
Because the Mandry cabin was now vacant, Eric and Lynn Foster moved up into it. The little cabin just above the Tabernacle was now available. The elders agreed that it would belong to Maureen and I and to our soon-coming family.

This new cabin had a second small bedroom and so Maureen and I, almost together, thought of one of the funnest things (in my mind) we would do in our new life together.

Kimberly Stevens was a bright and fiercely independent girl. She was determined in her school work, but she had poor, even hurtful, experiences with move practices in her childhood, through the difficult season when their mother had died of cancer. Kimberly was not rebellious, in fact, she was very kind and giving. But she stood for herself against those who liked to exercise authority and so was always getting in trouble, both in her home situation and with many of her teachers.

Maureen and I did NOT see her in that way. We saw an incredibly wonderful girl whose independence was not to be squashed, and our hearts wept for some of the stuff being imposed upon her. So – the very moment we knew this newly opened cabin was ours, we asked Kimberley to come up and speak with us. We sat down formally, pretending to be serious (something I’m not very good at). To our delight, we could see that Kimberley thought she was in trouble again.

Then we asked, “Kimberley, we want you to be part of our home and family. Would you come and share our new home with us?”

The expression on Kimberley’s face was worth good money. She became as one of our daughters and so remains to this day. We got to see her here in Houston just a couple of years ago, as she was stopping on a fly through. Kimberley has always made Maureen and I so very proud.

I had remodeled this cabin already, a couple of years earlier, thinking it would belong to Richard and Elizabeth. It didn’t need any major changes. I wanted to build a new set of kitchen cabinets for it, with oak-plywood fronts, but I would do that through the summer months. There were a few things that I asked the elders about, that would help make it a nice home for us to move into. Since I was taking a much heavier load in school, I also asked if Don, Dani, and Terry could be given two or three days each to help me do that work. 

The elders said, “No.” 

When I had remodeled this cabin, I had put in a larger window meant for a bay window to be built. That bay had not been installed. I loved growing things and sunshine coming in during the long six months of icy winter. Sister Nancy had a bay window in her living room filled with flowers. There were others in the community. But my request was denied as being unnecessary, even “fleshy.” 

Other things were denied as well and we were told  there was no time for this, that "other pressing needs” in the community meant no time was available for my home. Sister Nathel Clarke came over with Don Howat to help me simplify my requests for the cabin. She scowled and spoke critically of its layout, then left.

In the end, all that was agreed was that Terry Miller could give a couple of days to make the second bedroom more private for Kimberley.

In all my years in community, this was the single most painful thing ever done against me. I had worked many, many hours making almost every dwelling place in the community better for those who lived there. I had built Dave Smillie a beautiful home, yet he never thanked me for it, not once. (Sister Delores did thank me for her new home, something that meant very much to me.) And I had done all that work for others for one reason only, because I loved them.

The summer before, we had dropped everything to do a major remodel on Sister Nathel’s son’s cabin, and Brother Don had spoken those meaningful words into me. Now I was starting my family, Kyle was soon to be born. This was our first home. I felt truly that I had been kicked as hard as could be kicked.

I will not hide or try to explain away this offense. More and more, over the next couple of years, my strength as a husband, father, and provider in the community was being stripped away from me by a continuation of this type of treatment. Having stepped out of my autistic shell, I was very vulnerable and unprotected. The deep sorrow and helplessness of this important moment would work grief all through me for the next ten years and would mark its pain on the early lives of our children.

The one thing I must do here is to stand up for myself. – And that is what I must do in placing the Lord Jesus upon myself in that moment. – You had no right to disrespect Maureen and me in that way. – The claim that this was counteracting my “fleshy sinful nature” is, itself, hostile against the Salvation of Christ Jesus. – As you treat the least of these whose hearts are filled with Jesus, so you ARE treating Him.  

Having said that much, I will leave it there.

Nonetheless, in the present, I extend my forgiveness, with all my heart, over those whose decision worked such hurt in me. I now understand that they did not realize what they were doing. Even more than that, I recognize and honor the Lord Jesus who filled their hearts with His Person and glory, just as much as He filled mine.

A Garden of Peace 
Through this time, the North Star company had acquired the teardown job of a large shop in Fort St. John. Our reward was to have all of the materials for the buildings we were planning to build the next year at Blueberry. Others had charge of this job and it became frustrating to many because the leaders did not know how to lead a crew of men, staying focused only on what they were doing. It was many hours of long hard work, with a crew of maybe twenty men to tear down that shop. And again, Brian found places to contend with me over how I was trying to do something. 

Then, with the job maybe two-thirds done, Mike Pelletier, Ken Geiss, and I were taking down a high plywood wall. It was maybe thirty feet wide and sixteen feet high. Mostly just the studs, but some of the plywood was still on. Whether it was too heavy for us or not, I don’t know, but much more than that, it was top-heavy. There was a split moment when we all three knew that we could not hold it. In that moment, Ken slipped to the side and Mike twisted between the studs where there was no plywood. I also made a split decision and saw that I had no options. The side was too far to my right and in front of me was plywood. (This was not their fault, I’m glad the other two were unhurt.)

And so the wall came down hard on me. I knew how to handle such a thing, and so I made it roll across the curve of my back, but it stretched out my spine and drove the claws of my hammer into my side. I was not badly injured, but that was it for me. The logging company’s insurance paid for my chiropractic needs. Others finished the job while I returned home to rest and recover.

Both Graham River Farm and the Shiloh Farm had dwindled down to just a few people by the time I visited them in 1986. Both were closed completely by 1988. The properties were owned by the move fellowship and the buildings remained. Through this year of 1991, I believe, Brother D and Sister Ethelwyn Davison were led of the Lord to return to Graham River with the Shepherd’s School of Music. A number of students and teachers who had been a part of that school went with them. This included two families that would become more involved in our lives from then until now, Steve and Cindy Schneider and Lee and Claire Wilkerson. Maureen, especially, was close friends with Cindy (Dix) and Claire. 

The problem the new Graham River faced was that prior to their return, one of the young men who had lived there in his teenage years, went across the ice one winter when no one was there and lit fire to the two big barns, the school building, and the Tabernacle, burning them to the ground. Because of that, their first “tabernacle” was the largest cabin, which happened to be the former Davison cabin where I had also lived. 

At Shiloh, one of the families had remained for a few years, farming and caretaking the land. Before the end of 1990, they also had moved out to Fort St. John. Because of what had happened at Graham, the regional eldership gathering had decided to maintain a caretaker presence at the Shiloh property, with different ones taking a week or two at a time.

That July, Maureen and I agreed to spend a week at the Shiloh Farm as the caretakers. We had no obligation, just to be there in order to be sure that everything was watched over. We drove over by ourselves. It’s a long drive into Shiloh on gravel and then dirt roads over rough terrain. A two-story house just to the north of the large Tabernacle had been made into the caretakers’ cottage. 

Our time there at Shiloh became a dream in my memory. It was the height of summer. Everything was green and abundant. Flowers bloomed everywhere. Stepping aside from the intensity of Blueberry, with time just to ourselves and nothing required of us was close to the most delightful week of my life. We spent our time exploring everything. Maureen, of course, was large with our new baby, so we did not exert ourselves. Shiloh had been a large community with many buildings spread over a much wider area than Blueberry or Graham. It was situated in a broad valley, about a mile wide between two ridges on either side over 1000 feet up. It was isolated from everything and the feeling that valley gave was of wild but gentle protection. In the north, it only takes a few months after buildings are abandoned for the forest critters to move in, so it felt like we were exploring a strange ghost town. 

It was for us that summer a garden of peace.

Our Son Kyle 
Let me share now about our preparation for the birth of our child. We had been perusing a list of names, and I was calling out every ridiculous name to Maureen just to be silly. I wanted the name to include my own dad’s name, Emerson, however, and so we needed a first name to go with it. Maureen had our daughters’ names in her heart from her childhood, so this was partly my choice. At that point, we did not actually know by fact that it would be a boy. Suddenly my eyes lighted upon the name “Kyle,” and I said, “Kyle Emerson.” Both of us felt in that moment that Kyle was telling us what his name was already. (We were to learn later that “Kyle” was one of the most popular names chosen in British Columbia in 1991!)

We took preparation for Kyle’s birth very seriously. One large issue for us was the question of vaccinations. I was neither opposed nor for doing such a thing to our child; I simply did not have enough information. This was a question others had as well, and so we gathered a number of studies and articles, both pro-vaccination and anti-vaccination, all of them written, supposedly, on the basis of “science.” We made the firm decision to let the facts decide for us. 

We were astonished at the difference between the two types of articles. The anti-vax articles were filled with sound argument and provable/disprovable scientific and historic evidence. The pro-vax articles were filled with hot air, contempt, and the mighty claim of “evidence, evidence, evidence,” as if repeating that word over and over would actually produce something that does not exist.

Our decision was simple and clear. More than that, in the years since, I have seen only these descriptions of both sides of the issue, except for one difference. The pro-vax argument, while continuing to contain only hot air, has become far more contemptuous and hostile than it was then.

More than that, our children have never known any of the many man-made childhood problems that come out from the vaccine needle. 

Terri Rehmeier, the nurse in the community, had much experience with childbirth. We planned to have our first baby in the hospital in Fort St. John. But Terri gave the two of us a full course in pregnancy and childbirth which was invaluable to us. At the same time, Rebekah Lincecum agreed to be Maureen’s helper in the hospital, and so she worked with us in preparing Maureen for the pain in labor, teaching Maureen how to breathe and hold herself steady.

You see, Maureen was determined that Kyle would not begin his life stoned out of his mind, which is what happens when the mother takes pain killers for the birth.

On the fifth of August, a Monday, Maureen began to indicate labor. It was slow at first. We drove out to Shepherd’s Inn with Rebekah Lincecum and spent the night in the trailer of a brother by the name of Roman, who graciously gave us space. That way, we were only a half-hour from the hospital should we need to go quickly.

The labor was slow, so we went on to the hospital the next morning, a Tuesday. The hospital staff suggested that we not commit to the hospital until later, but that we should spend the day in town, doing things until the birth pangs increased. 

(I would spend quite a number of stressful days in the Fort St. John hospital over the next several years. I must say here that, in spite of its hospital feel, most of the nurses and doctors there were wonderful and always treated us with care and regard. Because Canada is a single-payer system for health needs, everything was taken care of for us. All they needed was our basic information.)

Our doctor for Kyle’s birth was supposed to have been Dr. Watt. Maureen had kept several appointments with him prior to this time. He was away on these days, however, and so Dr. Umadaly stepped in for Kyle’s delivery.

Maureen’s labor increased slowly through the day. As evening came on, we were walking around the block near the hospital. We paused on occasion and Maureen put her arms around my neck to wait out the pains. A First Nations lady was not far from us. The woman was clearly drunk, tall and stocky. But she came up to us with compassion on her face, put her hand on Maureen’s shoulder and blessed her in the name of the Lord. “God is with you,” she said. We returned to the hospital in awe of the grace of God that always surrounded us. 

After Maureen was admitted to the hospital, Rebekah stayed with her through the night, but at a certain point I went to the family room and slept on the couch. We went into the birthing room around noon the next day. It had been a long haul for my slip of a wife. Rebekah was her help, coaching her to breathe. I stood just behind her, utterly useless. In fact, at one point the doctor thought I had fainted, but I had just stooped to change the praise tape in the tape player. 

Kyle was born just after 5 PM. Except – the cord was around his neck, and he was quite blue. After all that, and suddenly the doctor was running out of the room with our little baby in his arms and with all the nurses at his tail. We waited in the grace of God until they returned. Our little boy was fine; I was a dad. 

I took Rebekah home that evening; we left Maureen to rest quietly with Kyle. The next day I returned to town. I had little money when I went to the flower shop, so all I was able to buy was three red roses in a tea cup. That Wednesday had seen the birthing of several babies in that wing of the hospital. As I carried my few roses into Maureen’s room, shared with other new mother’s, I saw vast flower bouquets and balloons everywhere. At first I felt a bit ashamed of the little I had to give, but then I remembered that every one of those other mothers had screamed for drugs in the pain all alone. I may have been useless, but I was there for her, with Rebekah. 

Maureen told me that the others had asked her what was wrong with her, how could she have been so quiet. 

As I looked at my precious wife, holding our wonderful little boy, two things awoke inside of me. First, was the realization that women are stronger than men. But much more than that, I realized, for the first time, just how deeply I loved Maureen. Yes, Asperger’s take awhile to connect with their true feelings.

Kyle will be 29 years old this summer. It would not be possible for parents to be more proud than we are of him. And that same love I felt for Maureen that day has only grown deeper and more true. 

Note
In drawing this letter to a close, I find that I am yet unable to bring a complete resolution inside the Lord Jesus to the difficulties shared here. I have not had the courage to say what I said in “Our New Home” in all these years before now, only the healing God has brought me through writing about Blueberry thus far gave me that courage. It is right that what I have said in this letter should stand as it is. When I start the next chapter, I will place things into God.