Writings By Phil

A photo of Jackie nailed itself to the back wall of my heart months before I even met her. To me, she was an unknown girl, half reclining, half sitting, in the back of a truck. She wore jeans, their blue color obliterated, painted over with a thick layer of tan colored dust. Her face was streaked with dirt. Her hair was long and black with wavy curls, made limp by the infusion of powder from the road. Despite her circumstances, and perhaps an acute desire to clean up, she smiled. She had a nice smile!!

She was girl a on a mission trip, and the dirt was the result of a long ride in the back of a truck over dusty roads to the Ayoreo Village of Puesto Paz in Southern Bolivia. That much I knew, but nothing more. “She’s cute,” I thought, but alas, she was probably only a 17-year-old girl, still in high school, who lived a million miles away from Sanford, Florida. “No hope for me!” I ruminated as sadness filled my heart. “Time to move on!”

I was 29, maybe already 30, when I saw her picture. I was working with SUMMIT, New Tribes short-term mission’s program. My task during those days was to put together a presentation book about SUMMIT that mission representatives could use to show the program to pastors and others wanting to involve their church, or themselves, in short-term missions. Jackie’s picture was one that I chose to include in the book!

I asked John Cross, my boss, “Who is she?” showing him the photo. Yes, I wanted to know for myself, but also, I asked, just in case names would go into the final script.

“That’s Jackie Jackson!” he said. “She was so challenged by her time in Bolivia, that she has already finished the first phase of mission training and is now in language school.” Behind him, pinned to the wall were some prayer cards. He pointed to one, “That’s her, now!”

The card was printed in black and white. Her face was clean, her hair cut shorter. I liked the first picture better when she had longer hair, even with dirt on her face! However, hearing John say that she was in language school in Missouri planted seeds of hope in the sad furrows of my heart. It meant that she was older than I thought! And, she wanted to be a missionary!

Later, when I had the office to myself, I found her file in the cabinet and gleaned all I could from her application and required references. There were no red flags, and I found that she was not just older than I thought, but that she was born in the same year as I was! I was interested!

I had a dilemma! How do you meet someone in the same mission, but so far away? If I just appeared out of the blue, she might think I was stalking her. She might not like me! She could already have a boyfriend. She could have looks and not personality. I didn’t know! Besides, I had no reason to travel to Missouri.
Really, I knew nothing about her and building hopes on a photograph was silly! I put the file back in the cabinet and pushed the drawer closed. I tried to close the door on wishful thinking, too – A relationship with the girl with dirt on her face in a photo was so improbable!

It was then that my stomach aches started. Pain, deep down in my gut, tore through me, sometimes for minutes, sometimes hours. It was hard to stand, it was hard to sit at my desk. I needed to see a doctor, but until then, I did my best to remain stoic. There were times, when alone in the office, I would lay on the floor on my belly. That position and the hard floor seemed to lessen the agony. Thankfully, the discomfort didn’t come every day.

I had no idea what caused my suffering. I had spent two years in the jungles of Bolivia, sometimes drinking swamp water. More recently l had traveled to the Philippines for five weeks as part of a SUMMIT team and had spent the time in a remote area on the island of Mindanao. What bugs had I picked up, I didn’t know, and could they be causing problems, now? It was a real possibility. A regular doctor wouldn’t be attuned to such things, so I decided to travel to Missouri to see our mission doctor. He treated missionaries from all over the world, so he would know, I hoped.

Living in Florida, I missed having four seasons and especially seeing fall colors. I scheduled my appointment for some time in October when I hoped the trees would be dressed to kill in leaves of red, yellow, and gold. I would only be there for five days and much of that time I would be sitting in the doctor’s office or enduring some kind of test to determine what was causing my gut to hurt.
Upon arrival, I was housed in an empty student apartment. I had no idea who my neighbors were. That first afternoon, finished with the doctor for the day, I found my lodgings cold. I didn’t want to turn on the electric heat, so I took my book and went outside and found a sunny spot in the yard. I sat on the ground and leaned my back against a cedar tree. The sun felt good, driving the chills from my bones.
Shortly after, a woman came walking by on her way home, finished with her classes for the day. We chatted for a bit. I leaned her name was Pam. Before she left to do her homework, another young lady came up the walk. Pam said, “This is Jackie Jackson, my roommate!” I felt hope again stirring in my heart. I didn’t plan this!! Not only that, but the women lived right next door to me in the six plex in which I was a guest!

When the women learned that I was having to fast for more than 24 hours for an upcoming procedure, they felt sorry for me and promised me a steak dinner when I could eat again. “I would like that,” I said. In the meantime, I showed them pictures of my time in Bolivia. and when she didn’t have to study, I asked Jackie to walk with me down by the lake, up the hill, wherever didn’t matter, I just wanted to spend time with her.

I got my steak dinner and more happy hours with Jackie. I wanted our budding relationship to blossom, something made more difficult by the fact that I was leaving for home and she was staying in Missouri. I wanted to write her and keep it going, but how do you ask that of a girl you just met? What reason can you give? “I love you and want to write you!” seemed too forward and might scare her away, I reasoned. In the end, I blurted out, “I think you’re a nice person and I would like to write you!” I left for Florida the next day, tiny seeds of hope sprouted in the field of my heart, something I hadn’t felt in a very long time.

After multiple tests, the doctor could not find my problem. In the end, he put it down to “spastic colon” and gave me a big jar of blue pills, telling me to take one every time I started to hurt. I went back to Florida and never even swallowed one pill. My stomach aches were gone! Apparently love cured me!

Nine months later I married Jackie Jackson, the girl in the photo with dirt on her face.

Hindsight has told me that “I think you are a nice person” was not the line a girl wants to hear. Apparently, it didn’t offend Jackie too much, because she did write me back! However, she never let me forget it. either!

Thirty-eight years later, Jackie, I still think you are a nice person! If you will let me, I want to spend the rest of my life with you! Happy anniversary!