Noah's Last Name and More of the Same

I was not given permission to post the next one. But I was asked to at least tell you it was not about sex. We had been seeing each other now for a couple of months and now had to face a period of what might be called the dating doldrums.  Anybody else know what I mean by this?  I mean it is when you get to know each other well enough to come to the realization that neither of you are perfect and a flaw or two start to show up.  At least now her parents were getting to know me good enough that when I drove all the way down they would let me stay overnight.  So I did just that I stayed at their home for the first time and attended church with them the following Sunday morning.  I found myself climbing the steps of an older Christian Reformed Church and soon was sitting with her in a bench right in front of the guy who had taken her to the prom a couple of months ago.
Christian Reformed Churches are interesting places.  And this one was no exception.  For many years the CRC had mostly people of Dutch descent.  So most of the people who went to them had a name with Dutch roots.  Van something or Ver something for the last name and Jan or Hans for the first.  In the Dutch language the R is always rolled out a little.  I knew this well as I had the experience as a young boy of spending several years in the Netherlands and attending the first and second grade there in a Dutch school.  The CRC was just coming out of a tradition which had some rather strict rules on what you could and could not do on Sunday.

A few funny things were starting to happen in the CRC .  You could not watch TV on Sunday until after the evening service.   At that time you could watch Bonanza and Lassie. For some members bike riding  was also out.  Movies where just getting off of the list and travel for recreational purposes was not looked on all that well.  Card playing was kind of out but someone had figured out that a card game by the name of Rook was OK because it just had numbers on the cards rather than pictures on some of the cards.  I think when you look at any denomination you could perhaps think of a few strange things that they did.  I never understood who was starting to change the rules.  At first I thought it might be God but then later I figured they were being changed by either a pastor, elder or deacon who felt like doing something on Sunday.  When the others all saw this they thought they could do it too and soon it was all forgotten about.

At the Vermeulen home meals were opened with prayer, the Bible was read after and then another prayer.  Over the years mashed potatoes were always on the menu as they were on this first Sunday of my presence.
It was kind of a formal setting and a nice table and it always looked kind of nice.  Deb's dad was a good prayer and we would open every prayer like this "Dear Lord, we have gathered before you in the afternoon hour of this day" and then he would carefully pray about the concerns of that the day and end with the reasons we had to be thankful.   In my home we had always had a little more rambunctious approach to meals.  So when Deb's mom went in to the kitchen and expressed some concern that the plate of spaghetti noodles were fully cooked I suggested that there was only one way to tell.  When you throw a piece at the wall and if it sticks it is done.  That two second flight of a piece of spaghetti over to the wall in that formal dining room almost cost me a life long relationship.   My to be bride was not pleased and it did not seem as though the rest of the family was all that impressed either.  Their youngest, Ken, did have a smile and he broke the ice.  He said "you know I have wondered all my life why all those guys in the Bible do not have last names.   Oh I said but they do. Just ask me. OK he said how about Noah.  I suggested his last name had to be VanderArk.  We had some fun that day giving some last names to a few other characters in the Bible.

I kind of received my first good chewing out that day. In the many meals that have been shared together over all of these years we have all learned to have a great time together. I pray now that many more can be shared and I promise Sylvia I will never throw food at the wall again.  Send me a note if you would like to know the last names of some of the other famous Bible guys.  Never have figured it all out but  they are all Dutch names.

It was time now for Deb to come and meet my family.  Tell you about that next time........it was interesting!!!!!

Stan the Man