Dear Readers,
Jeanne Myers of Iola recently wrote a friend telling of her experiences at Humboldt’s Biblesta and is kindly sharing it.
Hi y’all,
I wanted to share with you my experience at Biblesta yesterday in Humboldt, Kansas. It is a day dedicated to the Bible. There are parade floats with various scenes from the Bible with the scripture quoted, lots of food booths in the town square, the woodworking museum shop was open for tours and lots of Christian music with a country western flare and 24 pots of white beans cooking all day with folks bringing their own pots to take home.
Now, this is not my thing and I had never attended before, but Cheryl wanted to attend. The parade started at 1:30 p.m. but we were advised to be there early to set up our chairs. We selected a north facing curb with a building behind to shade the sun. It was a clear day after a big early morning storm, and the temperature was a lovely high 70s without the oppressing humidity. The weather alone seemed a minor miracle.
I was impressed with the differences in decorum of the people on the floats. Some stayed in character the entire time (three blocks) while others were apparently telling jokes and giggling, which could be distracting. One float is a large whale that squirts water off the top and a man lies in the mouth with only his legs visible waving at the audience. (Jonah, I suppose.)
Several observations. There was a calmness and a peacefulness in the entire population. I had a thought about rowdy teenagers or snipers, and yet it was quickly banished by a feeling of safety. People politely line up in queues and patiently await their turn. No pushing ahead. We set up chairs and no one placed their chairs in front of us but formed the second row. We were expecting folks to come at the last minute and sit right in front of us, which has now become typical. Even kids seemed to be sitting patiently, awaiting the parade, without distractions such as sidewalk chalk or iPods.
There were all “flavors” of Christianity represented although I was disappointed that we had not real Black Gospel music performing. Those folks have so much FUN in their church! But I was not aware of any tension among the different races or populations.
Time seemed to stand still. We sat for hours watching folks and listening to music in our lawn chairs until I found myself dozing. Then we had a very, very long line to wait until straight up 5 p.m. before they would dispense the beans that had been cooking all day. Beans don’t like me, but Cheryl said they were mighty good!
I found myself between two worlds, the business of email and Facebook vs the peacefulness of just sitting and observing. At one point I even had the thought that the music was distracting and wanted to just observe the people and the trees without all “the noise.” Somehow, I seem to have a terror of being bored and needing a book or iPhone for entertainment. Yet, as I age, I find that I am more content to experience this world, knowing that at some point, my time will expire and I may not see grass, trees or sky in the same way again.
This reminds me of our Farmer’s Market that begins promptly at 5:30 p.m. on Thursdays. Last year I went early to get some tomatoes and was first in line. They apologized but they could not begin selling until the horn blasted, absolutely NO sales until the official start time and no early sales. Just as it should be!
Jeanne Myers,
Iola, Kan.
