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OF PENCILS AND PROM GOWNS

By Mr. Morgan P. McCarthy

            The young Christian woman, sitting upon the wooden floor of her den, gazed upon her precious repository of a green bin in front of her.  It was made of wood, had a lid that opened upward, and measured two feet three inches wide by one foot five inches deep by one foot two inches high.  It had strong iron handles to both sides and a band of iron around its lid and an iron latch and iron clasp for a padlock if one desired a padlock.  On top of this closed green lid was a magic marker message handwritten by this woman in black magic marker on cardboard taped thereon with mailing tape. It was a classic poem loved by many Christians out there like herself, and it read the following:

“This world is not my home.

I’m just passing through.

My treasures are laid up

Somewhere beyond the blue.

The angels beckon me

From Heaven’s open door.

And I can’t feel at home

In this world anymore.”

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This poem was dear to this woman who was saved and looking for the Lord’s appearing.  She loved her Saviour of her life down here, and she loved her Saviour of the imminent rapture of the believers.

This young Christian woman then lifted the lid of this precious green wooden bin and saw the mirror that she had put in on the underside of this lid.  She paused to look upon her face with personal doubts.

Though a woman created by God, she felt as if she were an extraterrestrial when seeing her face.  Her skin was green, and her hair was much and wild and purple, and her eyes were black, and her nose was small, and her lips protruded, and she could not see her teeth for her lips, and her chin was small.  She looked more like a woman from Venus or a woman from Mars.  But God had not endowed Venus and Mars with life as He had so very much her Earth.  She doubted her attraction.   But she doubted nothing else about herself that God had created in her.  God loved her as she was.  Maybe a saved man might, too.  She thought about a future with a boyfriend-in-the-Lord who might find her stunning.  God could do that for her.  He was God.

            Her name was Miss Distry Reeves, and in this green bin at its bottom were two most precious possessions—a box of pencils and a prom gown.  They served as symbols of dreams of her woman’s heart.  The box of pencils represented her real life of writing for God.  The prom dress represented her dream life of dating a good man of God.  Resting the green wooden lid up against the wall, she first took up in her hands her box of twelve writing pencils.  With things like this, Distry had written many pages of religious/inspirational stories for God on pads of yellow ruled paper in cursive writing.  God had long ago given her the gift of writing, and it was a very fulfilling and satisfying hobby for Distry daily, to go along with her daily Bible studies and her daily prayers.  She did not lack for writing; nor did she lack for writing ideas.  All of her words were inspired by God, and the Bible verses that she did put in her writings were indeed perfect words of God, because they were King James Version Bible verses.  She then set this box of pencils back in the wooden bin. This was in the left side of the bottom of the green bin.  Miss Reeves then picked up the prom dress.  With this in her life before Christ, she

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had dated many handsome, but worldly men, herself dressed for all of these dates in this garment. But now, as a born-again woman, this prom dress could not be put on anymore; her dates had ended in her new life in Christ.  When she had first told her unsaved boyfriends about their need for the Saviour, as she had found out for herself and gotten saved herself, they all deserted her.  But she would not desert Jesus.  She loved Jesus most of all.  The Bible told her that she, being a believer, must date only men who were also believers.  And she obeyed God’s commandment about not being unequally yoked together.  And born-again guys living for God were hard to find in this world.  And she wisely chose to wait upon God to bring a boyfriend-in-Christ her way.  The wait was long.  None was coming.  And she was lonely.  But the prom gown was still in the green bin.  As soon as a boyfriend-in-Christ were to come for her, she would get it back out of the green bin and put it on for him.  Though, in her life before Christ with this prom dress, Distry Reeves had committed much immorality, in her life now with Christ, with this same prom gown she could become an elegant lady in an elegant dress for a God-fearing boyfriend.   It was all purple throughout full of that shiny fabric called “acetate.”   And it felt good to have on.  Distry then set back down in the green bin this prom dress.  This was in the right side of the bottom of this wooden bin.

            Distry Reeves was thirty-six years old now, a born-again believer for seven years so far.  She lived in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, nowadays, and knew all about the Oshkosh Museum and the Payne Art Center, and the E.A.A. and its much aircraft in this several day famous air show, Walter’s grocery store, the Oshkosh Library with its two stone lions along the steps to the library, and St. Vincent De Paul’s Thrift Store, and Ferno’s, which sold corn-on-the-cob, and also a massive quarry with a chain link fence around it to keep sightseers from falling into the deep vast pit, and Menominee Park along the shores of Lake Winnebago, and its little zoo.  And she knew all about Oshkosh’s annual plague of harmless lake flies at their time of the year.  And she especially knew about Oshkosh’s old mall, Park Plaza, in its days before shutting down years ago.

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            Just as the God of sanctification had cleaned up Distry Reeves’s prom gown life to His glory when she had found Christ, so, also, had He cleaned up Distry Reeves’s writing pencil life to His glory when she had found Christ.  For herself, Distry had tried to write on her manual typewriter.  But fixing typographical errors with an eraser wheel and its brush only served her to lose her temper and become irate at herself.  Later, she thought to use an electric typewriter.  Though the new thing of its day, those tabs that were meant to lift off the typographical errors, did not work for her consistently.  And she dared to complain to herself all about this as it was happening to her, also.  So, Distry stayed true to her pencils and her paper.  Besides that, her handwriting was remarkably legible even for cursive writing.  And she believed that her handwritten stories could someday become an effective soul-winning ministry in the future sometime.  Many people had already read her literary works as an unpublished writer; many more could read her literary works were she to become a published writer someday.  She did know better than to send such a handwritten story to any editor or publisher or agent.  God could help her with this in His time and in His way someday soon, hopefully.  She consistently prayed for that always.

            As a writer for some decades by now, Distry Reeves had passed through different “eras” or different genres, as she progressed in her craft, both before salvation and since salvation.  In 1978 she wrote a novel she called The Ages. She described it as “a history book about another world.”  In it she wrote about sticks that lived.  It had typical ungodly doctrines of the lost such as evolution and humanism and polytheism.  And it abounded in violence, sometimes graphic violence.  This first genre of her writing life Distry now called “violence.”  She was in tenth grade when she first wrote the first draft of The Ages.  And it had seen many rewrites since.  But God was not glorified with this novel.  She herself could not glorify God then, being yet lost in her sins for many more years.

            Then she began to write what she called “girl stories.”  Herein Distry wrote about fornication and adultery and other seedy ungodly dates.  She learned to like to write about call girls despite her

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complete ignorance of such a profession.   Her favorite movie character became the call girl “Lana” of the theater movie “Risky Business.”  Miss Reeves was twenty-two years old when she began this era of her writing.  And the year was 1984.  And her hours alone in her room upstairs at Mom and Dad’s house had corrupted her writing and her thoughts.  Herself an immoral young woman now, Miss Reeves’s girl stories not only did no honor to God, but they also did no honor to women.  Now that Distry was a born-again believer, she now called that age of her writing, “immorality.”

            Next, Distry came to write about a supernatural she-Collie dog angel whose form was truly “resplendent.”  This dog she called “Zack.”  She had fallen in love with this Zack and began to write stories about her.   Again the year was 1984 and again she was twenty-two years old.  So different this Collie was from the girls of her previous stories.  The girls of her previous stories only had one thing in mind with her men—to seduce them.  But this Collie dog made Distry giddy in a pure and asexual romance.  And because this supernatural Collie dog inspired magic in Distry’s heart without any of that sexuality that she always felt for men, this writer thought that Zack was all good for her.  And Distry wrote draft-after-draft of story-after- story all about this she-Collie angel.  Indeed a whole drawer of her two-drawer metal filing cabinet of that time were filled with these dog stories.  She did not know that this was the occult in her writing.  Such satanism exuded in these stories of “her wizard in the heavens,” as she affectionately called Zack in one of her dog stories.  As a born-again believer now, the wiser Distry Reeves now called this era “Wizardry.”  And it glorified the Devil even more than it did not glorify Jesus.  And in this Wizardry did the unsaved Distry find her most delightful writing of her life before Christ.

            After this, her star-crossed love for her Collie dog angel began to wane and to grow old in her heart.  The year was 1989, and she was twenty-eight years old.  Where once she ran the meadows and ran the seashores with her beloved Zack in her inspired science fantasy stories, now Distry had to settle into mundane fiction stories.  In fact these dog stories had become more like narrative nonfiction

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stories.  She had officially fallen out of love with Zack.  And in her good life now in Christ, Distry Reeves came to call this era, or genre, of decline “glorified term papers.”

            Then she moved to Oshkosh, searched for and found eternal truth, and became a born-again Christian.  The year was 1990.  And she discovered the joys of worship—reading her King James Bible every evening, praying to her Heavenly Father every night, and going to the Baptist church every time the doors were open.  And she began slowly to learn how to write now to please God and not to please the flesh or the world or the devil.  At first she did not know how to write Christian stories that really moved her as the dog stories had in her lost days.  She wrote fiction stories at first.  But fantasy was more her genre in the Lord.  She did not know this in her earlier months with Christ.  And this first era of writing for her with God she also called “glorified term papers.”  This was her era of writing “with the head.”  Then she became more imaginative in her stories for God, and she progressed to writing “with the heart.”  Then she began to seek to honor Jesus more with what she wrote, and she progressed to writing “with the spirit.”

            Then she came to the writing era that she now found herself in—that most especial genre represented by the box of pencils in her wooden green bin.  And she called this age of writing, “Of Sympathy and Sentimentality.”  This was the apex of her decades as a writer.  Everything that she wrote suddenly was more special than any of her dog stories had been.  By the reference to “Of Sympathy and Sentimentality,” Distry Reeves now was able to make her characters sympathetic to her readers—the key to good writing.  Herself in these stories and the boyfriend she had in these stories were now characters that the reader could find sentimental.  These were now in her life in her new wood filing cabinet, and these times were the mid-1990’s.  With these handwritten gems, Miss Distry Reeves hoped to someday have her readers to pray along with herself as her literary boyfriend character  led her through the sinners’ prayer unto salvation. That is, maybe someday, the reader would pray and get saved just as she did as the leading lady in her stories.  Vice versa, she could be the one leading her

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story-boyfriend through the sinners’ prayer unto conversion, and the reader could pray what the guy character prayed and get saved himself for real.  That is, the reader could get saved just exactly the same way as the leading man did in her short story.  What a way for Distry Reeves to spread the Word of God to the rest of the world—through her gift of writing given her by God.

            In her prayers and reflections about writing in Heaven to come, Distry Reeves thought to call it “Of Truth and Glory”  She did not know yet down here what that writing would be like.  It would be all about Jesus for sure.  That much she was sure of.

            In her life with boyfriends before she got saved, her boyfriends had names such as the following:  “Lance,” “Master,” “Party Animal,” “Older Guy,” “Jail Bait Man,” “Waster,” “Minor Boy,” “Molester,” “Delinquent,” “Recidivist,” and “Wildman.”  But the oddest one of all did not even tell her his name the whole week they went out together.  He liked to fix jalopies in his garage.  He told her that he always dreamed of what it was like to be punched by a woman.  And he drooled when he gazed upon her.  And this most dubious guy was the very one who had given her her special green bin.  When it was his green bin, it was his tool chest for the garage, and it did not have then that ode to Heaven on top or the mirror within.  The ode to Heaven and the mirror she had put in when he gave it to her.  Every time they got together that week, which was every day, he always said, “I wonder what it is like to get socked by a woman.”  Well, on their seventh day, this time he kept saying, “I wonder what it is like to sock a woman.”  The two were in his basement, and she saw his green wooden tool chest now in the recreation room down here instead of out in the garage.  He saw her looking at it with desire.  And he told her, “If you want it, you can have it.”

            She said, “It’s in your house now and not in your garage.”

            “I’ve got things in there in the house now for the both of us, Distry,” he said.

            “I don’t know how to work with auto mechanics tools,” she said.

            “That’s not what’s in there now anymore,” he said.

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            “What’s in there now?” she asked.

            He said, “The answers to both of my questions—punching and getting punched and all.”

            “Ooo,” she said.  “Could I go over there and take a look?”

            “Open up my old tool chest, Distry, and see what I have in there now,” he told her.

            She skipped up to the green bin off on the other side of this remodeled basement room, opened up the lid, and what she saw added more delight to her curiosity.  Therein were two pairs of brown boxing gloves.

            “Are you ready for some fun?” he asked.

            “One pair is smaller than the other pair,” she said, relishing this exciting new thing on this most novel date.

            “The smaller gloves are women’s boxing gloves, and the larger gloves are men’s boxing gloves,” he explained to her.

            “Men’s hands are bigger than women’s hands,” she said.

            “And men’s fists are bigger than women’s fists,” he said.

            “Are we supposed to box each other down in this basement?” she asked.  This was kind of kinky, but she kind of liked the thought of it.

            “Only if you want my green bin all for yourself, Distry,” he said.

            “You are hardly a big and powerful guy as far as men go,” she said.

            “And you are a tall gal with long arms for a woman,” he said back to her.

            “But I don’t know if I can throw a punch,” she said.

            “You will have to learn how to throw a punch if you want to win my green bin, O Distry,” he told her.

            “And I do not even know if I can take a punch,” she said.

            “You will have to learn how to take a punch tonight if you want to earn your green bin, Miss

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Reeves,” he told her.

            He went up to where she stood, grabbed his pair of boxing gloves from the green bin, donned them on his hands, and knocked them together as boxers always did.  She then did likewise, taking her boxing gloves, putting them on over her hands, and knocking them together most customarily.

            He then walked out onto his large braided elliptic rug in the middle of this hardwood floor, and he waited for her to come up to him.  She came up to where he stood, driven by the spirit of competition, and she stopped right before him.  A moment of hesitation passed.

            Then he said, “Slug me, Distry.”

            She said, “No.  You slug me,”

            He said, “But I want to give you the green bin.”

            And she said, “And I want to get the green bin.”

            Then man and woman drew back their gloved right fists, and they threw their hardest punch that they could punch, and they connected right to each other’s left temple at the same time.  Distry did not know what happened after that.  The odd man of this date was stunned, but he could tell that he was still on his feet.  He could see Distry down upon the rug and quite supine.  He knelt down beside her where she lay, and he asked her, “Distry, are you awake?”  She said nothing, neither moved, nor opened her eyes.  His head was quickly becoming re-orientated again, and all of his senses were coming back to him.

            With his left glove, he shook her shoulder, and she stirred, opened her eyes, and asked, “What happened?”

            “Why, I really believe that I knocked you clean out, Distry,” he said.

            “Oh,” she said.  And as she lay there in a daze, she had enough awareness and sense of humor to say, “It seems that I can not take a hard punch, and that I cannot throw a hard punch.”  And she shook her head, laughed at herself, and sat up on the rug.

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            “I’m sorry, Miss Reeves,” he said.

            “I’m not sorry.  I liked it,” she said.  And she got back to her feet, her head still dizzy, but her feelings wondrously alive.  “That was fun!”

            “It was fun for me, too,” he said.

            “It was more fun than what we usually do together with me in this prom dress,” she said.

            “I hope I did not damage your prom dress,” he said.

            “You did not,” she said.

            “This was more fun for me than what we do in the night together also, Distry,” he said.

            “Do I get your green bin now?” she asked.

            “Yes.  The green bin is all yours, Miss Reeves,” he said.  “But I get to keep the boxing gloves,”

            They then took off their brown gloves.   And he tossed both pairs into his closet.  He then brought her back to her home, the former tool chest in his favorite jalopy.  And the tool chest became the green bin.  And Distry Reeves at once put into it her box of pencils.  And she took off her prom gown and folded it up and put that into this wooden green bin as well.

            She never saw this unnamed fellow again.  He must have run off with another woman.  But she never forgot that special boxing match in the basement.  And it gave her great delights ever since.

The pencils inside symbolized her writing at the time of her life of sin, and her prom gown inside represented her flings at the time of her life of sin.  Getting saved from her sins later on most clearly changed what these two objects came to symbolize instead in her new life in Christ.

            How did Miss Distry Reeves become a born-again believer?  It was through the one man more fascinating to this young lady than even the man who had knocked her unconscious.  This man was a most faithful soul-winning man of God whose name was “Usher Flanders.”  He was gentle and compassionate and benign.  And he had a great burden for Distry’s soul.  And he was the man who told her, “Distry, you are a truly stunning young woman.”  This Flanders was standing in downtown

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Oshkosh, preaching in the streets, in front of the old Park Plaza mall building.  And he was not sparing in his words about hellfire and brimstone and damnation.  He was also giving out salvation tracts to all passersby who accepted them.  Distry took one and asked him, “Sir, how bad really is Hell?”

            He went on to say, “Hell, young lady, is an eternal lake of fire.  Hell is eternal outer darkness.  Hell is eternal separation from God.  Hell is eternal parched thirst.  Hell is eternal ravenous hunger.  Hell is eternal falling.  Hell is eternal worms.  Hell is eternal dying and yet never dying.  And Hell is eternal weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth.”

            “All of that is for ever, sir?” she asked.

            “Verily are the torments of Hell everlasting, fine young lady,” he said.

            “What a dread dreadful place that Hell is, sir,” said Distry Reeves.

            “Would you like to accept the Saviour Jesus Christ right now?” he asked.

            “This Saviour Jesus Christ stuff…it kind of bothers me and it kind of bores me both at once,” she said.

            “You are convicted of your sins,” he told her most sagaciously.

            “No,” she said.  “I am offended at this Jesus.”

            “My lady,” he began, “your offence at Jesus:  it’s not worth going to Hell for,”

            “Do you really think that I am going to Hell?” she asked.

            “Are you a born-again Christian?” he asked.

            “I?” she asked.  “No.”

            “Then you are going to Hell,” he said.

            “I would much rather go to Heaven instead,” said Distry Reeves.

            “To get to Heaven you have to ask Jesus to save you from your sins, and you have to do it in repentance,” he said.

            “I can ask Jesus to save me from my sins, if it means that I can stay out of Hell and get to stay

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in Heaven, after this life” she said.

            “Just ask the Good Lord for the free gift of everlasting life,” he told her.

            “That I will do,” she said.

            “You have to repent, also,” he said once again.

            “What does that entail?” she asked.  “Repenting, that is?”

            “You simply change your mind about sin and self and the Saviour,” he said to her.

            “About sin?” she asked.  He nodded his head.  “I think that my sins are kind of fun,”

            He said, “To repent, you have to see all sin as bad and that there is no such thing as a small sin in God’s eyes and that sin is why Jesus shed His blood and died on the cross for you.”

            “I can see that I have done some pretty bad things and that doing these bad things did bad things  to the Lord,” said Miss Distry Reeves. She had now changed her mind about sin.  She then said, “And you said that I have to change my mind about myself?”

            “Yes,” he said.  “To repent you have to see yourself as a sinner going to Hell.”

            “I am not a really really bad person,” she said.  “I never killed anybody.  I never did drugs.  I never once got drunk.  I do do things with men that I think that I should not be doing.”

            “It takes only one sin to die and to go to Hell,” he said.

            “Why, I have sinned at least one time every day,” she said.

            “A thousand plus sins every three years,” he said.

            “I am going on thirty years old,” she said.  “Did I really go and do ten thousand sins?”

            “You said it, girl,” he said.

            “Why, I am the worst sinner on Earth!” she said.  She had now changed her mind about self.

            “And you have to change your mind about the Saviour of the world,” he said.

            “You Christians are most holy,” she said.  “We unbelievers have a word about you Jesus people.”

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            “I know what it is,” he said.

            “Should I say it?” she asked.

            He said, “Say it,”

            And she said, “Jesus freaks.”

            “And proud of it,” said Usher Flanders.

            “And I am wrong about Christ and about Christians.  Aren’t I?” she asked.

            “Uh huh,” said Flanders with a vigorous nod of his head.

            “I heard all about how He died on the cross and rose again the third day,” said Distry.

            “It is true,” he said.

            “And He is God,” said Distry.  “It was God Who died for me and rose again the third day.”

            “Very much so, girl,” said Flanders.

            “I am dirty and full of sin.  He is holy and without sin.  And yet it was He Who went to the cross when it should have been myself who went to the cross,” confessed Distry.

            “Verily!” said Usher Flanders.  She had now changed her mind about the Saviour.

            “I am ready to repent now,” she said.

            “I can see in your words that you have already repented,” he told her.

            “What do I need to do now to become born again?” she asked.

            “Simply pray along with me the sinners’ prayer, and you will be saved,” he said.

            “My life down here will be different for me for now on.  Won’t it?” she asked.

            “You will do the things of God and not the things of Satan,” said Flanders.

            “No more wild nights with the guys?” she asked.

            “No more wild nights with the guys,” he assured her.

            “None at all?” she asked.

            “None at all,” he said.

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            “Never again?” she asked.

            “Never again,” he said.

            “Maybe one more time before I make up my mind about God,” she said.

            “Milady,” he spoke to her.

            “Yes, sir?” she asked.

            “Heaven—don’t miss it for the world,” he warned her.

            At once she said, “Then bring me to God.”

            And this was the sinners’ prayer that he led her through that made her a born-again believer:  “Dear Father:  Who is a sinner more than myself?  I do bad things that I should never have done.  And I do not do good things that I should have already done.  Therein have I sinned twice over.  I confess now that You sent Your Son into the world to shed His blood and to die for my sins on the cruel cross of Calvary.  And I confess now that this same Son of God and God the Son rose again from the grave on the third day and lives today; this is the miracle of Easter.  Lord Jesus, if You would, forgive me and cleanse me and help me to repent of my dirty rotten sins.  Save me and become my very own personal Saviour and give me a mansion Up in Heaven. Thank You, God.  In Jesus’s name I pray.  Amen.”

            She had now become born again into the family of God.  And it was right then that Usher Flanders said it to her—those magic words–”Milady, you are the most stunning young woman that I have ever led to Christ.”

            “Why, thank you, kind sir,” she said with a curtsy in her prom gown.  “My name is Distry,”

             “And my name is Flanders.  I am the usher of my Baptist church,” he said with a true gentleman’s bow.

            “Would you mind if I stayed here and gave out tracts with you?” she asked.

            “The honor would be mine and God’s, stunning Distry,” he said.  And thus did Distry Reeves spend the rest of her first day of salvation giving out salvation tracts with a real cute guy of the Lord.

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            But then one of her recent lovers came up to her, saw and heard what she was doing, and threatened her and Usher Flanders with a lead pipe.  She ran and looked back.  Usher Flanders remained with this boyfriend of hers, and the two were talking, and the man with the pipe was setting his pipe upon the sidewalk.  As she watched, she saw this man bow his head with Flanders and seem to pray.  Usher Flanders was leading her old lover to salvation just as he had her.  And here she was, far away and safe and cowardly in Christ.  In shame Distry Reeves prayed, “I can never show my face to Usher Flanders again.  I am sorry, O Jesus.  Forgive Your prodigal daughter.”

            Here she was now, seven years later.  Though she was without Flanders and without a saved boyfriend still, she had become the church clerk at her Baptist church, and she read her Bible daily, and she prayed nightly.  And she wrote all the time.  And she had picked herself up from her great fall from that first day and went on to live mightily for the Lord ever since.

            Remembering this seven years later, Distry decided that it was time to write now for the day, this one short story LIII –“Of Pencils and Prom Gowns.”  She took the first sheet of yellow paper and wrote down the title at the top with her pencil, followed by the words, “Note Page.”  She always filled out a rough outline for her story before she wrote page one of her story.  What most writers called “an outline,” she called “a note page.”  Once again she paused to pray that God help her to do Therthe best job that she could do to glorify His Son as she wrote.  Then she fell upon a reflection in the Lord to come up with ideas to write down on this note page.  Her traditional note page to a short story had eight scenes summarized with a random paragraph of notes for each scene.  The scenes thus summed up were preceded by the letters “A,” “B,” “C,” “D,” “E,” “F,” “G,” and “H.”  These alphabetic letters served as the numbers “1” through “8.” for each scene of the eight in this note page.  When the notes were all done in this formative stage of the story, then Distry Reeves would go ahead, study the first scene’s notes, headed by the letter “A,” and write up this first scene of the story officially upon the blank yellow pages.  One paragraph of a few lines of notes always made two pages of handwritten

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story.  Then she would go and write up the second scene of her story with the notes headed by the letter “B.” before her on the note page.  And so on to the end of the note page, writing the rest of the short story.  The climax scene to her handwritten stories were always three pages or a little bit more.  And the  denouements of her stories were the shortest scenes.

            As Distry Reeves reflected upon making notes right now, nothing came at first.  That was natural for her.  She had to wait upon God to give her these formative ideas.  She already knew from the story title that it would be all about her pencils and her prom dress in the green bin.  She needed only to add more great ideas to put into her story.  Then she could begin.  She thought.  She daydreamed.  She prayed.  She struggled.  She failed.

            And after an hour, she put down her pencil with her writing session aborted.  “Lord, this has never happened to me before!” she cried out in dismay. There was not even one word written upon this note page!  What went wrong like this for her first time in her writing life of some decades?  It had always worked for her in her lost life, and it had always worked for her in her saved life since.  Was this writers’ block?  This was downright queer.  Was it ever going to get right again?  What if this were for forever on?  What if she could no longer write stories for Jesus?  There was even some murmuring in her silent thoughts now against God.  And the writer of fifty-two Christian stories put down her pencil on her empty fifty-third Christian story.

            She at once sought her beloved prom gown that was in the green bin.  She reached in and gently took it out and prayed that this fetish of a garment could give her back her story to write.  It was all purple in shiny fabric.  This fabric for prom dresses at the time was called “acetate.”  It was of two pieces: the prom dress and the prom dress jacket. The prom dress itself had thick comfortable strings that went over a girl’s shoulders, and it had a bodice that started above the breasts and went down to the waist in a Basque waistline, and it had a skirt portion that had three flounces of fabric that reached down to the knees.  And the prom dress jacket had padded shoulders and long sleeves and reached

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partway down toward her belly.  There was even a large purple bow tie in the back.  Such purple luster endued this precious prom gown of her heart.  She then looked inside at the label and did read the tag, “International Ladies Garment Workers Union.” She passed this prom gown across her face.  She smelled the faded smell of prom gown fabric.  She held it up against her standing form as girls did with their clothes.  But the story that she had tried to write did not come back for her.

            She then let fall her prom gown carelessly back into the bin.  And she picked up her box of pencils from the bin.  And the first thing she said to herself was, “A writing pencil in my hand could not  do it for me.  How much less this box of extra writing pencils from its storage bin?  And she let fall her box of pencils recklessly back into the bin.  And Distry Reeves shut down the lid of her green bin.

            Then she ran to her table and picked up her King James Bible.  She heard it said at church that the Bible has the answers to life’s problems.  Even this odd problem that had suddenly smitten her at her writing table was not too big or too small for God to answer for her in the Good Book.  And Miss Reeves found a pair of verses in the Psalter that God wished for her to read right now.  This Bible passage was Psalm 25:4-5, and it read thus for her:  “Shew me thy ways, O Lord; teach me thy paths.  Lead me in thy truth, and teach me:  for thou art the God of my salvation; on thee do I wait all the day.”

She thought to herself and thought to God what this meant for her now with this ominous writing failure of this day.  And God told her what He was saying to her in these two Bible verses.  First of all, her days of writing would come back for her in God’s time and in God’s way.  Second of all, when she could again begin writing, it would no longer be just a hobby for her own pleasure and satisfaction.  Third of all, at that time, her writing would become a profession, her ministry to the lost and dying world that she had been praying for all of her Christian handwriting life.  And fourth of all, she had to endure testing from God’s refining fires of trials, before she could write for God again.

            Reflecting upon this, Distry Reeves prayed, “Thy will be done. O Lord.”

            She looked upon her writing table, and she looked away from her writing table.  God would tell

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her when it was right for her to come back there.  And she prudently walked out of the apartment and away from her writing right now.  She did not know where she might go right now in her hurry to get out of the house.  And though her thoughts to God at first were right in the Lord, the farther she got from her home, the farther away her thoughts became from God.  And she came to remember her old romances forbidden now by her Saviour in her life in Christ.  And Distry started wondering about looking for a guy again after seven saved years away from guys.  And she said to herself, “How I wish that I had put on my prom gown before I left home today.”  The Holy Spirit had already told her to not put on that prom dress for an unsaved man ever again.  And the Holy Spirit also told her to never throw out that prom gown, but to leave it in the green bin for a constant reminder of the immoral life that He had delivered her from when she got saved.  Knowing this, Miss Reeves did not go back to put it on.

Yet she still thought to look for a cute guy with herself dressed in blue jeans and argyle sweater and leather boots.  And, heedless of God’s righteousness, Distry walked to the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh to look for a hunk of a young college man in a dormitory.  And the Devil saw what she was doing, and he saw too it that she found her man most quickly and easily.

            It was a motorcycle dude just pulling into the parking lot of the first dormitory that she had come to.  He called out to her from his motorcycle, “Cheesecake girl!”  And she turned to look at him.  And he was indeed a hunk.  He pulled off his helmet and showed off long black hair and a face full of black beard and black mustache.  He had on a black leather motorcycle jacket full of zippers and chains and tassels.  And he had blue jeans on that were faded blue like her own.  And he had on men’s leather boots that reached high up his shins, like her own women’s leather boots did for her.  And he had on silver reflecting sunglasses.  And when he took them off, she could see his own eyes of black just as her eyes were eyes of black.  “Cheesecake girl,” he called out again, with a handsome smile.

            Returning the flirt, Distry called back to him, “Beefcake guy!”

            “I’m Biff Easy,” he told her his name.

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            “I’m Distry Reeves,” she introduced herself to him.

            “Your name is even prettier than your build,” he told her lasciviously.

            “I’m built for a good time with a cute guy, Biff,” she said in coquetry not at all innocent.

            “My place or yours, Distry?” he asked her.

            “How about my place?” she asked, in danger of backsliding on God.

            “Your place it shall be,” he said.

            “I haven’t done anything like this for seven years,” she said.

            “Do you have something at home that you can put on and be comfortable in?” he asked.

            “My prom gown!” she said right out.

            “You know what they say, Distry:  ‘Off like a prom gown,’” he talked dirty to her.

            And suddenly the great sin of her pursuit on this walk became clear to her.  She had been planning to violate her woman’s body this day—her body that belonged only to God now that she was a Christian.  Her body, as a believer, was the temple of the Holy Ghost.  Because she was born again, God’s Holy Spirit was indwelling her.  She knew what she had to do.  She had to flee.  She had to flee this man.  She had to flee fornication.  And at once, she turned away from this whoremonger and ran as fast as she could away from him.

            He called out after her, “I’m gonna get you, woman!”  But he did not.  And in great fear for her life and for her consequences, Distry Reeves ran all the way back to her apartment without stopping.  And when she got back home, she thanked God that this motorcycle man had not followed her.  And she ran in, fell before the green bin, and said, “I am sorry like I have never been sorry before, O God.

I was trying to become like my old self.  And I have hurt you for my backsliding.  How can a holy God like You forgive such a sinner as myself?”  And she wept in grief and repentance.  And her Heavenly Father forgave her.  And she could feel it.  And she stopped crying.  Never would Distry Reeves seek fornication again for the rest of forever.

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            She would make sure never to think about doing such a sin again.  She had a fireplace.  She started up a blazing fire in the fireplace.  And she would throw that prom gown into the fire and burn it up so that she would never seek a wild night with a guy again.

            Yet the still small voice of the Holy Spirit bade her, “My daughter, do not right now burn this prom gown in the fires of your fireplace.  Nay, O Distry.  You must take this prom dress, and go to Usher Flanders’s house, and show it to him.  I will put My words into his mouth as to what you must do with this.”

            The repentant Distry Reeves was so taken aback by these words that at first she thought that they had come from the Devil.  But then the still small voice said, “Thus saith the Lord.”

            She knew that the Devil always said instead, “Yea, hath God said?”

            So she could tell that it was the Good Lord Who had told her to keep this prom gown out of the fires.

            And Distry Reeves at once obeyed the Word of God.  She gently folded up this prom gown, set it in a paper bag with handles, and went out the door to go to Usher Flanders’s house to see him for her first time after he had first led her to the Lord, carrying this fetish in the bag in both hands.

            But before she got out of her yard, the still small voice said unto her in her ear, “Distry.  Distry.”

            She stopped, paused, and said, “Here am I, Lord,”

            And God said unto her, “Go to K-Mart.”

            “But why K-Mart, O Lord?” she asked.

            “My will for you is for you to go to Flanders’s apartment the next day,” said God.  “I have a trial for you to pass through first. It must take place at K-Mart.  And it shall happen today.”

            “I have a fiery trial to go through, O Lord?” she asked. “One from you and not from myself?”

            “I know what is in your heart.  Now you need to know what is in your heart,” said the still small voice.

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            In humility, Distry Reeves said, “Trials from You do that for us believers.”

            “Thus saith the Lord,” said the voice as a sound of many waters in confirmation of the will of God.

            She at once put the prom gown into the green bin and took her purse and her wallet and went driving to K-Mart in obedience to the Word of God.   It was now dark of warm spring night.

            On her way there she asked God in daring good thoughts, “Is Usher Flanders to be my boyfriend-in-the-Lord after all of this, O God?”

            And God told her in her listening head, “In fact, no.  But in fantasy, yes.”

            “My Lord Jesus, be still my heart.  But what do you mean by that?” she prayed.

            “You will show my son Flanders your prom gown as a girlfriend.  And he will tell you what to do with it as a sister-in-the-Lord,” said the Lord.

            “What’s going to happen to me this evening?” she asked.

            “As I was ever with you in your seven years as My daughter, O Distry, so shall I be with you in your fiery trial this evening,” promised God the Father.

            Then she stood there, in front of the department store sign.  This was K-Mart.  She had arrived.

Waiting upon God for what He had for her to endure, Distry Reeves went in.  She looked around.

She saw nothing unusual.  She saw nobody that she knew.  Everything was as it always was.  She then went to the restaurant, saw that classic K-Mart big container of orange drink, and bought a glass of it and sat down in a booth and drank from it.

            Just then what looked like a young prom couple came into this K-Mart restaurant area.  The young man was dressed in a men’s black suit and looked very sharp.  The young lady was dressed in a yellow prom gown.  Whoa!  Of all the colors that Distry Reeves had longed for in prom gowns, she had never seen a real yellow prom gown before.  It shone in its yellowness in its shiny acetate and in its feminine lace and in its bow tie in the back. “I want that prom dress, Lord,” she accidentally prayed

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out loud.

            The high school prom couple heard her, and they both said, “Thank you, ma’am.”  She grew most sheepish, and she nodded her head in self-effacement.

            In compensating for her words of desire, Distry Reeves said to the prom girl, “It looks good on you.”

            “Thank you,” said the prom girl again.  “Yellow is my favorite prom dress color.”

            “It might be mine, too, now,” said Distry.

            “There’s one more left on the rack,” said the prom girl.  “After that one sells, there will be no more left in the store.”

            “One last yellow one?” asked Distry.  That was not too bad.  If there were only one yellow one left on the rack, she surely could resist buying that one as dutifully as she could resist buying any of the other ones of other colors on the rack.

            “No, Miss,” said the prom dress girl.  “One last one of any color.”

            “You mean that there is only one prom dress for sale left in the whole racks?” asked Distry Reeves.

            “Uh huh,” said the prom lady with a nod of her head.  “And it is yellow.  And it is just like mine.  And it is size ten.”

            “Size ten.  That’s my size,” said Distry.

            “Ooo.  Go for it.  Buy it woman,” said the prom lady.  “You would look good in it.”

            In struggle with her flesh, Miss Reeves asked.  “When this one sells, there will be no more prom dresses in all of K-Mart here, young miss?”

            “Uh uh.  That is the last one left,” said the prom date.

            The gentleman with her said, “Our high school has a late prom.  All of the other high schools had their proms already.  Ours is here in June this year.  That’s why the racks are almost empty.”

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            “My prom dress cost me a hundred dollars,” said the prom girl.  “But it is worth it.  It feels good for a girl like me to have this on for my boyfriend.”

            Quickly did Distry take her wallet out of her purse and count her cash.  She counted two hundred dollars.  Quickly she put the wallet back into her purse.

            “Do you have enough?” asked the prom date girl.

            “I have enough money to buy two of them,” said Distry.

            “All the more reason to quickly buy that last one before someone else buys it,” said the prom lass.

            “Yeah,” said Distry with an assent.

            “We would be glad to take you to the Junior’s department.  We know where it is.  We were just there,” offered the prom girl.

            Yet instead Distry Reeves went on to say to her, “God has better things for this girl with you now than a new yellow prom gown.”

            “What could be better than this?” asked the prom date.

            “Yeah,” said the gentleman.  “My girlfriend wears a size eight.”

            “I do not know.  I do not know,” said Distry Reeves.  “But I believe.”

            In sincerity the girl in yellow acetate and yellow lace said, “Well, whatever it is from God, I hope that you find it here.”

            “Thank you both,” said Miss Reeves.  And the prom couple left.  Strong now in the Lord and happy with her stand for God, Distry went on to finish her delicious orange drink.  Then she left this K-Mart restaurant, prayed to God to lead her where He needed her to go, and warily looked out for the Junior’s department to stay away from that mysterious last yellow prom dress of the season.

            And she came to the electronics department.  And she came upon shelves of typewriters.  She browsed in curiosity.  She always did avoid typewriters in her writings.  That was a chief reason why

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she never got published.  But these typewriters did not look like manual typewriters.  And they did not look like electric typewriters.  They were in a way quite novel to her.  What were they?  She asked the man behind the counter, “Sir, what are these?”

            He told her, “These are electronic typewriters.”

            “Electronic typewriters?” she asked.

            “They are the new craze out there now,” he told her.

            “What do they do?” she asked.

            “They make fixing typographical errors easy,” he said.

            “That’s my problem,” she said.  “When I did try to type, my typographical errors always caused me to stumble.  I can write real neat.  But I type real messy.”

            “With these electronic typewriters, typing can be neat and no longer at all messy,” he said to her.

            “How does it work—fixing typos, that is?” she asked.

            “Just push down on the correction key, and, behold, the typewriter erases that typo right off of the paper, and then you go ahead and type the right key,” he said to her.

            “I never heard of such a great thing as that before, sir,” she said.

            “It is the correction tape spool that does that,” he said.  “And the ribbon is a disposable carbon ribbon.”

            “I never thought about buying a typewriter before for my writing,” she said.

            “Today is the first day that we got these in,” said the worker.

            “And today is like the last day that you have in this year’s prom gowns,” she said to him.

            “What’s that, miss?” he asked.

            “I was just thinking to myself,” she said.  “How much does an electronic typewriter cost?”

            “They run at around two hundred dollars,” he said.

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            Distry well knew that she had two hundred dollars left, but she took out her wallet from her purse and counted it again.  Of course.  Still two hundred dollars.

            Then the man said,  “We do have a special sale on this one over here if you’re interested in a bargain.”  She nodded her head.  And he led her to a gray one at the edge of the rack.  He said, “This one we have marked down to one hundred dollars.”

            “One hundred dollars?” she asked.  He nodded.  “I’ve got two hundred dollars in cash with me right now,”

            He told her, “It looks like you have enough to buy two of these.”

            Then she thought to herself in covetous daring silence, that she could buy both the prom dress and the electronic typewriter here at K-Mart right now with her two hundred dollars.

            After this long silence from her, the man said, “A penny for your thoughts, ma’am.”

            “I was just thinking,” she said.

            “What about?” he asked.

            “I made up my mind now,” she said.

            “What did you decide, whatever it was that you were thinking?” he asked.

            “I would like to buy a two hundred dollar electronic typewriter if I could,” she replied in the will of God and in obedience to His Word.

            And she bought a black electronic typewriter with white letters on the keys.  And she drove back home with her beautiful new electronic typewriter in the front seat beside her.  And she did not regret the prom gown that got away.  The best place in the world for a Christian gal was to be right in the middle of God’s will.  And Distry Reeves was truly happy in Christ.

            And the first thing she did when she got home was to have an hour-long thanksgiving prayer to God.  And then she had an hour-long study of the Song of Solomon from her King James Bible.  Then she spent an hour practicing with her new electronic typewriter, making typos and fixing them on

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spare scrap paper and praising God and singing hymns in her heart.

            It was bedtime now for Distry Reeves.  She had to get up early and go to Usher Flanders’s place for the closest thing that she had for a date with a man of God.  She was inspired by her electronic typewriter.  She was eager to go on this “date.”  And she reminisced over the prom gown that she may well have to sacrifice for God.  And instead of going to bed promptly, she decided to stay up late and see if she could get back to her story and this time see it come alive for her.  Much had happened for Distry since she had left this writing table in despair and discouragement.  And her story came alive!

It started; it continued; it finished.  And, behold, Distry Reeves’s very first hard copy of any of her stories.  It looked professional and presentable and publishable.  “This is real neat, O Lord!” she prayed.  She had herself in this story as the main girl character.  And she had this Usher Flanders in this story as the main guy character.  And in this tale she had on that yellow prom dress that she saw only upon the high school girl at K-Mart.  She saw the title of this most marvelous story on the first page.  It read “Of Pencils and Prom Gowns,”  She put the sheet back in, whited out the title, and replaced it with this new title, “Of Electronic Typewriters and Prom Dresses.”

            And now it was the next morning.  Not having had any sleep, the writer, though having written hard all night, was still refreshed anyway from the much creativity at her writing table.  The writing muse had invigorated Distry, and she was wide awake yet.  And she was ready for a new day in the Lord.  She had a word of prayer, went to the green bin, took out her old-time purple prom gown, and went to Usher Flanders’s apartment as God had commanded her to do for this day.  It was going to be interesting to see what she needed to do in her life with this acetate fetish for the good of her walk with God.  Good Usher Flanders would give her the words that God would wish her to hear from him.  And as she was about to leave her apartment, she thought about bringing her especial newly-written hard copy as well.  And she brought the prom gown and the short story with her to Usher Flanders’s place.

            And when he answered the door, she said, “Usher Flanders, do you remember me?”

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            “The pretty girl that I led to Christ,” he said in kindness and infatuation.

            “God wanted me to come here and ask you for some advice,” she said.

            “Am I worthy to give Christian counsel, O Distry?” he asked in humbleness.

            “Yes.  Yes,” she said.  “God told me that you are the one that I must go to,”

            “God will then give me the answer to give to you, O Distry,” said Usher Flanders.

            “I have a prom gown here with me that I brought with me to show you.  I always seem to get into trouble with it—especially in my unsaved life, but also here in my saved life.  What should I do with this?” she asked.

            “I see in that prom dress an elegant dress for an elegant lady,” he said.

            “It tempts me to act like a loose woman,” she said.

            He understood her completely.  And yet he said, “God forgives you.”

            “I don’t want it anymore to tempt me to act like I did before I got saved, Flanders,” she said.

            “I have a fireplace in my living room,” he said.

            “I am ready to burn it up with fire,” she said.  “Better here than at home.”

            He began to build a roaring fire in his fireplace.  And as he was doing so, he asked, “What’s that  in your big yellow envelope, Distry?”

            “Oh, a short story that I wrote last night,” she said.

            “Are you a writer?” he asked.

            “Oh, I am,” she said.

            “I am a reader,” said Usher Morgan.

            “You read the Bible,” she said.

            “And religious/inspirational short stories, too,” he said.

            “That’s what I write, Usher Flanders!” she said.  “Religious/inspirational stories.”

            “Could I read your story that you wrote, Distry?” he asked.

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            “I would be so honored were you to read my brand new story,” she said.

            And as the fire was burning with several logs, Usher Flanders and Distry Reeves sat on the sofa,

him reading, her watching the fire and awaiting with bated breath whether this devout holy man might approve of what she had written.

            And when he was done, Usher Flanders said, “Distry Reeves, you are a great writer!  I want to read all the rest of your stories.  I think the world out there will also want to read your stories.  You have a gift of writing that I have never seen before in anyone else.  I have never read a story like this one.  It is almost as good as reading the King James Bible.  Woman, why aren’t you published yet?”

            “This is the first story that I have ever typed up,” she said.  “My fifty-two other stories are yet in their handwritten versions.”

            “This must be story LIII for you then, Distry,” he said.

            “Uh huh,” she said.  “I bought an electronic typewriter yesterday and I typed it up when I should have been in bed last night.”

            “You should type up your fifty-two other stories with that electronic typewriter, girl,” said Usher Flanders.

            “I’ll do that,” she said.

            “Of Electronic Typewriters and Prom Dresses,” he said the title out loud.  “I can see how it is that a story can come to you so often, Distry.  You put yourself in every story as the girl looking for a boyfriend.  Her name is always ‘Distry Reeves.’  You dress her up in something pretty.  And you put a guy in this story.  And he is looking for a girlfriend.  And he likes the woman and what she is wearing.  If she is lost in her sins, the guy leads her to salvation.  But if he is lost in his sins, the woman leads him to salvation.  And they become boyfriend-and-girlfriend-in-Christ, and they live happily ever after.”

            “I do believe that that is exactly right, Usher Flanders,” she said.  “You learned so much about me from reading a short story of thirty pages.”

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            “And I can see that there is a little bit of romance in your Christian genre, too, woman,” teased Usher Morgan.

            “The fire in the fireplace is dying down, Flanders,” said Distry Reeves, holding up her purple acetate dress.

            “Time to throw it in,” he said.

            “I’m sorry, prom dress,” she said.  And she threw it into the fire.  And as it burned up, she said, “Farewell, prom gown.”

            “How do you feel, Distry?” he asked.

            “Free and kind of sad,” she said.

            “You did the right thing,” he said.  “There is nothing wrong with a prom gown in itself, for the lost or the saved, but you went and made it a fetish, Distry Reeves,”  And he said again, “You did the right thing by throwing it into my fireplace.”

            “I know, and I am beginning to feel better now,” she said.

            “God will reward you,” he said.  “God will bless you.”

            “But what can I dress myself up in as the girl in my stories if it cannot be my old prom dress?” she asked.

            “I’ve got two magazines of prom dresses on my kitchen table that God had told me to buy,” said Usher Flanders.  “I was at the bookstore today, and I saw them, and God told me to buy them and to save them for a special lady.  I bought them, and you are this special lady that God had told me about.”

            “Prom gown magazines, Usher Flanders?” asked Distry Reeves in delights.

            “One is called “Seventeen—prom gown issue,” and the other is called “Teen—prom gown issue,” said Usher Flanders.

            “Are there lots of pictures of prom dress girls in them?” she asked.

            “I don’t know.  I suppose that there are two whole magazines just full of prom dresses in them,”

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said Usher Flanders.  “I would say that you can get lots of ideas of how to dress up yourself in your stories with all of those photographs, Distry.”

            “Why, I could write for ever,” said Distry.  “Even up to the time of the rapture.”

            “Maybe I could be your man in all of your stories,” said Usher Morgan.

            “Would you let me make you my story boyfriend, Flanders?” asked Distry.

            “God had told me that I cannot have a girlfriend,” said Usher Morgan.  “He wants me to stay a single man.  But God wouldn’t mind if you could be my story girlfriend in your writing ministry.”

            “Let’s go see those prom dress issues together right now, Usher Flanders,” said Distry Reeves.

            “I rather have a fondness for prom dresses, too, if I may say so myself, stunning Distry,” he did say.

            And the writer and the reader sat down on the sofa in front of the fireplace, looking at prom gown magazines for teenagers.

            It is written about Distry Reeves’s ministry as a Christian writer seeking to win souls for Christ in her short stories, “So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase.  Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one:  and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour.”  I Corinthians 3:7-8.

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