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I wish I could tell you that I have been a long-time reader of Thomas Howard. I can't. Discovering his absolutely splendid The Night is Far Spent filled my Easter weekend and occasional moments with joy, insight, ruminations, and pleasure in his delightful prose.

Any fans of Thomas Howard out there? Any former students? Who'll speak up for this man?

I must unload one little point first: Sometime ago Thomas Howard must have discovered, perhaps in an old box of things no longer used, the word "piquant" and then and there decided it might be the finest word in the English vocabulary. Go ahead, I say to you my reader, read straight through The Night is Far Spent and underline each instance. (I give the definitions below.)

Howard mastered the Inklings -- Lewis, Tolkien, Williams, Owen Barfield and Warnie, with others. That distinguished group of beer drinking, manuscript reading, and Christian thinking group met at The Eagle and the Child. A friend of mine sent me a picture of the pub.

Inklings pub...

Howard tolerates fools impatiently, and by "fools" I mean uncareful and untraditional cozy Christian thinking and praxis. So, he comes off as a curmudgeon, but the kind where you say, "You know, Howard, you've got the angels -- or most of them -- on your side." So, even when I disagree, I love what he has to say and he makes me think.

Then comes his prose... exceptional, exquisite and at times eloquent.

On fiction and the gospel: "The odd thing about all these stories is that we cannot seem to get very far in them without finding our sleeves being plucked by the hint that we are reading about ourselves" (7). And "they seem to lead us away into imaginary regions, but they have an unsettling way of discovering for us the immediate place where we are" (9).

On a similar theme: "My own guess is that, on the contrary, a well-chosen image draws us further into truth than, say, the syllogism, or the equation" (28).

Or this one: "Imagination ... may, rather, be the faculty in us corresponding in a unique way to reality. We cannot pit it over against intellect and will and affection" (46).

On CS Lewis' capacity to make things clear: "Stand up and wave a hanky if you had had things plotted out with such stark clarity before you read Lewis" (67).

Splendid essays into the worlds and minds and hearts of Waugh and Lewis and Tolkien and Muggeridge and, perhaps a new name to you, Dietrich von Hildebrand -- a brilliant Catholic theologian who didn't write sparkling prose but he wrote solid theology and ethics.

And did I mention that Howard grew up in the heart of American evangelicalism and, after flirting at length with the Anglicans, crossed the Tiber and entered into fellowship with the See of Rome. That story of his I read long ago -- but this set of essays has made me a fan.

Go, see how many times "piquant" appears.

Piquant:

1. agreeably pungent or sharp in taste or flavor; pleasantly biting or tart: a piquant aspic.
2. agreeably stimulating, interesting, or attractive: a piquant glance.
3. of an interestingly provocative or lively character: a piquant wit.
4. Archaic. sharp or stinging, esp. to the feelings.

Now before I go any further to state my view on this, let it be known that my kind of doctorate is, as one pastor once introduced me before a Sunday morning sermon, "not the kind that does anybody any good." Indeed. So, I stand here with Anne Fadiman who, in At Large and At Small, says just what I think too:

"I take a dim view of healthful ice cream," she declares with the kind of gusto that only an essayist can muster (p.46).

How about you ... Do you like your ice cream frozen hard or softened? What is the best kind of ice cream for you? (And I surely think we ought to include frozen custard. No reason to include frozen yogurt, which is both too healthful and some kind of fu-fu departure from good commonsense.)

As a child my parents a few times a year yanked out our homemade ice cream machine, poured in gobs of salt and water, and then my mom -- somehow -- converted milk and stuff into the sweetest, finest ice cream I had ever tasted. Of course, the effort involved meant that far more often we wandered through Freeport, IL, to Dog 'n Suds or to Union Dairy or A & W or Superior Dairy. Good stuff ... nickel for one scoop and a dime for two scoops.

For all the good reasons Kris has found to eat bison she's found no good reasons to go more than once a week to Culver's for some custard. I've found all kinds of reasons to suggest a second every week, but she's got the facts on her side.

Anne Fadiman knows the history of ice cream -- how the ancient Greeks and 17th Century Florentines froze drinks to the delight of everyone. Italy remains at the forefront of ice cream today, and we've had a few gelatos ourselves. I cannot tell a lie: George Washington had two pewter ice cream pots, revealing that we got off to a good start in more ways than freedom for us and a headache for England.

Fadiman reveals that if she had not eaten ice cream her whole life she'd weigh 416 pounds less than she does now. She also reveals, with astounding memory, that she and her brother mapped a trip across the USA in accordance with fine ice cream shops, beginning in Santa Barbara at McConnell's, where everything tastes better because the world looks so sweet.

It's Thursday. Tonight, if we follow custom, will be our night to visit Culver's for a two-scoop Turtle Sundae. Honk if you see us.

At one point in the history of writing this blog, I thought I'd do a series on my favorite essayists. I think the series got off the ground with my favorite essayist and then fizzled: Joseph Epstein. I suppose it is a mistake to begin with the best. For years I devoured The American Scholar journal because Epstein was its editor and a regular contributor. Then he moved aside and Anne Fadiman assumed his fountain pen elegance. Then they sacked Anne and I dropped my subscription. There was something unique about The American Scholar -- the familiar essay.

In her new book, At Large and At Small: Familiar Essays by Anne Fadiman, Anne Fadmian collects a dozen of her familiar essays. I relish good familiar essays so much I'll only read one of these per week -- even though I've already read most of them. What, you ask, is a familiar essay? Glad you asked because that was what I thought I should jot down next!

"His viewpoint was subjective," Anne says of the prototypes in Charles Lamb and William Hazlitt, "his frame of reference concrete, his style digressive, his eccentricities conspicuous, and his laughter usually at his own expense." She uses the male pronoun for a reason: Her father, Clifton Fadiman, once said women didn't write familiar essays because "the form does not attract them." Anne has a response: "Well, it attracts me." And her book attracts me: a lovely font, a book small enough to fit perfectly in my hand, clothbound so it lasts, and content that makes me want to sit on my porch and enjoy the pleasure of someone who knows how to make words play their proper game.

There are today many critical essays (more brain than heart) and personal essays (more heart than brain) but not enough familiar essays (a balance of the two). They are a blend of "narcissism and curiosity" and many are saying the familiar essay's days are numbered. But, not for Anne.

And not for me. With her I hope "no dirge, gentle or otherwise," quoting her father again, "need ever be sung to lament its passing."

If you find the pace of the familiar essay to slow for you, you are too busy. Friendship, which creates the space for the familiar essay, isn't in a hurry and neither is Anne. So, sit down with At Large and At Small and Enjoy! She'll be a friend in no time.

Yep, familiar essays tend to be written by the sophisticates and border at times on snobbery and the essayists quote folks without footnotes from sources that are definitely highbrow, but if you want a piece to read to a friend over coffee, nothing works like a familiar essay. Nothing. It's simply designed for that setting. Two friends, together, who take a line of thought out for a walk with no purpose other than the enjoyment of conversing together.

The best Christian familiar essayist is Alan Jacobs. John Wilson, the marvelous editor at Books and Culture, has wisely opened his door to the essays of Jacobs.

James Vanoosting, in the introduction And the Flesh Became Word, says something that struck my inner chords: "Given half a chance, I'll write an essay before a book, after a book, between books, and (my favorite) instead of a book." There's a man after my own heart. In fact, a man who seems to have lived in my own house.

Which, of course, he has. JVO and I lived in the same home, he before I -- and that shows our relative ages -- but which, once you hit 50, no longer matters. How old someone is over coffee matters less than the pleasure of the conversation, and I could spend a many with him.

JVO has had numerous essays published and I have not. I've written a few, but no one has published them. Here's my admission: I love essays, familiar essays like those of Joseph Epstein and William Hazlitt and others, and I'd like to write one someday -- and if I could choose, I'd want it published in something like The New Yorker or The American Scholar (under a former editor). But, alas, when JVO left that home on Burchard in Freeport, IL, he went on to novel writing and essay writing. We are both professors, but I write books about the Bible and for the Church. Not that I'm complaining.

But, how odd is that? Two kids who barely knew one another who turn out to be writers and from a small midwestern town known mostly by the unusual nickname it gives its sports teams: the Pretzels.

The first draft of Jesus Creed had some essayist flourishes. My steady, insightful editor, good ol' Lil Copan, said something like this: "Whaddaythinkyou'redoing, Scot, writing an essay?" To which I said, "I like essays." To which she said, "This isn't an essay. Keep to the task." Which I did. Thanks to Lil.

Now, like a familiar essay, I've wandered a bit. Back to JVO's book. The first six chapters are personal narratives, and I loved them. He talks about Mikey Pohill, our next-door neighbor and about First Baptist Church. He speaks about the most wonderful librarian in the world, Mrs. Popp, and then he tells some stories about almost dying, about almost committing suicide, about depression and about divorce. Real stuff here. I hope some of you take up the chance to read him. The second section, called Biblical Narratives, has an insightful piece on "vocation."

I'm sitting here this morning trying to figure out why we call today "Labor" Day. A quick glance through Wikipedia's entries on "Labour Day", reveals that Labor Day is connected to the celebration of the contribution of workers to our world. But, I'm trying to figure out what in my life is so "laborious."

There is only one thing about my "labor" that I would call "laborious" and I'll get to that in a moment, but first this: I don't consider what I do to be "labor" or "work." I consider it a vocation -- something planted in me by God and designed by God to contribute to the Kingdom of God somehow and someway. Calling what I do, or what anyone does, "labor" turns it exclusively into a capitalist adventure designed to make money. And it turns it into a "labor force" vs. a "leader force." That, also, gives me some problems. I would hope we could work together. (Sure, I'm aware of deep divisions, and I'll avoid that.)

Here's what I do: I teach. Which means I have students under my care that I try to lead into more knowledge about the Bible and theology, into better modes of thinking, and into being more responsible in letting their knowledge and faith shape their behavior. I don't see this as laborious or even work. In fact, I love it so much that on Labor Day I miss that we don't have classes (though I don't teach on Mondays anyway).

I also read and write: which is what I do when I'm not teaching, though about everything I read and write shows up in my classes and gets filtered into one of those three rubrics of knowledge, critical thinking, and responsibility. And I love to read and write. I don't get up in the morning dreading what I'm called to do (the impact of seeing what I do as a vocation and not labor or work), but I go to bed looking forward what I am privileged to do the next day.

There is, however, one thing about my vocation that I dread: committee meetings. I can't think of anything good that comes of committee meetings. First, it takes a committee ten times as long to do something as a couple of people could do in discussion; and second, we have meetings because it is time to meet and often not because we really do have something that all of us need to chat about. And, third, and here I meddle: too often committee meetings are opportunities for some sorts to vent their anger about the labor setting of what they do, and I really don't have the patience to hear them out or want to hear their whining.

Maybe, in fact, that is the point: when we see what we do as "labor" we fail to see that it is a vocation from God. As Mr. Rogers would put it: "just for you." When we grind our vocations down into labor, we perhaps destroy the subtle balance there is between responsibility to others and God and our freedom, and it leads us to a rabid desire for the latter as we retreat from the former.

Well, have a good Labor Day, even if with me you see it as Vocation Day. A day to thank God for what God has called us to do and be in God's Kingdom.

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