So Near--So Far

Know how it feels when you stack up a house of cards, how the base seems stable, then how you add layer after layer till the tower gets two feet tall and you still have six or eight cards to ease onto the wobbly top?

Know how that feels?

That’s where I’ve been all weekend in writing my book on the history of firefighting in Jacksonville.

So close to finishing; so many final steps to add.

Each time I touch the thing, it threatens to topple.

Every comma I add makes the structure tremble.

But I think once I construct the index, the book will be ready for the printer to make me a proof-copy. It’s that close to publication.

Then Saturday morning, as I made a section break for the index… a Microsoft Word pop-up box informed me that I have insufficient memory and no further change can be undone… then, another pop-up box said, I’ve made too many edits and my text can not be saved…

I’ve worked (off and on) on this book since I wrote its first edition in 1986. I’ve updated it to 2007. What does Microsoft Word mean saying my text can not be saved?

My son-in-law says I need to go into the page set-up menu, then the tools menu, then to the confirm tracking box and click on that—but I may loose existing formatting.

My son Donald says that I need to create a blank Word document, re-set mirror margins and gutters, then paste my existing text and graphics into that—but I may loose existing formatting.

My beautiful wife Ginny says, “Calm down, John. I think you’re loosing it”.

Hey, I just yelled at the computer a bit; I am not loosing it.

I am calm.

I’ll get it done.

Whatever it takes.

In my mind’s eye, I see a finished copy of my book.

I imagine my finished book will look a lot like this:

In my mind’s eye, I see a finished copy of my book printed on fine velum with gold inlay encrusted with precious stones, and …

Oh, that’s not really my book; the photo really shows an illuminated manuscript in Coptic of Mark’s Gospel. Way back, when I worked at the Library of Congress, I actually got to handle a few such manuscripts. I’m not scholar enough to actually read one, but I did the heavy lifting to move ancient manuscripts from place to place in the library.

What a thrill.

When you handle an illuminated manuscript, you know you’re touching treasure!

I marvel at the precision the scribes exercised in transmitting God’s Word through the ages. These guys, working by lamp light, copied the Scripture in pains-taking detail. Like the guy who cut the facets of the Hope Diamond, the copyists knew they were handling something exceedingly precious and they treated the Scripture with the respect God’s Word deserves.

And when today I hear someone babble about not trusting the Bible because of copyists mistakes, I think he only displays his ignorance.

Anyhow, back to the relationship between my fire history book, my computer’s pop-up boxes, and the gold-encrusted Coptic Gospel in the photo.

The illumination shows St. Mark seated writing his book with a quill pen.

Mark is close to the end of his Gospel.

After the events of my morning with the computer pop-up messages fresh in my mind, I fancifully reconstruct what I think happened…

This angel pops up in front of Mark and says, “I have a message from God. Your subject/verb agreement is all wrong… You have to write the whole thing over”.

I imagine that if you flip to the next page of that codex, you’ll see an exquisite illustration bordered in lapis-lazuli with amber highlights—

I imagine it shows St. Mark strangling the angel.