A Year of Change: Becoming a Teenager,

Part 1

Teenage years are always tough. They are a time of intense internal emotions and fragile scrutiny from family and friends. The body begins to change, and you yearn for independence. God made us with those exceptional characteristics, and the modern world has created this "in between” time of childhood and adulthood that we call adolescence.

Most of us experience the beginnings of this life change between the ages of 12 and 14, and I was no different. The years 1970 and 1971 brought significant changes in many ways that set me up for change and transition for the remainder of my life. I turned 13 on October 24, 1970, marking the formal beginning of being a teenager. Yet, things began changing in the summer of 1970.

Change Begins with Summer

The conclusion of summer marked the end of my participation in Little League baseball. The following year would bring me to Pony League age, but I was unsure if we had ever had a Pony League team. Still, I was determined to make the best of it. Mr. Griffith, my seventh-grade history teacher and our assistant principal at the school, would be the coach this year. He mentioned he might try me out as a pitcher and first baseman. The year before, I had played second base and filled in at first. I had grown a lot that year, and my long legs promised a good pitching stride and a long throwing motion. Both positions were among my favorites, so I was eager to see what would happen.

Our team lacked promise. We consistently faced teams like Mamou, Eunice, Ville Platte, Rayne, and others, who had recreational leagues that selected their all-stars for tournament teams. In contrast, we had whoever showed up. Although our team did have some talented players, our talent was limited compared to the other teams.

Our first tournament that year was in Rayne, Louisiana, and we knew we were playing Mamou in our first game. Most people did not give us much of a chance because Mamou always had one of the better teams in the Little League District we were in. Our little Pine Prairie team surprised them that Saturday morning. Mamou still won 2-1, but we put up a good fight. I had the opportunity to be the pitcher that day, and I did not have a blazing fastball or anything like that. While I had long legs, I was not strong. My upper body strength was poor. Mamou's starter got the speed. Some guys on our team threw harder than I did, but they had difficulty keeping it over the plate. I consistently placed the ball on the corners and over the plate in key spots, limiting them to two runs over those six innings. Luke Chaffin made a great infield play in one of the later innings that kept us in the game, but our bats were not strong enough to surpass the talented Mamou pitcher. Mom and Dad were proud enough of me that they got a copy of the write-up in the local Rayne paper the next week and kept it in our scrapbook.

The rest of the summer brought reality back to my world. We played some practice games against teams like Eunice and Ville Plate. My pitching needed a lot of work if I was going to excel at it. After that first game, my tournament appearances did not go as well. However, I remember that we won a tournament game at Scott that year, although it was a forfeit when the Carencro team could not show up. A win is a win. We were grateful for that one victory in our season, regardless of how it occurred.

We completed our Little League tournament play in July and had to look forward to next year. There was even discussion about joining a recreational league for next year to give the team a better chance in the future. Of course, it was my last, and I would need to continue improving if we had any chance at a Pony League team.

My attention now shifted to the beginning of a new academic year. I would be in the eighth grade, bringing new adventures and uncertainties. My good friends, Victor McDaniel and Greg Brice, were always there for companionship. Greg and I went to the same church and saw each other most Sundays in the summer. Victor lived down the road from us and stayed in constant contact. The other friends I did not see much. I looked forward to seeing them when we got back together in August. I had developed a new acquaintance with David Glaze the year before. David and I became good friends in sixth grade, and we expected to share several classes in seventh grade. Once we got to seventh grade, we started rotating courses with different teachers for different subjects. And, like most seventh- and eighth-grade boys, I discovered that girls existed and were enjoyable to be around, most of the time.

During that summer, I discovered, while listening at home, that things were not going well with my dad’s business. My dad owned a local pulpwood yard in Easton. Some local families in Pine Prairie became frustrated with my dad because he rented space and created a second, small pulpwood yard at the railroad tracks in town. They did not like the appearance of the pulpwood railcars nearby. One of the most vocal individuals was my good friend David’s father, Mr. Glaze, who was also the high school principal. The wonderful thing was that I could sometimes walk to Dad’s office after school and get a ride home, especially after basketball practice when it started in the fall.

As late August approached, I focused on how the Astros would finish the baseball season and how the Saints would start the football season. And of course, LSU football was gearing up, so I read the Street and Smith magazine projections for the Tigers. I hoped for a winning season and to beat Alabama again.

My thought processes were changing also. We attended church every time the doors of our small Baptist church opened. In many ways, being a good Baptist was not based on faith stories, but on activity. I stayed as busy as I always did in church, and questions started showing up in my conversations. Why are we going to church so much? Where is God in all this? Who was God to me? Many of my friends were Catholic, and Baptists and Catholics were not supposed to get along in South Louisiana. They looked at us Baptists as strange. Many of us Baptists looked at them as “lost” and pagan. Yet, I had many friends who seemed as faithful to their understanding of God as I did. Their thoughts about God were different, but should I question their salvation? Our little church was changing. For the first time, the church considered and called an associate to help our pastor, Don Harris. He was going to help with the music in the church and work with us “youth.” (I guess I was one now.) If I remember correctly, his name was Jonathan Forrester, and he was a student at Louisiana College. I may misremember the name, but I remember he brought new energy to our church. From a distance, I could see how internal politics in the church were as real in a Baptist church as anywhere else. Mr. Bill Ortego in our church always seemed to be in the middle of conversations and somehow created unique challenges for the pastor.

My brother and I encountered our first challenge regarding church attendance and the local customs. Sunday mornings were sacred for Sunday School and worship. Stores and restaurants usually close on Sunday mornings. We knew this time was reserved for church. Then, our baseball team won a game on Saturday, and our next game was on Sunday morning, right in the middle of church time. I am not sure why they planned it this way; it was so anti-cultural in Louisiana. But Mom and Dad told us we had a real problem to deal with. In their minds, we should not play on Sunday morning. We needed to stand up to the pressure that society was putting on us to dishonor the “Sabbath.” Then they threw a curveball at us. They wanted us to decide what we should do. My Catholic friends and even some of my Protestant friends had no problem playing on Sunday morning. The team would have enough to play. So, what should we do? We were torn! I felt a responsibility to our team. When you commit, you should honor it. Yet, if we went, we felt like we were breaking an important Ten Commandment. We thought maybe our witness would be compromised. Mom and Dad were letting us decide, but they made clear what they thought. We honored them by not going. I want to say we did it because of a firm conviction of right and wrong. I think we did it as much because of their faith as ours. We did not understand what was at stake yet. Peace at home and honoring our parents were important to us. When you are brought up as a rule follower, it seems like an easy decision. And I began thinking about my faith journey. What did I believe about these things?

School Begins

With all these things happening, I also had to wrestle with starting the eighth grade. I looked forward to entering the eighth grade, the final year before high school, and completing it. We were all at the same school complex from kindergarten through 12th grade in Pine Prairie. Yet, there was a different vibe when you became a high school student. Many questions remained:

• Who would my teachers be? Teachers have always had a reputation. I enjoyed my seventh-grade teachers in math, science, English, and history. What would my new teachers expect?

• Who would be in my classes? Only 40 to 50 were in the eighth grade, and we would have 20 to 25 in each class. So, who would be with me in those classes? I knew some friends would be in classes with me, but who would be the new ones?

• How well would I handle the schoolwork in the eighth grade? I did not know what the work would entail, and I always felt nervous about whether I could complete it successfully. I am not sure why I worried about that. My grades were consistently near the top of the class, yet I was always concerned about meeting the requirements for some reason.

• What will boy/girl relationships be like this upcoming year? As a blossoming young boy, my thoughts about girls have changed. They were no longer a complete nuisance. I have started developing crushes and feelings for some of them.

• Who would be this year's class leaders and bullies? I had always wondered about those who would cause problems in our classes. I wanted to stay away from them.

• What will my connection to basketball be like this year? I was on the seventh-eighth grade boys’ team last year, but I was always nervous about whether I had improved and whether others had outgrown and outmaneuvered me.

• How would I fit in this year with my classmates? Like any twelve-year-old, I worried about how I would fit in. Most of my classmates were Roman Catholic in their religious orientation, and I knew many of them viewed life differently than my Baptist family did. It did not create too many problems for me. Yet, I was always concerned that something would surface. In Louisiana, Baptists and Catholics had a strained relationship.

• What would the tension be like in school this year? Integration started a couple of years earlier, and there seemed to be more tension in the community than in the school. We had a few new black students in our grade, and I thought they fit right in. One of them, John Semien, became a friend and played on the basketball team with me.

In the days before school began, I discovered that Mrs. Soileau would be my English teacher, Mr. Terry Ardoin would be my Science and Math teacher, and Mr. Oge would be my Louisiana History teacher. These were our four basic classes. We also had Physical Education (PE) every day. I do not remember who my PE teacher was. PE was one of those classes that I loved some days; on other days, I hated it. I think I had one more optional class, but I do not remember what it was. Mrs. Soileau could have had us for two blocks – one for Grammar and one for Literature.

I was so excited to learn that I had Mr. Oge as my teacher. He had been my sixth-grade teacher, and he and his wife, Martha, were family friends who attended church with us. Martha had been a family friend since our days at Acadia Baptist Academy, and I think she may have taught my brother David in the first or second grade. Mr. Oge had recently moved up to teach these grades, and I was thrilled at the thought of having him again. I loved history; it was my favorite subject in the seventh grade, and I even earned a special award for history from the local American Legion. In seventh grade, we studied American History, and now, in eighth grade, we would tackle the complex history of Louisiana. I could hardly wait! Mr. Oge was a role model for me.

Business Failure Disrupts Family System

As we began the fall, things were going well. Four of the five Kessler boys were on the bus together as we started school. We were all two grades apart in school. The youngest, John, was born into the family in November 1969, bringing new energy to our house. He would turn one later in the fall.

We could tell that things were getting tougher for Dad and his business. In the summer, word came that one of the pulpwood trucks he owned for his business had caught fire and been destroyed. Somehow, insurance would not cover the cost of replacing the truck. He had tried to find people to invest in his pulpwood business, but few joined him. A couple of friends and colleagues did invest. Dad asked Mom’s family and others to invest, but they did not see it as a good opportunity. (I'm not sure Dad ever overcame the pain of Mom's family not investing. I understand why they did not.) Mom and Dad did not own a home, so he took out a loan for his business, using our home’s possessions as collateral. When the fire occurred with the truck, it toppled his business finances into despair. He had to shut down the pulpwood business and find a job that could utilize the skills he had developed over the years. The loans and bills piled up from his business expenses. Mom returned to work at the Louisiana Baptist Convention full-time. He needed to find something quickly.

By late summer, he found a job working for a company that constructed power lines. That job brought him to Louisiana, and now he was back to that type of job again. It would lead him to Marksville and other locations throughout Louisiana. As a result, he would return to traveling and staying away from home during the week. By the beginning of fall, he and Mom decided they had no choice but to declare bankruptcy. His legal team managed the details. From the bank loan, we discovered that bankruptcy would involve auctioning off all our possessions at our house. Mom and Dad kept most of these details from us children throughout the ordeal, which took a tough toll on their relationship. Though Dad did not discuss it with any of us, I am sure it also affected his self-esteem. No one likes to think that something they attempted was a failure.

The sheriff was scheduled to auction all the items from our home in the fall. I do not remember the date, but recall the day's results. Mom had warned us before we left for school that things would be vastly different when we got home. And of course, things were hugely different. When we got off the school bus, everything we had known in our home was gone – Mom’s piano, the dining room table, television, stereos and records, furniture, and beds – everything was gone. By that evening, people from the church helped us get beds, a dining table, and other necessities.

I was unsure how to react. Admittedly, I felt shocked and uncertain about what all this meant. I wondered what my friends at school and church had heard. Would they view me differently? How would I face them the next day, knowing we had lost everything? My friends were very kind; they said nothing if they knew anything about it.

I do recall feeling different around the adults I knew. I am not sure where that feeling came from. Would the adult leaders in my life see us differently? I remember being called into the Assistant Principal’s office several weeks later. Mom had typed out a form for us children to get free lunches at school through the government-sponsored program for families. The assistant principal, Mr. Griffith, called me into the office to tell me he could not help us get free lunches because of how the form was completed. He treated me so formally that I was not sure what to think. It was the first time I sensed that he looked at me differently. He had been my baseball coach and seventh-grade history teacher, but acted like he barely knew me. It hurt! I took the form, looked at it, and showed him where Mom had filled in the reason for the application – my dad’s business bankruptcy. He had not seen it, I guess. He said, “Thank you. I missed that on the form. I will send it in, and hopefully, you can get it.” He never shared that he hoped we were doing okay or hated that it happened to us. It was the first time I felt like an outcast in the community.

By this time, Dad was on the road more than at home. My dad's construction company moved its power line construction to Oklahoma, so he was away during the week and on weekends. We lost our phone service because the bills weren’t paid. Since this year was decades before cell phone service, we had to go to a friend’s house to receive calls from him on the weekend. On Sunday afternoons, we went to Oge's home for Dad to call Mom. One Sunday afternoon in November, we watched the New Orleans Saints play the Detroit Lions at their house while Mom talked on the phone. Tom Dempsey, the Saints' field goal kicker with only a partial right foot, kicked a 63-yard field goal at Tulane Stadium, setting a new NFL record. The Saints won their first game of the season.

One week, Dad did not call. We found out the next week that he had fallen from one of the power lines at work and was in the hospital. He could not contact us and let us know what had happened.

That ended an unusual, eventful fall in my eighth-grade year. School was going great, but our lives had changed dramatically. My relationships with friends at school were still positive, and my classes went exceptionally well. And basketball season for me would soon begin! I had no idea this would be my family's last fall in Louisiana.