The Eternal Car Pool

 

Cindy Ketron 

1947-2025

Every school day morning my dad and I would head out a couple of minutes after 8. He would head the car up Conway Street hill to pick up Cindy Ketron. As she climbed in the backseat, he would give her his usual cheerful greeting: Good morning, little yellowbird, if she were wearing a yellow dress; good morning, little redbird, if she were in red.

Every school morning for 12 years, Cindy Ketron and I rode to school together. The cars would change over the years as my father traded, the other members of the car pool would grow and shrink as neighbors moved in and out, and the driver would change after I got my license, but there were the two constants: Cindy Ketron and me.

Every school day.

On Sunday I would see her in church.

And many Saturday nights our families would get together with a couple of other families for a dinner party.

I don’t remember a time in my life that I didn’t know Cindy Ketron. She was in my nursery class at Bethel Presbyterian. She was in my catechism class. She was in my high school graduating class.

And then I woke up two days ago to the news that Cindy had died. She was Cindy Mitchell now, had been for 50 years – of course I was at her wedding. (There was this one cute bridesmaid!)

Vince and Cindy Ketron dancing at the neighborhood's first boy-girl party - 1959

Off and on all day yesterday I would be overcome by a memory of Cindy. We had had one date, a seventh-grade cotillion dance, the cap to a six-week ballroom dancing class. One-two-three-slide, one-two-three-slide. We were not supposed to date, never were. We were friends, lifelong friends.

Cindy Ketron as Statue of Liberty in 1955 Johnson school play. Vince is Abe Lincoln. Johnny Murray is George Washington. 

Just when I thought I had shuffled through all the memories, all the reflections, one last one came to me, one that made me laugh out loud.

It was Christmas 1964. We were seniors and we had worked our way up the Bethel Presbyterian Church Christmas Pageant ladder. After stints as a shepherd tending his flock by night, one of the three wise men (as wise acre teenagers we called them the three wise guys), I had ascended to the role of Joseph. Cindy had worked through the Multitude of Heavenly Hosts and she was now the Angel of the Lord, a vision in a white robe, with paper mache wings and a halo of silver tinsel.

We practiced two nights a week for the month before the pageant. Toss twenty teenagers, most of them boys, in a church rec hall and mischief is sure to ensue.

It was always a challenge finding the Baby Jesus. He seemed to disappear at least twice a night. Gold, frankincense and myrrh were often replaced by toilet paper. The shepherds discovered that their rods and their staffs were perfect for sword-fighting. And the narrator seemed to have found a different Bible version every practice, none of them King James.

Joseph had his own contribution to the chaos. When the narrator read, “And, lo, the Angel of the Lord came upon them,” Joseph would begin a sound effect. Instead of whistling out, I would whistle in, creating a whizzing vibrating noise that sounded like a flying saucer was descending along with Cindy the Angel of the Lord.

The first time Joseph did this the Angel began laughing hysterically, her shoulders shaking. It was something that was not mentioned in King James.

Joseph knew a good thing when he found it.

Every practice from then on the Angel arrived to the sound of a flying saucer. And every practice it cracked Cindy up. Her shoulders would begin shaking and she would start laughing before I even started my whistle. Soon a couple of shepherds and a wise man or two learned the whistle. So that as the Angel of the Lord descended, it would sound as if the church were about to lift off.

Arrived the big night. Everyone was in costume. Cindy actually looked like an angel. The shepherds were complaining about the scratchy feed bag tunics and bare legs. Joseph had on the robe of a poor carpenter and a twinkle in his eye.

The procession moved through the Nativity without incident. Mary and Joseph were at the manger where, surprise, the Baby Jesus rested peacefully on a bed of straw. As the narrator began to read “And lo the Angel of the Lord…” Mary and Joseph turned their heads upward. There was Cindy. I caught her eye. I smiled. She smiled. Then I quickly averted my eyes to stare prayerfully at the Baby Jesus.

Afterward everyone in the congregation told us they thought it was the best Christmas Pageant that Bethel had ever put on.

I caught Cindy’s eye again. This time she had a full smile. I knew her so well after 12 years of the Eternal Car Pool that I knew exactly what she was thinking: If they only knew….