November 2: Jackson, TN

This morning we rented the marina car for our 70 mile trip to Jackson, Tennessee. The drive was beautiful and saw a cruiser moving down the still river, the fall leaves along the roadside, fields with cows, and the rolling hills of Tennessee. We are attending the church where Tom’s cousin, John White, is the pastor.

When we pulled into the drive at the First Presbyterian Church of Jackson, it looked like we were driving up to an old southern plantation house including the white columns. The First Presbyterian Church was founded in 1825 as a downtown church. This beautiful mansion was built by the Pigford family in 1918 including a carillon tower next to the house. At their death, the Pigfords left the house and grounds to the church on the condition that the house be maintained. The congregation accepted and in 1952 built their sanctuary next to the carillon and now use the house for Sunday School rooms and meeting areas. John’s office is on the second floor of the house. He told us that the local newspaper had a contest a couple of years ago on who had the best office view. As we looked out of his window at the hardwoods and deep lawn, he laughed and agreed that he had won the contest.

The service today is called the “Kirkin of the Tartan” and is in recognition of the Scottish heritage of the Presbyterian Church. Many of the men of the church wore plaid kilts and they had the Wolf River Pipes and Drums to play bagpipes for the service. The Presbyterian Church tracks its history back to John Knox in the 1500’s and his lay work to establish the Protestant church in Scotland.

John’s message from Ephesians 1:15-21 was on transforming our hearts. He gave the example of commitment – “Sign your name to a blank sheet of paper and give it to God to fill in”. The service also included the celebration of “All Saints Day” in which we were asked to remember saints that we knew personally. It was a very reflective time for Tom and I having both lost our parents in the past few years who we cherished and were grateful for. They had a beautiful liturgy that concluded with:

Give us grace, O God, that we will leave a legacy of faithfulness to encourage and challenge those who follow us along the way of discipleship; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

After church, we met Suzanne’s bubbling greeting as she came down from the choir loft. She showed us the bench that was used to play the carillon and told us the history of the church. It was fun to have lunch with John and Suzanne and their four children in their fellowship hall. John commented on what a good friend Tom’s Dad had been to him. They are doing well and it was a real treat to be with them and share their worship service.

We returned to the marina and made our preparations to cast off as the Titans and Green Bay Packers football game was ending. Once again, the one-channel cable got us as someone switched to another game just as the Titans game went into overtime. As we were pulling out, another boater (who had satellite TV) called to us that the Titans had won. I guess the fans left the stadium yelling “Seven and oh”.

The Tennessee River continues to provide beautiful scenery. We saw cattle on the water’s edge including a cow with her calf. We passed a sailboat in mirror’ed water whose captain was from Indiana and on his way to Mobile Bay. There were massive

stone cliffs of tier rock reflected in the calm river. We also passed a tug boat shoving 12

barges heavily loaded with coal on its way to electric plants downstream.

It is getting darker earlier now that we have left Daylight Savings Time, so around 4:30 pm, we pulled into an anchorage behind Swallows Bluff Island just beyond the cruiser, Puzzle. As we watched the sun go down the blue sky glowed a rosy orange and turned the water into a matching canvas.