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My Own Personal Narnia

7/25/2023

5 Comments

 
I know it started after we moved to Federal Way, because I remember the exact spot I was in.

My mother gave me a copy of The Hobbit a few years earlier, when we were still in Rohnert Park, California. I would have been in the fourth grade then (1978). Having been labeled “retarded” in the first grade, I could barely read, because none of the teachers considered me worth the effort. I struggled through the book, not understanding it all, but was able to eke out enough,
Picture
Mikal Johnson
because I had seen the Rankin-Bass cartoon adaptation of The Hobbit a few months earlier. This was the first book I had ever read.

I’m sure it was still the early part of ’78, still winter, because we had not moved to Washington yet. Certainly, it was Neil Church, our music pastor, who recommended The Chronicles of Narnia to me; and thank God he did! I recall coveting a UK published set he had in his office at the church. It was closer to my actual reading level, and, therefore, much more appropriate. I had a more recent US set, and I read these books over and over (probably over 30 times) from then through the ‘80s. There was something in them that spoke to my soul, and it offered me an escape of sorts from life in a world I didn’t feel a part of.

But this recollection was from when I think I was in the fifth grade, late in the school year… so 1979 when I was eleven years old. I was at the top of the long driveway, right before the decline started. I was unhappy, lonely, and found myself standing there, praying that God would give me a passage into Narnia, or someplace like it.

My teacher that year, for whatever reason he had, suggested that I see a mental health professional (though I’m sure he said “shrink”). Not because of the Narnia thing, nobody knew that. I was almost entirely disconnected in the classroom, only occasionally speaking up, correcting the teacher on a mistake and getting myself in trouble.

I saw a psychiatrist in downtown Seattle who got me talking a lot! I don’t remember any of the topics, but I do remember the IQ test. (And I remember seeing a capuchin monkey in a car on the freeway on the way home one day.) A few years would pass before I found out what the doctor had determined about me, but the following school year, my sisters and I found ourselves in a small private school. At the start of sixth grade, I tested at a second-grade reading level. By the end of the year, I was at seventh-grade.

Unfortunately, the prime years for learning the core of mathematics had passed. However, I became a voracious reader, and C.S. Lewis was my favorite author. I had read Mere Christianity and The Problem of Pain before I turned 14. I always had two books going: one for home reading, and one I carried when we went out. At home, it was almost always Narnia. Outside, I read Edgar Rice Burroughs, JRR Tolkien, Edgar Allan Poe, various Star Trek novels, and anything else that came my way. At least once a week, I walked down to 7-11 and also picked up a couple comic books.

In 1982, the private school closed and my parents contacted the school in Texas that had provided their curriculum, arranging for my younger sister and I to do school at home. In 1983, just as my first year of home-school was ending, my family started attending a new church. On the first Sunday there, I met Gavin Anderson. It was also his first time there, and we were immediately best friends.

Shortly thereafter, I was supposed to write a short story for an English class. I don’t think I’d written a story since fourth grade. The result was chock-full of the things I felt inside. It started, “There was nothing special about Steven Collier, and people made him feel that way.” It ended with him discovering a varve that was the portal to another world. He stood there, at the exit of the magical caverns, facing a sylvan scene and two moons in the distant night sky.

In the summer of 1984, Gavin and I spent a month together working at Lakeside Bible Camp on Whidbey Island. We washed dishes, set tables, did general custodial duties… and on a couple of occasions we snuck out of the cabin at night and took a canoe out onto the lake. We sat in the canoe for what must have been hours talking about the things that were of interest to us and (we believed) to no other teenager in the ‘80s. After speculating on what Tolkien might have written further on his world of Middle Earth, I told him about my short story. He asked, “Well, what happens next?”

This was the seed of the story I’d write about Steven Collier in a world of elves, dwarves, and dragons. To date, it’s easily the longest thing I’ve ever written. Over the next years, it was the vehicle through which I experimented with writing. It’s really not good, and I’m sure will never see print, but it holds a place in my heart.

Writing became the door that God gave me into my own personal Narnia.

In Christ,
Mikal Johnson

5 Comments
Cheryl Marcheso
7/25/2023 05:33:43 pm

Oh my, what an amazing story. You sure have come a long way. Good bless you

Reply
Ronda Greer
7/25/2023 06:58:05 pm

Fascinating narrative of your growing up years. Unfortunately children believe what they're told (or labeled). You are an amazing & determined young man. Thank you for sharing your story❤️

Reply
Carolyn Keefer
7/25/2023 07:48:49 pm

Having been a primary teacher of 1st and 2nd grade it breaks my heart to hear that they referred to you as "retarded". But, obviously, God was in control and led you to be able to express through writing all you were feeling.
I can't tell you what a blessing it is to have you as part of our First Pres family!
Thank you for sharing your story and continuing to share your gifts of service with our church family!

Reply
Karen Livingston
7/26/2023 05:02:38 pm

You must get your story into print. It sounds fascinating! God gave you this gift and it should be shared. Blessings!

Reply
Charles Branch
7/26/2023 05:24:58 pm

Thank you for sharing stories with me, and all of us. Learning never stops, and I like to say, "Since old dogs can't learn new tricks, if you learn something new every day, you'll never be an 'old dog'." One example: I didn't learn about the Fibonacci Series of numbers until I was volunteer help in ALP Math at Sorensen Magnet School, which develops into the Golden Mean, that Dr. Lewis Thomas, M.D. explained in his books. Michael Tellinger has written from South Africa books on Adam's Calendar, and Decoding the Ancient Ruins of Southern Africa, temples, villages and roads designed and built with the Golden Mean in their patterns. Wow! Resonating with this Earth...

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 First Presbyterian Church | 521 E Lakeside Ave | Coeur d'Alene | ID  83814
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  • Home
    • Connect With Us >
      • Prayer Request
      • eNews Archive >
        • 2020 eNews Archive
  • Who We Are
    • Leadership & Staff >
      • Job Opportunities
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        • Blog Archive 2021 >
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      • Family Connections
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