Bill Stagg and I started badly.

I heard about Bill before I met him…but just ten seconds before.  It was 1978 and I was a 31 year old novice Dean of Students at Charlotte Christian School.  I was confident, inexperienced and a danger to myself and others.  But worse than that, far worse that that – I had just busted one of Bill’s beloved and three other boys.  For me it was cut and dried, simple justice and only a matter of notifying the parents with a short and courteous reminder of the rules and a clear explanation of the punishment..

One day later the mail arrived at the Staggs and twenty minutes after that I heard heavy breathing, a distinctly raspy sound in the doorway to my small office.  I looked up to see a scarlet face, white hair, rumpled seersucker suit with the tie undone.  A man who was clearly on a mission from God with a vengeance.

I can’t remember if his index finger brushed my nose but I do remember his greeting:  “Just what in blazes do you think you are doing?”  The Old South and the Old Testament had physically merged right there in front of me.  The office was so small he couldn’t pace and there were no chairs except mine so he just stayed there, lodged and huge in the doorway.

This was not in the brochure they had given me!

I felt like a brand new lawyer in a John Grisham novel whose first judge is his worst nightmare.  Bill was almost Shakesperean like an offended Lear or Falstaff or Hotspur.  He was part Godfather, part courthouse lawyer and part jester – taking on any kings in the room…or any who thought they were.

Bill Stagg had blown into my life and I learned more about conviction, courage, loyalty, fairness, justice, mercy, bluffing, intimidation, humor, persuasion and discernment in the next two hours with Bill Stagg than any time previous in my life.  That was my first lesson from Bill and I never stopped learning.  He made me love students and not just school.

Bill was my own version of the film Pleasantville.  Everything starts in a neat, predictable, safe monotone of black and white.  But gradually at first and then in a flood color comes into their lives.  Bill and Kemp, Julia and Lee brought color into my life and the life of my family.  Bill and the Staggs took me from Pleasantville to Graceland.

I’d like to say we gradually formed a friendship but it was more like a fusion.  I loved him immediately.  Bill defended me and my family from that day on.  He named our firstborn “Perfect” and never called her anything else.  He was Mr. Wonderful – not flawless – but wonderful to her and to us.

He stood up for me from that first collision to the day five years later when Bill, dressed in his own concoction of running shorts, T-shirt with cigarettes rolled up in the sleeve, headband and sneakers, showed up at our door with pizza and the U-Haul truck.  He organized, cajoled, inspired, rebuked and charmed a weary crew for twelve blistering hours to pack everything we owned – including a few things we didn’t but he thought we would need.  Always the Captain.  Always huge and bigger than life.

Two years ago we stopped in Santee on our way home to Texas from Pawley’s Island.  As we drove away I thought of a passage from a poem I had taught so many years earlier to a class of poetry-hating, rowdy, brilliant and yet to be disciplined eighth graders.  While the title is “To My Mother”, I’ve always imagined Bill somehow.

Most near, most dear, most loved and most far

Under the window where I often found her

Sitting as huge as Asia, seismic with laughter,

Gin and chicken helpless in her Irish hand,

Irresistible as Rabelais, but most tender for

The lame dogs and hurt birds that surround her,

She is a procession no one can follow after

But be like a little dog following a brass band.

She will not glance up at the bomber, or condescend

To drop her gin and scuttle to the cellar,

But lean on the mahogany table like a mountain

Whom only faith can move… 

Bill in his own boisterous way introduced us to Graceland here in 1978 and two weeks ago after Bill’s death, Miss Carol, Mr. Fred, Perfect (Catherine) and Miss Haley went to Memphis and another Graceland and I thought of Bill and thanked God for him.

So, this afternoon it’s a line from Paul Simon’s song of that same title, Graceland, that I’m humming right along with the hymns:

“I have reason to believe we all will be received in Graceland” 

Bill Stagg and I started badly but we finished well.