Contextual note for this book review: I was born and raised in Honduras by pioneer Mennonite missionary parents. But I “came of age” as a teenager, young adult in the United States. Hence my experiences are opposite of the author, Don Clymer, who was raised Mennonite in Lancaster County, but transitioned into adulthood while serving in Honduras. Moreover, as a boy growing up in Honduras, I had personal experiences with voluntary service men. In fact, my interactions with the VSers formed my first impressions of what American young men were like (the impressions were, uniformly, good).
Coming of Age covers the years 1968-70. In the case of author, Don Clymer, these involve his late teens, until just before his 22nd birthday. In lieu of serving in the military (Vietnam War years) via the draft system, Mennonite conscientious objectors were given official alternative options of serving two years elsewhere in the world, as directed by their pacifist church mission leadership. These voluntary service men were known by the acronym, VSers. In the book’s Forward, Don provides a context about “registering for the draft.” Every 18 year-old male, at the time, had this heavy bureaucratic appointment hanging over their heads.
Don’s story begins with a description of sharing in a Mennonite missionary family meal, in Honduras, who specially prepared a traditional American Thanksgiving meal. However, outside the house window, a “pair of large brown eyes” appeared; a young, hungry Honduran girl watching them eat their American feast. Don writes:
God will never let me forget those eyes. Whenever I am ungrateful, whenever I become jealous of someone else’s material “blessings;” whenever I see someone waste or complain about food; I think of those eyes.
This is just one theme of Don’s stories, wrestling with poverty and faith, yet it is one subject of several that carry through all of Don’s stories. Other prominent themes in the book, include faith and youthful sexuality, working amidst an unfamiliar business culture, protecting his identity from American stereotypes (hippies, soldiers, etc.), Mennonite cultural distinctions in choice of music, expressive language, drinking alcohol, dancing, relaxing, and other activities. The author doesn’t just tell, he shows the reader how vulnerable and unprepared he was for his Honduras experience.
Moreover, Don provides an inside look at VSer inter-relationships and church life, along with and such fascinating side trips as “vacations,” “pranks,” and “softball.” Furthermore, we read of Don’s observations on differences between island life, and life on the mainland of Honduras. Each of these diverse themes and stories are told with candor, humorous chagrin, even honest, transparent perplexity. Don does not pretend to master all that he absorbs in the two plus years of his Honduras service—this is no sociological treatise. Rather, Coming of Age, engagingly tells the stories, as if, in the present tense, we, the readers, are coming of age with Don, as we turn the page . . . by page.
HONDURAS IS A HANDS-ON COUNTRY
As Don tells it, because the VSers, in general, were from rural farming areas of the USA, they were well-equipped for Honduras’ limited technology and engineering. Electricity was not always available; outhouses were still common. Maintenance, or logistics, in Honduras, is a full time, 24/7 job. So, despite being thrust into a 3rd world country with foreign language and customs, most of the VSers knew how to fix things, work with their hands, and problem solve with whatever was to hand. The VSers engaged in agricultural projects, including construction, carpentry, painting, plumbing, electrical work, mechanical repair, and, of course, many of them knew how to play softball. This hands-on service ability and mentality endeared the VSers to many Hondurans—they weren’t academics or bosses telling them what to do—but actively doing and showing how things can be done in a way that benefitted many.
By contrast, due to Don having been exposed to Spanish in high school classes, and being adept at numbers, he got involved in service projects dealing with accounting, assisting with keeping track of how funds were being used and tabulated. Hence, out of the all the VSers, Don had the unique experience of working with Hondurans in an office setting. Don’s accounting/Credit Union work took place on the mainland, mostly in La Ceiba, on the coast, and on the three bay islands, some 30-40 miles off the mainland. Island settings were more rustic, but the islanders spoke English, enabling relationships to quickly form.
After a full year on the isolated, English-speaking island of Guanaja, Don spent the rest of his time working in La Ceiba, a larger coastal city, which also housed the VS housing unit and office. It is here where “rubber meets the road,” where Don learns to adjust to Honduras culture and people. Other VSers often traveled to La Ceiba for training, retreats, and for short vacations. Hence Don got to meet many of the other VSers scattered throughout the country.
Don also writes of church life, and interactions with Standard Fruit Corporation headquarter employees. One office in which Don worked, was the Vicente D’Antoni Hospital credit union office. Here, Don engaged in conversations with employees regarding what was happening in the United States, and some negative Honduran feelings about the USA. Being a Mennonite, set Don apart from what others thought Americans were supposed to be like. Later, at an out-of-hand office party, Don had to deal with an inebriated married woman who wished to have sex with him (announced aloud to the party guests). Don chose, like Joseph with Potiphar, to flee the scene on his bicycle.
THE SEXUAL NEXUS OF FAITH AND FORBEARANCE
Don had several unbidden, and some awkward encounters with women. Some of the women were up for a momentary adventure, others for friendship, and a couple for romance, or just plain, sex. These encounters took place in Costa Rica (2 months of language training, and vacations), on the islands, and the Honduras mainland. Don writes these stories the way they happened, in surprise, shock, confusion, desiring, rejection, and fleeing. Don’s storytelling here, is superbly clear and specific with details, and perhaps highlights the book’s theme of coming of age.
Sojourning from Mennonite teenager to adulthood in your own country can be daunting, much more so, in Honduras, away from your home church, youth group, family and spiritual peers. In Honduras, Don was given sufficient freedom to deal with the awful, but wondrous continuum of dating, being friends with, getting close to local women, while at the same time, having to follow VS rules: “no dating, no kissing, no messing around.” I was not surprised that much of the time, Don was lonely, bereft of understanding confidants, having to press on, without knowing quite what to do, how to be; in other words, persevering, while living with a kind of existential home-lovesickness.
This was the nexus of trust and temptation, faith and forbearance, where Don’s disciplined Mennonite upbringing served him well. Mennonites, like other Evangelicals of that time, put up natural sexual hedges around their youth, so that if one were to break thru and have a sexual relationship, out of bounds, you would feel “the fearful breaking through” of that fence-hedge. To that end, Don writes with what I call, epistemological humility; He knew his limitations, both in what he knew, and how to embody who he was as a Mennonite. As much as faith can inspire, or aspire to greater things, faith can also restrain, and wait for a more fortuitous time . . .
MENNONITE SELF-DISCIPLINE AVOIDS FOOLISH ENTANGLEMENTS
Mennonites, during those years of the 20th century, were particularly disciplined in all aspects of life: work, play, romance, sex, church life. Each area had discipline and purpose. Wasting time, fooling around, lying, stealing, etc., were all forbidden. Now, to most of us, this kind of fenced–in living feels privative, even demeaning. Yet for the VSers, in the 60s and early 70s, this learned and ingrained discipline kept them from many foolish, temporary attractions and distractions. Mennonites are already set apart by custom and spiritual practices. In Honduras, Don writes about the many times that this sense of ‘difference” was relationally efficacious. Nevertheless, the charm of the book is that Don reveals that though his Mennonite instincts served him well, they did not always satisfy the emotional upheaval, and confusing situations in which he found himself. We forget how fragile this coming of age is, the tremendous energy there to try out, to explore, or how easily the natural passions are subverted and compromised. Don’s Honduras experiences were a life-changing testing ground, which he tells, later in the book, transformed the arc of his life.
OTHER SIGNIFICANT ANECDOTES
In Honduras, Don was exposed to the tragedy of warfare, playing competitive softball in a foreign country, leading singing and Sunday school classes, interpreting for English speakers, and what it’s like to vacation in Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica. He also tells a harrowing tale of almost crashing, facing death, in a small airplane. And much more besides . . . The author squeezes a lifetime of stories into two years, 124 pages. Don has a startling rest of the story, of what happened to him, since Honduras, acknowledging that the trajectory of his life was formed by what he lived through in Honduras. Going south for two years, changed everything for him, for what resulted up north for the next 50 years. You will need to read his book to find what happened . . .
For the sake of limiting my review, then, in conclusion, Don acknowledges that most Americans think they are the center of the universe. He writes:
It was not only potential girlfriends who didn’t understand . . . Unfortunately, few people were interested in my story. They would ask me enthusiastically, “How was your time in Honduras?” And after I got beyond “It was great,” their eyes would glaze over, making it clear that they really weren’t interested. This was tough to swallow. It wasn’t until many years and many heartaches later, that I was able to use my writing as a means to tell my story adequately.
Indeed, in the fullness of time, Don Clymer has overcome glazed eyes, and written a forthright, even fearful, but enlightening account of his formative adult years. I wish the book had gone on another hundred pages. But that very desire, “for those who can’t see the end from the beginning” is a good token of life here on earth, wanting more of a good story than can only be had, momentarily. Thanks, Don, for giving us such a sensate experience, for letting us see and feel how Honduras helped form you, and give you a destiny in Christ, in whom all our stories begin, and move onward, without end.
Of course, I highly recommend this book, for all the reasons stated above.
--Danny Blue
