LOYD BURL AND THE HOOTER’S GIRL
CHAPTER 15
Sunday May 8th 1988 to June 23rd 1989
TO EVERYTHING THERE IS A SEASON, A TIME FOR EVERY PURPOSE UNDER HEAVEN (Ecclesiastes 3:1)
Becky and I didn’t waste any time. A week after she agreed to marry me, we were married on a Sunday morning by Chester, the minister of her friend with whom she had been doing Bible studies. He was a Seventh Day Adventist pastor, so the empty church held plenty of room for all ten of our small wedding party.
Our honeymoon was postponed because I had to report to the Chicago Bears training camp. I made the team! I also made minimum wage for the NFL. But this was pretty good coin if you compared it to your average nine to five job. On Sunday September 4th, my Chicago Bears beat the Miami Dolphins. My first NFL game!
The next day, September 5th, Catalina Clutterbuck went into labor. Thankfully, by air, Two Harbors Minnesota isn’t all that far from Chicago. Also thankfully, I had an excellent employer that chartered me a flight getting me to Two Harbors just in time to see our healthy baby girl born! My first child!
To my surprise, Cat birthed our daughter in her grandparent’s home. However, her grandmother was a midwife. She also had another woman with her who was also a midwife as well as a nurse. Our daughter weighed eight pounds, four ounces. We called her Naomi Bella Burl. Naomi was one of Cat’s favorite female Bible characters, and Bella was after her grandmother.
On Saturday, October 1st, Becky gave birth to our daughter. Her first child, my second. Here’s an interesting side note, to me anyway. She was 33, I was 22, she was born in ’55, me in ’66, our daughter in ’88. Our baby girl weighed seven pounds, seven ounces. We named her Deborah Bonnie Burl. Deborah was after Becky’s favorite female Bible character, and Bonnie was after her mother.
Some in the Chicago Bears organization had raised eyebrows when their punter needed to briefly leave to see his baby daughter be born, one month after he needed to leave to see his baby daughter be born. I felt blessed, as a rookie no less, to be able to see my children come into the world during the football season.
Thankfully, Deborah arrived on a Saturday, and we had a home game Sunday, in which we beat the Buffalo Bills. Becky was living with me, in the bonds of marriage in Chicago. This birth was more convenient than flying up to the north shore of Minnesota to see Naomi’s entrance into the world.
After getting married, Becky kept up her Bible studies and became a dedicated follower of Jesus. I say to my shame, that my football career kept me from taking Bible truth as seriously as my wife did.
So when she was baptized on June 25th, 1988, by Pastor Chester, the minister who married us, I was in attendance, but did not go down into the watery grave myself. It would be a decade and a half before I fully understood the concepts behind baptism, and the significance of being raised to newness of spiritual life as you are first dunked, and then pulled up out of the water as if resurrected.
Another event happened to delay my spiritual growth. A year after Becky was baptized, the mother of my daughter was brutally murdered. The thing that took a while to click was her spiritual condition. The other mother of my daughter finally got through to me that the next thing the mother of my daughter would realize is the second coming of Christ as he was resurrected from the grave.
Eventually I would see this parallel between baptism and the resurrection of the righteous. For we are made righteous when we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior and choose to follow Him. This would lead to my own baptism, along with my two oldest daughters and one of my sons. Baptism is the way we honor Christ’s resurrection.
I wept that day, after I came out of the watery grave. Mostly overjoyed at fully accepting Jesus into my life. Oh, I had always fancied myself an upright, moral individual. And I was not ashamed to classify myself a Christian. But by the time I was baptized, I had advanced from an admirer of Christ to a follower.
There was another element to my tears. As I hugged the mother of one of my oldest daughters, I remembered the deceased mother of one of my oldest daughters. You see, in the year before the untimely death, the two mothers of my oldest daughters had become close friends.
To this day their bond amazes me! Satan wanted to use their human nature to make them jealous enemies. But Christ put the Kingdom of God into both of their hearts, and they became spiritual sisters. They took joy in their daughters being half siblings. So when one of them perished from this planet far too early, the other ended up raising her daughter as her own.
This is the part of the story that I haven’t looked forward to telling. I often have wondered how much Becky and Cat’s friendship had played a role in the violence that occurred toward the end of June 1989.
I had been at Chicago Bears training camp, honing my skills as a punter, and a holder for the place kicker. On Monday, June 22nd, Becky, our daughter, and our daughter’s sibling that was in the twelfth week fetal stage had driven up to the north shore to visit Cat for a couple days. Cat shared a bungalow with a girlfriend from church north of Two Harbors.
It was a little bit isolated, and Cat’s roommate was going to be gone for a couple days, as she and her fiancée were attending the funeral of his father. I was little ill at ease with Becky’s insistence to go stay with Cat. You see, Cat had acquired a stalker.
There was a restraining order against the obsessed, unhinged young man. Also, a retired police officer from Cat’s church was staying in his camper on the half acre lot where dwelt Cat’s house. Although I was tickled that the two loves of my life were friends, this was one co-mingling between the two that made me anxious. I said as much to Becky.
“Why do you feel the need to do this?” I pleaded with Becky. “Cat insisted that she’s fine.”
“Listen, Puntypooh,” Becky said with smile, using her private nickname for me. “I think at this point, I know Cat better than you.”
“How can that be?”
“Girl talk,” she replied a little flippantly. “Anyway, I get the clear vibe that she doesn’t like the idea of staying alone for a few days. But knowing Cat, she’s stoic and brave. Plus, she’s not alone since that cop she knows is staying on her property in a camper.”
“That’s right, in a camper.”
“Besides, P.P., you…”
“Don’t call me that, you know I don’t like it.”
She giggled. “Okay, Puntypooh.”
I wondered if Cat told her that she used to call me Kickypoo during their girl talk.
“Look, you’re away at training camp all week. I’d like some company myself. Plus, sitting on Cat’s porch, gazing through the trees at Lake Superior, and chatting the afternoon away is more desirable than being alone in our condo with only our baby to talk to. As much as I love her, Debbie isn’t a good conversationalist.”
“Alright, alright,” I said, waving my hands in submission. “But you be careful.”
Famous last words! The next day, I got a call that put my heart right into my throat.
“Loyd, oh Loyd!” Becky’s voice sobbed hysterically into the phone receiver.
The adrenaline surge I got felt like it might cause the top of my head to blow off. “Becky, what is it!”
“Cat’s been stabbed several times!”
Seven Sallie Showdown 