If you know anything about me from my writing, or from talking to me over time, or from being around me, it is this: I love my wife.
Loving someone with your whole heart is terrifying. You don't know in the early stages whether it is safe to dive in, and once you're in and comfortable, you have to guard against taking it for granted. When I met my lovely bride, it was like a beam of sunlight parted my fog, and I did dive. At some point, amongst all of the moving, failing, growing, and changing, we began to take things for granted.
Over the last few years, I've learned why people are so very terrified of love. I've learned the hard way that our love has faded, and she has made it clear that she no longer wants to be married. Not to me.
If you know anything else about me - and I leave evidence of this quirk of my personality lying around on the Internet - you know I tend to speak my mind. I speak truth to power, I share my opinions, and I object loudly when I run across a situation which strikes me as wrong. I don't fancy myself as a fading flower who holds back when someone deserves to be told off.
And I have been wronged.
But I haven't talked about this as openly as you might expect. Some of you know the whole story; it's not like I'm hiding anything. If you ask me privately, I may tell you. I just don't want to broadcast details all over the web. I don't want to say things that my children will see. And deep down, I want to keep alive the hope that when the dust - or this new patch of fog - clears, I'll be able to reclaim my bride.
So I keep broadcasting the one thing I do want you all to know. I tell you all with no reservation that when she is ready, I will still be here with my whole heart - cracked, but intact - ready to cry out passionately to the heavens what has been true since the day I dove head first into her life.
Loving someone with your whole heart is terrifying - and no less so when you are taking that risk for the second time. When you already know what you stand to gain, and what you are missing, it is no less tempting to wonder if you should make the leap. No less so when you have good reason to expect the worst. Or when you're making the leap without knowing for sure that you will land safely. Diving into turbulent waters and realizing how close you are to the rocks beneath - seeing them rush up at you...
If I have misjudged, and if I am headed for the rocks, let my cry be this:
I love my wife. Whole Hearted, Full Throated.
And I am not even putting my hands out to break my fall.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Sunday, September 11, 2011
The Impact on My Faith
Today, like every day of the last decade, we are feeling the effects of a deplorable act. My family's story is like that of most Americans; we were fortunate not to lose anyone directly, though some of us were close by. One of us could have been in the Pentagon that day; one of us was sent from the Air Force base in New Jersey in time to see the buildings come down and to help guide people away from the rubble to safety. We could have lost much more than we did.
This is about what we gained.
For many, the shock and the aftermath brought them to a place of renewed Faith. They turned to God - whether the God they had been raised to believe in and fallen away from, or the God they had never considered and now needed. "God Bless America" was everywhere in the years that followed the attacks. The ceremonies today are full of scripture, invocation of the name of God, and songs like Amazing Grace.
But as my friends and family well know, I have not turned toward their God in these years. They've seen me begin to identify myself more as an atheist or nontheist; a believer in nothing, it would seem. To them, this represents a loss. I see it as a gain. While they draw strength from putting a name to the universe, and imagining that it cares about them, I've drawn strength from confronting a cold, indifferent universe in which I can thrive despite adversity.
It has been hard for me - a boy raised deep in the thick of Southern Baptist faith and tradition - to learn a new vocabulary of faith and strength that doesn't require the existence of God. Music has helped. Poetry helps. Keeping hold of the ideas behind faith - love, charity, and mercy as the virtues that should drive us - while shedding the mystical, thought-clouding emotions tied to Faith has been an intense, private struggle. And life streams by, with currents and eddies that make finding your footing seem impossible.
Despite the impossibilities, I go on. We all do. It's impossible that we could even exist, but we do. That is the fact that ties all of us together regardless of the names we give to the world around us. What I've gained in the last decade is a source of strength based on the impossible. I've learned (and am still learning) how my faith drives me. My faith is not in a god that controls the minutiae of my life. My faith is in the always reliable turmoil that generates and destroys life. It makes me choose what is truly important to me more carefully. It makes me fight harder for what I've chosen; for my wife and children. For a career that I think is an important part of preventing future acts of violence like those we are remembering today.
My faith tells me that people, while dangerous and unpredictable, are just like me and are driven by knowable forces - and ultimately, their understanding of those forces is sometimes given names that I don't have faith in. God. Allah. Karma. Jesus. Part of my faith requires me to let them have their point of view, and only contradict them when they truly threaten me, or when I have reason to fear their faith is taking them somewhere dangerous to themselves. We will always struggle with the cloudy grey areas where different understandings bump into each other; but I've learned that "assume good intent" and a general avoidance of revenge and violence can keep those struggles from causing harm.
As a "budding atheist" you might expect me to be uncomfortable with the invocation of God that comes with the ceremony of remembrance. I am. But because I understand that people need to relate to the world in a way that brings them peace and equilibrium, I try to treat the references to God, Heaven and a Higher Power as a code for the same basic things that I do believe in. To me, the names we choose don't matter as much as the stories and the lessons they teach.
It's up to each of us to pull the lessons of life and love from those stories; just as it is up to us to pull the laws of the universe out of observation and experimentation. You might venerate Doctor Who as much as some do Jesus, or your own ego as much as some do Buddha; it doesn't matter to me, as long as you find a way to stand up and face down your challenges. It doesn't matter how you express your faith, as long as you find a way to deal equitably with others.
I haven't become a perfect person in the last ten years. In some ways, I'm as lost and confused as I ever was; I'm certainly just as obnoxious and socially retarded now as when I was a young Christian. I may never reach the goals I've set for myself, and I may still lose the things that are most important to me. That is life.
But no matter what God or the universe have in store for me, I will love and admire my wife and children, and will do my best to lift up those around me. I will do what I can to make things better - even though "better" is a moving target. I like to think I would have gotten here without the influence of the September 11 attacks, but the truth is that they did impact me. And this is where I am now.
Whatever your beliefs are, I hope your faith is taking you through the turmoil toward something better. I like what Admiral Mullens said on Twitter today: "Living well and for each other -- that is victory."
I hope that, whatever your beliefs are and whatever names you use for the universe, you find peace and strength in your reflections today.
This is about what we gained.
For many, the shock and the aftermath brought them to a place of renewed Faith. They turned to God - whether the God they had been raised to believe in and fallen away from, or the God they had never considered and now needed. "God Bless America" was everywhere in the years that followed the attacks. The ceremonies today are full of scripture, invocation of the name of God, and songs like Amazing Grace.
But as my friends and family well know, I have not turned toward their God in these years. They've seen me begin to identify myself more as an atheist or nontheist; a believer in nothing, it would seem. To them, this represents a loss. I see it as a gain. While they draw strength from putting a name to the universe, and imagining that it cares about them, I've drawn strength from confronting a cold, indifferent universe in which I can thrive despite adversity.
It has been hard for me - a boy raised deep in the thick of Southern Baptist faith and tradition - to learn a new vocabulary of faith and strength that doesn't require the existence of God. Music has helped. Poetry helps. Keeping hold of the ideas behind faith - love, charity, and mercy as the virtues that should drive us - while shedding the mystical, thought-clouding emotions tied to Faith has been an intense, private struggle. And life streams by, with currents and eddies that make finding your footing seem impossible.
Despite the impossibilities, I go on. We all do. It's impossible that we could even exist, but we do. That is the fact that ties all of us together regardless of the names we give to the world around us. What I've gained in the last decade is a source of strength based on the impossible. I've learned (and am still learning) how my faith drives me. My faith is not in a god that controls the minutiae of my life. My faith is in the always reliable turmoil that generates and destroys life. It makes me choose what is truly important to me more carefully. It makes me fight harder for what I've chosen; for my wife and children. For a career that I think is an important part of preventing future acts of violence like those we are remembering today.
My faith tells me that people, while dangerous and unpredictable, are just like me and are driven by knowable forces - and ultimately, their understanding of those forces is sometimes given names that I don't have faith in. God. Allah. Karma. Jesus. Part of my faith requires me to let them have their point of view, and only contradict them when they truly threaten me, or when I have reason to fear their faith is taking them somewhere dangerous to themselves. We will always struggle with the cloudy grey areas where different understandings bump into each other; but I've learned that "assume good intent" and a general avoidance of revenge and violence can keep those struggles from causing harm.
As a "budding atheist" you might expect me to be uncomfortable with the invocation of God that comes with the ceremony of remembrance. I am. But because I understand that people need to relate to the world in a way that brings them peace and equilibrium, I try to treat the references to God, Heaven and a Higher Power as a code for the same basic things that I do believe in. To me, the names we choose don't matter as much as the stories and the lessons they teach.
It's up to each of us to pull the lessons of life and love from those stories; just as it is up to us to pull the laws of the universe out of observation and experimentation. You might venerate Doctor Who as much as some do Jesus, or your own ego as much as some do Buddha; it doesn't matter to me, as long as you find a way to stand up and face down your challenges. It doesn't matter how you express your faith, as long as you find a way to deal equitably with others.
I haven't become a perfect person in the last ten years. In some ways, I'm as lost and confused as I ever was; I'm certainly just as obnoxious and socially retarded now as when I was a young Christian. I may never reach the goals I've set for myself, and I may still lose the things that are most important to me. That is life.
But no matter what God or the universe have in store for me, I will love and admire my wife and children, and will do my best to lift up those around me. I will do what I can to make things better - even though "better" is a moving target. I like to think I would have gotten here without the influence of the September 11 attacks, but the truth is that they did impact me. And this is where I am now.
Whatever your beliefs are, I hope your faith is taking you through the turmoil toward something better. I like what Admiral Mullens said on Twitter today: "Living well and for each other -- that is victory."
I hope that, whatever your beliefs are and whatever names you use for the universe, you find peace and strength in your reflections today.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
The Snip - a Public Service Announcement
Warning: Severe Ick Factor Ahead!
If you are bothered by discussions of medical procedure, bodily fluids, or patients' eye views of urology, then I suggest you skip down to an earlier blog (you might have missed one or two). It's probably very rude of me to recount these events, but I consider this tale to be a public service announcement, and so I'm going to post it, anyway.
I told Bernie the boss, "I'm going to be out Wednesday, and I won't be back until Monday."
My friend Paul asked why I was going to be out (me, the guy known for working 72+ hours a week)... and I told him; time for the vasectomy. "Are you NUTS?" he shouted, then his cheeks colored and he shuffled off.
I understood how he felt; he was a single guy with all of his silly macho ideals still intact. But my lovely bride and I had four little kids in rapid succession. Due mainly to allergies, other options for population control weren't viable. It was hard to make the leap, but we decided we'd both make sure that IT couldn't happen again. And I was going first.
I went to the evaluation appointment, not sure what to expect. I did not expect a very cute, pixie-faced Doctor to explain my choices for the procedure in graphic detail while fanning illustrations of the options before her face. She showed me the three basic methods:
*Two scalpel incisions directly over each tube
*Two incisions made with sharpened shears (jab through skin, open shears to make 1/4 in. opening)
*One scalpel incision in the middle, and fish out the tubes with a probe...
She saw I had turned green, so she showed me the list of six doctors in the practice. "They will each perform whichever method you prefer - except Dr. Herzinger; he only does the sharpened shears. He says it heals better with a ragged incision." That's right, it was pronounced "Dr. HURT-zinger".
In the end, guess who was the only doc available for the forseeable future?
So I showed up the day of, having shaved as instructed. This was an awkward thing for me, and I followed the instructions precisely, marveling to myself that people would do this regularly. Feeling more exposed than I had since puberty, I lay on the table, only to have the Dr. shake his ancient head and say with sad disapproval, "Didn't do a very thorough job there, did you?" Then he seized a straight razor and deftly cleared half an acre I had never seen before. (Strictly speaking, I still haven't seen it.)
Once I was completely shorn, and utterly humiliated, the anesthetizing began. Have you had a dental procedure done? Or heard Bill Cosby's bit about Dentists? The way they jab in the needle, and then slowly wiggle it around while they inject their cold poison, was compounded by the feeling of my testicle being inflated to the size of a basketball. I white-knuckled the sides of the gurney, and just as I was certain he had decided to dispense with "incisions" and just POP the bastard... he stopped. I released my breath and my grip, grateful it had ended without any hitting or screaming. The Doc nodded at me kindly and said, "Alright... now for the left one."
I survived, though, reminding myself that delivering four children was far worse for my wife than what I was going through was for me. Even watching him "tie it off" (like watching a rodeo bull-roping over the horizon of my own belly) didn't phase me after that.
And of course, I was expected to come back in two or three weeks for the Test. I needed to wait for everything to heal, of course, and then contribute a sample to make sure there were no stray swimmers finding their way out into the world.
Now, I had read "The Water Method Man", and had seen "Road Trip"; I had some preconceived notions (and not a little fear) of what this experience might involve. I was to be severely disappointed.
No "cute nurse" like in the movie; I got your basic Dundalk-bred troglodyte, complete with greasy ponytail and weak, acne-scarred chin, handing me a cup and saying, "Fill this to here, hon, and get it back within 45 minutes."
I was shattered. There was no "special room" for this, with porn or a fake boob or something? I didn't want to ask... there were scads of people in there! And Dundalkella had gone back to nibbling at a crab cake hidden behind her computer monitor. So I turned and left the office.
I went down to the car, and stared at the cup. It wouldn't take much, but where was I supposed to go? I only had (checking the clock) 40 minutes left, and home was twenty minutes away. Even if traffic was perfect, I only had a couple of minutes to try to produce a sample in a house full of screeching children! So I got out of the car and headed back into the building.
The men's rooms on the first three floors were either full of grunting patrons, or cleaning crews. On the fifth floor, I finally found some isolation. It was a dingy, brown-tiled orifice of a room, with peeling paint on the stall doors and no provocative graffiti. And there, despite fearful internal warnings about George Michael's arrest intruding on what I was trying to visualize -- I managed to produce my sample.
Handing the cup to the Gamorrean receptionist, she looked surprised to see me. "That was quick, hon!" I thought she had said I had 45 minutes, though. "Oh, for the love! You have 45 minutes from when you fill the cup!" At that moment, it dawned on her, and a few of the bystanders, just what I had done, and where I had likely done it. So I left.
"Man," I thought to myself. "I'm never doing THAT again!"
If you are bothered by discussions of medical procedure, bodily fluids, or patients' eye views of urology, then I suggest you skip down to an earlier blog (you might have missed one or two). It's probably very rude of me to recount these events, but I consider this tale to be a public service announcement, and so I'm going to post it, anyway.
I told Bernie the boss, "I'm going to be out Wednesday, and I won't be back until Monday."
My friend Paul asked why I was going to be out (me, the guy known for working 72+ hours a week)... and I told him; time for the vasectomy. "Are you NUTS?" he shouted, then his cheeks colored and he shuffled off.
I understood how he felt; he was a single guy with all of his silly macho ideals still intact. But my lovely bride and I had four little kids in rapid succession. Due mainly to allergies, other options for population control weren't viable. It was hard to make the leap, but we decided we'd both make sure that IT couldn't happen again. And I was going first.
I went to the evaluation appointment, not sure what to expect. I did not expect a very cute, pixie-faced Doctor to explain my choices for the procedure in graphic detail while fanning illustrations of the options before her face. She showed me the three basic methods:
*Two scalpel incisions directly over each tube
*Two incisions made with sharpened shears (jab through skin, open shears to make 1/4 in. opening)
*One scalpel incision in the middle, and fish out the tubes with a probe...
She saw I had turned green, so she showed me the list of six doctors in the practice. "They will each perform whichever method you prefer - except Dr. Herzinger; he only does the sharpened shears. He says it heals better with a ragged incision." That's right, it was pronounced "Dr. HURT-zinger".
In the end, guess who was the only doc available for the forseeable future?
So I showed up the day of, having shaved as instructed. This was an awkward thing for me, and I followed the instructions precisely, marveling to myself that people would do this regularly. Feeling more exposed than I had since puberty, I lay on the table, only to have the Dr. shake his ancient head and say with sad disapproval, "Didn't do a very thorough job there, did you?" Then he seized a straight razor and deftly cleared half an acre I had never seen before. (Strictly speaking, I still haven't seen it.)
Once I was completely shorn, and utterly humiliated, the anesthetizing began. Have you had a dental procedure done? Or heard Bill Cosby's bit about Dentists? The way they jab in the needle, and then slowly wiggle it around while they inject their cold poison, was compounded by the feeling of my testicle being inflated to the size of a basketball. I white-knuckled the sides of the gurney, and just as I was certain he had decided to dispense with "incisions" and just POP the bastard... he stopped. I released my breath and my grip, grateful it had ended without any hitting or screaming. The Doc nodded at me kindly and said, "Alright... now for the left one."
I survived, though, reminding myself that delivering four children was far worse for my wife than what I was going through was for me. Even watching him "tie it off" (like watching a rodeo bull-roping over the horizon of my own belly) didn't phase me after that.
And of course, I was expected to come back in two or three weeks for the Test. I needed to wait for everything to heal, of course, and then contribute a sample to make sure there were no stray swimmers finding their way out into the world.
Now, I had read "The Water Method Man", and had seen "Road Trip"; I had some preconceived notions (and not a little fear) of what this experience might involve. I was to be severely disappointed.
No "cute nurse" like in the movie; I got your basic Dundalk-bred troglodyte, complete with greasy ponytail and weak, acne-scarred chin, handing me a cup and saying, "Fill this to here, hon, and get it back within 45 minutes."
I was shattered. There was no "special room" for this, with porn or a fake boob or something? I didn't want to ask... there were scads of people in there! And Dundalkella had gone back to nibbling at a crab cake hidden behind her computer monitor. So I turned and left the office.
I went down to the car, and stared at the cup. It wouldn't take much, but where was I supposed to go? I only had (checking the clock) 40 minutes left, and home was twenty minutes away. Even if traffic was perfect, I only had a couple of minutes to try to produce a sample in a house full of screeching children! So I got out of the car and headed back into the building.
The men's rooms on the first three floors were either full of grunting patrons, or cleaning crews. On the fifth floor, I finally found some isolation. It was a dingy, brown-tiled orifice of a room, with peeling paint on the stall doors and no provocative graffiti. And there, despite fearful internal warnings about George Michael's arrest intruding on what I was trying to visualize -- I managed to produce my sample.
Handing the cup to the Gamorrean receptionist, she looked surprised to see me. "That was quick, hon!" I thought she had said I had 45 minutes, though. "Oh, for the love! You have 45 minutes from when you fill the cup!" At that moment, it dawned on her, and a few of the bystanders, just what I had done, and where I had likely done it. So I left.
"Man," I thought to myself. "I'm never doing THAT again!"
Decant the Midnight Lizard
Digging through old posts from 2003 or 2004, I found this:
I plunge my face into my pillow, and feel the cool fabric leach the heat from my strained and weary eyes. Clouds of the Sandman’s magic dust puff up around me, and I am already sailing away into a dream and relaxing into my pose of repose, which is not unlike that of the Coyote upon reaching the canyon floor in a Roadrunner cartoon.
“Did you empty the boy?” The voice of my lovely bride jerks to a halt my descent into slumber, and my body goes rigid as I fight my way back into wakefulness. I should have known I was forgetting something.
The Boy is three, and took to toilet training like a donut to coffee. The only problem he has is remembering to get up in the night to avoid drowning. It has become my job to empty him once before going to bed, and again in the morning before I leave for work. I don’t mind, except that he is an extremely heavy sleeper, as the twinge in my back will attest. I’ve lobbied against the nightly “dink o’walla” with all my heart, but have been consistently out-voted. I seem to be the only one who has made a connection between the 2.5 ounces of water he drinks just before bed and the 2.5 gallon deluge that issues forth from him between 10pm and 4am.
So, it falls to me as the last one down and the first one up to enforce the head call. If I don’t do it, he will awaken, cold and sticky, forty minutes before my alarm is set to go off, and will climb into our bed with his soggy drawers. The changing of sheets and pajamas (his and ours, now), and the wailing and crying (his and ours), and the rinsing off of his soiled body and tucking him into his remade bed generally leaves me with about ten minutes to go until I have to get up again. Not enough time to get any more rest, and too much time to sit and dawdle over my cereal.
This night, I am especially tired. The cold I have been fighting has resorted to guerilla tactics for the last couple of weeks. Gone during the work week, but suddenly appearing on Friday night. Sometimes it’s in my sinuses, sometimes in my throat, sometimes in my eye. I think it has a secret base in my liver, so I’ve been using the Russian remedy: one shot of vodka with a dash of pepper.
I drag down the hall, and grope about in his bed, looking for him. He is a small boy, and the bed seems large in the dark; he could be anywhere! He isn’t. I am about to give in and turn on a light when I feel something underfoot. It IS a foot. It is attached to the wee lad, who has made a nest under his bed out of stuffed animals, dump trucks, and a few Justice League action figures. Batman, devotedly standing guard, dives cowl-first onto my foot as I lift the boy like a sack of rice, and with a stifled yelp, I begin hopping painfully toward the bathroom, all while trying to keep a good grip on him.
Not many people fully appreciate how floppy the body of a sleeping child can be until they try to pick one up in the middle of the night. This one sags in the middle as I prop his head on my shoulder and drape his legs over the elbow of the other arm. It isn’t a problem until he startles awake and begins to writhe like a cat in a bathtub. I manage to prevent him from slamming his head into the door frame by slamming my head into the door frame. He will have an interesting vocabulary by the time he begins school. The blast of cranial pain distracts from the Bat-marks in my foot, though, and that helps me maintain my balance.
“Sh-sh-shh!” I say, trying to sooth him back into immobility. He relaxes a little bit, then suddenly drops back to sleep. I complete the journey to the bathroom with only minor limping, and try to stand him up on the little stool next to the toilet. His legs won’t go down. They waver bonelessly. They curl up under him, and he tucks his chin to his chest and throws his arms up, giving me nothing to hold onto. He almost slips away, but I manage to grab him by the elbows and haul him back up.
Now he’s mad, and his legs shoot out, as he explodes with furious activity. He is a whirlwind, a wolverine cornered, a many-tentacled rage beast desperate to get away from me.
Then, with a plop, all action stops. Something awful has happened. We stand there in the darkness, until realization dawns. He tears the night apart with his shrill, angry scream: “It’s CO-O-O-OLD!!”
He has planted his left foot squarely into the toilet bowl.
Yanking his foot free, he begins kicking savagely, liberally spraying toilet water hither and yon. Fortunately, it didn’t get on his clothing. After a brief tussle, I wrestle him up onto the sink, and jam his foot under the tap. I wash him, pat him dry, and stand him up - finally - on his stool. There, he proceeds to make water for an eternity.
I have time to wash myself up, dry, mop up the floor, check the pipes for wear, tidy the tub toys, and re-grout the tile. When he is done, I gently carry him back to his room, and place him gently in his bed, where he is supposed to be. I kiss him gently on the forehead, and whisper, “Sweet Dreams.”
When he whispers it back to me, all is forgiven, and I limp gratefully back to my own, sweet, welcoming bed.
I plunge my face into my pillow, and feel the cool fabric leach the heat from my strained and weary eyes. Clouds of the Sandman’s magic dust puff up around me, and I am already sailing away into a dream and relaxing into my pose of repose, which is not unlike that of the Coyote upon reaching the canyon floor in a Roadrunner cartoon.
“Did you empty the boy?” The voice of my lovely bride jerks to a halt my descent into slumber, and my body goes rigid as I fight my way back into wakefulness. I should have known I was forgetting something.
The Boy is three, and took to toilet training like a donut to coffee. The only problem he has is remembering to get up in the night to avoid drowning. It has become my job to empty him once before going to bed, and again in the morning before I leave for work. I don’t mind, except that he is an extremely heavy sleeper, as the twinge in my back will attest. I’ve lobbied against the nightly “dink o’walla” with all my heart, but have been consistently out-voted. I seem to be the only one who has made a connection between the 2.5 ounces of water he drinks just before bed and the 2.5 gallon deluge that issues forth from him between 10pm and 4am.
So, it falls to me as the last one down and the first one up to enforce the head call. If I don’t do it, he will awaken, cold and sticky, forty minutes before my alarm is set to go off, and will climb into our bed with his soggy drawers. The changing of sheets and pajamas (his and ours, now), and the wailing and crying (his and ours), and the rinsing off of his soiled body and tucking him into his remade bed generally leaves me with about ten minutes to go until I have to get up again. Not enough time to get any more rest, and too much time to sit and dawdle over my cereal.
This night, I am especially tired. The cold I have been fighting has resorted to guerilla tactics for the last couple of weeks. Gone during the work week, but suddenly appearing on Friday night. Sometimes it’s in my sinuses, sometimes in my throat, sometimes in my eye. I think it has a secret base in my liver, so I’ve been using the Russian remedy: one shot of vodka with a dash of pepper.
I drag down the hall, and grope about in his bed, looking for him. He is a small boy, and the bed seems large in the dark; he could be anywhere! He isn’t. I am about to give in and turn on a light when I feel something underfoot. It IS a foot. It is attached to the wee lad, who has made a nest under his bed out of stuffed animals, dump trucks, and a few Justice League action figures. Batman, devotedly standing guard, dives cowl-first onto my foot as I lift the boy like a sack of rice, and with a stifled yelp, I begin hopping painfully toward the bathroom, all while trying to keep a good grip on him.
Not many people fully appreciate how floppy the body of a sleeping child can be until they try to pick one up in the middle of the night. This one sags in the middle as I prop his head on my shoulder and drape his legs over the elbow of the other arm. It isn’t a problem until he startles awake and begins to writhe like a cat in a bathtub. I manage to prevent him from slamming his head into the door frame by slamming my head into the door frame. He will have an interesting vocabulary by the time he begins school. The blast of cranial pain distracts from the Bat-marks in my foot, though, and that helps me maintain my balance.
“Sh-sh-shh!” I say, trying to sooth him back into immobility. He relaxes a little bit, then suddenly drops back to sleep. I complete the journey to the bathroom with only minor limping, and try to stand him up on the little stool next to the toilet. His legs won’t go down. They waver bonelessly. They curl up under him, and he tucks his chin to his chest and throws his arms up, giving me nothing to hold onto. He almost slips away, but I manage to grab him by the elbows and haul him back up.
Now he’s mad, and his legs shoot out, as he explodes with furious activity. He is a whirlwind, a wolverine cornered, a many-tentacled rage beast desperate to get away from me.
Then, with a plop, all action stops. Something awful has happened. We stand there in the darkness, until realization dawns. He tears the night apart with his shrill, angry scream: “It’s CO-O-O-OLD!!”
He has planted his left foot squarely into the toilet bowl.
Yanking his foot free, he begins kicking savagely, liberally spraying toilet water hither and yon. Fortunately, it didn’t get on his clothing. After a brief tussle, I wrestle him up onto the sink, and jam his foot under the tap. I wash him, pat him dry, and stand him up - finally - on his stool. There, he proceeds to make water for an eternity.
I have time to wash myself up, dry, mop up the floor, check the pipes for wear, tidy the tub toys, and re-grout the tile. When he is done, I gently carry him back to his room, and place him gently in his bed, where he is supposed to be. I kiss him gently on the forehead, and whisper, “Sweet Dreams.”
When he whispers it back to me, all is forgiven, and I limp gratefully back to my own, sweet, welcoming bed.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Deja Vu Again: AFBMT pt. 3
Six Little Words (pt.1)
Three Strikes (pt. 2)
Do you ever get deja vu?
Perhaps you do when you are standing back outside that strange, alien building again, holding all of your worldly possesions in a duffel bag. Five weeks ago - a swiftly receding eternity ago - you were standing here facing the unknown along with 45 others just as scared and sleep-deprived as you. Now you are facing the prospect of meeting 49 new "others" who have been getting used to showering, eating, and learning side by side for three weeks. You are going to be the outsider, now. You are the "Recycle."
For five weeks you lived under the constant threat, which the leadership was always careful to say was not a punishment. "Recycling an airman is just a way of ensuring that everyone gets the training that they need," is the official explanation. You watched carefully when they brought Recycles into your flight; simple boys with slack jaws and glazed eyes who obviously didn't know ass from elbow or shit from shinola. To be fair, you don't know what shinola is, either, but you're pretty confident you could pick it out of that line-up.
Of course, you also thought you could learn to fold your underwear well enough to pass an inspection.
Do you ever get deja vu?
Perhaps you do when you are staring up the stairwell at the door to your new flight, and the only difference you see between it and your old one is the number on the wall. Five weeks ago, you were pretty sure the worst year of your life was behind you. The hard luck, the cruel woman, the indignity of returning to your parents' house and realizing that you were pretty much to blame for the whole mess was giving way to a new life. And in five short weeks you have burrowed your way to rock bottom.
You choke back a hysterical giggle as the dorm guard crisply and efficiently goes through the entry routine - the same routine you watched your old flight botch time after time, sending you here as a result. Well, to be fair, it was that and the underwear. Then you are inside, being greeted by a guy with flinty eyes and the kind of jaw you generally associate with Batman. He is your new dorm chief.
Deja vu never lasts, fortunately.
Dorm Chief is the student commander, usually chosen at random from the ranks of each flight. Your old dorm chief was a soft-spoken boy from West Virginia whose name was quickly corrupted into "Muffins" behind his back. He had always seemed a little overwhelmed. This new guy's name is Shocke, and he exhudes authority. If it weren't for the trainee name-tag and the telltale stubble on his head from his "Welcome to basic training" haircut, you would have guessed he was one of the TIs.
You're actually glad it's him greeting you instead of the TI. This flight belongs to SSgt Perro, a tiny woman with a huge presence. You remember hearing her march her flight and you shudder at the thought of that shrill, vicious voice, yelping like an insane, steroidal chihuahua. No one messed with her. One foolish airman - obviously a defensive lineman from some inner city high school - made a snide remark in her hearing during PT. Something about female airmen being allowed to do the pushups "on their knees." There is nothing as chilling as watching a skinny, five-foot woman bringing a six-foot, 200+ pound black man to tears so quickly.
Shocke seems to be as no-nonsense as SSgt Perro, and wastes no time in orienting you to your new environment. "We're going for Honor Flight," he begins. "I don't know what you did to get recycled, and you don't have to tell anyone, but if you do anything that threatens our chances to win, I'll make sure you disappear again." He manages to say this without sounding confrontational or threatening. "If anyone gives you any trouble, tell your squad leader, or come straight to me and we'll deal with it."
You are shown to your new bunk, and given a general introduction. You can't help feeling like a bug under a microscope, even though no one is paying particular attention to you. All you can do is unload your duffel and put your wall locker in order. When you finish, you turn to find the squad leader, Larsen, has been watching you, and you offer a wan smile.
"You seem to know what you're doing," he says. "Do you have any questions, yet?"
You shake your head, and start to make up the bed. He helps you get the sheets on, but when you spread out the faded olive-green army blanket - known as the "dust cover" - he blanches. There are coin-sized white spots all over it, which you assume to be bleach stains.
"Oh, crap!" Larsen squeaks. "Don't use that!" He calls Shocke over, and takes away the bedding.
"I'm sorry," Shocke says, briskly. "We were supposed to get you clean linens. The guy that used to be in this bunk got sent to the Med Center for psych evaluation yesterday. The guard caught him...um..." he fumbles for the right word, and blushes a little "...pleasuring himself." He strides off with the wad of offending linens, and the rest of the group offers apologetic mumbles to you.
Other than that, things go pretty smoothly.
After a day or two of handling your duties competently and staying out of trouble, people start to accept you. You let them believe you were recycled solely for failing inspections, and they offer to pitch in to help you pass the next one. Oddly, you pass with very little help.
Since you already completed all of the mandatory training for week four, you find yourself left alone to guard the dorm while the rest of the flight visits the rifle range and attends classes. You become a minor celebrity with your foreknowledge of the different activities they've heard so many rumors about. You resist winding them up over the number of shots they'll get (only four), and the supposed violation they all fear from some rumored medical exam (no cavity searches), and tell them all about the obstacle course. Excuse me, the Confidence Course.
You are even accepted to the point that your squad lobbies SSgt Perro to allow you to re-do the Confidence Course with the flight rather than stay in the dorm, much to your relief. Not only were you incredibly bored with that duty, but you were starting to have trouble staying awake - a fate worse than Recycle awaited the sleeping dorm guard.
And no way were you going to ask her yourself.
The next morning, when your new flight enters the chow hall for breakfast, you spot a familiar face working behind the food line. The new flight had just finished a week of KP before you got there, and now, it is apparently your old flight's turn to do Kitchen Patrol.
You aren't supposed to talk in line, but you risk a greeting. You old flight mate whispers a quick hello, and leans forward: "They aren't treating you bad, are they man? 'Cause if they're picking on you at all..."
"No," you say, "They've been great."
And then Shocke is there. "Is there a problem?" You tell him who the KP guys are, and his eyes narrow. "If they're picking on you at all..."
It's touching, actually. Fourty-nine people on each side of the line are actually concerned about your welfare. Ninety-eight people ready to jump to your side if you need help. You coast the rest of the day on a cushion of comraderie.
There's only one real problem brewing: you are getting sick. You don't let on that you aren't feeling well, for fear of being recycled again. This close to freedom, you aren't about to risk it; there will be time for illness AFTER week six. But the long days spent on your feet guarding the empty, overly air-conditioned dorm, alternating with the marching in the 104 degree San Antonio heat are taking their toll on your immune system.
After keeping up for a couple of days, your body has had enough; while standing in line in the chow hall, you collapse.
When you come around again, you're sitting on the floor with your head between your knees. SSgt Perro is asking you questions, and you hear yourself answering from ten miles away. "Are you alright?" Yes, ma'am. "Can you get up?" No, ma'am. "Why didn't you go to sick call?" I didn't want to get recycled again.
"I respect your tenacity, airman, but you need to take care of yourself!" She is speaking kindly, and she doesn't sound like a mad chihuahua. She sends you to the clinic, where you get a nap, and some medication. You feel better in the morning, and the last week cruises by.
So now, you've done it. You made it through Air Force Basic Military Training.
In some ways, you aren't sure what you have learned from it. Attention to Detail? Trust in Authority? Rely on your Teammates? Maybe it is all just a screening process to keep out the fatally insane, and the obvious nut-jobs, like the unmourned Reames. All you known is that you are proud, and that you are excited about moving on to the language school.
And that new, proud feeling is the opposite of Deja Vu.
Three Strikes (pt. 2)
Do you ever get deja vu?
Perhaps you do when you are standing back outside that strange, alien building again, holding all of your worldly possesions in a duffel bag. Five weeks ago - a swiftly receding eternity ago - you were standing here facing the unknown along with 45 others just as scared and sleep-deprived as you. Now you are facing the prospect of meeting 49 new "others" who have been getting used to showering, eating, and learning side by side for three weeks. You are going to be the outsider, now. You are the "Recycle."
For five weeks you lived under the constant threat, which the leadership was always careful to say was not a punishment. "Recycling an airman is just a way of ensuring that everyone gets the training that they need," is the official explanation. You watched carefully when they brought Recycles into your flight; simple boys with slack jaws and glazed eyes who obviously didn't know ass from elbow or shit from shinola. To be fair, you don't know what shinola is, either, but you're pretty confident you could pick it out of that line-up.
Of course, you also thought you could learn to fold your underwear well enough to pass an inspection.
Do you ever get deja vu?
Perhaps you do when you are staring up the stairwell at the door to your new flight, and the only difference you see between it and your old one is the number on the wall. Five weeks ago, you were pretty sure the worst year of your life was behind you. The hard luck, the cruel woman, the indignity of returning to your parents' house and realizing that you were pretty much to blame for the whole mess was giving way to a new life. And in five short weeks you have burrowed your way to rock bottom.
You choke back a hysterical giggle as the dorm guard crisply and efficiently goes through the entry routine - the same routine you watched your old flight botch time after time, sending you here as a result. Well, to be fair, it was that and the underwear. Then you are inside, being greeted by a guy with flinty eyes and the kind of jaw you generally associate with Batman. He is your new dorm chief.
Deja vu never lasts, fortunately.
Dorm Chief is the student commander, usually chosen at random from the ranks of each flight. Your old dorm chief was a soft-spoken boy from West Virginia whose name was quickly corrupted into "Muffins" behind his back. He had always seemed a little overwhelmed. This new guy's name is Shocke, and he exhudes authority. If it weren't for the trainee name-tag and the telltale stubble on his head from his "Welcome to basic training" haircut, you would have guessed he was one of the TIs.
You're actually glad it's him greeting you instead of the TI. This flight belongs to SSgt Perro, a tiny woman with a huge presence. You remember hearing her march her flight and you shudder at the thought of that shrill, vicious voice, yelping like an insane, steroidal chihuahua. No one messed with her. One foolish airman - obviously a defensive lineman from some inner city high school - made a snide remark in her hearing during PT. Something about female airmen being allowed to do the pushups "on their knees." There is nothing as chilling as watching a skinny, five-foot woman bringing a six-foot, 200+ pound black man to tears so quickly.
Shocke seems to be as no-nonsense as SSgt Perro, and wastes no time in orienting you to your new environment. "We're going for Honor Flight," he begins. "I don't know what you did to get recycled, and you don't have to tell anyone, but if you do anything that threatens our chances to win, I'll make sure you disappear again." He manages to say this without sounding confrontational or threatening. "If anyone gives you any trouble, tell your squad leader, or come straight to me and we'll deal with it."
You are shown to your new bunk, and given a general introduction. You can't help feeling like a bug under a microscope, even though no one is paying particular attention to you. All you can do is unload your duffel and put your wall locker in order. When you finish, you turn to find the squad leader, Larsen, has been watching you, and you offer a wan smile.
"You seem to know what you're doing," he says. "Do you have any questions, yet?"
You shake your head, and start to make up the bed. He helps you get the sheets on, but when you spread out the faded olive-green army blanket - known as the "dust cover" - he blanches. There are coin-sized white spots all over it, which you assume to be bleach stains.
"Oh, crap!" Larsen squeaks. "Don't use that!" He calls Shocke over, and takes away the bedding.
"I'm sorry," Shocke says, briskly. "We were supposed to get you clean linens. The guy that used to be in this bunk got sent to the Med Center for psych evaluation yesterday. The guard caught him...um..." he fumbles for the right word, and blushes a little "...pleasuring himself." He strides off with the wad of offending linens, and the rest of the group offers apologetic mumbles to you.
Other than that, things go pretty smoothly.
After a day or two of handling your duties competently and staying out of trouble, people start to accept you. You let them believe you were recycled solely for failing inspections, and they offer to pitch in to help you pass the next one. Oddly, you pass with very little help.
Since you already completed all of the mandatory training for week four, you find yourself left alone to guard the dorm while the rest of the flight visits the rifle range and attends classes. You become a minor celebrity with your foreknowledge of the different activities they've heard so many rumors about. You resist winding them up over the number of shots they'll get (only four), and the supposed violation they all fear from some rumored medical exam (no cavity searches), and tell them all about the obstacle course. Excuse me, the Confidence Course.
You are even accepted to the point that your squad lobbies SSgt Perro to allow you to re-do the Confidence Course with the flight rather than stay in the dorm, much to your relief. Not only were you incredibly bored with that duty, but you were starting to have trouble staying awake - a fate worse than Recycle awaited the sleeping dorm guard.
And no way were you going to ask her yourself.
The next morning, when your new flight enters the chow hall for breakfast, you spot a familiar face working behind the food line. The new flight had just finished a week of KP before you got there, and now, it is apparently your old flight's turn to do Kitchen Patrol.
You aren't supposed to talk in line, but you risk a greeting. You old flight mate whispers a quick hello, and leans forward: "They aren't treating you bad, are they man? 'Cause if they're picking on you at all..."
"No," you say, "They've been great."
And then Shocke is there. "Is there a problem?" You tell him who the KP guys are, and his eyes narrow. "If they're picking on you at all..."
It's touching, actually. Fourty-nine people on each side of the line are actually concerned about your welfare. Ninety-eight people ready to jump to your side if you need help. You coast the rest of the day on a cushion of comraderie.
There's only one real problem brewing: you are getting sick. You don't let on that you aren't feeling well, for fear of being recycled again. This close to freedom, you aren't about to risk it; there will be time for illness AFTER week six. But the long days spent on your feet guarding the empty, overly air-conditioned dorm, alternating with the marching in the 104 degree San Antonio heat are taking their toll on your immune system.
After keeping up for a couple of days, your body has had enough; while standing in line in the chow hall, you collapse.
When you come around again, you're sitting on the floor with your head between your knees. SSgt Perro is asking you questions, and you hear yourself answering from ten miles away. "Are you alright?" Yes, ma'am. "Can you get up?" No, ma'am. "Why didn't you go to sick call?" I didn't want to get recycled again.
"I respect your tenacity, airman, but you need to take care of yourself!" She is speaking kindly, and she doesn't sound like a mad chihuahua. She sends you to the clinic, where you get a nap, and some medication. You feel better in the morning, and the last week cruises by.
So now, you've done it. You made it through Air Force Basic Military Training.
In some ways, you aren't sure what you have learned from it. Attention to Detail? Trust in Authority? Rely on your Teammates? Maybe it is all just a screening process to keep out the fatally insane, and the obvious nut-jobs, like the unmourned Reames. All you known is that you are proud, and that you are excited about moving on to the language school.
And that new, proud feeling is the opposite of Deja Vu.
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Reality Denial in Children
I have four (4) children. They range in age from 8 to 14. That means that for the last 8 years I have had four (4) people in my home between the ages of 0 and 14. I am well aware that this number is far too small to represent any kind of statistical sample of the general population - but despite that fact, I feel safe in drawing some conclusions about children.
Observation A - A child has an object - such as a toy, a cup full of milk, or socks (on their feet). Later, the child is unable to locate said object, even if it is pointed out to them.
Conclusion 1: When something a child has in their possession loses contact with that child, it ceases to exist.
This object or possession effectively disappears when the child lets go of it. You or I may see the object fall from the child's hand and fall for a very long time and shatter in a spectacular display of destruction and disorder, and the child WILL NOT NOTICE. And when you call attention to said object, they will be surprised to discover it there in a pool of its own constituent elements.
Observation B - The child pours a cup of milk. The adult, witnessing this, cautions the child not to leave the milk on the table (where it will inevitably cease to exist - and also become cheese). Despite this helpful warning (see Conclusion 3), the child will later deny leaving the cup of very new cheese on the table in the sun.
Conclusion 2: The history of a given object has no bearing on its current condition.
This idea manifests itself in a variety of ways. In the previous example, the child will deny breaking the object - regardless of their shared history with that object. Even if they have carried that cherished possession with them for an entire day, singing songs about it and professing their love for it, when they become angered and hurl it away, Conclusion #1 takes effect, and Conclusion #2 allows them to say - with all true honesty and belief, "I didn't do that!"
Observation C - Child sitting on the couch, pulling socks off of their feet, is warned that socks do not belong stuffed behind the cushions, and nods violently with understanding (while craning to see the TV). Later, when confronted with the 5 socks discovered in the cushions behind the spot where they were sitting, they deny loudly and sincerely having ever placed any sock anywhere. The adult will insist on the child removing the socks to their laundry basket. This is declared to be completely unfair.
Conclusion 3: Cause and Effect are not related.
Observation D - You observe a child armed with a dark crayon traversing a room. No other children are home. Upon entering that room a few minutes later, you discover a new work of art not in the Sotheby's catalog, but sure to be worth $24.95 (for the jug of caustic chemicals which will be required to remove it, and the paint to patch the marred spot on the wall). When asked, the child will nod sagely, and cluck with false sympathy that it must have been Sibling A or B - who have both been at school for 4 hours.
Conclusion 4: The existence of Other Children absolves every child of all blame for everything - ever.
If you have an Only Child, you may not have noticed this phenomenon; that is assuming that you also have no pets, cousins, local playmates, convenient adults (like Dad), or imaginary friends for the Child to blame. They don't have to live with you in order to take the rap.
I do hold out hope that these phenomena are limited to the larval stage of human... despite the existence of Doomsday Believers, Global Warming Deniers, and Supply-Side Economists.
Observation A - A child has an object - such as a toy, a cup full of milk, or socks (on their feet). Later, the child is unable to locate said object, even if it is pointed out to them.
Conclusion 1: When something a child has in their possession loses contact with that child, it ceases to exist.
This object or possession effectively disappears when the child lets go of it. You or I may see the object fall from the child's hand and fall for a very long time and shatter in a spectacular display of destruction and disorder, and the child WILL NOT NOTICE. And when you call attention to said object, they will be surprised to discover it there in a pool of its own constituent elements.
Observation B - The child pours a cup of milk. The adult, witnessing this, cautions the child not to leave the milk on the table (where it will inevitably cease to exist - and also become cheese). Despite this helpful warning (see Conclusion 3), the child will later deny leaving the cup of very new cheese on the table in the sun.
Conclusion 2: The history of a given object has no bearing on its current condition.
This idea manifests itself in a variety of ways. In the previous example, the child will deny breaking the object - regardless of their shared history with that object. Even if they have carried that cherished possession with them for an entire day, singing songs about it and professing their love for it, when they become angered and hurl it away, Conclusion #1 takes effect, and Conclusion #2 allows them to say - with all true honesty and belief, "I didn't do that!"
Observation C - Child sitting on the couch, pulling socks off of their feet, is warned that socks do not belong stuffed behind the cushions, and nods violently with understanding (while craning to see the TV). Later, when confronted with the 5 socks discovered in the cushions behind the spot where they were sitting, they deny loudly and sincerely having ever placed any sock anywhere. The adult will insist on the child removing the socks to their laundry basket. This is declared to be completely unfair.
Conclusion 3: Cause and Effect are not related.
Observation D - You observe a child armed with a dark crayon traversing a room. No other children are home. Upon entering that room a few minutes later, you discover a new work of art not in the Sotheby's catalog, but sure to be worth $24.95 (for the jug of caustic chemicals which will be required to remove it, and the paint to patch the marred spot on the wall). When asked, the child will nod sagely, and cluck with false sympathy that it must have been Sibling A or B - who have both been at school for 4 hours.
Conclusion 4: The existence of Other Children absolves every child of all blame for everything - ever.
If you have an Only Child, you may not have noticed this phenomenon; that is assuming that you also have no pets, cousins, local playmates, convenient adults (like Dad), or imaginary friends for the Child to blame. They don't have to live with you in order to take the rap.
I do hold out hope that these phenomena are limited to the larval stage of human... despite the existence of Doomsday Believers, Global Warming Deniers, and Supply-Side Economists.
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Going to Pet the Rabbits
NOTE: This is about me and my discovery of something about myself. It is not intended to be an attack on anyone or their faith. If you read this and choose to be offended, I'm not going to take responsibility for your choice.
I sat in a church this morning for the first time in many years.
It was a memorial service for the little daughter of a friend - a girl who had a degenerative condition which was expected to take her by age two. She made it almost to seven.
I can't imagine the kind of strength it must take to care for someone with a condition like that. I've known a number of people who have carried that burden, including my friend Karen, who didn't develop her condition until she was in her twenties; her mother had to watch her decline from a healthy young woman until she passed away last February. When I think about it all, it hurts; and I'm weak, so I don't often think about it. But my friends who are in that situation don't have the luxury of simply turning away and going back to a life like mine - they need to be strong and face it every minute... and they need to draw that strength from somewhere.
So I sat in a church this morning for the first time in many years, listening to my friend's pastor.
Being a memorial service, it was all about the family's comfort. The songs they used happened to be mostly familiar to me, because I grew up with them; "Amazing Grace" and "It Is Well With My Soul" were featured. The first verse of the latter one is particularly appropriate, and I was struck today by how Zen it is:
That part, at least, is a universal comfort; attaining peace in the tempest is a skill that everyone should learn - and the elemental imagery of the water here is striking. As I listened, I thought about how important that Idea was to me growing up, and how I've held onto it. That, at least, was something good and honest that could help my friend grieve, I thought.
But I sat in a church this morning for the first time in many years, listening to my friend's pastor talk about Heaven.
And I started to feel angry and creeped out. Because listening to him speak, and toss out all of those Great Truths that pastors must keep in their repertoire, I bristled at the undercurrent of what he was saying.
It wasn't just that he kept referring to God and Heaven as if they are real things - like I said, I grew up with that stuff, and came to terms with it long ago. I think of it as the poetic license that grief and comfort require of religion. It was something else. Two things, actually.
First, I felt like this service was being used against me. My very presence was being co-opted by this man to accuse me - not personally, but as part of the group. He took the liberty of declaring that "we are all here to affirm what we know to be true - that there is a God and He is in control" - things that I don't know to be true, and do not affirm. This was a lie, and what's more, his body language and use of repetition and verbal sleight of hand showed me that he knew it was a lie.
This pastor didn't know me or what I believe. His descriptions of Heaven, and his logic for "proving" its existence, while being tolerable in the context of comforting the family, were cheapened by his assertions. His repetition of that idea, and his flowery and alluring descriptions of the things that the little girl would now be doing in Heaven - that all rang even more hollow.
It reminded me of Steinbeck's "Of Mice and Men" - the pastor was George, spinning the fantastic story of a promised ranch full of puppies and bunnies, and I felt like Lenny. If you take a moment to review the plot summary, I'm sure you'll understand why I say I felt creeped out.
As for the second thing, the thing that made me angry, well that's more complicated... and it has more to do with my "atheist conversion experience."
Remember, I already expressed immense respect for the strength required of people who have to deal with something as painful as what my friend has dealt with. Raising ANY child is a challenge and a non-stop roller-coaster of fear, risk, and heartbreak - interspersed with just enough joy to make it worthwhile. But for these parents, that joy can be bitter and elusive - and even a victory can be tragic.
To do what they do - to survive and thrive as my friend has done - is a pure triumph. We cheapen these things in our culture with our perpetual tabloid stories and Lifetime or Hallmark "disease of the week" movies - but these are quiet, epic heroes who are doing the impossible. I don't blame any of them for leaning on something that I don't believe in. In the past I've made the mistake of referring to their faith as "a crutch," but it really isn't that. A better analogy would be to compare it to weight training or long-distance running; rather than a prop to support them, it is conditioning for facing reality in the long term instead of the short, escapist bursts the rest of us can get away with.
Look again at the first verse of "It Is Well With My Soul" and tell me which is easier - to look objectively at yourself from the middle of your pain and simply "decide" to accept it, or to tell yourself something comforting and poetic that helps you move past it? Most healthy and otherwise happy people I know can't face the prospect of a vast, cold, empty Universe that doesn't care about them; how do you expect people under tremendous pressure to cope without giving that Universe a name (God) and convincing themselves that despite all evidence to the contrary, there is hope and love and joy in it?
There is - but it's hard to see unless you work at it.
So, no - I don't balk at all when people need to draw strength from these ideas, and I don't think it would be helpful or kind to "correct" them when they tell me (and affirm to themselves) that it came from Jesus or God - or the Magic Feather they clutch in their trunk. The truth is that wherever they think they're getting that strength, it's coming from within themselves - and being humans, it is an amazingly deep well. (Doctor Who says so all the time!) So why am I angry at the pastor for playing into this helpful world of hopeful poetry?
My own break with Faith came when I realized what a logical cheat God was. Well, not God, but those speaking on His behalf. (Poetic construct that I believe Him to be, none of my anger is really ever directed at "Him" anyway.) Those pastors love to tell us that everything good comes from Him, and is solely to His credit. Without Him, we are not capable of anything at all. And what about all of our failures and sins etc.? That's all on us. Me, specifically. Or you.
(Today, I heard the pastor lay blame for the tornados and flooding going on in the Midwest on our wicked ways. Very comforting, indeed.)
The important idea here is, no matter what you do, no matter how hard you try - or even if you don't try at all - God gets all the credit for your "goodness" and you get credit for the bad stuff... right down to horrific weather phenomena. It's a logical trap designed to prey on those who need to tell themselves that there is a source of strength outside themselves. To defy the pastor is to put the source of their strength at risk; to question his logic is to risk their faith in themselves. So the pastor tells them their own strength is an unreliable and dangerous flaw, and that they should trust in God - and someday, we'll have a ranch where we can pet the rabbits. Just like Lenny.
As I grew up, and realized that maintaining my faith meant I was expected to surrender to this double whammy of self-denial, I balked. Obviously, I assumed at first that it was just my sinful pride talking, right? Except... I came to understand that the source of my "slackerdom" stemmed from distancing of responsibility from myself, and placing it in this God who seemed not to take care of my homework or my auto maintenance and bills without a heck of a lot of assistance from me.
But I don't mean to trivialize this concept. I watch people suffer through these awful things in life all the time. They call on their God all the time, and sometimes, when they stop crying and dig down deep, they find something inside themselves that gets them through. Sometimes it's just a matter of letting go - of becoming the water, if you will - and they can cope. Then they thank God for it.
You can believe that is God, if you want to, and if it helps you get through whatever you're facing, who am I to rip that away from you? But it still bothers me because denying our successes and only claiming our failures robs us of something vital. It denies that we have that strength in the first place, and by taking away that faith in ourselves, we are weakened.
So I sat in a church this morning for the first time in many years, listening to my friend's pastor talk about God, and about her strength, and I realized that I, as a non-believer could see something in her that no Believer really sees. They pay lip service to her, but then steal her credit and attribute it to God - a construct meant to put a happy face on a cold, brutal Universe.
And while they were doing that to her, I realized that as a non-believer, I can see what is really divine.
I sat in a church this morning for the first time in many years.
It was a memorial service for the little daughter of a friend - a girl who had a degenerative condition which was expected to take her by age two. She made it almost to seven.
I can't imagine the kind of strength it must take to care for someone with a condition like that. I've known a number of people who have carried that burden, including my friend Karen, who didn't develop her condition until she was in her twenties; her mother had to watch her decline from a healthy young woman until she passed away last February. When I think about it all, it hurts; and I'm weak, so I don't often think about it. But my friends who are in that situation don't have the luxury of simply turning away and going back to a life like mine - they need to be strong and face it every minute... and they need to draw that strength from somewhere.
So I sat in a church this morning for the first time in many years, listening to my friend's pastor.
Being a memorial service, it was all about the family's comfort. The songs they used happened to be mostly familiar to me, because I grew up with them; "Amazing Grace" and "It Is Well With My Soul" were featured. The first verse of the latter one is particularly appropriate, and I was struck today by how Zen it is:
When peace like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say,
It is well, it is well, with my soul.
by Horatio Spafford
That part, at least, is a universal comfort; attaining peace in the tempest is a skill that everyone should learn - and the elemental imagery of the water here is striking. As I listened, I thought about how important that Idea was to me growing up, and how I've held onto it. That, at least, was something good and honest that could help my friend grieve, I thought.
But I sat in a church this morning for the first time in many years, listening to my friend's pastor talk about Heaven.
And I started to feel angry and creeped out. Because listening to him speak, and toss out all of those Great Truths that pastors must keep in their repertoire, I bristled at the undercurrent of what he was saying.
It wasn't just that he kept referring to God and Heaven as if they are real things - like I said, I grew up with that stuff, and came to terms with it long ago. I think of it as the poetic license that grief and comfort require of religion. It was something else. Two things, actually.
First, I felt like this service was being used against me. My very presence was being co-opted by this man to accuse me - not personally, but as part of the group. He took the liberty of declaring that "we are all here to affirm what we know to be true - that there is a God and He is in control" - things that I don't know to be true, and do not affirm. This was a lie, and what's more, his body language and use of repetition and verbal sleight of hand showed me that he knew it was a lie.
This pastor didn't know me or what I believe. His descriptions of Heaven, and his logic for "proving" its existence, while being tolerable in the context of comforting the family, were cheapened by his assertions. His repetition of that idea, and his flowery and alluring descriptions of the things that the little girl would now be doing in Heaven - that all rang even more hollow.
It reminded me of Steinbeck's "Of Mice and Men" - the pastor was George, spinning the fantastic story of a promised ranch full of puppies and bunnies, and I felt like Lenny. If you take a moment to review the plot summary, I'm sure you'll understand why I say I felt creeped out.
As for the second thing, the thing that made me angry, well that's more complicated... and it has more to do with my "atheist conversion experience."
Remember, I already expressed immense respect for the strength required of people who have to deal with something as painful as what my friend has dealt with. Raising ANY child is a challenge and a non-stop roller-coaster of fear, risk, and heartbreak - interspersed with just enough joy to make it worthwhile. But for these parents, that joy can be bitter and elusive - and even a victory can be tragic.
To do what they do - to survive and thrive as my friend has done - is a pure triumph. We cheapen these things in our culture with our perpetual tabloid stories and Lifetime or Hallmark "disease of the week" movies - but these are quiet, epic heroes who are doing the impossible. I don't blame any of them for leaning on something that I don't believe in. In the past I've made the mistake of referring to their faith as "a crutch," but it really isn't that. A better analogy would be to compare it to weight training or long-distance running; rather than a prop to support them, it is conditioning for facing reality in the long term instead of the short, escapist bursts the rest of us can get away with.
Look again at the first verse of "It Is Well With My Soul" and tell me which is easier - to look objectively at yourself from the middle of your pain and simply "decide" to accept it, or to tell yourself something comforting and poetic that helps you move past it? Most healthy and otherwise happy people I know can't face the prospect of a vast, cold, empty Universe that doesn't care about them; how do you expect people under tremendous pressure to cope without giving that Universe a name (God) and convincing themselves that despite all evidence to the contrary, there is hope and love and joy in it?
There is - but it's hard to see unless you work at it.
So, no - I don't balk at all when people need to draw strength from these ideas, and I don't think it would be helpful or kind to "correct" them when they tell me (and affirm to themselves) that it came from Jesus or God - or the Magic Feather they clutch in their trunk. The truth is that wherever they think they're getting that strength, it's coming from within themselves - and being humans, it is an amazingly deep well. (Doctor Who says so all the time!) So why am I angry at the pastor for playing into this helpful world of hopeful poetry?
My own break with Faith came when I realized what a logical cheat God was. Well, not God, but those speaking on His behalf. (Poetic construct that I believe Him to be, none of my anger is really ever directed at "Him" anyway.) Those pastors love to tell us that everything good comes from Him, and is solely to His credit. Without Him, we are not capable of anything at all. And what about all of our failures and sins etc.? That's all on us. Me, specifically. Or you.
(Today, I heard the pastor lay blame for the tornados and flooding going on in the Midwest on our wicked ways. Very comforting, indeed.)
The important idea here is, no matter what you do, no matter how hard you try - or even if you don't try at all - God gets all the credit for your "goodness" and you get credit for the bad stuff... right down to horrific weather phenomena. It's a logical trap designed to prey on those who need to tell themselves that there is a source of strength outside themselves. To defy the pastor is to put the source of their strength at risk; to question his logic is to risk their faith in themselves. So the pastor tells them their own strength is an unreliable and dangerous flaw, and that they should trust in God - and someday, we'll have a ranch where we can pet the rabbits. Just like Lenny.
As I grew up, and realized that maintaining my faith meant I was expected to surrender to this double whammy of self-denial, I balked. Obviously, I assumed at first that it was just my sinful pride talking, right? Except... I came to understand that the source of my "slackerdom" stemmed from distancing of responsibility from myself, and placing it in this God who seemed not to take care of my homework or my auto maintenance and bills without a heck of a lot of assistance from me.
But I don't mean to trivialize this concept. I watch people suffer through these awful things in life all the time. They call on their God all the time, and sometimes, when they stop crying and dig down deep, they find something inside themselves that gets them through. Sometimes it's just a matter of letting go - of becoming the water, if you will - and they can cope. Then they thank God for it.
You can believe that is God, if you want to, and if it helps you get through whatever you're facing, who am I to rip that away from you? But it still bothers me because denying our successes and only claiming our failures robs us of something vital. It denies that we have that strength in the first place, and by taking away that faith in ourselves, we are weakened.
So I sat in a church this morning for the first time in many years, listening to my friend's pastor talk about God, and about her strength, and I realized that I, as a non-believer could see something in her that no Believer really sees. They pay lip service to her, but then steal her credit and attribute it to God - a construct meant to put a happy face on a cold, brutal Universe.
And while they were doing that to her, I realized that as a non-believer, I can see what is really divine.
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