Just came back from a long bullshit session with a fellow lieutenant and my commander after work. It started out pleasantly enough, but by the end I was drained, and sorry I had stayed after work to enjoy the boots-on-the-table camaraderie. The subject of debate, which started with politics and moved to the deficiencies of the public school system, turned into both of them trying to convince me that math, as the "universal language," is the most important subject of all. If civilization ended tomorrow, they postulated, we could do without Shakespeare, but the Pythagorean Theorem would be indispensable. I responded that since mathematical concepts are usually predicated upon the use of characters whose meanings are derived from language, I considered both language and math to be equally important. Guffaws ensued, as apparently nothing could be allowed to share the stage with math. This particularly pissed me off, because from what I gather of our conversations about undergraduate study, I was the most balanced student of the three of us, consistently applying myself, excelling in and appreciating all of my classes--in high school, I can honestly say that trigonometry and statistics were a joy, even if they came a little less easily than English and Spanish, the subjects I later majored in in college. I suggested that they try to communicate one single mathematical concept, such as addition, without using speech. Neither even attempted to do it, but somehow I walked away as the one "without a clue." My husband, normally a bastion of literary and l'arte pour l'arte soapboxes, is off getting in touch with his bean-counting* side during Army Reserve training this weekend, and I couldn't find any like minds online. I just had to sigh and immerse myself in internet surfing. Ughh. I don't belong here! (By which I mean, I don't belong here longterm, of course...)
*"Bean-counting" is a phrase (I don't remember if I ever heard it outside the Army) that refers to painstaking accountability of people, equipment, training, and other resources. I would say that 90% of what I do all day, every day, is associated with some slide where we have to brief exactly (which is an art and science) what we have, how much we still need to meet the standard (by regulation or a higher headquarters' articulated standard), and exactly how we are going to make up the difference. For example, the silliest thing happened one month, when a tiny, antiquated piece of equipment almost became the subject of hot debate. It had been identified as missing several months prior, and was probably being phased out, as the Army decided to take our authorizations for it from a large number (say, 50) down to 0 very suddenly. Yet the equipment was still listed as required for our mission. Unless you read our MTOE (Modified Table of Organization and Equipment) very carefully, you would wonder why the numbers were suddenly showing us as less ready than we were the previous month to go to war. We had to scrub that thing inside and out before we figured it out. The issue ended up being that this tiny piece of equipment, which we had suspected for months as missing, had finally been updated in our property book to show the shortage. My commander and I scratched our heads, trying to figure out how to brief this, neither wanting to draw attention to the missing piece of equipment, which had already been paid for out of pocket, as per regulation. In the end, we decided (and this is the artful piece) not to even bring up the change, which was staring our commander in the face on the slide, unless asked. It worked--he was so preoccupied that he didn't even notice, which gives us time to try and order a replacement and work through other channels to get our readiness rating back to perfect. That, in sum, is bean-counting. I have to believe that it is a valuable skill, and I don't underestimate the human component to it: logistics are everywhere, and the ability to manage resources is something I've come to appreciate because of my worldview. I see people as stewards or managers of the world, responsible for its care, and when it comes to securing resources for my family, classroom, or school district, I think it will probably come in handy. It does force you to appreciate and dignify people around you whose work touches logistics --from the bus driver, to the chief custodian, to the maintenance guy... it is a beautifully complex world we live in. My only frustration with last night's dialogue at work was that I bend over backwards to access my mathematical, right-brain, and masculine sides every day at work. I just wish sometimes it were more reciprocated by my colleagues who seem at times to live in those hemispheres almost exclusively.
Friday, November 6, 2009
tension is to be loved
My husband and I went on Columbus Day weekend to Dallas, visiting with my college roommate, her husband, and family, as well as my dad who happened to be visiting his girlfriend. We heard Anne Graham Lotz speak on Sunday morning--a simple message from a complex passage surrounding the vision of the prophet Ezekiel. Anne drew from the supernatural beings of Ezekiel's vision--who are a composite of mythical creatures and who seem to defy description by their occupance of time, space, color--a picture of the characteristics of God. The appearance of winged man, lion, ox, and eagle are already well established christological symbols, corresponding to the nuanced portrayals of Christ in the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. On many a church facade the writers of the four gospels are often depicted as these figures, so close was the correlation between Ezekiel's vision, these four pictures of God, and the accounts of Christ in the gospels in the mind of church tradition. A complete rundown of the allegory can be found at the following link:
http://www.sacred-destinations.com/reference/four-evangelists.htm
Suffice it to say that Anne conveyed, with a distinct blend of Eastern Seaboard and Southern Bible Belt sensibilities, a simple message from the passage: when we are at our most disillusioned, Christ comes in royal strength and power, offering himself as our intermediary, as one who has shared in our suffering humanity, as the one who is still sovereign, soaring over all of our circumstances, and toward whose purposes all of life still tends. What struck me in her exegetical approach was that, even though she was standing on rock solid ground when it came to church interpretive tradition of the text, she did not mention it once. I appreciated the connection between her interpretation and art that I had seen in Europe, along with the minutia imparted to me in my college Christian theology class, silently. The effect was that I was quickened, riveted--such aesthetic connections bring me satisfaction and pleasure in a way that I can actually feel physically, as if I had just had the first bite of a pie just taken from my own oven, or been given a kite to fly. The excitement these connections generate for me can only be properly called part of my worship experience.
Whether Anne also relished that connection is unclear to me; she can't have been totally unaware of it, with her education and exposure to the world. Though her father Billy always deferred to her as the better preacher of the two, I saw his influence in her decision not to make a show of erudition or "dropping names," so to speak, by making this longstanding connection in church tradition between the four heavenly creatures. Perhaps it is the American evangelical way to avoid "vain knowledge that puffeth up," or the need to distance oneself from all liturgical impulses within the church. I would have liked to hear her mention it, since the ability to recognize such patterns in old buildings, stained glass, illuminated manuscripts, poetry and prose, remind me that American evangelicals are not the first to try to bring the tenets of the faith and the person of Christ to the people--to make them come alive in allegory and color, making known the hidden knowledge of God. The effect her omission of this detail seemed to have on her message, however, was to add freshness and relevance that drew the whole hour toward a single insight: the presence of Christ on his throne. Anne's catchphrase and book title "Just Give Me Jesus" rang appropriately with the preeminence of the divine relationship and presence, even if I would have preferred to revel in the mystery of the otherworldy messengers, their movement, the rushing of wings, and the expanse "like ice" above their heads. I could get bogged down alternately in the symbolism of each description, or in creating a pictorial image of each. As I sit here I think I subconsciously must want to write a paper connecting this vision to Christ in each of the gospels, characteristic by characteristic. But what Anne did stylistically was to draw attention to her real theme: the consolation of a God who is enthroned, yet comes to speak into our despondency:
Then there came a voice from above the expanse over their heads as they stood with lowered wings. Above the expanse over their heads was what looked like a throne of sapphire,and high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man. I saw that from what appeared to be his waist up he looked like glowing metal, as if full of fire, and that from there down he looked like fire; and brilliant light surrounded him. Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the LORD. When I saw it, I fell facedown, and I heard the voice of one speaking.
It is this speaking that most captivates me about the passage now, though it took me too long to pay attention to it. Wading through the images to get to the words:
He said to me, "Son of man, stand up on your feet and I will speak to you." As he spoke, the Spirit came into me and raised me to my feet, and I heard him speaking to me.
And later in the passage:
"The people to whom I am sending you are obstinate and stubborn. Say to them, 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says.' And whether they listen or fail to listen—for they are a rebellious house—they will know that a prophet has been among them. And you, son of man, do not be afraid of them or their words. Do not be afraid, though briers and thorns are all around you and you live among scorpions... You must speak my words to them, whether they listen or fail to listen, for they are rebellious. But you, son of man, listen to what I say to you. Do not rebel like that rebellious house; open your mouth and eat what I give you."
As intimidating as it is to have God put words in your mouth that must be spoken to others, regardless of their receptivity, I love especially that God uses disillusionment here as a catalyst for his cause. Into the vacuous space of disappointment and even resentment, God can speak his solution, his Being into the not-being of our unrealized hopes. I find this so comforting, because in my nascent professional life of nearly three years, I have never been so easily frustrated, embittered, or disillusioned. These moments for me rarely possess that epic quality of unrest portrayed by the protagonists in the movies, where sorrow comes only for a few scenes, and joy comes bursting through--just in time for the overcoming chords of a triumphant musical score--to resolve all the pain and trials before the credits roll. My frustrations are of a more persistent and thereby corrosive nature: the longer I spend with them, the less I feel like an overcomer, and quotidian pressures often keep me from rising above my own disillusionment in a way that feels resolved or accomplished. Nevertheless, I have found that God visits and speaks, if not with flashing and sapphire, between the dishes and the dust of the morning commute. If we take what he puts into our mouths during such visits, chew and digest them, and speak them out to the intended audience, we in those moments become co-creators with God, co-intercessors, co-heirs, and co-restorers of the broken world. Hearing Anne speak reminded me of this reality, once very natural to me, but now more awkward with age and the knowledge that often, the intended audience will not receive the word that God has given you for them. That is the risk, I suppose, of joining in any divine venture this side of heaven.
The primary cause of our trek to Dallas--the U2 concert itself--was also well worth it. I felt as if I hadn't missed out on decades of listening to them, because they played some of the old stuff and some of the new. Bono, as is his wont, got preachy about fighting injustice and hunger, and Rev. Desmond Tutu addressed the audience in a video presentation...it was all meaningful. I about lost it--no, wait, I did loose it, thinking of my mom and grandma, and the throbbing sea of humanity around me--when they played Where the Streets Have No Name. I knew it wasn't quite church, or heaven on earth, that we were experiencing, but there were shadows and glimpses of it enough. It was a very good concert, in the sense that you couldn't really say that it was all a vanity. They were realizing their vocation as spiritual creatures--artists, at that--by making the most exquisite music. Bono remind me of David dancing before the ark, a comparison made by my husband's college roommate that has stuck with us.
And then, afterwards, ears throbbing, the onset of a headache coming on, I was lost in a dreamworld, like Mary, treasuring what I had seen and heard in my heart. I was reaching for my husband's hand (he was a zombie, too), and walking past some floor-level boxes when a row of middle-aged, wealthy-looking men, leaning over their box rail said something to me and started laughing and whistling. I didn't register it at first, but my husband Z later confirmed that they had, with the drunken camaraderie of nostalgic fraternity brothers, offered me $20 to see my "titties." I had not even worn a shirt with a low neckline, as I wanted to be comfortable, and I burned with anger for hours after hearing him repeat what I thought I'd heard them say. Z got mad, too, and had either of us not been so distantly preoccupied with nobler, more heavenly things, we both probably would have cussed them up and down and caused a scene. But it was like that space between a dream and waking up where you fight to stay asleep--we couldn't rouse ourselves enough to be angry or even make eye contact in the moment, and just kept walking. So, as I was rudely reminded, it was not church--not even close. But if that concert was like heaven, then they were like the fool who, having been invited after the first string of guests refused to come, came to the wedding feast in the wrong clothes, and for being so out of tune, was thrown out "where there was weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Matthew 8).
http://www.sacred-destinations.com/reference/four-evangelists.htm
Suffice it to say that Anne conveyed, with a distinct blend of Eastern Seaboard and Southern Bible Belt sensibilities, a simple message from the passage: when we are at our most disillusioned, Christ comes in royal strength and power, offering himself as our intermediary, as one who has shared in our suffering humanity, as the one who is still sovereign, soaring over all of our circumstances, and toward whose purposes all of life still tends. What struck me in her exegetical approach was that, even though she was standing on rock solid ground when it came to church interpretive tradition of the text, she did not mention it once. I appreciated the connection between her interpretation and art that I had seen in Europe, along with the minutia imparted to me in my college Christian theology class, silently. The effect was that I was quickened, riveted--such aesthetic connections bring me satisfaction and pleasure in a way that I can actually feel physically, as if I had just had the first bite of a pie just taken from my own oven, or been given a kite to fly. The excitement these connections generate for me can only be properly called part of my worship experience.
Whether Anne also relished that connection is unclear to me; she can't have been totally unaware of it, with her education and exposure to the world. Though her father Billy always deferred to her as the better preacher of the two, I saw his influence in her decision not to make a show of erudition or "dropping names," so to speak, by making this longstanding connection in church tradition between the four heavenly creatures. Perhaps it is the American evangelical way to avoid "vain knowledge that puffeth up," or the need to distance oneself from all liturgical impulses within the church. I would have liked to hear her mention it, since the ability to recognize such patterns in old buildings, stained glass, illuminated manuscripts, poetry and prose, remind me that American evangelicals are not the first to try to bring the tenets of the faith and the person of Christ to the people--to make them come alive in allegory and color, making known the hidden knowledge of God. The effect her omission of this detail seemed to have on her message, however, was to add freshness and relevance that drew the whole hour toward a single insight: the presence of Christ on his throne. Anne's catchphrase and book title "Just Give Me Jesus" rang appropriately with the preeminence of the divine relationship and presence, even if I would have preferred to revel in the mystery of the otherworldy messengers, their movement, the rushing of wings, and the expanse "like ice" above their heads. I could get bogged down alternately in the symbolism of each description, or in creating a pictorial image of each. As I sit here I think I subconsciously must want to write a paper connecting this vision to Christ in each of the gospels, characteristic by characteristic. But what Anne did stylistically was to draw attention to her real theme: the consolation of a God who is enthroned, yet comes to speak into our despondency:
Then there came a voice from above the expanse over their heads as they stood with lowered wings. Above the expanse over their heads was what looked like a throne of sapphire,and high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man. I saw that from what appeared to be his waist up he looked like glowing metal, as if full of fire, and that from there down he looked like fire; and brilliant light surrounded him. Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the LORD. When I saw it, I fell facedown, and I heard the voice of one speaking.
It is this speaking that most captivates me about the passage now, though it took me too long to pay attention to it. Wading through the images to get to the words:
He said to me, "Son of man, stand up on your feet and I will speak to you." As he spoke, the Spirit came into me and raised me to my feet, and I heard him speaking to me.
And later in the passage:
"The people to whom I am sending you are obstinate and stubborn. Say to them, 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says.' And whether they listen or fail to listen—for they are a rebellious house—they will know that a prophet has been among them. And you, son of man, do not be afraid of them or their words. Do not be afraid, though briers and thorns are all around you and you live among scorpions... You must speak my words to them, whether they listen or fail to listen, for they are rebellious. But you, son of man, listen to what I say to you. Do not rebel like that rebellious house; open your mouth and eat what I give you."
As intimidating as it is to have God put words in your mouth that must be spoken to others, regardless of their receptivity, I love especially that God uses disillusionment here as a catalyst for his cause. Into the vacuous space of disappointment and even resentment, God can speak his solution, his Being into the not-being of our unrealized hopes. I find this so comforting, because in my nascent professional life of nearly three years, I have never been so easily frustrated, embittered, or disillusioned. These moments for me rarely possess that epic quality of unrest portrayed by the protagonists in the movies, where sorrow comes only for a few scenes, and joy comes bursting through--just in time for the overcoming chords of a triumphant musical score--to resolve all the pain and trials before the credits roll. My frustrations are of a more persistent and thereby corrosive nature: the longer I spend with them, the less I feel like an overcomer, and quotidian pressures often keep me from rising above my own disillusionment in a way that feels resolved or accomplished. Nevertheless, I have found that God visits and speaks, if not with flashing and sapphire, between the dishes and the dust of the morning commute. If we take what he puts into our mouths during such visits, chew and digest them, and speak them out to the intended audience, we in those moments become co-creators with God, co-intercessors, co-heirs, and co-restorers of the broken world. Hearing Anne speak reminded me of this reality, once very natural to me, but now more awkward with age and the knowledge that often, the intended audience will not receive the word that God has given you for them. That is the risk, I suppose, of joining in any divine venture this side of heaven.
The primary cause of our trek to Dallas--the U2 concert itself--was also well worth it. I felt as if I hadn't missed out on decades of listening to them, because they played some of the old stuff and some of the new. Bono, as is his wont, got preachy about fighting injustice and hunger, and Rev. Desmond Tutu addressed the audience in a video presentation...it was all meaningful. I about lost it--no, wait, I did loose it, thinking of my mom and grandma, and the throbbing sea of humanity around me--when they played Where the Streets Have No Name. I knew it wasn't quite church, or heaven on earth, that we were experiencing, but there were shadows and glimpses of it enough. It was a very good concert, in the sense that you couldn't really say that it was all a vanity. They were realizing their vocation as spiritual creatures--artists, at that--by making the most exquisite music. Bono remind me of David dancing before the ark, a comparison made by my husband's college roommate that has stuck with us.
And then, afterwards, ears throbbing, the onset of a headache coming on, I was lost in a dreamworld, like Mary, treasuring what I had seen and heard in my heart. I was reaching for my husband's hand (he was a zombie, too), and walking past some floor-level boxes when a row of middle-aged, wealthy-looking men, leaning over their box rail said something to me and started laughing and whistling. I didn't register it at first, but my husband Z later confirmed that they had, with the drunken camaraderie of nostalgic fraternity brothers, offered me $20 to see my "titties." I had not even worn a shirt with a low neckline, as I wanted to be comfortable, and I burned with anger for hours after hearing him repeat what I thought I'd heard them say. Z got mad, too, and had either of us not been so distantly preoccupied with nobler, more heavenly things, we both probably would have cussed them up and down and caused a scene. But it was like that space between a dream and waking up where you fight to stay asleep--we couldn't rouse ourselves enough to be angry or even make eye contact in the moment, and just kept walking. So, as I was rudely reminded, it was not church--not even close. But if that concert was like heaven, then they were like the fool who, having been invited after the first string of guests refused to come, came to the wedding feast in the wrong clothes, and for being so out of tune, was thrown out "where there was weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Matthew 8).
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
suits, salaries and the second grade
Of the handful of perplexing childhood experiences I can recall, I will recount one that still has emotional resonance for me as an adult. It was a restless afternoon, and my second grade classroom could not contain me. I had been dutiful all day, completing my assignments on time. Now, faced with another bluish ink-on-white ditto, I was coming quietly unglued. It was the equivalent of someone telling you to run until you reached the horizon, and spending all day in pursuit of it, the “Aha!” moment comes too late: there is no line to be reached at the edge of the world! I had, of course, hoped my teacher might run out of work to give us. If I finished everything well ahead of many of my peers, I bargained with myself, I might be afforded some time to daydream… This would not be the last time I was devastated by the reality that in life, one never runs out of work—there is always more than can be thought up by whoever is running the show.
Staring at my blank, crisp ditto worksheet, I became aware of my curious, love-hate relationship with it. Worksheets, after all, can give you a great sense of accomplishment upon completion. There, on one page, are contained all the fruits of your labor for the last hour. Turning in the finished product is gratifying, and a tremendous relief if it was a requirement to move on to something else. On the other hand, worksheets represent all things painfully necessary, quotidian, and compartmental. Worksheets are wickets that must be negotiated along a course set out by someone else for you to complete. By what authority do they establish these wickets? Who can say, when a bright, balmy Charleston afternoon is busy convincing you to forget the arbitrary requirements of the classroom and wander outside to discover only what you will, when you will. I wanted to be skating around the cul-de-sac at home, jarring bugs with my sister on the brush trails behind our fence—anything but sitting at a futile desk with the scent of dirt and stale sweat still on my skin from recess (hours ago), staring at the lines on that ditto copy. The purply, blurred edges of the words and shapes on it reminded me of the autumn sunset we would have to be dragged indoors from later that evening. Staring out the window, I forgot my worksheet, leaving it half done.
When I was dragged, unwillingly, back to an awareness of the classroom activities, I scrambled to complete it, realizing that I had slipped behind the others in my work. I recall a small bell ringing from the teacher’s desk, and a shuffling in the row next to ours. Suddenly, I noticed that my desk-neighbors in front and behind were taking their seats. I had not noticed them get up, and swung my head around to follow the stream of feet to the teacher’s desk at the back of the classroom. Mrs. C, our teacher, was intent upon collecting all the completed worksheets as each student passed her desk. She was pleasant, but not smiling as much as usual.
I liked Mrs. C, and often felt very conspiratorial with her because her husband was my piano teacher, and she would send messages about lunch dates and groceries to him by me when I was dismissed from class to attend my lessons in the music department. As I watched her at her desk, I detected that she was also passing something out to students from a bucket as she received their assignments. I turned and looked at the others in my row, busy unwrapping things and popping them into their mouths, and immediately joined the queue since I had apparently missed my chance to turn in my worksheet and receive one of whatever good thing was in that bucket. As I straggled up to her desk, full of expectation, I handed her my work and was panicked to see that the bucket was nowhere in sight. I asked her about it, and explained that I had missed the bell for my row and was just now coming to turn in my worksheet. “That’s fine, H.,” she said, “but you were late. Please pay better attention next time.” She rose to return to the front of the class. I started to point out her oversight, and to inquire about my access to the bucket, but she stopped me and instructed me to return to my desk. I had missed my opportunity, and ought to have been more vigilant.
I returned to my desk out of sorts, my face on fire. I did not cry, but something caught in my throat. I did not understand how my infraction—arriving with another row because I had missed the bell—deserved this deprivation. The candy was still there, wasn’t it? She could take it back out as quickly as she’d put it away, no harm done, and I’d have promised to pay better attention and come when called. The girl in front of me had turned around just in time to see me returning empty-handed, and to save face, I whispered, “I didn’t even want one of those things anyway.” Mrs. C called my name from the front of the class and instructed me to take a place in the back corner facing the wall, until she released me. I had never been sent to the corner in all my life, and this was public humiliation. My face was hot, my hands clammy as I stared at the blank corner until she admonished me not to talk out of turn anymore and to return to my seat. I was still reeling from perceived incongruities and injustices suffered at her hand, but relieved at being allowed to return to my seat to serve the rest of my penance under knowing looks from my peers and the relentless, dragging minute hand on the clock that would release me for the day.
That memories still have the power to recreate the physiological effects of shame, anger, and frustration when recalled years later speaks to the persistence of unresolved experiences. I still blush when I think about this encounter. As crises go, it was a small one with no real trauma associated. But what was the point of it? I was one of Mrs. C’s most consistent high-performers, and I knew this from her comments on my report cards which my mom read with us when they were mailed home. What was the purpose of denying me access to the bucket of goodies she had so industriously meted out to the rest of the class, one by one? Was she trying to teach me a classic lesson, “You snooze, you lose?” Did she think that it would be merciful to teach me early in life not to try and get by on my merits—that I must pay attention like everyone else to deadlines and windows of opportunity that elapse and slam shut without respecting persons? Perhaps she was simply tired that day, and felt the minutes crawling too slowly by until she could escape home to do what she willed, when she willed it. Perhaps she brushed aside my neediness in the aftermath of a mistake, in order to recollect herself in the front of the classroom and to focus on the final tasks of the day. Whatever it was, it still irks me.
It irks me because as an adult I have been on the other side of that desk, at work, and chosen to accept the late product from a subordinate or co-worker, to endure my sense of the five o’clock blues in order to see the relief wash over their faces. I rarely send someone away for arriving even a half-hour late if I can help it. It doesn’t usually serve the purpose of mission accomplishment in my line of work to do so: everyone is on a tight timeline, and chances are they had to wait on someone else who made them late, and will be running late to the next place, too. I might as well help them.
On the other hand, in college and in the Army I have been penalized for missing a deadline, or simply missing out on something that could only be offered for a finite amount of time. Cajoling and eliciting sympathy by arriving out of breath, papers and cell phones fluttering about you will only get you so far. Sometimes the window is just closed, the clock cannot be turned back, and thing proceeds with or without you, no matter how outstanding your performance record is or how well-liked you are. To provide me, perhaps inadvertently, with an early illustration of this in a rather arbitrary fashion does not make Mrs. C a poor teacher, merely a human one. Knowing how and when to respond to students when they err, how to make object lessons intentional and transparent rather than utterly bewildering and confusing is riddled with obstacles. Accurate transmission of a well-guided teaching point is the goal, but there may be many different ways to reach that goal, and none that work every time for every learner. If I were to use an object lesson to enforce a principle (like timeliness) with the aim of developing punctuality in a student, I would keep this event in mind. Even with the best of intentions from an educator, it is just as likely that the student will be so hurt, puzzled, or confused about the consequences that they will either miss the lesson entirely, or feel justified in foisting their own arbitrariness upon future children, students, or employees. Weighing the pros and cons of the candy bucket lesson, I’m not sure that the means truly supported the end, or that the end was achieved: I continue to be a perennial idealist, inclined to think that if people like me and like my work, they will cut me some slack—within reason—when I fail, and I in turn will do the same for them.
This brings me back to reflect on the original purpose of the ditto worksheet. As a drill or rehearsal, the worksheet can be viewed as preparation for what is arguably the most joyless aspect of adult life: paperwork. The more I think about that ditto sheet, its insipid disguise as a stepping stool into the tedium of sundry request forms, staff estimates, periodic reports, memoranda, and proposals, the more frustrating the scenario replays in my mind. What is the point of a worksheet, but to beat people down at an early age, to teach them the necessary evil of a paper trail to show that they actually exist, that they have a seat in the room, that they actually know something, that they can contribute, learn, or make progress? Of course, life, work and education as we know them would be impossible without documentation and deadlines. The challenge, then, is to teach students how to observe and employ them without becoming cogs in a machine of well-documented work. If one can teach a child, or an adult, how to do this while still regarding the person as more than a representative slip of paper, or a late customer, I would judge that person to be a successful teacher.
Staring at my blank, crisp ditto worksheet, I became aware of my curious, love-hate relationship with it. Worksheets, after all, can give you a great sense of accomplishment upon completion. There, on one page, are contained all the fruits of your labor for the last hour. Turning in the finished product is gratifying, and a tremendous relief if it was a requirement to move on to something else. On the other hand, worksheets represent all things painfully necessary, quotidian, and compartmental. Worksheets are wickets that must be negotiated along a course set out by someone else for you to complete. By what authority do they establish these wickets? Who can say, when a bright, balmy Charleston afternoon is busy convincing you to forget the arbitrary requirements of the classroom and wander outside to discover only what you will, when you will. I wanted to be skating around the cul-de-sac at home, jarring bugs with my sister on the brush trails behind our fence—anything but sitting at a futile desk with the scent of dirt and stale sweat still on my skin from recess (hours ago), staring at the lines on that ditto copy. The purply, blurred edges of the words and shapes on it reminded me of the autumn sunset we would have to be dragged indoors from later that evening. Staring out the window, I forgot my worksheet, leaving it half done.
When I was dragged, unwillingly, back to an awareness of the classroom activities, I scrambled to complete it, realizing that I had slipped behind the others in my work. I recall a small bell ringing from the teacher’s desk, and a shuffling in the row next to ours. Suddenly, I noticed that my desk-neighbors in front and behind were taking their seats. I had not noticed them get up, and swung my head around to follow the stream of feet to the teacher’s desk at the back of the classroom. Mrs. C, our teacher, was intent upon collecting all the completed worksheets as each student passed her desk. She was pleasant, but not smiling as much as usual.
I liked Mrs. C, and often felt very conspiratorial with her because her husband was my piano teacher, and she would send messages about lunch dates and groceries to him by me when I was dismissed from class to attend my lessons in the music department. As I watched her at her desk, I detected that she was also passing something out to students from a bucket as she received their assignments. I turned and looked at the others in my row, busy unwrapping things and popping them into their mouths, and immediately joined the queue since I had apparently missed my chance to turn in my worksheet and receive one of whatever good thing was in that bucket. As I straggled up to her desk, full of expectation, I handed her my work and was panicked to see that the bucket was nowhere in sight. I asked her about it, and explained that I had missed the bell for my row and was just now coming to turn in my worksheet. “That’s fine, H.,” she said, “but you were late. Please pay better attention next time.” She rose to return to the front of the class. I started to point out her oversight, and to inquire about my access to the bucket, but she stopped me and instructed me to return to my desk. I had missed my opportunity, and ought to have been more vigilant.
I returned to my desk out of sorts, my face on fire. I did not cry, but something caught in my throat. I did not understand how my infraction—arriving with another row because I had missed the bell—deserved this deprivation. The candy was still there, wasn’t it? She could take it back out as quickly as she’d put it away, no harm done, and I’d have promised to pay better attention and come when called. The girl in front of me had turned around just in time to see me returning empty-handed, and to save face, I whispered, “I didn’t even want one of those things anyway.” Mrs. C called my name from the front of the class and instructed me to take a place in the back corner facing the wall, until she released me. I had never been sent to the corner in all my life, and this was public humiliation. My face was hot, my hands clammy as I stared at the blank corner until she admonished me not to talk out of turn anymore and to return to my seat. I was still reeling from perceived incongruities and injustices suffered at her hand, but relieved at being allowed to return to my seat to serve the rest of my penance under knowing looks from my peers and the relentless, dragging minute hand on the clock that would release me for the day.
That memories still have the power to recreate the physiological effects of shame, anger, and frustration when recalled years later speaks to the persistence of unresolved experiences. I still blush when I think about this encounter. As crises go, it was a small one with no real trauma associated. But what was the point of it? I was one of Mrs. C’s most consistent high-performers, and I knew this from her comments on my report cards which my mom read with us when they were mailed home. What was the purpose of denying me access to the bucket of goodies she had so industriously meted out to the rest of the class, one by one? Was she trying to teach me a classic lesson, “You snooze, you lose?” Did she think that it would be merciful to teach me early in life not to try and get by on my merits—that I must pay attention like everyone else to deadlines and windows of opportunity that elapse and slam shut without respecting persons? Perhaps she was simply tired that day, and felt the minutes crawling too slowly by until she could escape home to do what she willed, when she willed it. Perhaps she brushed aside my neediness in the aftermath of a mistake, in order to recollect herself in the front of the classroom and to focus on the final tasks of the day. Whatever it was, it still irks me.
It irks me because as an adult I have been on the other side of that desk, at work, and chosen to accept the late product from a subordinate or co-worker, to endure my sense of the five o’clock blues in order to see the relief wash over their faces. I rarely send someone away for arriving even a half-hour late if I can help it. It doesn’t usually serve the purpose of mission accomplishment in my line of work to do so: everyone is on a tight timeline, and chances are they had to wait on someone else who made them late, and will be running late to the next place, too. I might as well help them.
On the other hand, in college and in the Army I have been penalized for missing a deadline, or simply missing out on something that could only be offered for a finite amount of time. Cajoling and eliciting sympathy by arriving out of breath, papers and cell phones fluttering about you will only get you so far. Sometimes the window is just closed, the clock cannot be turned back, and thing proceeds with or without you, no matter how outstanding your performance record is or how well-liked you are. To provide me, perhaps inadvertently, with an early illustration of this in a rather arbitrary fashion does not make Mrs. C a poor teacher, merely a human one. Knowing how and when to respond to students when they err, how to make object lessons intentional and transparent rather than utterly bewildering and confusing is riddled with obstacles. Accurate transmission of a well-guided teaching point is the goal, but there may be many different ways to reach that goal, and none that work every time for every learner. If I were to use an object lesson to enforce a principle (like timeliness) with the aim of developing punctuality in a student, I would keep this event in mind. Even with the best of intentions from an educator, it is just as likely that the student will be so hurt, puzzled, or confused about the consequences that they will either miss the lesson entirely, or feel justified in foisting their own arbitrariness upon future children, students, or employees. Weighing the pros and cons of the candy bucket lesson, I’m not sure that the means truly supported the end, or that the end was achieved: I continue to be a perennial idealist, inclined to think that if people like me and like my work, they will cut me some slack—within reason—when I fail, and I in turn will do the same for them.
This brings me back to reflect on the original purpose of the ditto worksheet. As a drill or rehearsal, the worksheet can be viewed as preparation for what is arguably the most joyless aspect of adult life: paperwork. The more I think about that ditto sheet, its insipid disguise as a stepping stool into the tedium of sundry request forms, staff estimates, periodic reports, memoranda, and proposals, the more frustrating the scenario replays in my mind. What is the point of a worksheet, but to beat people down at an early age, to teach them the necessary evil of a paper trail to show that they actually exist, that they have a seat in the room, that they actually know something, that they can contribute, learn, or make progress? Of course, life, work and education as we know them would be impossible without documentation and deadlines. The challenge, then, is to teach students how to observe and employ them without becoming cogs in a machine of well-documented work. If one can teach a child, or an adult, how to do this while still regarding the person as more than a representative slip of paper, or a late customer, I would judge that person to be a successful teacher.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
lone star
When you occupy a piece of ground early in the day, and watch it shift from afternoon into twilight, you experience an unexpected intimacy with the landscape. When evening comes, and the lengthening shadows constrict your easy movement around roots, holes, and sylvan debris, your senses are quickened but you still feel at home in that space. Not so when thrust into a place where night has already come before you. There are other eyes that watch you comfortably, alert, having spent the day where darkness has fallen. You are the one who doesn't belong--you have not become a part of the landscape and your clumsiness in the night gives your near-panic away.
I saw so many shooting stars this week, out in the field with my Soldiers. Each night we were in a different location, but whether in the slick, humid woods or out in the open grass we could see the stars. Do stars shoot through the sky all the time, and we just can't see it because of all the light pollution around us? There may have been an extraordinary amount of meteoric activity lately, but I didn't waste a single shooting star. I wished I was home, I wished I were a better wife, I wished my mother were still alive. Wild horses checked our perimeter, and I wished I could coax one into letting me ride.
I asked my platoon sergeant, who also noticed the extraordinary stellar activity, if he ever felt overwhelmed by a feeling that he married someone so wonderful that it was hard to believe they ever fought, or did anything but stay very, very close to each other for hours on end. He said that this feeling snuck up on him often while he was away from her. He and his wife have children and are decades ahead of me in life, but I was contented to hear him say this. It does keep growing, the needing and loving and wanting not to be apart. It made me feel less childish that I was really, deeply, missing my husband while on a short training event less than an hour away. Sometimes I wonder what we will do if/when either of us deploys. How did my parents do it? I have no answers, only the vague apprehension that it is virtually uncharted territory, and the only existing maps are lopsided and contain warnings that "Beyond Here There Be Monsters." It is one thing to miss your dad for six months every year, as I did growing up. This will be another thing entirely.
I saw so many shooting stars this week, out in the field with my Soldiers. Each night we were in a different location, but whether in the slick, humid woods or out in the open grass we could see the stars. Do stars shoot through the sky all the time, and we just can't see it because of all the light pollution around us? There may have been an extraordinary amount of meteoric activity lately, but I didn't waste a single shooting star. I wished I was home, I wished I were a better wife, I wished my mother were still alive. Wild horses checked our perimeter, and I wished I could coax one into letting me ride.
I asked my platoon sergeant, who also noticed the extraordinary stellar activity, if he ever felt overwhelmed by a feeling that he married someone so wonderful that it was hard to believe they ever fought, or did anything but stay very, very close to each other for hours on end. He said that this feeling snuck up on him often while he was away from her. He and his wife have children and are decades ahead of me in life, but I was contented to hear him say this. It does keep growing, the needing and loving and wanting not to be apart. It made me feel less childish that I was really, deeply, missing my husband while on a short training event less than an hour away. Sometimes I wonder what we will do if/when either of us deploys. How did my parents do it? I have no answers, only the vague apprehension that it is virtually uncharted territory, and the only existing maps are lopsided and contain warnings that "Beyond Here There Be Monsters." It is one thing to miss your dad for six months every year, as I did growing up. This will be another thing entirely.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
wedding dress
My dad's girlfriend recently emailed me an interesting quote, attributed most often to Rev. Sam Pascoe (the former priest of Grace Anglican Church who was defrocked for having an inappropriate relationship with a parishioner, was repentant, rehabilitated, and later reinstated under the bishop of Uganda):
Christianity started in Palestine as a fellowship;
it moved to Greece and became a philosophy;
it moved to Italy and became an institution;
it moved to Europe and became a culture;
it came to America and became an enterprise.
(It might be added that, where it has gone from the West to the East, from developed countries into developing ones, Christianity has manifested itself in many combinations and extensions of all five of these.) While the quote itself is insightful, I was more impressed by a particular response to the quote, recounted by David Ryser, founder of RawReligion.com, which "seeks to explore topics surrounding nontraditional expressions of Christianity, commonly referred to as 'organic church' or 'simple church.'" The site generates "content that looks at the implications of life outside the four walls of the institutional church," including book reviews and website introduction. The site heralds what it terms an “ecclesiastical revolution” that is "far-reaching and has the momentum to change the expression of Christianity in a single generation... [the revolution] draws on the principles and concepts of the early church, and may rightly be called instead a 'returning'":
It is not about building a new structure or marketing edge. It is about returning to the natural, simple, and organic expression of the Body of Christ. The book of Acts and Paul’s epistles display timeless principles about the spiritual DNA of the ekklesia (or “Church”).
Back to the quote, when Ryser shared this simplified version of how Christianity has progressed from fellowship to enterprise, he paused for dramatic effect, and then reminded his class that an enterprise is essentially a business. He was stunned by the insightful response of a student in his class:
She asked such a simple question: "A business? But isn't it supposed to be a body?" I could not envision where this line of questioning was going, and the only response I could think of was, "Yes." She continued, "But when a body becomes a business, isn't that a prostitute?
Christianity started in Palestine as a fellowship;
it moved to Greece and became a philosophy;
it moved to Italy and became an institution;
it moved to Europe and became a culture;
it came to America and became an enterprise.
(It might be added that, where it has gone from the West to the East, from developed countries into developing ones, Christianity has manifested itself in many combinations and extensions of all five of these.) While the quote itself is insightful, I was more impressed by a particular response to the quote, recounted by David Ryser, founder of RawReligion.com, which "seeks to explore topics surrounding nontraditional expressions of Christianity, commonly referred to as 'organic church' or 'simple church.'" The site generates "content that looks at the implications of life outside the four walls of the institutional church," including book reviews and website introduction. The site heralds what it terms an “ecclesiastical revolution” that is "far-reaching and has the momentum to change the expression of Christianity in a single generation... [the revolution] draws on the principles and concepts of the early church, and may rightly be called instead a 'returning'":
It is not about building a new structure or marketing edge. It is about returning to the natural, simple, and organic expression of the Body of Christ. The book of Acts and Paul’s epistles display timeless principles about the spiritual DNA of the ekklesia (or “Church”).
Back to the quote, when Ryser shared this simplified version of how Christianity has progressed from fellowship to enterprise, he paused for dramatic effect, and then reminded his class that an enterprise is essentially a business. He was stunned by the insightful response of a student in his class:
She asked such a simple question: "A business? But isn't it supposed to be a body?" I could not envision where this line of questioning was going, and the only response I could think of was, "Yes." She continued, "But when a body becomes a business, isn't that a prostitute?
This is precisely the sentiment expressed by songwriter Derek Webb in "Wedding Dress":
If you could love me as a wife
and for my wedding gift, your life
Should that be all I'd ever need
or is there more I'm looking for
and should I read between the lines
and look for blessings in disguise
To make me handsome, rich, and wise
Is that really what you want
I am a whore I do confess
But I put you on just like a wedding dress
and I run down the aisle
and I run down the aisle
I?m a prodigal with no way home
but I put you on just like a ring of gold
and I run down the aisle to you
So could you love this bastard child
Though I don't trust you to provide
With one hand in a pot of gold
and with the other in your side
I am so easily satisfied
by the call of lovers so less wild
That I would take a little cash
Over your very flesh and blood
Because money cannot buy
a husband's jealous eye
When you have knowingly deceived his wife
What concerns me is that Martha and Derek are both quite right--many facets of the American church exhibit a shameless kind of advertising and overall seductive behavior. I don't ever get the feeling in Scripture that Jesus was schmaltzing people like a used car salesman--if anything, he warned fully of the liabilities involved in following his teachings. Yet so many Christians seem to be trying to sell you something when they evangelize. I have even been in the awkward position where I felt that I, too, had to propagandize others in order to be faithful to the mandate of sharing the Gospel. But in the end, sharing the gospel without sharing life with people, getting to know them as fellow human beings, brothers and sisters, is like stripping down and having sex with a total stranger. Even the Sinner's Prayer with which some quickie evangelists like to "seal the deal" feels purely transactional and not relational at all. It is like the money or the awkward words exchanged after making a purchase: "Thank you, come again!" While some groups of believers make a whore out of the Church by this dubious "selling" of the message of Christ, others (as I have tried to discuss in other posts here) exhibit a haggardness--the resignation of a lazy housewife who is selling herself short. Neither the prostitute nor the mumu-clad matron are aiming for the total vitality, virtue, and radiance befitting a bride of Christ. So when we go to church on Sunday in many American churches, we either go to be seduced by their hustle act, or to be spiritually complacent, chubby, and tired. Those of us who can endure neither of these options are tempted to avoid church. These two choices are, of course, a false dilemma: living out our faith in the context of Christian community is still a worthy endeavor, even if it seems elusive. The third option, and what that might look like, is the question of the day.
If you could love me as a wife
and for my wedding gift, your life
Should that be all I'd ever need
or is there more I'm looking for
and should I read between the lines
and look for blessings in disguise
To make me handsome, rich, and wise
Is that really what you want
I am a whore I do confess
But I put you on just like a wedding dress
and I run down the aisle
and I run down the aisle
I?m a prodigal with no way home
but I put you on just like a ring of gold
and I run down the aisle to you
So could you love this bastard child
Though I don't trust you to provide
With one hand in a pot of gold
and with the other in your side
I am so easily satisfied
by the call of lovers so less wild
That I would take a little cash
Over your very flesh and blood
Because money cannot buy
a husband's jealous eye
When you have knowingly deceived his wife
What concerns me is that Martha and Derek are both quite right--many facets of the American church exhibit a shameless kind of advertising and overall seductive behavior. I don't ever get the feeling in Scripture that Jesus was schmaltzing people like a used car salesman--if anything, he warned fully of the liabilities involved in following his teachings. Yet so many Christians seem to be trying to sell you something when they evangelize. I have even been in the awkward position where I felt that I, too, had to propagandize others in order to be faithful to the mandate of sharing the Gospel. But in the end, sharing the gospel without sharing life with people, getting to know them as fellow human beings, brothers and sisters, is like stripping down and having sex with a total stranger. Even the Sinner's Prayer with which some quickie evangelists like to "seal the deal" feels purely transactional and not relational at all. It is like the money or the awkward words exchanged after making a purchase: "Thank you, come again!" While some groups of believers make a whore out of the Church by this dubious "selling" of the message of Christ, others (as I have tried to discuss in other posts here) exhibit a haggardness--the resignation of a lazy housewife who is selling herself short. Neither the prostitute nor the mumu-clad matron are aiming for the total vitality, virtue, and radiance befitting a bride of Christ. So when we go to church on Sunday in many American churches, we either go to be seduced by their hustle act, or to be spiritually complacent, chubby, and tired. Those of us who can endure neither of these options are tempted to avoid church. These two choices are, of course, a false dilemma: living out our faith in the context of Christian community is still a worthy endeavor, even if it seems elusive. The third option, and what that might look like, is the question of the day.
Saturday, July 4, 2009
premonition of grief
I was watching " Seven Pounds" with my husband several weeks ago. The scene is irrelevant, but at one point during the movie, something washed over me that is barely accountable in words. The kind of desperate sobs I emitted are by now not strange to my husband; he tightened the circle his arms made around me and pressed his head closer to mine, as if to better hear and interpret my reverberations and gurglings. I felt, with a surety that clenched my whole ribcage and sucked the air from my lungs, how unbearable it will be to lose him to death. Beyond that, I have run out of words. To account for how long and how deeply this feeling racked me, this glimpse of a particular, eventual bereavement, I have to borrow words from Stuart Townend's hymn "How Great the Father's Love for Us":
How great the pain of searing loss...
Perhaps it is my conviction that very few of us actually have one single "soul mate" to find in the world, but rather a handful of people with whom we could find love and happiness. Perhaps it is my utter lack of certainty in nearly all worthy endeavors prior to making that leap of commitment, and taking the first steps that, gaining momentum, convince me that this was my path all along. Perhaps it is the happy contradiction that my husband defies the model of compatibility I would have chosen when we first became friends, and when I was looking elsewhere for love--that our friendship, and then our romance, have been a pleasurable experiment across culture, affiliation, lifestyles and temperament. Each of these things precludes for me the kind of immutable "in love" experience where we are both deadsure that "we are meant to be together." I deal in endless possibility, and so am able to hypothesize what life would have been like if we had chosen different people, different paths. But in the aftermath of losing my mother and grandmother--two women who I could not have chosen but who rather chose me--I have encountered a new kind of certainty about the people I am committed to. It would be morbid to base everything on this, but allowing the possibility of someone's absence to sneak up on me, to imagine for a moment life after their departure, is quite helpful in determining how much they mean to me, how intertwined our lives have become. The strength of my grief parallels the strength of my love for my husband: I know only that without him, life would be shabby, so many shades of grey, that my howling would go on for months--even years--upon discovering his absence. It is proof of the thing's existence by the vacuum, the shockwaves felt in its absence--about as close as I can get to being deadsure of anything.
...
The stone was semiprecious
We were barely conscious
Two souls too smart to be
In the realm of certainty
Even on our wedding day
We lit ourselves on fire
Oh, God not deny her
It's not if I believe in love
but if love believes in me
Oh, believe in me
...
U2 "Moment of Surrender" from 2009 album, No Line on the Horizon
How great the pain of searing loss...
Perhaps it is my conviction that very few of us actually have one single "soul mate" to find in the world, but rather a handful of people with whom we could find love and happiness. Perhaps it is my utter lack of certainty in nearly all worthy endeavors prior to making that leap of commitment, and taking the first steps that, gaining momentum, convince me that this was my path all along. Perhaps it is the happy contradiction that my husband defies the model of compatibility I would have chosen when we first became friends, and when I was looking elsewhere for love--that our friendship, and then our romance, have been a pleasurable experiment across culture, affiliation, lifestyles and temperament. Each of these things precludes for me the kind of immutable "in love" experience where we are both deadsure that "we are meant to be together." I deal in endless possibility, and so am able to hypothesize what life would have been like if we had chosen different people, different paths. But in the aftermath of losing my mother and grandmother--two women who I could not have chosen but who rather chose me--I have encountered a new kind of certainty about the people I am committed to. It would be morbid to base everything on this, but allowing the possibility of someone's absence to sneak up on me, to imagine for a moment life after their departure, is quite helpful in determining how much they mean to me, how intertwined our lives have become. The strength of my grief parallels the strength of my love for my husband: I know only that without him, life would be shabby, so many shades of grey, that my howling would go on for months--even years--upon discovering his absence. It is proof of the thing's existence by the vacuum, the shockwaves felt in its absence--about as close as I can get to being deadsure of anything.
...
The stone was semiprecious
We were barely conscious
Two souls too smart to be
In the realm of certainty
Even on our wedding day
We lit ourselves on fire
Oh, God not deny her
It's not if I believe in love
but if love believes in me
Oh, believe in me
...
U2 "Moment of Surrender" from 2009 album, No Line on the Horizon
Monday, June 22, 2009
whose arm doth reach the ocean floor
Growing up the daughter of a submariner, I was always fascinated by the raw beauty and power of the sea. Its proximity was partly to blame; until I went off to college, I had never lived in a land-locked place. The other reality that inspired my awe, however, was that the ocean was my father’s livelihood. Even as he knew how to navigate and operate within it, he lived constantly at its mercy.
As a little girl when I spoke of my father as being “at sea,” I really had no notion of the dangers he faced—he had helped teach my sisters and I how to swim, and for all I knew that’s what they did out “at sea,” diving off the deck and swimming with dolphins. The water, as I knew it then, was all glee and shimmer and launching off of his shoulders in the deep end. It was not until later that I began to appreciate the grisly possibilities associated with his seafaring deployments.
At a navy base chapel we attended when I was in 4th grade, I learned to sing the lines of a hymn which hung, cross-stitched by one of my mother’s friends, in the hallways of various homes we lived in:
Lord God, our power evermore
Whose arm doth reach the ocean floor
Dive with our men beneath the sea
Traverse the depths protectively
Lord, hear us when we pray and keep
Them safe from peril in the deep.
Its hauntingly beautiful melody gave me my first inkling of the risks involved in sea service. The second was when Dad began taking us to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I remember being speechless after viewing the new exhibit, “Planet of the Jellies,” where it first occurred to me that there were places in the ocean so dark that the creatures living there possessed their own bioluminescence as a substitute for sunlight. There was a theater where a mysterious woman narrated our odyssey into “The Deep Water,” and we learned that there were many strange creatures in the deepest, uncharted parts of the ocean where no human had ever been. When my father brought me home a compressed Styrofoam cup which had been subjected to the pressures of deep water, I began to see the ocean in the same way that I saw the moon: and I saw my dad as an astronaut. Even when his deployments waned to occasional crew drill assessments that lasted only weeks, I saw him as braving the elements, brandishing his grit and skill against the entropic forces of nature and human error.
When in high school, I attended the dedication ceremony for a local submarine veterans park commemorating all U.S. submarine crews ever lost, and I was struck by how many of them had fallen during peacetime due to fires, accidents and the relentless, unpredictable sea. It became clear to me that the fragility of my connection with my father during periods of sea duty was something I had not fully appreciated for much of the time he was gone. As I reconstruct my childhood deployment memories with this in mind, it strikes me that there were a few habits my father kept which made our relationship deceptively easy, and fostered an intimacy which I took for granted.
My father’s being frequently underway became so passé to me at an early age, that in a casual tea party with my grandfather at the age of three or four I commented, pinkie deftly poised in the air after a sip of air from my cup, “So anyways, my husband’s going to sea.” Clearly, I had heard my mother say something with her friends and was, customarily, mimicking her. I took all my cues from her regarding this otherwise strange arrangement whereby Dad disappeared for half of the year. I wore his t-shirts to bed at her suggestion, anticipated his rare phone calls when the boat had pulled into port, and planned all the things we would do when he got home. I recall my mother joking with other wives about the short, sound-bite messages called “family grams” periodically wired to the ship’s crew. There were running jokes of family grams that didn’t make sense or had been cut off and left with absurdly scant details, with unwitting double-entendres and accidental homophones. You eventually ran out of room for all the things you wanted to say, and had to make the most horrific cuts to squeeze a coherent message into those lines.
I also heard her talk about “mail drops,” which I envisioned as happening through some great tube lowered to the submarine through which the mail was shot or sucked into the great, central hatch I had often capered down on visits to the dock. (It was not until I had seen a helicopter perform a real mail drop on the Discovery Channel that it occurred to me the sub would have to come to the surface periodically.) What I always knew was that the preparation for a mail drop was very intentional, and required at least a day. There would be cards, pictures, and tapes of my sisters and me. These all required Mom’s patient arbitration between competing speakers, all eager to recite the newest rhyme and sing the newest song from school or church. My mother was a master at managing mood swings and petty squabbles to get each one of us to shine for our moment of expression on the stage she had created between the A and B sides of the cassette.
I recently heard a Father’s Day special on NPR’s This American Life entitled “Ask Your Father,” in which a grown man shared a collection of his tapes, which he had made for his father who was frequently at sea with the merchant marine. The recordings, ranging from 1st to 7th grade, quiver with a palpable yearning that his father would eventually use the B side of the tape (which he always left blank) to send him back a message. His father never did. When, as an adult, he asked his dad why, there was no good answer, only deep regret. Of course, he had listened to the tapes—he just never took into account that his son was really devastated that he did not reach back to him across the long distances.
I simply can’t imagine what having such a disengaged father would be like. If my mother bent over backwards to make deployments seem normal, my father more than met her halfway. I still have many of his postcards in my possession, which used to arrive monthly while he was away, even though the submarine did not have mail drops or pull into port as frequently. Some of them are postmarked from the exotic places whose pictures they bear; others of them are not postmarked at all. Rain or shine, birthday cards and flowers appeared, all bright and thoughtful. The best card I’ve ever received came on my birthday in Charleston , South Carolina
When my dad finally did come home each year, these same special occasions, missed once or twice before were doubly celebrated. He made us his priority when he was onshore—soccer games, dance classes, piano recitals—he was there. Math homework was suddenly not so intimidating, except for his periodic reminder that there was “no crying in math.” He seemed remarkably equipped to return from long absences and reestablish immediacy in his relationships with us, to affirm us, to amuse us, to hold us accountable and to talk us down from ledges. Perhaps his intuitive, highly verbal way of relating to us was thrust upon him, being surrounded with daughters. Maybe it was the hallmark of being his mother’s son—she had always been a highly expressive, passionate model of womanhood from the first. Whatever the source of my father’s knack for good communication, even from long distances and depths, I have found it to be a rare gift. It is noteworthy that this man who was absent for almost half of my childhood, has remained one of my closest friends in adulthood.
This friendship has been possible because my parents raised us on a rigorous policy of candor, in which there was little room for pouting or sidestepping when faced with the truth. I have learned to appreciate this, because you always know where you stand, and valuable information is never withheld, if you will dare to ask the question. This was never more comically obvious than when, at the mature age of six, I asked to know where babies came from. I knew that the bedroom played a part, but I thought that perhaps the event could occur while husband and wife held hands—their arm-skin forming a sort of semi-permeable membrane through which the baby-making materials could pass. My father quickly banished all such sci-fi renditions from my mind: we would have a meeting about it after the younger girls were in bed. That night, pulling the H encyclopedia from the shelf, he showed my sister S. and I its transparent layouts of the human body, complete with cardiovascular, muscular, digestive, and reproductive systems. That was how we got the birds and the bees talk—straight up, no chaser. These night conferences occurred whenever we had serious business to transact (a very similar one had taken place just a year before, when after my persistent nagging, my parents had prayed the sinner’s prayer with me one stormy Guam night in our living room). When invited to these powwows, we felt as if we had been initiated into some privileged world of mature responsibility—partly because we helped my parents convince my sisters we were still in bed, and also because we were treated as if we had a right to understand and discuss whatever was being presented there.
Predictably, my father has not always been a perfect communicator. There were times where the “honeymoon” period after his homecoming was followed by an abrupt adjustment for everyone. After being in the highly regulated world of a deployment, he could not fathom why the recycling wasn’t sorted properly, why everything wasn’t ship-shape. My mother jokingly referred to him as “Captain von Trapp” on such occasions. There have also been times, as each of us came of age and went off to college and the wide world beyond, where communication with Dad became strained, confusing, and full of power struggles. He has become famous for anchoring his perspective in a sea of hormones and emotions with such gems as “This offends my common sense!” and, “Can we all stop emoting here and just be rational?” (In recent years I have begun to deprive him even of those classics, rebutting him with recent neuroscience findings that the female brain is more highly adept at processing emotion, and therefore it is possible to be both emotional and rational at once. His point is well taken, however, that men and women view and solve problems quite differently, and that they ought to learn from one another constantly to avoid crippling extremes.) His attempts to remain himself while struggling against a swirling tide of changing, independent young women are admirable—a lesser man might have jumped ship long ago, settling for mediocre conversations and emotional distance.
Every god-fearing dad in some way strives to image our Heavenly Father, and I believe mine has done so most notably in his use of words—both spoken and written—that reach to us even from a long way off and remind us of who we are…who we are becoming. Even as I have struggled not to lose my faith in recent years, I carry a persistent image of God as an affirming and affectionate parent who does not shy away from the tough conversations, but confronts them with dignity and compassion. When I cannot hear God clearly or when it seems He has deployed His Spirit elsewhere and left me—de profundis clamo (“out of the depths I cry”), and I have fair certainty because he is my Father, that what is hidden will be made known in good time, that there is a postcard coming soon in the mail, that there is a late-night conversation that will elucidate things, and that our relationship will be continually made new.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)