Who's Your Daddy?
I appreciate the kind comments to my post below; my bro read it, and told me when I saw him it was 100 percent accurate. Well, is that good or bad?
My trip to Long Beach was good, though mostly hard. I always get triggered, anxious and/or depressed, when I travel south, even though I never regret the trips, and so much good comes from them. I saw my little baby niece, only ten days old! I had the best talk I may have ever had with my brother, mostly about Dad. And I generally did cool stuff: went to Getty for the first time (saw Wesley Clark) at lunch and roaming the galleries; Huntington Library for the twentieth time probably; hit the Queen Mary, the Observation Bar, this little art deco bar in the front of the ship. Why the band was playing cheesy top 40 instead of jazz is beyond me.
And incidentally, you can go onto that ship for free at night, and no one is around. It's really very cool. I saw a couple who had brought taco bell up and was eating at a table on the starboard deck, the side that faces the city. What a view they had! For a six buck dinner! S and I walked all the way around that thing. I dug.
What else was good? Lots of food, too much, at Steph's mom's. I ate pie at least once a day, yams, ham, turkey...we made both. We actually ate twice on thanksgiving. Now the reckoning...I have to cut back on calories and make more time for exercise.
S saw her father for the first time in nearly a decade, and interacted with him more than she had in longer than that. He tried very hard. He was an okay cat, quirks aside. Which brings me back to my start and my title.
My father just called me, to say hi, but also I think because he was wondering about my brother and the baby. And everything my mother says about him is still true: he feels so sorry for himself, he whines, he assumes the worst in every situation that regards him. Remember that low self-image I was talking about? That incredible self-deprecation, and the underlying defensive anger? It's still there. Lurid. I was cool to him on the phone. That's been my attempt for a while now, the last couple years or so since I looked him up and found where he was living: treat Dad like he's mentally ill, which he actually is in some sense I feel; like the rainman, or a retarded person, or a drug addict or an alcoholic. That sounds cruel, but to me it's realistic. I can't expect much from him; I try to treat him humanely in return. I know it means a great deal to him, a man who has lost his sons and probably doesn't know why, or who would have to think very hard, probably harder than he wants to, to understand why.
Oh man. This hurts.
But I pay a price. I try to let my anger out here, or in talking to others, so that when I call him I don't smash that fragile ego. Maybe I'm protecting him more than I need to. It was so good to talk to my brother about what happened when I was 17, when he moved out of the area just after his marriage, about my stepmother and her obsession, I mean obsession, with her own kids (the last time I saw her, she talked about each of them for the entire three hours she was here). That conversation with my brother included some heavy realities. Stark truths. Hard emotions. Things I've forgotten. I do know my ocd blew into full swing that year I was 17, as my dad meandered a hundred miles away and stayed in Long Beach and tried to make it. That story is for another time; it's worth telling, or I'm worth telling it.
So yeah, dad. A man who needs to be cared for, controlled really, so much by his wife he would choose her over his own children. A man who did just that. And now a man who wants everything to be forgiven, forgotten, resolved. It has been more than twenty years, and I'm trying, but it is very difficult and I can't blame my brother; in some ways I admire him for taking a harder line with dad, for sticking up for his feelings more, admitting them and not trying to minimize them in any way. It's more self-respecting, maybe. I've wondered many times: do I have depression and anxiety and obsessions because of genetic influence? He has little or none of this and he was adopted. But what stuck out to me most in our conversation was how much more he lets himself feel angry, how much less he blames himself. That doesn't sound genetic to me.
***
Other news: as I said, the trip was hard emotionally, and good. Now that I'm back the reality of what it's like to work from home alone is again settling in and I wonder: should I shift colleges to the one in my district more near my house? I could work there maybe four days a week instead of two? At least three. Heck, I might have to do five. But the long days home alone are hard, harder than they were, and the lack of structure is part of that. Right now I'm so behind in my online classes. It's just getting tough to sit here and do the work, though I'm not ignoring it completely. I should be grading right now; I needed this first.
And to top all this hard dad work off, my faith has taken a dip. Since Schweitzer. I actually think I've come to a place where I have a response to his central argument, but I haven't had time to process it, write it all down, center into it. I haven't stopped praying, but I have doubts, again. I actually think it's connected to my other anxieties and my ocd. Was it Erickson who says that faith results from positive infant/mother connection? What happens in the absence of that? But my doubt is also the product of simply thinking. Schweitzer's thesis is possible, not certain, but possible. And then there are so many other issues. Foremost among them miracles. Certainly, if a God is admitted, miracles could happen. But when miracles are examined inductively, in light of other historical accounts of miraculous events and even current accounts, it becomes much more complex. This was Hume's main point, or one of them: humans believe all kinds of whacky things. Myths get built quickly after the death of a great man. Has it ever happened to anyone else the way it's happened to Jesus? No. Not that I know of. And I've never seen that kind of ethical teaching (though Christ's world-view has philosophical problems too, like damnation) or self-aggrandized view in the presence of that kind of miracle record.
But all that's for another time. Thanks to funkiller and chameleon for posting so often! And thanks to scooter and my bro for reading regularly, I know. And to the rest who read and post.
God will not conceal himself from one who seeks, even a wounded one. And I suppose working through all this dad pain is part of getting well (as opposed to obsessing until my brain is raw). My ocd does respond to exposure work, but no doubt, that's tough to do when so many emotions are running through my mind. In some strange way, obsessions are a primitive attempt to nurture the self. Like cutting (and I've never cut, though man have I struggled with obsessions regarding it). A therapist told me that years ago, and I sensed it on this vacation. There's also much more going on, including a mental pattern, an instinctive response to anxiety, a way to cloak anger and pain, all kinds of things.
Most of all, I crave the hope of Christ again. With that, there is no darkness of any real depth. Christ promises more than just eternal life, he promises eternal love, final justice, limitless grace for his children...it's tough to get too down for too long in the face of those. Just writing that I feel the muscles in my shoulders and arms relax, for the moment at least.
Peace to all.
My trip to Long Beach was good, though mostly hard. I always get triggered, anxious and/or depressed, when I travel south, even though I never regret the trips, and so much good comes from them. I saw my little baby niece, only ten days old! I had the best talk I may have ever had with my brother, mostly about Dad. And I generally did cool stuff: went to Getty for the first time (saw Wesley Clark) at lunch and roaming the galleries; Huntington Library for the twentieth time probably; hit the Queen Mary, the Observation Bar, this little art deco bar in the front of the ship. Why the band was playing cheesy top 40 instead of jazz is beyond me.
And incidentally, you can go onto that ship for free at night, and no one is around. It's really very cool. I saw a couple who had brought taco bell up and was eating at a table on the starboard deck, the side that faces the city. What a view they had! For a six buck dinner! S and I walked all the way around that thing. I dug.
What else was good? Lots of food, too much, at Steph's mom's. I ate pie at least once a day, yams, ham, turkey...we made both. We actually ate twice on thanksgiving. Now the reckoning...I have to cut back on calories and make more time for exercise.
S saw her father for the first time in nearly a decade, and interacted with him more than she had in longer than that. He tried very hard. He was an okay cat, quirks aside. Which brings me back to my start and my title.
My father just called me, to say hi, but also I think because he was wondering about my brother and the baby. And everything my mother says about him is still true: he feels so sorry for himself, he whines, he assumes the worst in every situation that regards him. Remember that low self-image I was talking about? That incredible self-deprecation, and the underlying defensive anger? It's still there. Lurid. I was cool to him on the phone. That's been my attempt for a while now, the last couple years or so since I looked him up and found where he was living: treat Dad like he's mentally ill, which he actually is in some sense I feel; like the rainman, or a retarded person, or a drug addict or an alcoholic. That sounds cruel, but to me it's realistic. I can't expect much from him; I try to treat him humanely in return. I know it means a great deal to him, a man who has lost his sons and probably doesn't know why, or who would have to think very hard, probably harder than he wants to, to understand why.
Oh man. This hurts.
But I pay a price. I try to let my anger out here, or in talking to others, so that when I call him I don't smash that fragile ego. Maybe I'm protecting him more than I need to. It was so good to talk to my brother about what happened when I was 17, when he moved out of the area just after his marriage, about my stepmother and her obsession, I mean obsession, with her own kids (the last time I saw her, she talked about each of them for the entire three hours she was here). That conversation with my brother included some heavy realities. Stark truths. Hard emotions. Things I've forgotten. I do know my ocd blew into full swing that year I was 17, as my dad meandered a hundred miles away and stayed in Long Beach and tried to make it. That story is for another time; it's worth telling, or I'm worth telling it.
So yeah, dad. A man who needs to be cared for, controlled really, so much by his wife he would choose her over his own children. A man who did just that. And now a man who wants everything to be forgiven, forgotten, resolved. It has been more than twenty years, and I'm trying, but it is very difficult and I can't blame my brother; in some ways I admire him for taking a harder line with dad, for sticking up for his feelings more, admitting them and not trying to minimize them in any way. It's more self-respecting, maybe. I've wondered many times: do I have depression and anxiety and obsessions because of genetic influence? He has little or none of this and he was adopted. But what stuck out to me most in our conversation was how much more he lets himself feel angry, how much less he blames himself. That doesn't sound genetic to me.
***
Other news: as I said, the trip was hard emotionally, and good. Now that I'm back the reality of what it's like to work from home alone is again settling in and I wonder: should I shift colleges to the one in my district more near my house? I could work there maybe four days a week instead of two? At least three. Heck, I might have to do five. But the long days home alone are hard, harder than they were, and the lack of structure is part of that. Right now I'm so behind in my online classes. It's just getting tough to sit here and do the work, though I'm not ignoring it completely. I should be grading right now; I needed this first.
And to top all this hard dad work off, my faith has taken a dip. Since Schweitzer. I actually think I've come to a place where I have a response to his central argument, but I haven't had time to process it, write it all down, center into it. I haven't stopped praying, but I have doubts, again. I actually think it's connected to my other anxieties and my ocd. Was it Erickson who says that faith results from positive infant/mother connection? What happens in the absence of that? But my doubt is also the product of simply thinking. Schweitzer's thesis is possible, not certain, but possible. And then there are so many other issues. Foremost among them miracles. Certainly, if a God is admitted, miracles could happen. But when miracles are examined inductively, in light of other historical accounts of miraculous events and even current accounts, it becomes much more complex. This was Hume's main point, or one of them: humans believe all kinds of whacky things. Myths get built quickly after the death of a great man. Has it ever happened to anyone else the way it's happened to Jesus? No. Not that I know of. And I've never seen that kind of ethical teaching (though Christ's world-view has philosophical problems too, like damnation) or self-aggrandized view in the presence of that kind of miracle record.
But all that's for another time. Thanks to funkiller and chameleon for posting so often! And thanks to scooter and my bro for reading regularly, I know. And to the rest who read and post.
God will not conceal himself from one who seeks, even a wounded one. And I suppose working through all this dad pain is part of getting well (as opposed to obsessing until my brain is raw). My ocd does respond to exposure work, but no doubt, that's tough to do when so many emotions are running through my mind. In some strange way, obsessions are a primitive attempt to nurture the self. Like cutting (and I've never cut, though man have I struggled with obsessions regarding it). A therapist told me that years ago, and I sensed it on this vacation. There's also much more going on, including a mental pattern, an instinctive response to anxiety, a way to cloak anger and pain, all kinds of things.
Most of all, I crave the hope of Christ again. With that, there is no darkness of any real depth. Christ promises more than just eternal life, he promises eternal love, final justice, limitless grace for his children...it's tough to get too down for too long in the face of those. Just writing that I feel the muscles in my shoulders and arms relax, for the moment at least.
Peace to all.
Comments
whoa. More than welcome to you. I'm sure I've told you I love your blog, stand in awe of your writing, and feel something close to a reverential envy when I consider your education. You did something I always thought I was 'supposed' to do in this life: find my identity/realize my potential in the ivory halls. Sad fact is, I was so anxious as an undergrad I sabotaged myself constantly; I'm still getting the education I missed.
But enough about me! It sounds silly, yet if I knew you were going to comment here I would have spruced up my text. The two entries you responded to I threw up sans edit.
As I think I commented once at your site, I've read your blog all the way back to its beginning, and feel a fraternal company in your pain. (Oh, I said fraternal, and we've been speaking of the Terrors; humor is always good near despair.)
One thing you say here that really sticks out to me is that Hume did not have my experience of the world. That's quite interesting. I will simmer in it.
As far as Dicken's sources, he's widely said to have used Carlyle, though you may have read that. My penguin editor spent much time pointing out weaknesses in Dicken's depiction of the revolution, some from Carlyle or Dickens' misunderstandings of him. But then events like that, even experienced first hand, would have so many different interpretations, Dickens' seems as good as any. And on HT, I actually wrote a paper (which I'm probably glad I lost) on that my first semester in grad school, responding to some critic who asserted an incestuous attraction between the siblings. My fave bro/sis novel that comes to mind, though, is Mill on the Floss.
Thank you again, friend. Best of luck in Cambridge.
t