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Bonds
that Make Us Free, Part 20: Opening Ourselves to Others
by
C. Terry Warner
TOUCHED BY
THE TRUTH
When
someone we have been blaming becomes real to us, we change. We become
a person who sees another person as real. We change from being accusing,
guarded, and self-absorbed to being open, self-forgetful, and welcoming.
Of the various
kinds of situation in which this change of heart takes place, and
the various processes by which it takes place, I've chosen three
to focus on in this article. Each of these has to do with letting
ourselves be affected by light coming from others, or, in other
words, by the truth concerning what they are feeling.
One situation
that can occasion a change of heart occurs when the person who has
been the object of our suspicion, fear, or resentment disarms us
by the way he or she responds to us. Perhaps another family member
does not take offense as we expect. Perhaps a friend obviously delights
in seeing us again or goes out of her way to assist us. Perhaps
a parent loves us without reserve. Such responses can soften even
a cynical or spiteful heart, and there are people who affect and
soften others daily simply by their constant and disarming compassion,
love, or welcoming attitude. They may or may not express their feelings
verbally (others, including children and animals, can keep us open
to life and hopeful simply by their love or loyalty).
It is altogether
too easy to minimize the salutary influences of such welcoming,
I-You people upon the character of families, communities, and nations.
I do not think this world would be tolerable for any of us without
these people—and perhaps many of us can at one time or another
be counted among them. When we have hardened and withdrawn into
ourselves, as we all do at times, we desperately need to encounter
other beings on a fairly regular basis whose regard for us or for
others softens us again.
In Parts 22
and 23, we will meet several such people. For now I will offer a
story so slight and simple that it might easily have gone unnoticed.
I offer it not because it's singular, but because it isn't—because
it represents uncounted numbers of nourishing acts that almost never
get acknowledged, even at the time, even silently. Yet in spite
of that, the small acts of kindness I do remember sprinkle
my recollections of my life like mountain flowers in bloom.
When I first
drove the southern California freeways in mad traffic many years
ago, I was trying to get onto the San Diego Freeway heading south
from an undersized on-ramp. A woman pulled past me on the left,
into a position where she had good visibility and could pull in
front of me and grab the next chance onto the freeway. But then,
when the first break in the stream of cars came, she waved me on
past her. That had been her intent all along, to help me into the
traffic flow. I am still moved when I consider that fleeting act.
I never saw her face, but strange as it may sound for me to say
it, I loved her.
The second kind
of situation in which we change by opening up to others differs
from the first in obvious ways. Here, the person blamed suffers
some stern adversity or tragedy that renders him or her helpless
and thereby makes our various petty, self-absorbed concerns minuscule
and shameful by comparison. The vulnerability of that person, struggling
with his or her difficulties, melts our hearts. A story I heard
from a crusty, old-line manufacturing engineer named Monte will
show how this happens.
Monte's son,
whom he considered irresponsible, called him one day to ask if he
and his wife could stay with Monte for a few weeks. They had gotten
behind in their rent and had been evicted. Monte agreed reluctantly,
though he considered his daughter-in-law even more irresponsible
than his son.
When the couple
arrived in a rented moving truck, they revealed that they needed
a car for a while, as theirs required a major repair. With even
greater misgivings Monte again consented, and so they went off in
his car to buy some things they needed. An hour or so later he got
a call informing him that they had been in an accident. And his
daughter-in-law was the one who had been driving! This threw Monte
into an inward fit. He stomped around the house for the entire time
it took the couple to bring the car back. (Though bashed, the car
could be driven.)
When Monte heard
them pull up in front of the house he told himself he could not
go out to meet them with all his hostility "hanging out."
So he collected himself as much as he could, tried to calm down,
and put on the best, most considerate kind of smile a person is
capable of when treated as he had been treated. It was in this condition,
determined to act cordially, that Monte descended the stairs and
walked out the front door toward the curb. He would listen to their
side of the story, he told himself; he wouldn't raise his voice.
Monte was almost
to the car before he could see his daughter-in-law, who was sitting
in the driver's seat. Her head rested on the steering wheel, and
she was sobbing. At that moment, he said, his heart melted.
What melted
this man? He had, after all, done everything that lay within his
power to act as considerately and generously as possible. What melted
him was the sight of his daughter-in-law broken and contrite. This
image punched through his shell of self-concern. It disrupted the
certainty with which he had judged her. It threw him and the confidence
with which he looked down on her into confusion.
Seeing another's
helplessness and vulnerability can do this to us. To realize that
behind an indifferent or hostile or arrogant facade another person
is struggling just to claim a place in the world, a place she does
not really believe she deserves—this blows our superior
attitude to smithereens. All the willpower Monte could muster
had failed to extinguish the accusation in his heart, but something
about her, the very person he had been despising, rendered
him unable to retain his hardness toward her any longer.
I have spoken
as if Monte was humbled by the image of his daughter-in-law broken
by adversity. This is only partly true. The sight could humble
him only because he allowed it to. His own responsiveness was
the critical factor. This is a universal truth. Scenes that some
regard compassionately may not affect others at all, or at least
not appear to affect them. Consider the images from the holocaust
death camps that we watch in horror and tears in PBS documentaries.
The Nazi personnel responsible observed those same scenes daily,
in person, with what at least seems to have been utter indifference
and in some cases satisfaction.
PLENTY THERE
TO MELT OUR HEARTS
There is a third kind of situation in which the truth about another
melts our hardness of heart. In this situation the person we are
blaming, unlike Monte's daughter-in-law, may show no vulnerability
at all. In fact he or she may even consider and treat us as an enemy.
And if so, to open ourselves to them we may need to be confronted
with the truth about their feelings and fears by some extraordinary,
arresting event. We may even need to make some extraordinary effort
to discover it.
The following
story was told by a man, whom I'll call Hal, to a group in Minnesota
that I was teaching. It recounts Hal's relationship with his son
Robby, who as a young teenager had hardened himself toward his family.
The story is an example of how someone who makes every effort to
mask his vulnerability (in this case, Robby) can nevertheless melt
a person's heart—provided, of course, that that person will
allow it. In the story Hal told, the softening of heart also required
one of those extraordinary events I mentioned. The event was Hal's
finding a school essay written by Robby's older brother Tom. That
essay disclosed to Hal things about Robby that Hal had not known.
In recounting the experience, Hal actually read Tom's essay, a copy
of which he had with him, to the group.
This was Hal's
story.
Robby, our sixth
child, was as lovable a little boy as I have ever met. Everyone
who got to know him said the same. He couldn't say his l's
and r's very well; when only three he climbed up on my bed
with me, put his stubby little arm around my neck, and said "Daddy,
when peopoe come on ow pwopoty, we want to say, Get off ow pwopoty.
But then we wemembow it's weewee Jesus's pwopoty and so we say,
Come on ow pwopoty."
Though exceptionally
strong and competitive, Robby never learned to play baseball because
baseball takes place in summer, and to get to practice he had to
walk through neighborhoods where he would encounter animals, and
he was incapable of failing to stop and spend as long as possible
with an animal when the chance arose. He always retained at least
one for a roommate, if not a dog or a cat, then a rabbit or a rat.
And he feared nothing. When not more than eight he was walking down
the street with me and saw three boys about nine or ten beating
up on a younger boy. Without any hesitation Robby piled into that
fray and pushed the bullies off.
Robby had taken
for his hero his brother Tom, four years older. He enjoyed what
seemed an idyllic life, as happy as a boy can be imagined to be.
But during his twelfth year something awful happened. A charismatic
and troubled young man a year older than Robby had moved in on a
neighboring street. He had organized a number of his peers into
a gang that called itself "The Vandals." They became the
prime juvenile concern of our local police department. Robby was
popular and "cool," so it was not surprising when they
began recruiting him. It did surprise me, though, that he succumbed.
Almost overnight he turned angry and destructive. His new friends
would come for him in the middle of the night, and he would slip
out the window to join them. My wife, Karina, and I were heartsick.
Why would he ever have taken up with such so-called friends when—as
far as we could tell, anyway—his life had seemed so perfect?
I knew Robby's
will to be so strong that any forcible restraint would only make
him more determined. So I resolved to do everything I could to keep
our relationship alive. After he would cause his nightly ruckus
at the dinner table and storm downstairs, I would go down to his
room and talk, sometimes for long periods, until he would finally
open up and laugh with me a little. When he went out at night I
got in the car to find him; I wanted him to know that I would always
be out there looking for him, and soon he stopped going very often.
We sought for
some way to reconnect him with animals, hoping that this might soften
him again and draw him away from The Vandals. I hit on the idea
of buying him a horse. But, knowing that Karina would rightly not
approve of buying the worst-behaved child the most prized present,
I conspired with Robby to buy Karina a horse. With the help of a
dear friend, he learned to care for and handle it. I arranged for
him to be invited to work on a ranch in Arizona; he quickly became
so skillful and trustworthy that the owner allowed Robby alone,
among a number of young men who worked there, to ride his thoroughbred
horses. But when Robby came home for the school year, he took up
with his old friends again.
I gave Robby
all that was in my heart to give, as did Karina. In fact, I believed
myself to be as loving as a parent can be toward such a child. But
often I resented his inconsiderate ways and the disruptions they
caused in the family. At those times I looked upon him as ruining,
if not our lives, then at least our peace.
Just how far
short I fell of appreciating the truth about Robby became clear
on one spring evening in 1990. I discovered an essay displayed on
my computer monitor when I went upstairs to my office. Robby's brother
Tom had written it for an English class at the university. Only
partway through my reading of it, Robby became fully real to me.
I could understand from his perspective why everything had happened
as it had. And my feelings for him changed as radically as my understanding.
My hardness toward him disappeared. The circuit of love between
us, though long disconnected, was reestablished, and my heart glowed
with sorrow and joy.
Here is the
essay I read that evening on the monitor screen.
"Cowboys
and Indians is our favorite—we always play, just Robby and
I. At first we are both mighty braves, but I soon become the Chief,
and Robby my warrior. We play all day, then at night in the darkness
where no one can see I say, 'I love you,' and he says it back. It
is weird to say that to another boy, but I love Robby. Our dreams
are like movies, to run away to the mountains, living like Indians
with long hair.
"Tufts
of hair fall onto the sheet hanging around my neck, one end of the
hair frayed and split like a horse's mane, the other clean and sharp.
Summer is the time for hair cutting. The old sheet that Mom had
wrapped around my neck hangs on my body limp. I have no muscles
to fill it in. Clumps of hair fall onto my lap, forming a strange
pattern on the stain positioned on the sheet. I wet the bed sometimes.
Robby and I have tried to avoid this for four years now. No one
else on the block has to have a butch for summer, so why do we?
Mom tried to cut it alone but she couldn't catch us. She waited
for Dad to return from work. He plops me onto the high chair and
sits there to make sure I won't move. Robby cries also. He could
care less but he wants to be like me.
"Indian
style, Robby sits on the floor, his face streaked like a badly washed
window, the tears cutting paths in the summer dust of his face.
He looks at me like a sad sheep dog, his hair in his eyes. I am
the Chief and he is my warrior. He would rather die than betray
me. I have given in and am having my head shaved, so he is also.
"The buzzing
of the razor sounds like the background noise of our old record
player. Mom's hands feel steady as I sit in the chair. Suddenly
the buzzer stops. I hear the snapping of the scissors. I'm surprised
when I look at my hair in the mirror. She's not going to buzz the
whole thing. I step down from the chair with grown-up hair. Robby
climbs onto the chair expecting the same haircut. He steps down
completely shorn, like a sheep who has lost his prize wool. We are
different for the first time and we both know it. 'It doesn't matter,'
I say, but it does.
"That summer
I sit at the table and tell stories after Robby goes to bed. I catch
him looking and listening through the spaces between the stairs.
He wants to hear my stories. But I have hair and he doesn't. None
of my other friends are buzzed that year either. On the fourth of
July, I leave with them and he follows me like a puppy. He has always
come with me before, so why not this time? I guess he doesn't know
what to do without me. 'Get out of here,' I say. My friends all
laugh. He keeps following. 'I'm going to kick your butt if you don't
leave.' He cries, tears cutting paths in the dust of his cheeks
again, and I run with my friends laughing and following me.
"That night
I lie down with firecrackers ringing in my ears. The door opens
a little and I see shiny cheeks and a fuzzy head poke through the
opening. 'Sorry I followed you, Tom. Good night, I love you.' I
don't say anything. The door closes. I turn on the radio so I won't
have to think about him.
"I love
Robby. We are still best friends. At family reunions we stick together.
I hang out with Robby because we don't fit with our cousins. They
come from another part of the country; they talk different. This
year at the reunion Robby and I don't have any shorts so we take
off our pants. Our tan bodies are bronze, accented by our bleached
white 'Fruit of the Loom' briefs. We find a sprinkler with which
we can spray the other kids at the park.
"We take
turns drenching people. Suddenly I turn on Robby, spraying him until
he's soaked. He doesn't say anything, just looks at me and wonders.
I'm tired so he takes the sprinkler. He suddenly turns on me. The
water hums as it sprays past my ear. He can drench me. He hesitates,
then turns and sprays someone else. I want him to spray me back
so I won't feel like such a jerk. I walk behind him, pulling down
my 'Fruit of the Looms' as I go.'Just for that,' I say, 'I am going
to pee on your back.' He pleads no. I laugh. Yellow liquid splatters
on his shoulder blades, steaming a little as it rolls down the trough
made by his spine, down into the back of his shorts. He doesn't
move. Christie, my little sister, sees. 'I'm telling,' she shouts.
I run, with Robby running after because he doesn't want to be left
alone.
"Dinner
is not very good anyway. Salad and squash are all we eat in the
summer because Mom says we are to grow what we eat. I just want
to be excused. Dad looks up from his dinner at Mom and then at me.
'Did you pee on Robby today?' he asks. Without even looking away
I say, 'No.' 'Did too!' Christie retorts. Looking at Robby, Dad
asks if it's true. He doesn't even pause; he has already made up
his mind. 'No, I was wet from the sprinkler,' he says.
"School
comes again. Our hair grows longer. We are the same again, but not
really—like an ice cream cone, if it starts to melt there is
no way to make it look the same again no matter how you lick. I
need money now. I steal from Dad. He never misses the money, and
only Robby knows. He never tells. Soon he needs money, too. He's
young and gets caught.
"Dad asks
who took it. I say, 'I didn't.' 'No one is going anywhere until
we find out who took it,' Dad says, trying to sound mean. I look
at Robby. He has faith in me. 'Robby took it,' I say. It is silent—like
when someone dies, no one knows what to say.
"The Chief
has betrayed his warrior.
"It would
be better if he had betrayed me. When a Chief betrays his warriors,
they kill him.
"Robby
just makes new friends.
"He doesn't
follow me around anymore, though he would like to. He still says,
'Good night, I love you.' I only answer, 'Good night.' Once he says
it twice, hoping to hear me say 'I love you' back. But I do not
say it.
"I am his
idol still. Anything I do, he does. What I wear, he wears. Mom even
stops buying separate clothes for us. Although he never lets me
know that he is copying me, he wants to be just like me. I have
long hair to my shoulders in a ponytail. He wants one too. Mom says
no. We are different, and we both know it.
"I leave
home for several years, and when I return, my hair is short. His
hair is longer than mine ever was. He hugs me, but he doesn't say
'I love you.' At night I wait for him to return from his date. When
he arrives, I say, 'I love you'—twice. There is no answer.
He doesn't say it, but I think my warrior loves me still."
That was Hal's
story of how his heart opened to his angry son. What touched him
so? Wasn't it simply Robby's humanity? Wasn't it Robby's gritty
effort to steel himself against being hurt? Wasn't it Robby's anxious
determination to cultivate and hang onto his new friends? In short,
wasn't it the truth, understood and appreciated for the first time,
about the boy's feelings and struggles?
Whether you
call this Robby's humanity or the truth about Robby doesn't really
matter. It shone like a light into Hal's inner darkness. It came
as a gift, a gift that changed a discouraged and somewhat self-pitying
man. It came—and we should remember this—from the boy
Hal had considered the destroyer of the family's happiness. It was
a gift Robby gave just by being.
In the realities
around us there is plenty—plenty and to spare—that is
able to soften and humble us and open our fearful, judgmental, hardened
hearts. Whether those realities have that effect depends upon
our opening ourselves to them.
This article
is part of a serialization of Bonds That Make Us
Free: Healing Our Relationships, Coming to Ourselves by
C. Terry Warner.
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