I'm a man. A man's man. As an athlete growing up in small-town Indiana, I lived for baseball. I spent long hours by myself in the woods hunting and fishing. Dad was more than a role model to me, more like a God. It was much later that I was willing to see flaws in him -- passed on to me. I imagined myself as a brave, take-no-crap kind of guy, who would have been the one in combat to throw himself on the grenade. So when I felt tears rolling down my cheeks years ago, when puppies and babies were cast in the golden light on Kodak commercials, I was really scared. "What's happening to me?" I thought, but dared not ask anyone. How could I admit this? I went to movies and always left weeping harder than my wife. At the end of Die Hard, when bloody John McLane finds Holly after all the carnage at the Nakatomi building, I was balling. This was Die Hard, for God's sake. Now, my wife just looks at me and says, "You're so sweet." I'm not really, I just can't control my tear ducts. Maybe there's some medical reason for this. That would be an easy explanation: Oh, don't mind these tears. I've got tearductagonewildoma -- it's not terminal, just embarrassing. Rev. David at our church called me "leaky" the other day. I'm sure to need a Kleenex before service is finished. If I think back to those years when I was less compassionate, I think of my kids. I loved (and still love) them, but I wasn't very good at it. They brought me great joy -- still do. But my job then was simple -- I was the discipliner. The kids were lined up at the door when I came home, and my wife (the ex) would start with, "Do you know what your kids did today." The screaming would begin. I was the justice of the un-Peace. Who wants this job, I thought. Years of training taught me to be hard. I haven't spent as many years undoing the damage, but I'm working on it with my grown kids. They are delightful people, open-minded and intolerant of prejudice of any kind, but with eccentricities very similar to mine. Surprise, surprise. It hasn't been easy for them. Typical of American families today, they've had to endure at least two marriages of both parents. And no parents, even those like us who had joint custody, could keep the venom hidden from the kids. Over time, it subsided. But in the beginning, unfortunately, the kids became messengers for their parents who wouldn't speak. They learned the lessons I was teaching. Sometimes, I meet families that seem perfect. The parents are successful, loving, compassionate, involved, selfless. The kids are smart, responsible, confident and mature. Closer investigation always reveals flaws. Always. For 15 years, I've been trying to teach my grown kids a different reality. I don't lecture. I don't coerce. I just try to be peace and joy, courageous enough to face difficult situations in responsible ways, and compassionate enough to cry when I feel it. It's okay. Maybe even sweet. |
