For me...

A year ago I said out loud that I would like to move. I’ve been commuting 40 minutes to work and 75+ home for EIGHTEEN YEARS. I’ve never in my life spoken up for what I wanted. Never KNOWN what I wanted. Then a year ago I said out loud that I would like to move. My desire immediately took on life. My kids connected to it. We started to hunt. Surely, God would hear my first gentle wish and let me have it easily? It took a year. Agony. Ups and downs. I felt an unfamiliar surge of hope a hundred times. I gave up a hundred times. Wanting something. Everyone KNOWING I wanted something was excruciating. Like standing on a stage in the spotlight when what I know is sitting in the back row in the dark. We decided to give up at the end of the month and then it all fell into place. Someone LOVED our home and wanted it. We found the best home we had looked at in the whole year. And it all worked out. My kids heard what I wanted and worked for it. Tina heard what I wanted and gave up everything for me. For me...

Resonance

Play a G on the bassoon and the G string on the guitar vibrates. Each room has it's own pitch. Play that note and the room rings. Just music? Wind past a bridge at just the wrong speed and the bridge resonates. Concrete and steel turned to dust. Powerful. I find that I resonate at the wrong pitch. I read a story to my kids that I thought was beautiful. When I heard it through their ears I realized it was depressing. I played them a piece of music I thought was sweet and realized it was the sound of despair. I'm tuned to depression. The sounds of happiness grate my nerves. How can I tighten the strings and raise the pitch?

innocent and sweet and fun

I’ve always hated holidays. When I was a kid my mother made a big fuss on birthdays and Christmas. She would decorate, make a cake, plan gifts. But it was a lie. Our home was bleak and angry and violent. My mother would be in bed when I left for school and in bed when I got home. In her nightgown for days. Or she would be gone when I got home. She would be absent and then suddenly angry. Always at me. Then the perfect holidays. She made me bring her tea on a tray in bed. It had to be the way she liked it. Half-and-half in a little blue and white pitcher. But it was just a matter of time before something ruined the day. Something failed to be perfect. Then it was my fault.

But one of Tina’s amazing qualities is loving and creating beautiful holidays. Every birthday is special. Thoughtful, beautiful, delightful. But for years, especially after the church blowup when I was depressed, I dreaded every event. For two years I had a migraine on EVERY holiday. But, the events are so good and the children are so wonderful that they have been winning me over. For a while I hated them AND loved them. Smiling through the migraine. Seeing that my people are precious and being glad they were happy, but suffering myself. Yesterday we celebrated the twins’ 10th and it was perfect. Not the perfect show of my childhood, but real perfect. Innocent and sweet and fun. Bobbing for apples. Soccer with the neighbors. A piñata in the shape of a kiwi. Smiling children. I loved it.

sulking in the back seat

When Drew was 13 I used to take him with me whenever I went out somewhere in the car. Sometimes, he would sit in the back seat and sulk. Refuse to even speak. I would joke with him, try to plan part of the outing he would like. I would talk to him as if he wasn’t sulking and try to draw him out of it. He would just glare at me in the mirror. I couldn’t understand it. I grew up without a father. Drew had a nice father who wanted to be with him, but he didn’t know it. He treated me like an enemy.

At the same time, Siri was 11 and LOVED to go anywhere with me. She was cheerful, talkative and happy. Same dad, same car, same situation.

Drew got over it, but I think I’m still doing it. Sulking in the back seat, not knowing how to enjoy. Not knowing that I am loved and could be happy. I’m trying really hard to change.

it slips away

I found my father’s briefcase in the basement. Musty black leather. Inside, his perfect block lettering. Drawings he made. He drew so well. Some part of me longs to be like him. Which part draws me? Alcoholism? Wife battering? Abandoning his kids? Suicide? Some part of me misses him and wants to be like him. I don’t have any bad feelings toward him. I’ve never been angry with him or felt any judgement toward him.

And then there is me. I do something good, something kind, something smart, and I feel good. For ten minutes. An hour. Then it slips away and I’m sick of myself again. My easiest emotional reaction to myself is condemnation. It is so easy to judge myself. Lazy. Fat. Stupid. Boring. My brain tries to tell me I am a good father, a good husband. Interesting. But some part of me wants to suffer. It crushes me. Ruins my sleep. Follows me everywhere I go and judges everything I do. Not creative enough. Doesn't matter. Pathetic. I deserve to suffer. But I don’t know why. My brain sees that my father failed. That I am succeeding in many ways, but it doesn’t reach the part of me that hates me. If it were anyone else judging themselves so cruelly I would be kind to them. I would tell them they were good. Brilliant. Wonderful. Why am I the only one in the world that doesn’t deserve any kindness? I don’t know what to do about it.

her eyes shined

In 2013 I went to Guatemala with my 18 year old daughter. One day we were in a rural area visiting some families that do not speak Spanish, but a dialect that I couldn't understand a word of. While the grownups talked, I went outside to see the kids. None of the kids we visited had fathers and I decided that I was going to completely let go and put in my eyes as much delight and enjoyment as I could possible give them. Actually, it was less like putting and more like letting go. I played with them, swung them around, hung them upside down. Never spoke a word. Looked them in the eye and smiled at them. There was one girl in particular. Seven years old. It took me 30 minutes to coax her out to play with me and her brother. Smiling and waving to show her it was safe. When she joined us we threw a small thing like a hula hoop back and forth for almost an hour. Every time I looked at her I allowed my full heart to show. She had the most beautiful smile. Her eyes shined. She saw in my eyes that she was beautiful. Right now I can feel her in my chest. Little girls see in our eyes that they are lovely and that's how they know they are lovely.

how hard her life was

My father was interested in man things. He was a test-pilot, rode a motorcycle, drove a sports car, drank beer, watched football, collected guns. After he died we had no money. He was living with a woman who fought my mother in court for his estate. Said she was his common-law wife. As a result we had no money. Food was an issue. One day my mother took one of his guns out of her closet. She sat me and my brother on her bed. She tried to kill all three of us. She couldn't follow through, but she tried. Sobbing. She would sometimes tell us about it later. To show how hard her life was.

i'd rather suffer

I really struggle with inconsistency. There are days when I am brilliant. Interesting. But most days I am mediocre. Dull. Stupid. The bad days scare me. They seem more real. I sit in my cubicle by myself and try to use self-talk to remember how to be interesting. It doesn't work. I want to be happy. My family needs me to be happy. But I hate myself so much that nothing moves. I have so many reasons to condemn myself. It's easy. Almost pleasant. Downhill the whole way. The world seems so black and empty in those moments.

I know the answer. It is so simple. Confidence. When I believe that I am special, I am. Confidence is such a mystery to me. The world is full of men that are confident. But they rape and kill and hate. They do harm and feel put out when everyone fails to bow to them. I am a man that cares. For women. For children. For hurting people. Even in my black moments I know this. If only I could use their trick. Tap into confidence and move through the world without doubt and fear. I would be a force for good. But somehow, in a way that seems stupid even to me, I don't trust it. Confidence, deep down, feels like the path to being one of them. It feels like if even if I could stop constantly questioning myself and judging myself I would become an asshole. Another arrogant man that takes and hurts and then leaves. I'd rather suffer.