I have not been good about regular posting in the last two weeks. There's a lot going on.
The hospital where I practice is not doing well. They have lost the confidence of the physicians. Their competitor has a group employed model that is very attractive. I have told my partner of 13 years I will be leaving, and I hope to become part of this employed group.
My daughter is going to Auburn. We leave this Friday. When we come back, there will only be three of us. This is what I have prepared her for all her short life. I want her to go to college. I have encouraged her in school, tried to give her moral values, taught her caution and fostered her judgment. She is as ready as anyone I have ever seen. She has her insecurities and fantasies about college, and she will have to learn in her own way and time that both of these are false.
I am the one suffering. I am not prepared for her to go to college. In my typical, decathected way, I have done the job I set out to do, and paid no attention to my feelings, until now, when they wash over me like a tsunami. I don't want her to leave. In saying this I am not proud, and know I am being needy and self-centered. I don't want her to leave for a couple of reasons.
First, she is genuinely likable, a great part of our home. She is funny. She is observant and bright. She does the most devastating imitation of me, one that can only be based in love, but also in insight and observation. She has made more odd faces than any person I have ever known, and that includes my wife. We have very few pictures of her just smiling. She is helpful and kind.
Second, and most pathological, I know what life with a home of three is like. One of my more prominent memories is sitting down to dinner after my father died. My mother sat in her chair for a couple of weeks, and then naturally and silently simply sat down in my father's chair one evening. And that is where she stayed. I got used to three at the table, but it was very sad. My father was more naturally cheerful and funny than my mother. My mother could break into shouting and lecturing without warning. Many meals were eaten not exactly in fear, but in resignation.
It is perfectly ridiculous to associate that with my wife and son. We are completely different, and we have eaten together many times. I know we lost my father involuntarily, while Kelly is leaving voluntarily. I know all this. But I can't get fully away from a fear of a table of three.
A third, and even less valid reason to be upset, is that I never expected to see this. I expected to be dead, and without transplant or dialysis, I would be dead right now. This is the first milestone of an extended life. It is welcome of course, but in the all-too-human way, I am upset by a good thing because I remember the bad. I can't quite get out of what M. Scott Peck calls the old road maps. I can't speak for anyone else, but it is very difficult to forget old patterns, old truths, values instilled through fear, beatings, teasing, multiple repetitions.
My received and learned reality is that I will die young and horribly. My daughter going to college conflicts with that inculcated and entrenched reality, and so it is upsetting even while it is good.
I imagine people raised in poverty experience this problem if they are suddenly wealthy, especially if they are wealthy through fame. One of the lines in the Gospel of Thomas gets at this in a different setting. 'That this wealth can dwell in this poverty is a miracle' (referring to the spirit dwelling within the flesh).
The richness of this experience is being lived out in a soul that expects death, trouble, sadness. It is quite surprisingly difficult to accept and live happiness. My daughter writes songs. Yesterday I was recording some of them for her. One of them is about her fear of leaving home, which has made everyone who hears it cry, including me. The refrain line is 'Mommy, Daddy- I'm so scared'. So am I.
Ted
The hospital where I practice is not doing well. They have lost the confidence of the physicians. Their competitor has a group employed model that is very attractive. I have told my partner of 13 years I will be leaving, and I hope to become part of this employed group.
My daughter is going to Auburn. We leave this Friday. When we come back, there will only be three of us. This is what I have prepared her for all her short life. I want her to go to college. I have encouraged her in school, tried to give her moral values, taught her caution and fostered her judgment. She is as ready as anyone I have ever seen. She has her insecurities and fantasies about college, and she will have to learn in her own way and time that both of these are false.
I am the one suffering. I am not prepared for her to go to college. In my typical, decathected way, I have done the job I set out to do, and paid no attention to my feelings, until now, when they wash over me like a tsunami. I don't want her to leave. In saying this I am not proud, and know I am being needy and self-centered. I don't want her to leave for a couple of reasons.
First, she is genuinely likable, a great part of our home. She is funny. She is observant and bright. She does the most devastating imitation of me, one that can only be based in love, but also in insight and observation. She has made more odd faces than any person I have ever known, and that includes my wife. We have very few pictures of her just smiling. She is helpful and kind.
Second, and most pathological, I know what life with a home of three is like. One of my more prominent memories is sitting down to dinner after my father died. My mother sat in her chair for a couple of weeks, and then naturally and silently simply sat down in my father's chair one evening. And that is where she stayed. I got used to three at the table, but it was very sad. My father was more naturally cheerful and funny than my mother. My mother could break into shouting and lecturing without warning. Many meals were eaten not exactly in fear, but in resignation.
It is perfectly ridiculous to associate that with my wife and son. We are completely different, and we have eaten together many times. I know we lost my father involuntarily, while Kelly is leaving voluntarily. I know all this. But I can't get fully away from a fear of a table of three.
A third, and even less valid reason to be upset, is that I never expected to see this. I expected to be dead, and without transplant or dialysis, I would be dead right now. This is the first milestone of an extended life. It is welcome of course, but in the all-too-human way, I am upset by a good thing because I remember the bad. I can't quite get out of what M. Scott Peck calls the old road maps. I can't speak for anyone else, but it is very difficult to forget old patterns, old truths, values instilled through fear, beatings, teasing, multiple repetitions.
My received and learned reality is that I will die young and horribly. My daughter going to college conflicts with that inculcated and entrenched reality, and so it is upsetting even while it is good.
I imagine people raised in poverty experience this problem if they are suddenly wealthy, especially if they are wealthy through fame. One of the lines in the Gospel of Thomas gets at this in a different setting. 'That this wealth can dwell in this poverty is a miracle' (referring to the spirit dwelling within the flesh).
The richness of this experience is being lived out in a soul that expects death, trouble, sadness. It is quite surprisingly difficult to accept and live happiness. My daughter writes songs. Yesterday I was recording some of them for her. One of them is about her fear of leaving home, which has made everyone who hears it cry, including me. The refrain line is 'Mommy, Daddy- I'm so scared'. So am I.
Ted
A moving post. Thanks for putting all those wrenching emotions into words.
ReplyDeleteDavid