How to keep a world

The other day one of SBs school friends came over for a play date. (SB is unable to go to school right now because of all his appointments and his new and changing physical disabilities). The friend's dad and I chatted outside in the backyard as the kids played. He told me how devastated he and his wife were when they heard the news of SB's tumor. This has been a common refrain from other parents. I've crafted a response for these situations in which I thank them for their thoughts and support. I tell them how strong SB has been and how hopeful and positive we feel about the situation. It usually ends with the other party asking about the latest treatments and such, and wishing us well.

This one went differently.

The dad said, "When you hear about something like this, I just don't know how you make sense of it. I mean, you don't want this to happen to anybody. But a 4 year old kid? How can God allow this to happen? How do you keep a world together when this happens?"

How to keep a world together. I loved this turn of phrase because, as a cultural researcher, I'm fascinated in how individuals keep their worlds together. One of the enduring findings of cultural research is that individuals maintain their "worlds" (by which we mean their sense of identity, purpose, meaning, orientation) by being embedded in communities. In this way, there is no such thing as a pure individual. Even the idea of individuality arises only through communities.

So, this question of how to keep a world together in the face of something as senseless as this hit me with some weight. I struggled to formulate a concise answer, and while I was fumbling my words I realized how central my academic research has been to my coping. (Disclaimer: The Wife [TW] also studied cultural theory and so I should say OUR academic research and OUR coping.) I know in my bones that nothing makes sense--not triumphs nor tragedies--without social connections. And so when cancer came to visit us, TW and I both instinctively knew we had to reach out and hold on--to each other, to our families, to our friends, to whomever we safely could.

We are not institutionally religious people, but directly next door to us in the hospital's PICU was the infant granddaughter of the personal assistant to an internationally-known megachurch pastor. You'd know him. Anyway, our families connected because of shared faith and one evening, an assistant pastor from this church was visiting next door and came by before leaving. He said he'd heard of what we were going through and wanted to pray with us.

I was the only one in the room at the time. I thought about it for a split second: I'm not formally religious, we would never agree on the meaning of this situation, or the efficacy of his prayers. But he was willing to reach out and I knew that I needed to reach out. He held my hands as SB was sleeping and said what I remember to be a quite lengthy prayer. It built, as a good sermon does, to a crescendo in which the pastor was begging God--I remember he said, "like a child tugging on the pant legs of his daddy"--to heal my son. I felt a strange distance to myself: I was crying and simultaneously analyzing my tears. Why was I crying? I don't believe in this sort of religious supplication. Yet, it's literally bringing me to tears.

I think the answer is that the pastor helped me "keep a world together" that night. The objective reality of his actions--whether prayer is real--isn't the issue. The meaning of his actions, how they helped me understand and make meaning out of our situation, was the real issue. The imagery of the child tugging on dad's pant legs, stuck with me for several days. It was both comforting and challenging. It was comforting because it made all my vague feelings of helplessness more concrete, more obvious, and thus less powerful. The more concrete and recognizable the feelings, the less power they had over me. But this imagery was also challenging because I didn't want to be a child in this situation. I have a child and he's sick, and he needs me to be an adult, a parent, a man.

So, how did I answer my friend on the back porch that afternoon? How does one keep a world together in this situation? That will be the subject for another blog post...