Too early?

So much in life depends on timing. An otherwise perfect punchline, kiss, or investment, if done too soon or too late, can fail miserably. Before the small c came into our life, SW and I would often remark at the seemingly terrible timing of parents who came on morning news shows after tragedy struck their child.

We would look at these grieving people and wonder what would compel them to share these intimate and terrible feelings with the world. Maybe down the road, when it's not so raw. We always assumed that these parents did it out of some knee-jerk desire to over-share in this age of facebook and reality TV. It seemed almost obscene. 

But now SW and I find ourselves engaged in some form of this behavior. She has her blog and I have mine here. In both we share pretty intimate details of our situation. And not only that, but when I'm at work and I see a colleague for the first time since SB's diagnosis and surgery and they ask how I'm doing, I'll almost always launch into SB's story. It rarely even matters how well we know each other. 

I've been concerned from the beginning that when I do this, and when I write on this blog, that I'm needlessly exposing myself and my family, that it's just too soon to write and talk to those who aren't very close to us, that I might be just fishing for sympathy. 

In honesty, I can't rule out any of these possibilities. But I don't think that any of these accurately describes what I'm feeling when I share our unfolding story. In those one-on-one interactions with people I haven't seen since the diagnosis, I feel compelled to say something about SB because it permeates every part of my life now, and I feel that they need to know that something has fundamentally changed for me. It's as though I can only relate to another person if they can recognize that change. (And strangely there are people I've told who seem not to register the tectonic nature of this change; in this case, we just can't relate.)

But more broadly, I think the desire to share an experience like this is an almost instinctual recognition that its potentially devastating and world-shattering effects need to be repaired, and this repairing is done through talking about what is broken, missing, and dissonant. By recognizing what is shattered and what fissures have opened in our world, we can at least begin to acknowledge our new reality and make a new home here. And in rare instances, we are even able to invite others in. 

Grace period

There have been several times over the past two months when we've had to rely on institutional "grace periods." I've forgotten to pay bills, return library books, submit class grades, send off an article--the list goes on. SW pointed out last week how we've been the recipient of a much deeper sort of grace period. Too true.

An institutional grace period is a strange enough concept. Built into strict, bureaucratic, anonymous structures are these allowances for human frailty and need. The date of return is clear when we check out books. There is no room for misunderstanding. Yet, in many library systems, there is an allowance for returning books late--a period of grace shown by the library toward the library user.

For those of us who grew up in practicing Christian homes, this use of the term "grace" is deeply telling of our relations with these large institutions. Grace, as every sunday schooler knows, is the love and salvation the unworthy sinner receives from God. The special thing about grace, especially in traditional Protestant theologies, is that it flows freely to humankind even though humankind has done nothing and-- here's the kicker--cannot possibly do anything to earn or be worthy of this grace. In most of these theological systems, the sinner only has to accept such grace.

And so what sort of grace is shown to us by these bureaucratic institutions? Aren't these unmerited gifts, these periods when we are not penalized for failing to live up to the contracts we have entered in to? In a free market society such as ours, what else should we call the favors done to us? It's little wonder that we would rely on religious language when the iron-clad bureaucratic structures we live under are bent, if even for a limited "period," to make room for our human shortcomings. We experience them as moments of real humanity, of an older, now mythical communal bonding that only exists today in fits and starts in the nuclear family. But whereas the grace shown to us by our immediate family members is seen as organic (I mean, as simply part and parcel of the parent-child relationship), the grace shown to us by modern, anonymous institutions comes to us as nothing less than a secular miracle. 

It's unsettling because in the modern world we experience others (both individuals and institutions) through the logic of the balance sheet. What are our debits and credits vis a vis others? Whom do we owe and who owes us? If we choose to be lax in balancing our relational books, then we will surely fall into the red. We'll be taken for chumps. In fact, this is how we most often consciously consider institutional grace periods: periods in which an institution will allow us to take advantage of it. 

So, what about this grace period my family has been shown by those in our orbit? I must admit, it's been as overwhelmingly beautiful and profoundly moving as it has been unsettling. We've expected and received a great deal of care from our immediate families. But what leaves us speechless and tearful is the love and practical support we've received from individuals and groups whom we've known only for a short time (or sometimes not at all). These gifts are best described in terms of grace because we have surely done nothing to earn them: we have not shown that we are willing or capable of returning the favors; we have not shown that we can put the favors to good use; in some cases we have not even demonstrated our real need of the gifts (even though the need is there, I assure you). 

Isn't this what makes grace a truly sacred concept? It is a relational interaction that defies every logic we use to govern our lives in the modern world. We live in terms of contracts and exchange, even (or especially) in our social relationships. How many times will you invite me to dinner before you expect me to invite you? The social contract is not just an abstract political concept. We use it to govern our lives. But the sort of grace we've received is ignorant of this reasoning.

It's unsettling because there is no calculating logic to it. We cannot possibly balance these books. 

Empathy

A couple weeks ago, New York Times columnist David Brooks drew attention to what he calls the latest craze in American culture: empathy.

There are shelfloads of books about it: “The Age of Empathy,” “The Empathy Gap,” “The Empathic Civilization,” “Teaching Empathy.” There’s even a brain theory that we have mirror neurons in our heads that enable us to feel what’s in other people’s heads and that these neurons lead to sympathetic care and moral action.

Brooks argues that empathy, while a key ingredient in pro-social action (i.e., "sympathetic care and moral action"), is ultimately inadequate. 

The problem comes when we try to turn feeling into action. Empathy makes you more aware of other people’s suffering, but it’s not clear it actually motivates you to take moral action or prevents you from taking immoral action.

Those who turn feeling into action 

feel compelled to act by a sense of duty. Their lives are structured by sacred codes. 

He goes on to note that these codes can be religious and non-religious. Their sacredness does not emerge from some eternal, objective order, but rather comes from deeply ingrained notions of social connection and disconnection. 

Think of anybody you admire. They probably have some talent for fellow-feeling, but it is overshadowed by their sense of obligation to some religious, military, social or philosophic code. They would feel a sense of shame or guilt if they didn’t live up to the code. The code tells them when they deserve public admiration or dishonor. The code helps them evaluate other people’s feelings, not just share them. . . .
The code isn’t just a set of rules. It’s a source of identity. It’s pursued with joy. It arouses the strongest emotions and attachments. Empathy is a sideshow.

We now have had the strange but fortunate opportunity to be the sustained object of many people's empathy and "sympathetic care and moral action." In fact, if you're reading this blog, it is almost certainly the case that you have given to us in this regard. In any case, Brooks's column has stuck with me. 

Empathy for SB has been overwhelming. Whose heart doesn't break at the mention pediatric cancer? Whose breath doesn't catch when hearing of a four-and-a-half-year old boy facing a sudden life and death struggle? But empathy's fire needs tending if it's to keep its heat. Does that mean it's "a sideshow"? I think that Brooks is on to something here.

The most enduring "sympathetic care" we've been shown has come from individuals who appear to be moved by more than empathy. I'm not sure their moved by a "social code," as Brooks argues. But they at least seem to be moved by a heightened sense of who they are and who they should be. I suppose that could be a social code. Brooks says, "It's a source of identity." But the source isn't a code but rather a conception of their best selves.

Perhaps I'm projecting. Because at the end of a long day, exhausted and running on mainly on the fumes of stress and caffeine, my first reaction to SB's whininess or general recalcitrance is anger and dismissiveness. What snaps me out of it? Well, I don't always snap out of it. But when I do, it's not because I draw on an endless well of empathy in my soul. I snap out of it because I suddenly realize what the father I want to be would do. 

The worst day of my life

One of my favorite bloggers has a new regular feature in which readers ask him random questions and he answers by video. Today's question was, what was the worst day of your life? I didn't have time to watch the video but the question immediately led me to think about what most bystanders would assume to be the worst day of my life: August 5, 2011, the day SB's brain tumor was discovered.

But strangely it's not. That day, to paraphrase a famous Muslim poet and a German philologist, exists beyond good and bad, best and worst. It is impossible to properly convey. The world was never so vivid, my senses never so heightened, my life never so real and meaningful. There was never a question of what I should be doing or where I should be.

Everything was so immediate and real. Of course, it was terrifying as well. Terrifying as in causing terror. The thing about terror, though, is that it's a key element in what philosophers have called the sublime. Although there has been loads of disagreement on the concept, the definition that's stuck with me is that the sublime is the pleasure we get from being threatened and overwhelmed by nature. It is the intense feeling of the fragility of life.

In this very narrow sense, that day and the few that followed were sublime. Although our lives are now about battling, managing, problem-solving, and persevering, we are reminded occasionally of the depths and immensity of the forces we face. Our worst days are those of drudgery, not those when we are reminded how terrifying our situation really is.