The Opposite of Dancing

Context, for those who might not know: My parents are divorcing.

Because of the unseasonably warm weather this winter, I had hoped that I would escape my usual February doldrums. Not so. 

I invited Mom down for her birthday, primarily because I thought I needed to be fair since I had invited Dad for his. My sister said I was crazy, and I know she’s right. I just hate the idea of being estranged from my family; primarily because I don’t think it is “nice.” “Nice” is such a stupid, insipid idea. I guess I think that maintaining a tie with my family is more than nice… it is stability, loyalty, sense of place. Yet the visit with my mom left me bereft.

I guess that I have always been trying to make Mom and Dad what I need them to be; a real picture of a mom and dad; whatever that means. But they aren’t what I need. Unless what I need is something to rise above. 

When she left, I felt such a sense of emptiness, an infinite sadness. Futility. My great fear is that I have spent my entire life trying to be a peacemaker and healer of my parents’ relationship, costing myself my own ideas for adulthood, my own plan for a life. (Not that I had any great plans of my own...) My sister, who feels less beholden to them, has built a “real” life for herself; married, kids in the house. Sometimes I feel that my life was like that of a second child born to donate organs to a chronically or terminally ill older sibling, except the illness in this case is an illness of soul on the part of my parents. Sick and dysfunctional, I know.

So, now it feels that not only have I not succeeded in healing my parents, I have no life that is my own.

When she left town, I did not call anyone to talk. There is nothing left to say. There is nothing left but the sense of futility and emptiness. The only thing would suit is a long cry and a cuddle.

 

“I wish that I could just lay my head in your lap and cry for awhile.” But even that is denied me. As I knew it would be. And this right before Valentine’s Day. Of course.

To extend to myself a greater bit of grace, I could say that my adult life has been not a seeking of healing and peace for my parents, but a seeking of healing and peace for myself. It feels to me as if I spent my 20s trying to get my life quiet; that I have always been seeking peace. But my more honest friends have told me that I spent quite a bit of my 20s seeking fun. (Yet I find peace in fun and communion with friends.) 

It is said that Jean Vanier (a spiritual mentor to Henri Nouwen) once gave this blessing:

“May all your expectations be frustrated.
May all your plans be thwarted.
May all your desires be withered into nothingness
That you may experience the powerlessness and poverty of a child and sing and dance in the love of God the Father, the Son and the Spirit.”

But I am not singing, and I am not dancing. I am heartsick.

Maybe Lent will bring the cure.