Reflections (Jim)
Right Now 12/15/2005
Right now reminds me to a great extent of my life after college. Working at Rockwell International, a job I hated to survive, is like Lowe’s. Only now I don’t know if Lowe’s will ever go away. At Rockwell they said I could afford to be the rebel but they had to be sheep because eventually management would get me if I stayed, as they must. But my rebellion is not with work and authority now as it was then. Perhaps I’m meant to be a tentmaker, like apostle Paul, or a carpenter, like Jesus, while I do my real life’s work outside of how I make my living, like most people do.
Now also reminds me of then in that I’m coming out of a great disillusionment. I admit I have a little bit of the Danny Thomas syndrome, where if God makes me great, I promise I’ll build him a great shrine (St. Jude’s). But at 49 I accept that my heyday, to be noticed, is past, and that my contributions will be modest. But unlike then, they will be mine now. Work will never consume me again, as it eventually did.
At 40, facing suicide, I knew what I had to do, to live. I had to find a way to give back. So if it’s not in how I make a living then in some other way. If licensure doesn’t let me do the work I must do, then outside that path too. How doesn’t matter. Versus back then, after college, I had to find a way to fit in. Back then it was survival. Now it is about my meaning, about who I am.
What was it that I needed to survive anyhow, that had run out at 40, that I’ve sought all my life? It is to belong. It’s the basis for everything I do or have ever done. It’s not why I must now give back though. I have to give back to life because it’s something I now feel part of.
Yet strangely enough, I still live so distant and detached, like it’s my nature now. Atlanta feels painfully far from family now, but it is home too. It’s my siblings children I most fear. My namesake, my gay Uncle Jim, is just the same way as me here. He too felt deeply estranged from his father. I live quite vicariously. If it wasn’t for friends, I’d do nothing but work.
My father changed over night into a deeply compassionate, sensitive man, when facing cancer for the first time 13 long years ago. He remained unnatural and awkward with it, but didn’t care from then on. He stayed deeply connected and expressive of it from then on. To let myself belong fully would be to deeply let go.
Right now reminds me to a great extent of my life after college. Working at Rockwell International, a job I hated to survive, is like Lowe’s. Only now I don’t know if Lowe’s will ever go away. At Rockwell they said I could afford to be the rebel but they had to be sheep because eventually management would get me if I stayed, as they must. But my rebellion is not with work and authority now as it was then. Perhaps I’m meant to be a tentmaker, like apostle Paul, or a carpenter, like Jesus, while I do my real life’s work outside of how I make my living, like most people do.
Now also reminds me of then in that I’m coming out of a great disillusionment. I admit I have a little bit of the Danny Thomas syndrome, where if God makes me great, I promise I’ll build him a great shrine (St. Jude’s). But at 49 I accept that my heyday, to be noticed, is past, and that my contributions will be modest. But unlike then, they will be mine now. Work will never consume me again, as it eventually did.
At 40, facing suicide, I knew what I had to do, to live. I had to find a way to give back. So if it’s not in how I make a living then in some other way. If licensure doesn’t let me do the work I must do, then outside that path too. How doesn’t matter. Versus back then, after college, I had to find a way to fit in. Back then it was survival. Now it is about my meaning, about who I am.
What was it that I needed to survive anyhow, that had run out at 40, that I’ve sought all my life? It is to belong. It’s the basis for everything I do or have ever done. It’s not why I must now give back though. I have to give back to life because it’s something I now feel part of.
Yet strangely enough, I still live so distant and detached, like it’s my nature now. Atlanta feels painfully far from family now, but it is home too. It’s my siblings children I most fear. My namesake, my gay Uncle Jim, is just the same way as me here. He too felt deeply estranged from his father. I live quite vicariously. If it wasn’t for friends, I’d do nothing but work.
My father changed over night into a deeply compassionate, sensitive man, when facing cancer for the first time 13 long years ago. He remained unnatural and awkward with it, but didn’t care from then on. He stayed deeply connected and expressive of it from then on. To let myself belong fully would be to deeply let go.
posted by LifeWriter at 6:31 PM
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