I came from good people.
I didn't always know that.
You know, it's funny. When I was 18 I sustained an eye injury. (Okay, maybe it wasn't THAT funny.) The coral I was sterilizing for my fish tank overheated and exploded. I was hit in the eye, scratching my cornea and the rebound of the hit resulted in what the medical folks among you will recognize as a contra-coup lesion of my retina. Think of it like whiplash of the eye...it gets smashed in and then snaps forward and the snapping forward part was strong enough to cause a bit of a tear at the back of my eyeball.
That wasn't the significant part though. The significant part was when the doctor told me I had "the retinas of a 60 year old." During the exam they discovered I had little deposits on both my retina, called drusen, that signify the early stages of macular degeneration. Macular degeneration is a condition that ultimately results in a person losing the center of their field of vision so they can only see things around the edges or periphery. At 42, I still see fine. Full field of vision. No need for you to worry. (You were a little worried, weren't you?)
Well, I realize that there is actually a lot to be said for peripheral vision and that's how I discovered that I came from good people.
When you look at my parents straight on, this is what you might see: My father is a retired heating and air conditioning wholesaler from the South Side of Chicago. He's mostly a hermit who is happy with his dogs and his garden. He doesn't call. He's not a social butterfly. Never a gabby man, his hearing loss has made him even less so over the years. My mom had 4 kids and a high school education and when the apartment complex she worked for was bought out by a new company and she was let go the only job she could find at age 60 was as a pit clerk in a casino in Northwest Indiana.
Pretty simple people, really. You might notice them shopping at Sears or seated at the table next to you at The Wagon Wheel ordering the Country Breakfast.
But when you start to shift your gaze, you see in my father a man who passed up a chance to attend the Art Institute of Chicago to run a heating and air conditioning warehouse so he could support his family. You'd see a 73 year old man who still talks to his best friend from 1st grade nearly every day. A man with the touch of St. Francis (his name is Frank by the way) who could probably get a grizzly bear to eat from his hand. And you would see in my mother a woman who turned away from a full college scholarship because she wanted to be a mom. And you'd hear her laugh. And you'd notice how no matter where she went somehow people in need would always see that she was someone who would listen to them and they would readily seek her advice. You'd see a woman who, although she can't always afford it, appreciates craftsmanship and quality and the history behind an artfully wrought object.
Article comments
1 - Geek's Girl
What a lolvey,well written piece. A pleasure to read, thank you.
2 - gypsyman
I know there is something I should say to you about this post, but it's not coming easy. I'm probably trying to hard to see it.
Both of your parents sound like extremely gifted individuals for being able to recognize love in all it's many shapes and sizes and how to share it with others.
My wife is quite similar in that she will sit on the street with a homeless person and talk without any self consceousness or effort. She says it makes her feel like she has acomplished something real if she can touch a person's life through whatever personal hell they might be living.
Like your father she is able to have wild creatures come up to her and feed. If we go for a walk we usually have to tell all the cats who have followed us home that they can't come in.
To be able to offer genuine unconditional love to the world is a wonderful gift, but like all gifts is two sided. The other edge of the knife is the amount of pain these empathic people could potentialy be feeling at any time.
When you love that much you also feel the pain of others with equal intensity. When you live with a person who feels that much pain you have to be prepared for the depth of their emotion and how it will affect you. They need uncoditional love to prevent them from becoming sick.
I'm not like my wife, except for being able to provide her with what she needs, perhaps in the case of your parents, who were so alike, neither was able to offer the other the support they needed.
You are a very wise woman to have learned those lessons. So many people see the actions of people like your parents as abnormal and dismiss them as strange.
Thank you so much for telling this story today.
gypsyman
3 - Laura Young
Thank you both for your kind comments. gyspyman, you are right...when you open up you open up to everything. It takes a lot of work to be healthy in that. It's hard to keep your heart open no matter what. I'm committed to living that way but there are certainly easier paths. But none quite so rewarding...