Torn

There's nothing where he used to lie
The conversation has run dry
That's what's going on
Nothing's fine, I'm torn…


I'm all out of faith
This is how I feel

I'm cold and I am shamed,

Bound and broken on the floor…

Illusion never changed
Into something real

I’m wide awake and I can see

                                                             The perfect sky is torn…

“Torn” – Natalie Imbruglia

            There is nothing more brutal than watching children stand at the foot of their parent’s casket.  So solemn, small, and all alone.  Unable to speak.  Just tears, so many, many tears.  Our brother-in-law died.  He was 51.  He leaves behind four children.  My sister-in-law is a widow at 44 years old. 

            We didn’t see the kids as much as we wanted to because of him, and my sister-in-law as well.  He had a great heart, and was in some ways beautiful, but had no control over his mouth, his unreasonable expectations, his tortured self, and it was a bitter brew.  To have known him almost all my life—we grew up together—and know his astounding work ethic, his intelligence, his humor, his graciousness as a host, his true love of us all, and to know the other side, so dark and damaging and dominant was heart-breaking.  And our love for him was very real, and we were always torn. His childhood wounds—he lost both his parents young—were never worked through, never cleaned and bound.  He ranted and raged and took his pain out on all of us.  So we had this terrible choice to make:  try to be there, overlook the abuse, get sick and stay around, or go.  We left.  For years.  And we were always torn.

            Regret is a motherfucker.  You see the kids, the casket, and, all at once, you want to make things right, make everything all right.  And there is no way.  And you tell the kids you love them.  You tell them you are there for them.  And your nephew says, “But you weren’t around that much.  Why?  Why weren’t you around?”  And you want to die. And you can’t tell him how badly you were torn.

            My therapist told me what they tell everyone, “You cannot control anyone, only yourself.” A basic tenet of psychotherapy; too bad Woody Allen didn’t get this.  So, anyway, you choose self-preservation.  You stay away, in angst and depression, and wonder, at a time like this—when all is said and done—did that self-preservation thing feel better?  Better than you do now?  And that “I gotta put myself first” thing therapists tell us, well, how did that work out for us?  …But you weren’t around that much.  Why?... Where were you?...

            Do I feel any better now, when all has been said and done?  The answer is, I’m torn.  Yes, I feel better for not having to watch the kids being damaged.  Trust me, I was not passive when we were around.  I tried for years to do something about it, but my efforts were futile, and I was ferocious in my frustration and fears for the kids.  No, I do not feel better because I love those kids and hate the years of missing them.  But, I knew we were all limited in what we could do.  I was realistic.  We hung in there for years.  And we left when we started feeling sick inside ourselves just being there or thinking about going there.  And, I’m torn for another guilt-laden reason:  I am feeling relief that he is gone.  I am feeling a way back into the kids’ lives that his mental illness blocked for so long.  And, I’m feeling that maybe—fuck the “maybe;” this is no time for equivocation; the truth is that I believe the kids are better off without him.  I hate that. But, this is how I feel; I’m cold and I am shamed, even though I know our greatest hope for another, for any other, never changes into something real when you are wide awake…And, again I’m torn:  My sister and I lost a parent while still children ourselves, and I know that loss is primal, is, especially when relationships are contentious, forever.  I hate that they will suffer all the insufferable feelings.  I hate that we can’t do anything much about that.  And I hate that I have these awful feelings about him being gone. There is nothing more brutal than watching children stand at the foot of their parent’s casket… I live this truth.  Ann and I were those children. Loss is a motherfucker.  Guilt is a motherfucker.  And, nothing’s fine; I’m torn.

            Buddha said, “Life is difficult.”  What a fucking understatement.  LIFE  is CONFLICT, and just how much you can stand, and how much you can resolve or affect it in any way that makes the living any easier.   Life is a motherfucker.   Nobody survives it.  We search for our purpose.  We hope to make something good of our time here.  We don’t even know, empirically, if there’s a there after here; we pray there is, maybe even believe, and hope it is grand. We grope around, make mistakes, commit our sins, make amends, fall and fail, resound, succeed, witness miracles—even make them, seek to grow, be our best selves (if we are somewhat alright in the head), are funny, crazy, selfish, self-less. We are amazing.  We are all this, do all this without ever truly knowing to what end in the end.  So, I am really not all out of faith; I mean, look, the Republicans just went out to dinner with the President, gay marriage is gaining tremendous support and acceptance, most of us don’t want a crazy person to get a gun, even if it means delving into private mental health histories and making legal gun-getting harder, and I have had a full human experience, ever-growing compassion, and a deep ability to love and love more, love better, despite my early, primal loss, and, probably, because of it.

           

            Hemingway said, and I paraphrase, “Life breaks everyone, and some of us get stronger in the broken places.”   Breakdowns give us the chance to rise up.  Shatterings can let the light in.  We, all of us, are torn.  And where the heart has been rent, love finds its place to repair.  That is not just a wish.  It is my belief.   It is what I have lived.  And, for our little ones, it will be, although and because they are torn.