“My child, in life ahead of you, keep your capacity for faith and belief, but let your judgment watch what you believe. Keep your love of life, but throw away your fear of death. Life must be loved or it is lost... Keep your wonder at great and noble things, like sunlight and thunder, the rain and the stars, and the greatness of heroes. Keep your heart hungry for new knowledge. Keep your hatred of a lie, and keep your power of indignation... I am ashamed to leave you in an uncomfortable world, but someday it will be better. And when that day comes, you will thank God for the greatest blessing a man can receive: living in peace.”
- letter from a Yugoslav soldier in World War II to his unborn child
There are thoughts that strike your brain in life. Original, bolt from the blue type stuff that haunts your mind and hangs about your shoulders forever like either a mantle of greatness, or Coleridge's albatross. I remember one inky, humid central Florida night of too much wine and conversation alternating between work, theology and late nineties Gen X angst I said to a close friend “I hope that life brings me wisdom without bringing too much pain with it.”
One thing is for sure, the soldier quoted above, soon to die without meeting his child, never had to pray for wisdom. Like many of the 'greatest generation,' his mettle had been tempered and hardened in the forge of two world wars and a worldwide depression.
This has been a horrendous year for both of us. Both for reasons covered in this blog, and others unmentioned. A really, really stinky year. I'm looking forward to a much better 2009. Hell, I'm just looking forward to 2008 being over. I just hope it did its job... getting me a little closer to good Dad potential.
Part two of the worry that GreenEggsNHam often sees as I stare off into space is the world we'll raise a child in. Things are pretty bad. Without giving too much info, let's just say I am on the front lines of the financial part of the mess we find ourselves in. As bad as the media makes it sound, believe me, it has downside potential.
There you have it. Id, dukkha, theodicy, whatever name your frame of reference bestows upon it, I have exposed the glittering black insect of fear on the underbelly of my soul; will I be as good of a Dad as needed for the times we are in.
Sigh.
How dramatic.
Anyhow, here's what I know... Ukulele will have two parents who completely and totally dig each other. She'll be frequently embarrassed by random songs made up on the spot in honor of our house pets. She will have to endure us holding hands and many other forms of PDA. She'll have to tolerate the nightly flying of the housecat, and made up words, and LOTS of football. ...and she'll be the luckiest little girl on earth.
That's just my two cents... ignore it all, it could be the Benadryl talking.
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1 comment:
Hi Gatorman!
It took an awfully long time for the "someday it will be better" to genuinely come true in Yugoslavia. I hope that child lived to see it.
I've been to most of the former Yugoslav republics, and several of them are among my favorite countries in the world. But oh man, the 20th century really put them through the ringer.
Here's to 2009.
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