As I was trying to prepare
this speech for Father's day, I had a dream. In this dream I saw
my father in a battle field and I was thinking how the war influenced
him and indirectly influenced me through him.
My father seemed to lack some
human emotions, or more like emotions didn't affect his actions.
He might show anger but his body was completely limp when he did.
No clenched jaw, no raised voice. I couldn't imagine him doing
harm to others because he was angry. Violence was wiped out in him.
He also had a distinctive gentleness
in any situation. He seemed to be holding everything lightly.
He was almost killed three
times in the war. He also saw so many deaths. On Saipan
island where he was sent in the summer of 1944, more than 90% of over
thirty thousand Japanese troops perished in a relatively short battle
that lasted about three weeks.
Later in my life when I thought
about the peculiarity of my father's character, I imagined most of
his human emotions must have bottomed out. Emotions that make
human existence heavy were gone and he became light.
Although I appreciated his
lightness, I felt ignored by him since he wasn't showing much interest
in whatever I was doing.
Once in high school I consulted
him about an English language question, knowing he was using his English
skills in his career. He simply said, "Look in the dictionary."
In my twenties, I realized
I wasn't good at learning from personal interactions with teachers.
I thought this came from the lack of teacher-student relationship in
my early years with my father.
I attributed his reluctance to teach to the war, too. After our devastating defeat, our country shifted from emperor worship to democracy in about two weeks. He must have felt he couldn't trust any authority enough to teach anything to his children based on that authority.
When I had my own son, I found
myself more interested in what he did than my father was with me.
And yet, many times he would come to me to show something and I would
ignore him. I wondered if I was doing to him what my father had
done to me.
I also noticed in my son a
similar difficulty of learning from a teacher. He wants to figure
out things by himself.
When I gave advice to him on
soccer technique, his answer was consistently "no" even when he
was very young, way before the rebellious teenage years. He might
incorporate my advice after a few weeks of his own thinking, but his
answer at the time was always "no."
Recently I am realizing maybe
I have been putting too much significance on the war's influence on
my father. It was a tremendous experience, but the way he was
shaped by it was unique to him.
He could have lived his life
as a sorry fellow who lost his will to live in that tragic experience,
or he could have lived an angry life blaming those who caused the tragedy,
or he could have lived in abject misery from survivor's guilt, but
he didn't. He just lived a remarkably normal life.
My father, I, and my son, all
seem to share this peculiar type of independence. Sometimes it
benefits us, like when my father survived when almost everybody else
perished. Sometimes it gives us troubles because it hinders learning
and teaching through personal connections with teachers and students.
The three of us grew up in
vastly different environments: my father in a remote mountain
village, I in post war Tokyo and Osaka, and my son in the age of computers
and internet and ipods in the United Sates.
But perhaps we can learn from
each other's life experiences if we stop focusing so much on the differences
in our environments and examine the way we respond to them.
The parable of the Prodigal
son is a good story for kids, I think it is one better appreciated as
an adult. People, esp. kids, can appreciate the older son's
annoyance - a very understandable human reaction in that situation.
But as a parent, I can now better appreciate the unconditional love
of the father for the younger son. It is as a father, I came to
truly understand the meaning of unconditional love - that no matter
how frustrated you might be, your love endures.
I have a few small stories
to share:
From my childhood, thinking
about my father, I often find that I value the little things he taught
me, like learning to use a lawn mower, or learning to skip stones at
the beach.
You can read more about this
in my newsletter column next month, but on a recent trip to the Oregon
coast, I was feeling a little frustrated, and so I decided to try skipping
some stones.
My father taught me to skip
stones when I was about Anna's age. I've always enjoyed skipping
stones, but I never have had much success at it - skipping stones
is something I've found deceptively difficult.
But on that particular day
in Lincoln City, to my pleasant surprise, my stones skimmed the water,
bouncing quite a few times over the water before sinking.
That day, skipping stones was
a valuable and meditative practice. And I thank my father for
the intuitive wisdom to know that learning how to skip stones is a good
and useful thing.
Another scene that sticks with
me is my father and my grandfather (my mother's father) discussing
politics. My grandfather was a big fan of Ronald Reagan.
My father was not a fan of President Reagan. But both my father
and grandfather always found a way to discuss President Reagan, or budget
cuts, or taxes with courtesy, so that, from an early age, I saw that
people could disagree about politics, or anything, and do it in a respectful
and even friendly way.
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Anna was born in 2000, and
being a father in the 21st century has been an interesting
and challenging experience. Expectations for fatherhood have been
evolving. My grandmothers and my mother were the primary child
caregivers. My grandfathers and my father were definitely involved
with their families, but there was never any question that I would seek
to be more involved with parenting. But traditions change slowly,
and, since I was working full time, Laura was doing more of the parenting.
Still, as Laura faced recovery
from a c-section and post-partum depression and other challenges of
motherhood, I found myself scrambling to be as involved as I could when
I wasn't at work. Making dinner, bathing Anna, singing lullabies
at all hours of the night to put Anna to sleep, over and over again.
I had quite a good repertoire of lullabies, and at 3 or 4 in the morning,
I would convince myself I was a pretty good singer.
Working full time while Laura
was part time, I often felt that I missed out on so many things that
Anna was doing. I also missed out on a lot of diapers and tantrums.
But I had my share of special moments:
As Anna was getting close to
crawling, we were wondering when she would finally do it. Then
one day, when I came home from work, Anna was sitting on our living
room floor and saw me walk in to the room, and immediately crawled to
me. I really appreciated that.
I've been continuously fascinated
with the development of a child. Helping Anna learn to walk, and
talk, and especially to read, has been amazing. Teaching her to
swing a bat and hit a baseball and run around our imaginary bases has
been it's own special joy.
Several memories relate to
elections: the night of the 2000 election, Anna was only 8 or
9 weeks old. She woke up, as she often did, around 4 am, and I
was trying to rock her back to sleep, and I turned on the TV so see
if anything new was happening with the election, only to find that no
one knew what was going on and it was a mess. I remember the sense
of bewilderment at what was happening, and laughing at Dan Rather's
bizarre metaphors about the craziness of that night.
The night of the 2008 election,
we made sure Anna watched the results with us, and watched Barack Obama's
speech, and we told her to remember because she was watching history.
Then, I managed to volunteer in Anna's classroom for Inauguration
Day to help teach the class about what was happening.
Being in the classroom that day was an attempt to be like my father and grandfather debating politics respectfully, to show by example what I think is important
Someone is always asking me, aren't I proud to be the parent of my daughter. It happened at the time of her birth, and now again as she is excelling in school.
From my point of view, it is the wrong question, with the wrong word involved, and certainly asked to the wrong person.
Here's why, for two reasons. First of all, it isn't really a question. There is a cultural assumption embedded in those words that, of course, I must be proud, and therefore what I am really being asked to respond to is nothing about me, and certainly not my daughter, but to be in agreement with this culture's norms about fathers, males, and parenting dads.
Secondly, and more important, the word proud to my ears puts the emphasis on me rather than my kid, and if it's so great that she's been born or is doing so well in school, why do I need the praise and not her.
My whole deal with being a parent has been to make sure my daughter thrives. What happens with me, I could care less about to a great extent. But with her, I have been the provider of possibility in her life -- and here I'm not just talking economically. In order that her world be a strong one, not just for my daughter, but all her contemporaries, it necessitates an understanding of that world, and how she can contribute to it in a good way. So she and I have talked politics, and economics, and religion, and interpersonal everything from the beginning; what my kid lacked in goo-goo from me was made up for in global warming, Grapes of Wrath, God, and gratitude for family and friends.
Is it any wonder then that this child brings an engaged-with-the-world perspective to her life. But it is not because I'm calling every shot. I have given her a framework, but she is in charge of her own choices. For instance, she is a committed member of her high school's Gay Straight Alliance, and to such an extent that you might wonder -- if she's not gay, what's in it for her... Well, if you ask her, she'll tell you something about the importance of all people being treated equally. Does that sound familiar to your ears... How about the first principle of Unitarian Universalism: we affirm and promote the inherent worth and dignity of every person. She's just putting that into practice.
My daughter's also on the honor roll at school. Has been forever, and will be forever. It is an interesting question to think about as to how come. And it's a question that I don't know I've asked her directly about. But here's my guess as to what her answer might include. She cares about herself and the world, and she wants to make a difference. A sloppy strategy won't get her there. Perhaps there are another half-a-dozen reasons as well, but I think that one would be pretty close to her bottom line.
And here's a third thing to say about my daughter: she's way involved with the Unitarian Universalist church. I know what her answer to the question why would be on this one, even if I wouldn't necessarily say it in the same words. What she experiences in being engaged with other UU youth is a community of love. Sound too simple... I can assure that it is not. Love with a capital L is probably the basis of every religion, and this one no less than others. In fact, I describe this church as a laboratory for Love, not that I always pass the class. So it is no surprise that she finds that community totally central to her life. I think she has a handle on what all of us, one way or another, are doing in this building on Sunday mornings. And therefore it also shouldn't surprise you that she's interested in becoming a Unitarian Universalist minister. If this path is so good, why not immerse yourself in it and make it your life's work.
Given all of the above, here's what I can say about my kid other than I'm proud of her. How about I'm thrilled by what she's up to in the world. I'm inspired by her choices of what she cares about, her commitment to herself and others, her decision to become a vegetarian because of the inhumane treatment of animals raised for food, and, here's one that's maybe the best -- I like and respect her friends, even her boyfriends (who come from that same UU community by the way). I'm also in awe of her ability to pull it all off.
As for proud -- you know that word comes with a bad reputation in this culture. It's said that it precedes a fall, and understandably so. I say we can it. And why anyone would want to pin it on me or someone else is understandable on the one hand, if she or he has never thought about it, but once having heard what I have to say here, I at least don't expect to hear it directed toward me by any of you.
It's like when I tell people that I have a teenage daughter, and the eyes begin to roll, and the snickers start, and the predictions rattle forth about all the difficulties I'm going to encounter with raising this child. That kind of thinking, so widespread, and so inaccurate and limiting, does something harmful: it keeps girls, and women, and men in their place.