Days of Profound Gratitude - Thursday, 30 June 2011 - Part I

Days of Profound Gratitude – Thursday, 30 June 2011 – Part I

Following the previous late evening's thunder showers in which my family and I were thoroughly drenched and forced into surrendering our dogged pursuit of serendipitous bargains at outlet stores while on vacation, the Thursday morning of June 30th began as an average day in the ""Low Country" of South Carolina. Weather wise, the seasonal four "Hs" (hazy, hot and high humidity) appropriately describe the sweltering and energy draining temperatures of a typical summer day in the Mid-Atlantic coastal region. Having one primary intention for the day of visiting an older brother in the hospital who underwent back surgery three days before, my family and I pulled out of the hotel parking lot an hour later than I desired.

My inexplicable and perhaps irrational anxiety about visiting with my family and the place of my childhood morphed into an argument between my wife and myself about differences in parenting styles relating to our daughter's larger than life personality and preferences which often infringe upon the personal space and wishes of others.     At mid-life, I retain vivid memories of being the butt of countless jokes in group settings during my childhood. While the pain of these emotional scars has lessened greatly over the years, I worried about having to defend myself in the presence of my two beloved children who at thirteen and nine years of age still possess the first naiveté of parental perfection. I doubt I stand alone as a father who hopes his children maintain such an illusion for a few more years.  Nevertheless, as I completed filling the gas tank and merged onto the interstate, I did not know then that my fears were unfounded. As this day drew to an end at 12:30am in the next morning, I would fall asleep giving profound thanks to Almighty God for His unquestionable and enduring faithfulness over the course of the thirty-one and a half years since I left my childhood home.

It is often said "hindsight is twenty-twenty" which practically means reflection and distance yield a perfect vision of past events. Yet, I doubt historians and psychologists would agree unconditionally with that premise. For me, the distance of more than three decades of time, life experience, personal growth, spiritual progress and emotional and relational maturity help me better understand my childhood circumstances which comprise the foundation of my character.  Popular culture and public discourse quickly and easily offer the simplistic labels of dysfunctional and complex when characterizing one's childhood years. Maturity and distance reveal just how relative, individual and perhaps unique those terms really are.

Additionally, poverty and heartfelt need were always present when I was a child. As one of seven siblings with two other cousins who were reared by my paternal grandparents who had grade school formal educations and even less formal and non-professional work experience as a handy man and tenant farmer and domestic, I definitely knew the daily disillusionment and depression of poverty.  Remarkably, I did not appreciate fully the extent of the poverty manifested in our house, car, clothes, food, furnishings and neighborhood until I visited my freshman year boarding school roommate’s Central Park West twenty-five room apartment in New York City during a stopover enroute to Sumter South Carolina for a holiday break. Parenthetically, I vehemently disagree with the opinion which condemns any type of denial as bad and ineffective.  Actually, in retrospect, I am glad I was not aware completely of just how poor we were.  Had I been, I would have viewed upward social mobility and acquisition of formal collegiate and graduate education as an insurmountable mountain.  Standing in the midst of horse stables with shabbily built wooden fences and the obvious pungent odor of manure and rain soaked hay, the father of Ann Boleyn in the recent movie bearing that title advises his daughter when contemplating an arranged marriage, "There is not a circumstance in life that breaks the spirit like poverty."

Years into our adult lives, poverty would cause partially the death of one of my brothers at a young and tender age as he was exhausted after trying with all his might and failing to live the life he imagined.  He and I could easily exchange places were I to have been totally cognizant of the breadth and depth as well as width and length of the poverty in which I was reared.  Nevertheless, my musings three decades later resound with genuine gratitude for this very same poverty that I despised as a child.