Or at least it can.
It feels to me like the greatest aha moments of growing older come from having some distance between the hurts that happened & the accumulating experience of life. Of being able to recognize the times we caused distress without any intention, the moments we lashed out in the heat of anguish, the opportunities for bridge building we let pass, the sulks we got in rather than reaching out for clarity, the hurts we harbored in place of stepping out with compassion. And accepting that the same is true of others with us.
The power of distance - and the fresh perspective it has the potential to offer - came home to me yesterday, as I listened to a discussion on NPR about the why behind the Russian people turning away from Perestroika - the promise of a more open government - back to all the old ways so neatly embodied in Vladimir Putin. The upshot was that the people had tried the new ways & were dissatisfied; the reality didn't match the idealized hope.
SHAZAM! In an instant, I had a whole new way of experiencing my sister, opening up possibilities that had never dawned on me before. A new interpretation I seriously doubt would have been possible twenty years ago, one that might only have happened after she'd passed & active issues ebbed away.
My sister was brilliant, gifted, massively talented, possessing both great intellect & astonishing insight. That's how I was raised to view Mim & certainly some aspects of that assessment were spot on. Yet, she didn't seem to do anything with her gifts & graces.
Except, she did. It just hadn't hit home with me. At least, not until yesterday, listening to a discussion on the car radio.
Some background - on Friday, my well-being coach asked me about the positive ways I'd been affected by Mim's 07/03/15 death. It wasn't her death that had an impact, but what others said because of it, things I'd always sensed but had only heard people deny, brush off as negative rather than as caring, loving. That drew us into discussing the impact of Mom's September 2001 death, Dad's in March 1973.
Dad's death at such a young age - 62 - affected all of us, in vastly different ways. For Mim, it was an unsought liberation. As long as Dad was alive, she didn't need to be independent - Dad was always there to help take care of her. She was almost 30 when he died, without anything that suggested an independent life. Dad's death thrust her into the arms of life.
Within ten years, she'd find a spiritual community in the Laurel Church Camp, "go from the back of the room to the front." seek counseling, get her bachelor's from New York University, get a real job working as a houseparent for very young children at a private school. Within fifteen, she received her MSW from Rutgers, got an even more serious job working with autistic children, was honored at a black tie dinner with a VERY official proclamation from the New Jersey State Legislature honoring her volunteer work with autistic children & families, had her own car, her own apartment, had a life that anyone could relate to & respect.
Within five years, it was gone. From what I could piece together, she was back to working with children literally within their environment, often living with the family, never able to completely separate herself from the intense work. I recall a rare visit - she lived in a little room at the top of the house, which meant going up at three flights of steps on legs that were already in bad shape; as the three of us - Peter, Mim, myself - ate lunch in her room, one of the children sat outside the door & constantly begged to join us. They were rare visits, because I'd be in a deep depression for days after one; my brother told me he'd advised his daughter NOT to take her girls over for a visit.
Until yesterday, I'd viewed all that as some epic tragedy. But, listening to the conversation about the Russian people turning back to what was because of dissatisfaction with the perceived ideal they'd achieved, it shifted into a different possibility.
It's clear that Mim started to more fully come into her own after Dad died. As I've experienced so many times over my own lifetime, once she set out on a bold venture, the Universe kicked in as an active partner. Frank Rose introduced Laurel, which - more than any other factor - changed Mim's life. At Laurel, a place she trusted, she tagged up with a counselor who would help her edge her way into the world. A benefactor stepped up to underwrite attending NYU. People & circumstance got her through Rutgers, where additional expenses included her first apartment & car. She got her degree, got a job working for a state agency, had a normal life. Except she didn't. It was possibly a standard life, an average life, but it was far from her normal.
Like the Russians, Mim had achieved what others said was ideal, only to find that it was anything but for her. What others experienced as normal, Mim never had. What she did, they didn't.
In this new interpretation, Mim didn't leave the agency in Jersey City because she'd failed in any way, but because it wasn't anywhere close to a good fit. She'd gotten the degrees, the job, the life - but it didn't suit her. Mim was called to a different sort of work. And back to it she went.
Personally, I believe that - if things had been different in her head - Mim could have done the work that spoke to her ~and~ been able to make a good living, to be financially secure with a stable life.
Mim had so much to share with others, insights & creative approaches to an issue that was as red hot twenty years ago as being an eldercare anarchist is for me, now. Mim had the right educational background, the right developed skills, her unique & wildly relevant lifetime of experiences. She was totally in the right place with the right background, the right credentials & even accolades for doing things HER way.
One thing that Mim lacked was trust. Trust that the times were on her side, trust that others were there to give every form of support, trust that the Universe thought she was totally terrific & utterly able. Most of all, Mim seemed to lack trust in herself, which always stunnd & downright horrified me. What was the sense in being the all-brilliant, all-gifted, all-wondrous Mim is she didn't believe it?
It's taken me 64 years, Mim's death & listening to a radio discussion about Russia to have a different, more resonating interpretation of what might have been going on in my adored older sister's life She set out to do great things, she accomplished them, reached the sought-for pinnacle; knowing she'd been there, done that, she was freed to do her work in her way. She was the Russian people who tried Perestroika, found glasnost to be lacking & went back to how things had been, a life that others find "less" but they believe best suits them.
Could I have come up with all of that even ten years ago? Nope - still mucking my way through the aftermath of the perfect storm that broke at the time Mom died. Could I have made the connection before Mim passed? Will never know. But this I know for sure - distance, of every sort, has made my heart grow wiser.
No comments:
Post a Comment