Wrestling

Dear Eugene,

I am a father who could never stop talking and hates himself for it.  My kids know my passive-aggressive silence is usually short-lived, an aberration that does not even try to disguise as a remotely possible paradigm shift.

One day this all shall cease, I told them, meaning my death.  I wonder if they know there are more than one ways for me to shut up.  The other would be when I cease to love.  One is often tempted to make such care-less mistake.  I wonder if they know how big and often a temptation this is to me.

I wrestled my son a few days ago, quite literally.  A tussle became a scuffle and ended with a wrestle.  The urge came out of nowhere for me and probably for him and before we knew it we were hitting the ground.  Quick and dirty as it was, Bellow's "Henderson the Rain King" flashed over the celestial of my confusion, Costello's "I Can't Stand Up For Falling Down" rang between my ears.

Then the strangest thing happened, as in Bellow's story, that in a few thousands fired-up heartbeats I and my son have grown to know more about each others, like a rapidly fast-forwarded growth montage, a quickened light-year leap in grasping who the other person truly is; the sudden and immense expense of energy seemed to have uncorked our bottled-up frustration and bewilderment about each others and exhausted their power over us.

I've always wondered why God would, of anything, choose to name his people B'nai Yisra'el, the children of Israel, meaning, wrestling with God (and men).  Why not name them "having faith in God," or "surrendering to God," or "worshiping God"?

God gave me an answer a few nights ago: You always wrestle with the one you try to know, to love.  Those who keep nodding their head in so-called submission could't care less.

And, for the record, like Jacob/Israel, I won :)

Yours, Alex

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