WEDDING PLANS
By Jack Donovan
Bill Tanner’s kid and mine are getting married tomorrow. Lots of folks are already upset over the kids’ decision because they think it’s a big mistake … eighteen’s too young to know your own mind they say. In fact, there is many of them, friends and relatives, who won’t even come. I must admit I thought that way about the kids at first, so I can’t get mad.
When the kids coma and told me way last Fall, I could have skinned them then and there. I took on like they had betrayed me … and the family. Everything I was taught told me they were wrong. They said they understood my feelings … they was sorry … but they were getting married.
“Why in Hell you have to get married,” I remembered saying, “there’s other ways to handle it. Go away and live together”, I told them, but it stuck in my throat trying to get it out. They wouldn’t have any of it. I wouldn’t have any more of them that day either, I’ll tell you. I got roaring drunk down at John’s after dinner. All I got out of that was a fitful night sleep on the sofa … you see, Nellie had enough of that carrying on with her Pa in the past. They next day I recall having trouble keeping my insides from jumping up in my throat every time I got near the smell of the barn. Long as I stayed out in the air I was alright.
All day and lots more to follow, I thought about not much else. I thought, kids are like Purdue chickens, when they’re out on display they carry your tag. You like to be proud of them … if you can; especially when you only got one. Nellie never let on whether she knew about the kids or not and I really didn’t have the nerve to bring it up. I even spoke to the Preacher but he was too much on my side to help.
I decided, at last, maybe I could make some sense out of it by talking to Bill Tanner to see if he could do anything with Joey. I had stayed away from Bill because I figured it was most Joey’s fault. Bill and I knowed each other since our Daddy’s had the still together out in Stryker’s Wood. Bill and me hadn’t been that friendly even since we each got married and started working our own places about the same time. I knew, though, that Bill and Martha -- Thad Moffet’s girl -- had tried as hard as me and Nellie to have kids. Each only had the one. Born around the same time, they were always together, church together and played together. Bill and I once joked about them living together to save shoe leather.
Well, this night, I reckon Bill must have been thinking about our problem for some time too. When I sat with him on his porch that evening Bill put his head down in his big, hard hands and bawled like a baby. He just rocked back and forth saying, “Why God, why?” over and over. I listened for an answer too. Looking up into the sky to give my eyes something to do, I saw a Hawk circling. I followed it for a long time.
Eventually Bill sat back, tears still streaming down his cracked face like it was melting. I figured he was blaming himself because he said, “I done everything I could for the boy, Martha did too. Somewhere we musta failed.”
“Bill”, I said, in the beginning I felt like I got kicked by the same mule. That’s why I came over here … trying to see what you’re going to do about it … get Joey to change his mind, something. But you know, sitting here watching and thinking while you were hurting gave me a bit of sense I didn’t have before I came.”
Well, I went on talking to Bill ‘til after dark. I got no idea where I come upon the things to say, but it seemed to help Bill. As I recall, the things I talked about were real simple, honest feeling about life itself and how they bear on our problems. Simple as the advice to Bill was, I’ve had the Devil’s own time using it myself since. Simple ain’t always easy.
What I was telling Bill went something like this: the Man upstairs gives us this life to do something with. Now, I don’t think it was His mistake that we come into life with nothing except a hunger for food and love. Somewhere the basics got mixed when giving food or things came to mean the same as giving love. There’s no argument that giving to others is our duty, but most of us will only give when we got all we need, plus a little just in case. If we got that much trouble with things, you can see the problem of giving love away. Most of us think our love is like a tank of gas. We come into the world with a full tank and we ain’t going to give much away unless we see a service station ahead. If we give any, we like to think of it as a loan to be paid back.
When we bring kids into the world, we give them food, things and love, asking nothing in return. Only later, when kids get enough to start giving, we get scared they might not return the gas we loaned them. Since most of us mixed up love with things, as I said before, we look for the kids to make a payback. Not real things, mind you, but rewards like pride and compliments for being their folks. As if giving them what they needed to grow up made all the difference in what they growed up to be … it don’t. We can’t take credit for their successes – that’s the bad news. The good news is we don’t have to take any part in their mistakes neither.
“Life’s a journey, not a destination”, somebody said. The journey’s all in getting to know more and more about ourselves as we grow. It’s learning to give away the endless supply of love we was born with – not expecting or needing a refill. God said we should get to know Him, love Him and serve Him while we’re here. He made all people in his image so we could practice-up ‘tl we meet Him. We each certainly have enough to do just minding our own business of knowing, loving and serving others. If each of us did just that, we wouldn’t have to be so all-fired worried about getting … it would come, naturally.
Bill wondered what that had to do with the kids getting hitched? Well, it seems to me that they truly believe they’re full of love for each other, and that ain’t bad. If they’re making a mistake, it’s their mistake. It’s an experience they have to go through. If they make it work, more power to them – no credit to us.
I know I’m going to have trouble in accepting other people’s opinions, but that’ll be a chance to practice tolerance. I’ll have problems when I think of Grand-kids too. That’s my chance to work on my pride; do I need a monument? I’m going to continue to have problems handling it because I’m still on my journey. Funny thought, if I try real hard now, I can be grateful to the kids for the chance they give me to practice on me.
My problems are of my own making. The experiences they have coming from their decision are theirs to learn from. We’ve got to respect their right to those experiences regardless how we feel about their choice. It ain’t a matter of right or wrong anyway, it’s just a different path on the journey. Do we really have any way of knowing where their journey will take them? Has our own choice of paths been so perfect? Not mine.
Tomorrow’s the Wedding. I intend to kiss them both and offer my love and friendship wherever they go and whatever they do.
It won’t be easy … those boys have been a big part of my life up ‘til now … it surely won’t be easy.
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