Chris Herrington decided years ago that his reality was much more fun…
and he’s ready to tell you why.
Sit back and relax.
It’s going to be a bumpy ride.
When we are young, we are sometimes put into positions of responsibility that we cannot possibly uphold. Think of how often children have to get themselves ready for school: the simple thing of getting physically ready, collecting lunch money, having all of the items on an all too often long list of things that need to be packed up and taken to meet obligations at school, or having the amount of focus needed to set aside the emotional turmoil of home so that learning can even begin to take place. Yet, there are far more heavy items to carry with us when we are young: secrecy, abuse, shame, guilt, abandonment, rage, loneliness, isolation, or loss. And sometimes, death takes over the mind: hard, heartless, ruthless, unforgiving, unforgettable, and disrupting. What can a child do then?
I was such a child, having lost both a brother and a sister by the time I was 4. I remember, now, after years of therapy and hours of self-talk and writing endless stories, essays, poems, and letters to children that no longer exist except in my mind, or to those children that I never had, even after several miscarriages. Father’s Day is the worst day of the year; I hate it and wriggle to find other things to think about. The fall, when my sister died, is awful; I feel anxious and angry, often sullen and disappointed in myself.
I remember my sister’s death. My father was sitting in the dark, watching TV, and I had gotten up to go to the bathroom, which was located in my parent’s bedroom but connected to a hallway. I took the short cut through their room, passing by my sister’s crib on the way back, the oxygen tent canopied over her to help her breath, the sizzling misty sound of the escaping gas, the moment I listened just briefly to check on her respiration and noticed that it was not even as shallow as it always was but rather that it was non-existent, breathless, silent. Even at 4, I knew that this was not good, not acceptable, and I ran to get my dad. He was engrossed in the movie he was watching, unflinching. This was not what I needed! Not what my sister needed! I was trying to get his attention, really trying, and I began to yell and then to throw things, and he simply looked through me and around me, as if I were not capable of being as important as what he was paying attention to already. I don’t remember exactly what I said, but I remember that he got up in a rage at my repeatedly yelling and throwing things to get his attention. I can’t know what he must have thought that I was really up to! He chased me into the bedroom to catch me and noticed for himself that she had gone into respiratory failure. His instructions had been that, if she had stopped breathing, he was to thrust a 6 inch needle of adrenaline directly into her heart; he sunk to the floor with her in his arms, and he was yelling now and then crying and holding her, but she was gone, long gone.
Throughout my teens and twenties, I lived life as if to have enough experiences to fulfill two lifetimes. I barely survived. Following a divorce and years on the open highway, I came back home to Texas to confront my father. We sat and talked in a flat bottom boat, and I told him what I could about how I had lived and asked all the questions I needed to, but I was unsatisfied, beaten down, and had a hard time resting or relaxing at all. This was the part where I finally let go of the guilt of having survived my sister’s death. He still wasn’t listening. I was 36.
I have studied psychology, philosophy, world religion, and every branch of science from the science of the mind in Buddhism to the branching nodes of psychophysics, the wave construction of music, and the topological reconstruction of emotional spaces in iconology. I could not find anywhere the simple answer to the question, “What was the beginning of these panic attacks that had reduced me to a reclusive analyzer?” Sometimes the answers we seek are right in front of us, but we have to be ready, open-minded enough to hear it, listening, and honest enough to be able to digest it when it comes to us.
So, I was sitting there this morning, nursing a wrenched back with a heating pad, taking a day off of school, waiting for the repairman to come fix the dishwasher and the DSL guy to come fix the computer, when I clicked on a recording of “Hawaii 5-0.” I know! Well, the story goes that McGarrett has to rescue his sister from a jam he put her in by telling her a secret about their dad. He gets there just in the nick of time, and then it hits me, as I am crying over a stupid TV drama, that what has been driving this the whole time is the same emotion McGarrett has about putting his sister in danger: He would not be able to live with himself if anything ever happened to her because of him. If I had been better at getting dad’s attention, I would have been able to rescue my sister! Duh! Shame on me!
Ah, what could I have really done, really? My brother had died of the same medical problem the previous year, and she had only outlived him by a few months. I could not have saved her; I was only 4, for God’s sake! I was angry at my dad for his not listening. Not being listened to has always been a big problem for me. Shame, that’s the beast that started this whole mess. If only I had done “X,” I could have prevented asking “Y” all these years? It was very revealing to sit and look at the characters’ faces as they reunited. McGarrett’s relief was palpable and heart-felt. I did the best I could, for a 4 year-old. This finally got my attention. Book’em, Danno.
runningturtle87
Having completed 32 years of public school service, Chris Herrington lives, with his wife, in Appleby, Texas, and his writing consists of blogging and essay writing concerning an array of topics including education, mediation, self-development, and human interests. He teaches at the Martin School of Choice, plays racquetball, and enjoys his job.
Chris Herrington can be reached at herrington@everythingnac.com
