Remembering Brad: On the Loss of a Son to AIDS (16 page)

BOOK: Remembering Brad: On the Loss of a Son to AIDS

2.15Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub

ads

Remember the xeroxed articles you sent home with me in August? I’ve read them with interest. The article on literary patronage
—
à la foundation and university support
—
was a new perspective on the subject for me, and useful, since that is a subject I sometimes talk about with students. Apropos of the articles on LSD, what can I say? To deny outright on the basis of my present personal experience (or lack of it) that the use of this drug can result in something positive for some people under the right conditions would be foolish. To deny that use of such a potent agent can be potentially dangerous, depending on the person and the conditions, also seems foolish to me. So I suppose you and others must make your personal choice, weigh the risks and the rewards. How does one intelligently weigh such a matter? Perhaps with reference to one’s
whole
life and one’s happiness in that whole perspective. Does use of such a drug alienate you from the reality to which you must inevitably return, or does it make that reality better, easier to sustain, happier? Does it make life in general a good experience, or does it leave one cloyed, disillusioned with the daily routine. I say this in relation to your remarks last week in which you expressed a degree of disillusionment about the future; you spoke of being jaded. I’m sorry to hear that, for at 24 the world and the future ought to be opening out, with a positive sense of desirable challenges and opportunities ahead. I don’t want to jump to the conclusion that drug experience is necessarily responsible for your present feeling of alienation, but I do think that what I am suggesting here is a good way to assess any kind of experience at any stage of life: does it reconcile one to reality and make the possibilities within that reality seem richer.

Let me give you my considered testimony. On the whole, life is good, desirable. At times the world may seem mad (this has always been so; it is not just a reflection of present absurdity), but order and meaning on a small and personal scale are possible.
Happiness
may not be possible perpetually on a day-to-day basis, but
meaningful
living is
—
if there is something in one’s life that one is willing to sacrifice for. This may be useful work that is rewarding, it may be goals of achievement that one is striving to reach, it may be someone who matters enough to work and sacrifice for. To be meaningful, life must be a challenge
—
otherwise it would get dull in a hurry. But to any intelligent, thoughtful individual, life’s challenge cannot be other than apparent. It is not always easy to avoid alienation, cope with discouragement, and accept oneself. But with time, the focus sharpens, and meaning and satisfaction seem to be more consistently available. Your mom, for example, has struggled over the years for self-definition; and that struggle is now paying off. She is happier now, more confident, more accepting of herself, more capable, more creative, more relaxed, more fun to live with than ever. I, too, though my pattern has been a different one, feel more relaxed, more self-accepting, find more pleasure in my environment, feel more in tune with my life.

Well, you can decide if there is anything of value in these beliefs of mine, this qualified optimism. Let me presume to offer a bit of advice: avoid whatever kind of experience leads to your feeling jaded; cultivate that which gives a sense of purpose, achievement, self-acceptance. You have a fine future to look forward to, and you have the equipment
—
mental and physical
—
to make the most of it.

Another one-sided conversation, but we’ve had such good, intense talks that I can almost feel you are present here. Now I wait to hear your response
—
whenever a good and suitable occasion shall allow. You were right to remark on the phone that it would be so very nice to be together and have a long conversation. How would you like to come to snowy Idaho for Christmas?

With love, Dad

* * *

4 January 1983

Dear Brad,

At least a month has passed since that longish telephone conversation in which we talked of religion, and you said that your contact with the born-again Christian and his hyper-positive pronouncements had reawakened some old uncertainties in your mind. I trust that that mood has passed to some extent by now. Nevertheless, I know how someone like that can bowl one over temporarily, if, that is, one is of the type who acknowledges that some things in life seem uncertain, and what sane man doesn’t? Then in blows the guy who
knows
all the answers, and all the answers are
simple
! It’s the level of his confidence that causes one to pause and say, “Could this gullible fellow be right after all?” Well, I’ll stake everything on his being wrong; otherwise God is demeaned and our human dignity and stature as his children are undermined.

Here are a few of the premises on which my religious faith rests:

1) God is not running us through an arbitrary obstacle course for his own glory and satisfaction; he is not interested in punishment as such. He is not a legalistic tyrant waiting to pounce when we stumble. These notions are contrary to the nature of a loving, patient God; they are contrary to the dominant tenor of Christ’s teachings as we have them in the Gospels.

2) God wishes to foster our individual growth and development. He does not mean earth life to be primarily restrictive, inhibiting, but rather expansive and conducive to our progress.

3) In the long run, “rewards” and “punishments” are inherent in our deeds, our ways of living and being; they are not arbitrarily imposed from outside by a stern judge. Joseph Smith understood this, I think. In the Doctrine and Covenants occurs this passage which you will surely remember: “There is a law irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated
—
And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated” (130:20-21). I take this to mean that the consequences of our acts are inherent in the very nature of those acts. That is, doing good deeds for others generally makes us feel good and has a beneficial effect on the long range development of our character. Selfishness (i.e. preoccupation with self to a degree that an appropriate balance between the self and others is not maintained) does not lead to peace of mind or a good feeling about oneself. Being useful in the world, doing something that seems worthwhile with one’s hours, brings satisfaction; idleness ultimately leaves one empty and dull and possibly frustrated. Etcetera. You can supply numerous examples as well as I. This is almost like saying that we create our own punishments and re-wards
—
or choose them at least, but always within the eternal law. And the law is eternal not because God said arbitrarily, “Let it be so!” but rather because the relationship of acts and their consequences are very consistent and have always been so.

Such a view is consistent with my conviction that God is interested in our growth, and that he allows us to work out our paths in relation to what we learn through our ways of acting and being. In this sense, “sin” is following courses that frustrate our quest for growth, wholeness, harmony. “Sin” alienates us from self and from others by creating barriers, stumbling blocks, frustrations.

Clearly, then, we must assess the rightness or wrongness of our behaviors by continually evaluating their results. Sometimes this is easy because the results are obvious in the short run; other situations are more complex, and short term outcomes may not hold consistently as time passes. But God is not keeping a book to effect punishment. He simply allows us to become the sum of our acts.
That
is his “judgment.”

Because it is sometimes difficult to gauge the long-term effects of our acts, we can often assist ourselves by studying the lives of others, the cumulative experience of the race. Still, that does not suffice by itself. Existentially considering the truth of our own experience is finally inescapable. That entails living with some uncertainties; that means, as Sartre put it, that we are willing to assume the “burden of freedom.”

Apropos of your born-again friend and his assertions, you might remember that Christ’s statements in the Gospels are filled with a number of striking ambiguities, paradoxes, even outright contradictions. The reborn Christians pick and choose rather restrictively, but we must accept the gospel in its completeness and its complexity. Perhaps it’s time for you to reread the Gospels yourself in order to be able to point this out to him more effectively. More importantly, you may find a good deal of clarity for yourself by engaging those provocative texts from your present vantage point.

Enough for tonight. Love, Dad

Father and son, in Logan, spring 1959.