Archive for the ‘endings’ tag
Fathers and Sons
It isn’t often that I am able to take a photo out of the window of a plane that is actually worth keeping. this is far from a quality photo, but it has a certain value for me. I took it as we were flying over Calgary, circling for our approach for a landing as we returned to Canada. Sunset talks about an ending to a day. For me, this spoke about an ending to the time in Mayan Mexico, the end of yet another part of my journey. As always, endings are about losses with the apprehension that the future, the unknown might hold a harder journey ahead.
The feelings within since landing in Canada have been magnified by a return to conditions that require medications for allergies. I resisted taking them until this morning and watched as my head began to close down, disappear into a dense fog that reduced vision to a narrow focus as if wearing blinders. Queasiness and apprehension and foreboding. I have returned but don’t know if I can really return or just visit with a fractured persona which persuades others that I have returned and life will go on as it has always gone on, go on with no indications that the world has changed.
I returned to learn that I will be grandfather again in the fall, this time my son will became a father. His world is also changing. The time spent with my son was like time spent in sunshine, a time of promise and shared stories. I listened to his dreams of a different place, connection with history, a journey of discovery. The father-son bond is vital and real. Of all the family and extended family, it is only with him that I can tell my story fully with a sense of full acceptance. With the rest, it is more about limiting exposure to the fullness of who is this person they have come to know over the years and decades.
How well can we get to know each other when we struggle to know our “self”? That isn’t always important. It is not the depth of knowledge of other, but more about a curiousity of the “other” without the need to attach projections in order to “fit” the “other” into relationship. It is more about being open to discovery, bit by bit of who this “other” is. Unconditional acceptance of other.
