I Reached the Tipping Point

I’m feeling melancholy.  I want to set the mood for this post, for my thoughts flow from that feeling, although perhaps melancholy is not the right word, yet the touch of sadness it conveys is what I am feeling.  I have failed, is what I am feeling.

Oh, I’ve had lots of successes in my life along with more than an average share of failures, but this feels different.  I think perhaps it is what the alcoholic might feel, sober for months or years, when he wakes up with the hangover he thought he was past, had beaten.  There are lots of other examples I could give of such habits, addictions, things people thought they had put in the past --- when they suddenly were confronted in the present.  Friends, not having been there, can’t really understand.  “Get up and start again.  Sorry you failed, but we’re all sinners and we must confess our failing, resolve to change, and just go on!”  But for the one who strongly felt that he HAD gone on, that he was farther down the road with the bumps behind him, the fall is shocking:  he is not who he thought he was.  It’s a sad thing to realize.

I’ve traveled a long road.  I thought the worst was behind me; I could see the destination approaching in the distance, and with each day it seemed clearer, and I was sure I was on the path to get there, but I learned I have a long way to go.

Earlier this week I saw and noted some small sights along my path, people God put in my life.  These were no miracles or conversions or any great things, but I saw God’s hand in the little opportunities He gave me to be who I think He wishes me to be.  One was aided, one relieved, another smiled and perhaps another had a seed planted --- regardless, it all felt right.  It felt like God had taught me things, and He could count on me to remember the lessons.  They were small things and gave me peace --- until this large thing came along.

It started when I heard of a playhouse in a nearby community; I like plays.  I usually invite someone to attend with me, but it seemed most of my friends were very busy, and so I decided to check out this new theater on Wednesday afternoon alone.  The theater is in a nice small building, seating perhaps 125 or so in a U-shaped arrangement, with the stage in the center.  I was seated in the front row, at the top of the U.

The play was about a woman who had walked out on her husband and kids and then lived a wonderful life for 15 years.  Writing books under a pseudonym, she had grown rich, famous, and (as we find out) enjoyed numerous boyfriends (until she tired of them).  And then she found out that her husband, who said he’d file for divorce when she walked out the door, never did.  Technically, she had illegally done a number of things claiming she was single, and so she came back to straighten that out --- and ensure her (still) husband didn’t claim any of her money.

The cursing and the screaming at one another started early in the play, and continued throughout.  Every sexually-related curse word (any you could likely think of, and more) was screamed, by every character.  After 15 minutes I wanted to leave, but I was seated right next to the screaming actors, and across the room from the exit.  If I were to stand up and leave, I’d have to walk in front of the actors and all the spectators, and so I stayed.  I had thoughts in the back of my head, I guess, reasons to not inconvenience others, or perhaps even a hope to get to the part of the play where the angry characters ultimately reconciled.  That part of the play never came, and at the end of 90 minutes the wife walks out the door, cursing the marriage that enslaved her and all women, predicting that in a few years the farce of marriage would disappear forever from history, and women will then be free and happy.  Dim the lights.  The end.  Applause (except from me).  Exit (quickly).

The temperature had dropped 20 degrees while I was in the theater, and it was pouring rain outside.  I felt as if some of the filth might be washing off me, so perhaps the rain was a good thing.  I don’t know how to describe my feelings then, but the play scenes seemed to be highlighted in my brain, like magnified in bright colors.  I couldn’t forget them.  When I got home, I made myself some dinner and then picked up a novel to read.  In its first chapter I read of a man who had grown up in the South, went North to live, and then returned to the South as part of his job.  He’s in the center of a small town when he sees two young Negro boys being beaten up because they looked the wrong way at some white men.  The visitor sees that the men are planning to hang the boys, and so he steps in.  He takes a beating from the men, but the boys were able to run away.  And then my eyes were opened.

I had read in the playhouse flyer how the art director there had chosen that particular play, for it “is written with a modern voice that resonates well today” (ego-driven cursing?).  “The play is staunchly focused on genuine human struggles of identity and relationships.  In our divided world where compromise can be an obscenity we can hold true to what we believe” (like the fact that marriage is an evil thing?).  What the playhouse manager was saying, and what the play was saying, is that what people want at the moment is what they should take.  The players screamed marriage was preventing them from doing what they wanted --- which they were darn-well going to do.  Just as what the white men were going to do to those Negro boys, until someone took a stand.  But in that playhouse, when marriage and Christianity were being beaten, I never took a stand.  I sat in the first row at the playhouse, visible to everyone, as was the gold crucifix I wore around my neck.  All that that crucifix --- and I thought I --- stood for was being mocked right in front of me, and I sat there.  Later in the evening I thought of what had happened to Peter in the courtyard: “Aren’t you one of His followers?” he was asked.  And by my inactions I saw that I had imitated Peter’s reply: “I do not know the Man.”

I had thought that I did.

Oh, there are things I can and will do as I go forward, humbled that I am not the man I thought I was, that I wanted to be.  I could have walked out of that theater, highly visibly, perhaps giving courage to others to leave also.  Lives could have been changed, perhaps saved.  But we’ll never know; an opportunity was wasted.  I remember the happy ending to Peter’s life-play, where Peter said: “Lord, You know that I love You.”  And then henceforth he acted like it.  I pray I can do likewise.  Maybe this humbling experience was God’s answer to my prayers for humility: “Tom, you have a long way to go.”

And so, for now I will trudge along, melancholy, but more than ever aware that MY WAY, the things I do first and foremost for me, is not His way.  I cannot put myself and what I want (or embarrassments I want to avoid) first in my life.  And I WILL NOT celebrate with the huge numbers in our culture (and celebrated in the play) who say that “getting what I want” is the proper purpose of life.  I was too weak, but I pray I will get strong enough to make a stand in the future, even if I get beaten up.