
I picked up the phone to check in with my mom. She’d recently moved into a senior living facility with my dad, and it had been challenging for her.
Community meals were uncomfortable because she has dementia and she’s a lifelong introvert. They had to go down to the cafeteria for the prepared food, which required sitting restaurant style, ordering, and then being in the presence of other residents whose names my mother could not retain, which was disturbing to her.
But answering my call, she was clearly not disturbed. She snatched up the phone on the first ring with a bright hello, and said, “I’m doing great!” when I asked for an update, which made me curious about what had changed.
During their recent move we discovered all sorts of treasure tucked away in closets and boxes, one of which is a four-generation portrait of my grandmother with her matriarchal lineage.
I inherited two essential qualities from my mom. A desire to help others, and a mind that often defaults to confusion and alarm. My grandmother was the model of kindness, while my grandpa provided the confusion and alarm. Seeing the picture got me wondering where these familial traits come from. How much character DNA do I carry from my ancestors? Can I really even claim personality habits as my own if they’re just behavioral heirlooms that have been passed down over time? Am I on generational autopilot?
These considerations are the foundation of story, because every so often, a rogue agent of action breaks out of the familial pattern and makes a dash for the open window of the human spirit. When an individual is able to cast off the decades of generational habit in favor of what is wanted and needed in a given moment, we feel the possibility of such transformation for ourselves.
And that’s just what happened with my mom who had risen above her confusion, self-doubt, and fear.
Ordinarily she’s the most docile, accepting woman you’ve ever met. But I had caught her in this moment of fierce clarity. Turns out she was mad about the lack of engagement in the dining hall—frustrated that people were just sitting and staring at the bare table, saying nothing while waiting for their food.
This is what she said.
“I don’t like seeing people with big histories, sitting around saying nothing, because everybody is afraid to go first. I’m getting the feeling that your dad and I are here for a reason. I’m feeling more and more inclined to go first. To get involved. There’s so much history here inside of people. So many lives worth sharing. I’m just saying to people, ‘Tell me a story.’”
Hell ya!
I was so inspired by my mom’s refusal to let her dementia dictate her experience or to let those who have remarkable personal history withdraw in silence, that I decided to share it.
So I briefly summarized the exchange and posted it in Substack Notes.
As you can see, over a hundred comments and thousands of endorsements celebrating her initiative rolled in. But the same morning I discovered that so many had been touched by her story, I received another piece of news in my inbox.
An alarming and record-breaking number of wildfires devastated forests last year.
My exuberance about my mom’s impact was immediately squashed. I felt emotionally disoriented in the face of these two conflicting pieces of information. The story I shared quoting my mom generated a celebration of the human spirit. And, on the other hand, every day we seem to learn of another disaster or catastrophe that is looming over humanity.
Exhausted by the task of trying to hold the opposing feelings of the moment, I plopped down into a chair, overwhelmed by the cognitive clash. How are we supposed to hold the dissonance of these times?
How are we supposed to hold the dissonance of these times?
How do we digest both the profound expressions of courage, creativity, and humanity that are showing up around the world—like the support for my mom—as well as the rapid unraveling of our environmental, social, and economic climates at the same time?
I closed my eyes in an attempt to digest, and then I realized the answer was provided by the 108 people who left a comment on my mom’s story. They were all acknowledging her courage to change her local climate by changing the conversation she was having with herself and with others.
I started re-reading the comments. They ranged from exclamations of support, to encouragement to carry on, to others who shared stories of their own. My mother had started a conversation that mattered.
What if letting the warmth of our connections languish is the cause of universal systems getting knocked out of whack?
We’re powered by the heart, and when we lose that connection we’re easily tempted to forfeit our inner resources for technology and machinery that give us a surrogate sense of meaning and agency.
Spiritual cooling causes global warming as we fire up vehicles, power tools, screens, and artificial intelligence to buoy our sense that we still possess an active charge.
But if connection is what we all really want, our stories can save us from searching for power in all the wrong places.
The challenges of our current time are urging us to act, to set a new course for our future.
But in what direction will we turn?
Into the arms of borrowed power? Or into an embrace of our shared humanity, and the stories that reveal it?
I’m okay with my mom forgetting names, because she’s remembering our need to connect. If we’re going to change the climate, that feels like a good place to start.
Rick, I remain impressed – and more than a wee bit envious – by your ability to flesh out the essence of what it means to be human, both individually and collectively as social creatures. This essay is no exception.
Before reading this, I never would’ve connected the relationship between "spiritual cooling" and global warming, and how sharing our stories can “save us from searching for power in all the wrong places.” But that connection is indeed true.
Clearly, you get this. So does your mom …
You inherited another quality from your mom: storytelling!