"Put the whole world behind you and forget it"

Today I’m unlocking a paywalled piece from about two years ago, about monks, perpetual prayer, and my father’s favorite movie, The Night of the Hunter.

I’m often compelled by monks and monkishness in a way I’m not at all compelled by any other religious community. Likely this is because I have met very few monks in the course of my life. Monks discipline themselves, rather than others – I don’t readily associate them with pastoral abuse because I think of them as having been charged with the keeping of only one another in practice, and with humanity in theory. This may not be true, historically, but the association lingers regardless. I do not go inside a church building, I do not purchase anything from the Spiritual Disciplines table in a bookstore, but I quite like a monk. They render the constant-surveillance of God less terrifying, because they dedicate their lives to staring back.

“Sit in your cell as in paradise; Put the whole world behind you and forget it. Watch your thoughts like a good fisherman watching for fish.” The problem with the imagination is it makes so many things nearly-bearable. Every moment, watch your thoughts; hunt them like a sportsman; forget everything behind you; make a heaven of hell; bear Hell. Empty yourself; trust me and me alone.

I find great comfort in the fact that no one I am related to now knows where I live. If they wanted to find me, they could not.

So much in my life these days twists up into fear. When in doubt, tremble. I spent much of the first two years of my family estrangement rooted in anger of the type that often lends itself most readily to small movements, to quiet, to the sort of stillness that has neither rest nor steadiness in it, like the David Lynch’s Angriest Dog in the World.

That anger is still present and accessible within me; it is a perfectly reasonable response to a violation of safety, honesty, principle, character. But it has less momentum than it did one year ago, two years ago, is not the same burning energy that wakes me up in the morning, that shields and carries me throughout the day, that wraps me in comforting fantasies of power and destruction as I fall asleep, and as a result I am more often beset by grief, loneliness, anguish, despair, and anxiety, which I like less. I did not find this frequent anger comfortable, exactly, but it was at least vital. Whenever I am wrapped up in existential questions about meaning and suffering, I often mistake anxiety for meaningful emotional work, and believe that the best possible thing for me is to sit alone, as anxious as possible, for as long as possible. I can see this does not carry the ring of great truth when I speak it aloud in front of someone, or type it out as I have done here, but it is a very compelling thought whenever I am alone.

Two quick logistical notes on estrangement: First, and for whatever reason, I have found the app that makes it most difficult to block or remove a contact is Venmo. Second, that estrangement is a commitment, even a practice, but it is not a perfect application of the will. I can decline to have certain conversations, and can take certain steps to discourage active contact, but I cannot decide on any given day what I might remember, how I might feel about what I remember, or even whether I learn any new information about someone I no longer have a relationship with. Several weeks ago I learned from a direct message from a total stranger that my sister had just had a second child, and that my father was preaching again; the stranger wanted me to confirm the news, which I was not in a position to do, and I found myself with equally-unwelcome information and emotional reactions on my hands.

This is not a very good analogy, but in some ways estrangement feels like shopping for a dinner party that is suddenly canceled moments after checking out. What am I going to do with all of these ingredients? With this memory, with that feeling, with this foundation, with that familiar, familial gesture. Where am I going to put it all? Who’s going to take responsibility for this change?

Lillian Gish is wonderful in Night of the Hunter, and gets some of the last lines in the script.

For every child, rich or poor, there’s a time of running through a dark place; and there’s no word for a child’s fear. A child sees a shadow on the wall, and sees a Tiger. And the old ones say, “There’s no tiger; go to sleep.” And when that child sleeps, it’s a Tiger’s sleep, and a Tiger’s night, and a Tiger’s breathing on the windowpane. Lord save little children.

John and Pearl, the little children who have been the Preacher’s target for the whole movie, are celebrating Christmas in her home, where she’s taken in a wide assortment of orphans of all ages. After this startling little speech, she has a moment with John, which is also my father’s name, which is also my brother’s name. She’s given John a watch, and he’s so proud of it he can hardly speak. “That watch sure is a fine, loud ticker,” she says. “It’ll be nice to have someone around the house who can give me the right time of day.”

The script says that John “finally finds his tongue.”

“I ain't afraid no more!” he shouts, running upstairs to join the other children. “I got a watch that ticks! I got a watch that shines in the dark!”

What I’ve got to find is a watch that ticks, and a watch that shines in the dark. For two years I had my anger, but that burns out, and doesn’t last. Before that, I had my family, but they did not do right, and they would not do right, and I could not abide with them. I’ve got to find a watch that ticks, and shines in the dark, on every Tiger’s night.