Faith and Fantasy

Everyone has expectations of family.   We’re hardwired to seek love, acceptance and affection.  When we don’t get it there’s pain and loneliness.  One coping mechanism is denial.  It can be very blind, as blind as my mom was.  She lost the sight of her left eye on the farm when she was in her 30’s.  A bailing wire pierced through her cornea.  Later in life she developed cataracts and then macular degeneration in her one “good eye” as she called it.  You know how they say people that lose one sense usually develop other enhanced senses.  She didn’t.  She lost most of her hearing also.  She depended on those around her.  Mostly she used bait  when she thought she needed control.  That worked for a long time for her.  The problem is, when you tease the wrong jackal for too long, it comes after you.  I suppose she had a fantasy that she could make everyone that wanted what she had, love her.  But that was denial on her part, for she knew…deep down she knew.  Love is totally detached from the material.

Mom died 7 years ago.  It was a Friday, July 28^th, 2006.  Robin and I were just leaving a local restaurant, Global Gourmet when I got the call.  My daughter Mary called to tell me she had died.  It had been a long 5 days since we found out that she was in hospice, unconscious and expected to live only another day or two.   I felt a flood of emotions.  I was grateful her torture was over.  I was morbidly sad that we had lost the close and comfortable relationship we had before The spider intervened.  I hadn’t been able to see her in over 4 months, though we only were separated by 10 miles.  It was just too dangerous.

I’ve had a lot of fantasies in my mind since then.  Sometimes fantasy becomes real, other times it’s as hollow as cotton candy.

But one thing I’m sure of is that Faith is the belief in the fantasy in your mind.