No Miracles Here?

One of the most relaxing things I do is watching Roseanne reruns. I've never understood my fascination with (the first few seasons of) this show, nor why I find it so comforting. The other night they aired the episode in which a tornado is expected to touch down in Lanford. As the family scrambles around trying to prepare as best they can for this disaster, Dan searches for the First Aid kit.

"Oh it's not a First Aid kit anymore," Becky tells him. "Darlene's been using it as a lunchbox."

"And what happened to the stuff in the First Aid kit?" he asks Darlene, only to learn she sold it to the football team.

This little snippet of the program grabbed my attention for the first time. I may have seen it about 100 times (or more), but this was the first time I realized what was going on inside of me as I took in the interaction between Dan and his daughter.

If that had been me, I'd have been grounded for 3 weeks. But first I would have been told in no uncertain terms how stupid I was, how I never do anything right, and I'd better start watching my step. Shame was my stepdad's favorite form of punishment. Oftentimes the threatened groundings or withheld allowances never materialized, but that's not to say I got off easy. One thing that he never forgot to do, or changed his mind about doing halfway through, was shaming me.

I watched nearly spellbound as Dan and Roseanne let Darlene know she'd had no business selling their First Aid kit to the football team--and then, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, they went on to other things. There was no dwelling on her screw-up, no name calling, no shaming, no bringing it up every few minutes. Though I've seen this episode countless times, I think I was half expecting a different outcome this time: Dan goes into a rage and locks Darlene out of the house, tornado warning and all. Roseanne laughs as Dan shames her (as my mother did with me every time), while Becky and DJ stand around snickering and scoffing--clearly relieved it's Darlene and not one of them who did such a dumb thing. Of course the plot never varied (thank goodness.) As it unwound I began reflecting on why it had such a powerful affect on me. The only word I could come up with in conclusion was grace. The Conners may not be perfect but they know a little something about grace. They don't expect perfection in themselves or their children. They aren't concerned with what others will think. They are who they are, and they and their kids have a wide margin for error.

Grace.

What an odd concept! I thought back to my sour suburban childhood home, trying to come up with even one instance of grace in action. I couldn't scrounge up even one such memory. My mom and stepdad existed in a grace-free environment. There were to be no foul-ups, no human failings, no second chances. And most certainly they cared very much what the neighbors thought. My mother would rather my stepdad rape me (as long as it was done in secret where she wouldn't have to hear the neighbors talking about it) than to be mortified by our front lawn not getting mowed in time, or one of her children roaming about the block with dirty fingernails or unkempt hair.

It was as if my stepdad and mother announced, upon joining together in unholy wedlock, There will be no miracles here.

No miracles, no grace. Toe the line or suffer the consequences, just don't expect sympathy or compassion.

Oh but didn't grace sneak in anyway, despite their efforts to live in a grace free atmosphere? Love, grace: call it what you will, I see instances of it creeping in when least expected. Not from my mother or stepdad, to be sure. George MacDonald, the Scottish preacher, once said, "Love surrounds us, seeking the smallest crack by which it may rush in." Had I realized back then how often love found its way in through the dinkiest crack, I would have laughed up my sleeve. For there I was, this shamed redheaded stepchild, losing myself in one wonderful book after another, feeling that deep down sense of delicious comfort, pleasure and lack of self-consciousness which I found only within the pages of fiction. And there I was with my best friend Bec, sauntering or running all about the block having the time of our lives. This was grace, this friendship with which I'd been so blessed. There is no other way to look at it. The delight of books? Pure grace. My best friendship? Grace all the way through. My backyard fort: oh God may as well have rapped his knuckles on my parents' foreheads and said, "Hello, anybody in there?" I mean, what an obvious show of grace was the fort which provided me with so many hours of respite (as well as a safe haven) from my family's lunacy. My abusers were too blind to see this fort for what it represented to me, in the same way that they were blinded to anything which didn't touch them directly.

Love really does sneak in through the cracks, it must be so. I've experienced this time and again myself. It's as if there isn't a force in the world stronger than Love. When we least expect it Love, and its twin, Grace, trickle in and give us that extra shot of hope we need to face another day.

Comments

[marjakathriver]

You are amazing, Beauty, in your insights gleaned from this sitcom and your way of writing about it. I'm so glad you had that best friend and the realization of those moments of grace. Maybe through love and grace, we can eradicate child abuse on our planet some day.

For World Day for the Prevention of Child Abuse, I'm hosting THE BLOG CARNIVAL AGAINST CHILD ABUSE at my own blog on Thursday. Would you consider submitting this post? Thanks, in advance!