How the Parable of the Cracked Pot Informs a Son’s Trauma.
Part I of II. Part II link here.
Mom’s passing1 forces so much to mind. She had been lead into the QAnon sewer by friends, some family and her faith. Staunchly anti-mask, she transmitted Covid to several, almost taking Dad with her. Fortunately, my brother and I had intervened with Pops earlier and he was fully vaccinated. At 90, the virus was something like a three day cold for him. However, his lungs haven’t recovered. He has an increasing reliance on oxygen, that he’d never previously needed. Independent living is no longer possible for him.
I loved Mom unconditionally. I’m sure she loved me, even if I didn’t pass her political litmus test. She perceived my spiritual condition with even more disappointment. It is a relief to know that she has moved beyond her worries, pain and struggle. In her way she was empathetic, indiscriminately merciful and generous – despite becoming difficult for some of us. She supported so many in need. She took responsibilities that weren’t hers and ignored some duties that were clearly in her charge. As an imperfect creature myself, I learned it’s best to not keep score.
The last time I saw her was in August of 2010. We had been working at settling in a small town, camped for a few weeks at an RV Park nearby. But our offer on property didn’t work out. Mom and a friend came to our camp one warm morning to say goodbye. My wife and I made breakfast on our outside kitchen. We lounged in the August shade on camp chairs over coffee. It took her a bit, but Mom settled into being a guest. The pine scented breeze was perfection. It was sweet.
Even then, however, there were cracks in the pot of our relationship. Something was leaking.
To me, she lived under an impenetrable spell; An illusion of her independence. She was an early casualty of toxic televangelism that preyed on so many. That Pops didn’t go along, resulted in Mom’s separation from him. Never divorced, he always supported her, through 58 years of their marriage. He built a house for her at the age of 67. When there was trouble, he was the first person she called. And there was lots of trouble, mainly financial.
Her faith empowered a militant sense of sovereignty and defiant, unapologetic certitude. She suffered noxious relationships while distancing herself from healthy associations. Fascist politics and Christian Confrontationalism seems like it would have to be in contrast to her compassion, but in her mind they weren’t. Mom experienced life as a victim. She was at war with anyone who questioned her reasoning. She doted on her great grandchildren and their Q-adjacent parents.
Admitting to the trauma of estrangement into my understanding of our relationship helps me reconcile some of the tension between us.
Since making breakfast that morning, contact with Mom steadily diminished. A whole decade passes. And then Covid in 2020. All that remains is an archived voicemail she left not long before she went to the hospital on Thanksgiving Day, 2021. Her message is filled with rage and hostility. Why she was inspired to vent her feelings I do not know. I had been keeping distance. Doing so seemed less damaging. I didn’t want to be a source of aggravation, or the target of rage. It’s been very painful… a little tragic perhaps … the experience of this difficulty. I’m very sorry, yet sort of blessed to have earned a certain perspective.
As I learned to appreciate Mom as a victim and our relationship as a cracked pot2, I was more able to disconnect my feelings in favor of a wiser, more circumspect approach. “Hurt people hurt people” the saying goes, especially ones they love. Pains me to admit, but I know it went both ways. It’s not rational. She was not accountable for the distance between us, nor was I or anyone else. She made her choices. It wasn’t my responsibility to disagree. I’m not bitter, angry or resentful.
I’ve learned something in the experience of these things. Being her son informs the rest of the life that she gave me. Thank you Mom, for the flowers that have grown up along the way. The cracked pot of our relationship watered them.
Obituary of Alida Irene Gerhart, nee Davison. 4/25/37 – 12/4/2021
The Gerhart family of Helena announces the passing of wife and mother, Alida Irene. Alida was born to Reno Fay and Ida Marie Davison of Highwood, Montana where Fay was postmaster into the 1970s. She was the younger of two children, survived by her sister Joanne Peres, nee McCafferty/Davison, of Fort Benton, Montana.
Alida graduated from Highwood high school in 1955 and moved to Great Falls to study nursing. She dated Richard G. Gerhart of Belt, Montana and they were married on June 2nd, 1956. Alida enjoyed many familiar aspects of Montana native life, including fly fishing and elk hunting which was rare for women in the 1950s. She and Dad took us camping and fishing, coached baseball, and attended our football games. She ran the family cabin on Landers Fork near Lincoln, Montana while we and our cousins ran wild.
Mom was a renowned cook, famed for matrimony bars, canned lake trout, chokecherry syrup and rhubarb jam. Her summer BBQs were crowded. Alida was notoriously “fast behind the wheel”, but she always made time to discuss her Christian faith. Mom gave of herself to family, friends and especially anyone in need.
Alida is survived by her husband Richard Gerhart and married children David (Kristin), Rodger (Amber), Kamron Allen (Scott), and Joel (Elizabeth). At the time of her passing, the family had grown to include five grandchildren and four great grandchildren. A memorial gathering is planned for sometime in the summer of 2022.
The Cracked Pot
A Parable
A water bearer in India had two large pots, each hung on each end of a pole which he carried across his neck. One of the pots had a crack in it, and while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water at the end of the long walk from the stream to the master’s house, the cracked pot arrived only half full.
For a full two years, this went on daily, with the bearer delivering only one and a half pots full of water in his master’s house. Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments, perfect to the end for which it was made. But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection and miserable that it was able to accomplish only half of what it had been made to do.
After two years of what it perceived to be a bitter failure, it spoke to the water bearer one day by the stream. “I am ashamed of myself, and I want to apologize to you”. The bearer asked, “Why? What are you ashamed of?” The Pot replied, “For these past two years I am able to deliver only half of my load because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to your master’s house. Because of my flaws, you don’t get full value for your efforts”.
The water bearer felt sorry for the old cracked pot, and in his compassion, he said, “As we return to the master’s house, I want you to notice the beautiful flowers along the path.” As they went up the hill, the old cracked pot took notice of the sun warming the beautiful wild flowers on the side of the path, and this cheered it somewhat. But at the end of the trail, it still felt bad because it had leaked out half its load, and so again it apologized to the bearer for its failure.
The bearer said to the pot, “Did you notice that there were flowers only on your side of your path, but not on the other pot’s side? That’s because I have always known about your flaw, and I took advantage of it. I planted flower seeds on your side of the path, and every day while we walk back from the stream, you’ve watered them. For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate my master’s table. Without you being just the way you are, he would not have this beauty to grace his house.”
Narrow Way Cafe 