Dear Son,
Hi, it's Dad. You know, it still amazes me, that word - dad. I didn't think it would ever happen, or happen this way, but I'm glad it did. Mom and I are happy you're in our lives, and by the time you read this, if we've done what's right, you'll know it without a doubt.
Son, I'm writing this letter from the past, a past that is probably as foreign to you as any other country. The world as I know it is a complicated place, though maybe quaint by your standards.
I am writing to let you know that those of my generation faced a number of challenges in the new millennium, and some unfinished business from the old.
By the time you receive this letter, the world will have recognized, quantified, and attempted, perhaps many times, to grapple with the large questions of the age: nuclear proliferation, energy, climate change, and poverty.
Privately, I will have struggled with the perennial challenges of life, and questions concerning body, mind and soul.
And all of us, at different stages of life, if we are honest, strong, and loving, face the eternal questions of purpose, personally defining happiness, and searching for love that is good and true.
I want to let you know that I've been there; I know what you're going through. I've done it with fewer tools, a weaker will, with all the uncertainty and fear and unpreparedness that it seems each generation embraces in its sometimes helpless, sometimes empowered, dance of progress. The problems you face are different, perhaps unique in all of human history, and will require all the creativity, energy, and courage your generation can bring to bear.
But I hope you feel, as I have come, unwillingly but inexorably, to recognize that the power remains in the hands of the individual. Each day you choose to live, and to live a certain way, with certain values, and with a level of courage, awareness, and compassion that will determine a measure of your destiny.
There will always be external forces at work. And your identity will be broken, sewn together, and reforged many times, to the point you might not recognize or know yourself. But know this - whoever you are, you are defined fundamentally by the choice to live a certain way. Own that choice - in so doing, you will have seized full claim to your humanity, and taken the first critical step toward life.
I'm writing it because I want you to judge me in the future, to the extent that I've kept my promises to you. I could, and should, write a thousand things here. You deserve so much, and I know not what I, and my generation, will be able to provide.
It is a poor excuse to say that there is virtue in leaving something undone for the next generation to accomplish. But I cannot, and would not, promise to solve all the problems in society. Many problems, in fact, might not be problems at all. I hope that you will realize sooner than I the necessity of the many seemingly inefficient, inconsistent, and broken aspects of life that somehow, invariably, draw tiny bits of goodness from individuals who choose to live. To see the beauty in things - it is a struggle, but a struggle that builds us into wiser men.
I don't know if you'll enjoy cheap water, energy, and housing. I hope, but do not know, if you will do a better job than I of receiving and absorbing the knowledge that was so wonderfully provided to me through good schools and excellent friends. I can't even promise a future without nuclear terrorism, militarism, economic crises, or a world with living pandas. There is so much that I cannot promise, and that breaks my heart, and brings tears to eyes that have seen much suffering, and sink in shame at the many unrealized possibilities for service.
But this I promise to you - to be the kind of father that you need, not the father I missed. I promise to draw understanding from within myself, but also to rest heavily upon the experience and wisdom of others. I promise to try to place progress over pride, to learn from failure, patient in sacrifice, and gracious in the penumbra of your generation's achievements and way of life. For it is in that that we should feel neither jealousy nor regret, but ultimate confirmation that we brought a bit more truth and beauty to the world.
You come from a long line of individuals whose struggles with the self loomed greater than the struggles with the world. I want you to give yourself permission to conclude the peace early, and permit yourself to grow and prosper. There are certain tensions that serve more purpose in their continuation than in their resolution.
Son, you have my love and respect - you need do nothing to earn either. But you will find, I hope, the drive to earn both from yourself, and that will propel you to be a good man. For that, above all other things, I thank God, this day and all days, glorious and dark.
Thank you, for reminding me why I fight, and what victory truly is.
Love,
Dad
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