In the 1990s an 2000s, until he died in 2008, my father was a member of a couple of writing classes at the West Hollywood Community Center, which I think generated his prodigious output that I often think will take me more years than I have left to cull. But it is a task that I have been and remain glad to undertake, albeit with the speed of a garden slug. Often, the teachers Bea, or Rick, would propose a topic for the senior students most above age 60, and several way into their 80s. My father was somewhere near the age I am now when he wrote many of these tales, reminiscences and opinions.
As I read through these writings over time, I see many things about my father, some of which I am still trying to clarify, but much of which I knew, like his perpetual guilt and a deep anger, and his ever present doubt about the Spiritual, which fascinated him, but which at the same time, he pushed away, with a sarcasm that when directed to me or friends and family, could be a difficult to forget cut, and sometimes undeserved by its recipient. Or so the recipient would think.
These stories reveal a man in constant internal struggle. Maybe that's all of us. But I tend to think that it is some more than others, and right up to the end Dad was working on something that was generated by something he could not reveal even to himself.
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"OK," I say to my reflection in the mirror, what can you say about Rick's selection of theme for this week's writing class? Well, at least I can name them all?"
"Don't be flippant," says my image, "this is a serious matter."
"What the hell," I conclude to my substantial self, "Perhaps it's not Dinner With Andrew, but it's as good a device as any. Off the record, come to think of it, I have probably violated all of the Seven Deadly Sins. You want the truth? More than once. Maybe as recently as last week."
"Be serious," says my image counterpart, "these sins are not only Deadly, they are Cardinal. Now there's a little distinction, to diverge for a moment. Any prelate of stature would tell you that the Maxims reflect moral failings that 'seriously interfere with living a spiritual life'. Nevertheless what did you do last week to help forge that inevitable heavy chain you will carry eternally in that great beyond?"
"I'll tell you. But first, that business of Spirituality: Medieval Catholic patter. Who says I want to be spiritual? Anyway, last week, I go to a Rite-Aid to buy some pipe cleaners so I can blow some cleansed secondary smoke into the Los Angeles smog. When I reach the cashier's line, I find myself standing behind one of thos magnificats of creation, a beautiful, bare-backed young woman, with little in front to mitigate total nudity. From a logical and critical point of view, it is still too cold for such gratuitous revelation. Nevertheless, the unblemished perfection and intoxicating texture of youth is a sight that creates great peril for my immortal soul: I Lust.
"Dirty old man," chides the mirror image.
"Yea, verily," I say, and in that same week I go to Cingular, to renew my cell phone contract. The eyes that look up at me reflect the eternities of outer space: beauty beyond the secular. She waves her enameled fingers to dispel an offending loose hair and I note the golden band of fealty, no doubt to some undeserving male. I Covet.
"For shame," says my visible conscience. "What was the Saint who said these failings can lead to more serious transgressions? Was it Aquinas or Augustine?"
"Funny you should mention the latter?" I note back. "He lived a merry life before he went into hiding behind the cloth. As we know, there are many things lurking beneath celestial costumes. Good subject say, for the Cardinal of Boston. An item for another day. To return to matters relating to Amartia, the Greek for 'missing the mark': In my youth I was guilty of Sloth, or, if you apply a less onerous description, Laziness. I can still hear the sonorous voice of my sainted father summoning me from a deep slumber, 'Son, are you getting up or what?' 'Or what' was a perpetual plea by dad for me to greet the daylight and look for a job. In those salad days of hanging out at the Candy Store without the wherewithal for a three cents plain or a two cent chocolate covered jelly bar, I may have committed my first two violations of the deadly seven."
"Yes," I remember, "you were particularly exercised when the Cohen brothers stomped in or their daily libation at the fountain."
"Now, there was Gluttony. Murray Cohen was big and fat. Bernie was bigger and fatter. Each time they came to the counter they would order a malted milkshake and while waiting, stuff their mouths with jelly bars and other goodies. They always had the cash. I felt Anger at their profligacy in the face of my penury, and Envy at their good fortune."
"Oh, yes, nodded my mirror companion, "that leaves the pitfall that may bar our way to Paradise. You know what Thomas Aquinas says is the most serious of all the seven deadly sins? Remember when you were waiting tables at the Catskills resort and got into that game of craps with the real estate mogul?"
I remembered. It was a Friday night and the mogul always came up on weekends to minister to his Honey--that was her name. Indeed, she was.
I Coveted, I Lusted and I Envied. The mogul clearly felt his own anger when I dropped my forty bucks in the crap game. But I bridled when he handed me back the money I had lost. I would have succumbed to the offer except for the patronizing remark, "Here, kid" that came with the temptation to take it back. Pride.
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