Roles: We All Actors on Life's Stage

As many of us go through the year-ending holidays as parents and grandparents, we are looked to by our children as those who lead the activities and celebrations and just set the tone for our home.  We are usually embracing a role that our parents had embraced before us.  Sometimes it is out of a sense of tradition and sometimes it it because we want to do.  Anyway, let's focus on the word 'role'.  What is a role to me?  It is a part we play.  It is actions or attitude we embrace.  We embrace them for our own reasons.  

Sometimes, we embrace the part or actions/attitude because that is what is expected of us.  We want to be considered by society as being "responsible".  In other words, we do what is expected because we don't want to 'look bad' to others.  Sometimes, we embrace our role because it is a core belief of our faith.  We want to be respectful or obedient of our Higher Power (God) and/or our moral code.  The "Fear of the Lord" might keep us on the right track and/or just wanting to make sure we please our Father (Higher Power).  Sometimes, we feel like we are being judged by those close to us.  We may want to please our parents, spouse or even children.  Perhaps maybe it could be more like that we don't want to 'displease' them.  Sometimes it may be as simple as we want to be feel good about ourselves.  So, we embrace a role to boost or ego a bit.  Sometimes, there is just something deep inside us telling us that a particular role is just something that we should have or do or are meant to have or do.  Whatever the draw,  sometimes it feels to me in a way that we are actors on a stage called life.  Our audience may be society at large, those close to us or are Higher Power.  

Sometimes we embrace a role with almost reckless enthusiasm.  We are excited and can't wait to burst onto the stage and start belting out our lines.  That is, we are almost getting ahead of ourselves.  We are on the edge interrupting the other actors or actresses who are in the process of finishing their lines.   Sometimes, we embrace our role with dogged determination.  We appreciate it is what we should be doing or where we should be.   We push and grind through it in a bid to make sure we get it right or complete.   Sometimes, like Noah, we grudgingly embrace our role because, while we hate it, we are facing consequences if we don't.   Whether it is someone's wrath, a loss of face or just personal shame, we are compelled to meet our role.  Whatever way we embrace it, we still behaving like actors on stage.  Just sometimes we have an easier time getting into the character of our role.  Additionally, sometimes we just do a better job in 'acting' our role.  While it would be best if we embraced our roles properly and gave an Oscar worthy performance in our roles, much of the battle is just accepting and trying.   Like a famous PSA for adopting says, "You don't have to be perfect to be the perfect parent."  Sometimes it is enough to accept and work seriously at your role.

I've expressed why we seek and/or accept roles.  I've also expressed how we embrace our roles.  But, let's get more concrete.  What our our roles?  Below is just a sampling of roles and not meant to be a complete list or in any particular order.

ROLES (examples)

• Becoming/being a parent
• When I took my daughter's mom to the hospital 13+ years ago, I felt like we were a couple with this concept of impending parenthood represented by a significant bulge in her tummy.  I knew conceptually that we were about to become parents, but nothing could fully prepare me for what followed.  We went to the hospital as a couple with the idea of a child on the way.  We left as a couple that just happened to have this little person who was fully dependent on us.
• As we were taking this little person to the car on the way out, it struck me: I'm a parent now and I don't know if I have what it takes.  Life hits you quick sometimes and I realized that I needed to suck it up and try no matter my insecurities.
• I was on 'stage' with the audience being the world.  I felt like I had to put on a good performance in the role of 'parent'.  Honestly, for me, my real audience was my daughter, her mom and my Higher Power (God).
• Being a good spouse/significant other
• As I've heard and been advised the real work of relationships/marriage is not when things are going smooth.  The real work is when there are difficulties, differences or conflict.   It's easy when things are going smooth to be embrace the illusion that 'love' alone will carry the day.  However, as anyone who has been in a long-term marriage or who has been divorced realizes that warmth towards your SO is important.  However, dedication and determination will carry the day long term.  In other words, 'playing your role'.
• Being a good employee
• I've heard the phrase, attributed to Mark Twain, "Find a job you enjoy doing, and you will never have to work a day in your life."  I don't necessarily totally agree with that.  I think that even people that love their job, need a break from time to time.  Even the most loved jobs can have their own challenges.
• Our role is quite clear here: If you are do a job, do it properly (or to the best of your ability).  It's hard to take pride in doing a job poorly and/or disinterestedly.
• Being a citizen or member of society
• In order for society to function smoothly we have to be a good neighbor and we have to participate in it. 
• We play the role of a voter.  We take seriously the role of choosing our leaders and/or our rules.
• We can play the role of a good neighbor.   If we see someone that is distressed or needs help.  Even if we don't feel like getting involved, putting ourself at risk or just interrupting what our own routine, we can play a responsible role.
• If we are in a 'hero or leader' role, it is important that we embrace the role properly.  It is important that we set a good example.  That could making sure we are appropriate in our role.  It could mean that we put others before ourselves.

Roles can feel uplifting, roles can feel challenging, roles can feel foreign, and frankly roles can even feel miserable.  But, however a role feels, if we are meant to take a role, it is important that we take it seriously.   An actor on the stage will only be accepted by the audience if he/she takes his/her role seriously.  Similarly, I believe we can live a meaningful, purposeful or proper life if we are willing to take seriously or accept our role.   This isn't always easy and sometimes as I will aside shortly, roles can be brutal.  For me, when I think about it, if God can take the form of a man and take on hurt of the sin of the world and the brutal death for us, maybe I can suck it up.

Just my 2 cents.

-- Rich

• In 2011, I had to play the role of a loving younger brother while I helped with my late brother's passing.  In 2015, I finished that role as I had his ashes interned.  I wrote a eulogy for him.
• In 2014, I had to play the role of a responsible son as my mom died suddenly and not fully prepared.  I had to pull together (financially and logistically) a funeral and a wake in a matter of a few days.   Once again, I had to write a eulogy.
• In 2015, I had to set up another funeral and burial as my dad finally succumbed to Parkinson's related complications.

In each case, I wanted to run away from responsibility.  I didn't want to have to push through the pain and the loss.  My mother and dad had entrusted me to be the 'responsible party'.   My late brother's passing was unexpected and he didn't entrust anyone.  But, as his closest family member, I knew it was my role to see that he and his memory were treated properly and respectfully.   He needed a strong advocate and no one had to tell me, I just knew it was my role and as I look back my honor.

The reflection across the pond: the connection of the past to the future which we embrace.

Kristi,

A funny thing happened on the way to getting married to you last weekend.   I remembered the past as a reflection in the water.  I was standing on one side of the water, but looking down and across the pond, I saw a reflection on the other side of the water.  In that reflection, was my old life.   My old life had some good points and some not so good points, but the reflection was quite clear to me.

Just recently Nancy Reagan passed away at the age of 94.  It seemed like just yesterday that her husband Ronald Reagan had passed away not too long before to great fanfare and mourning.  But, it was really actually near 12 years ago.   Twelve years ago was a very different time and a place in my life (as I suspect it is for many people, including my wife Kristi). I was in a different relationship, my daughter hadn't been born yet, three of my late family members were alive and well, I had my old house and enough hair to justify not shaving it yet.  In short, I had a relatively simple life and had yet to experience some of the darkest moments.   But like a reflection, it wasn't as 'solid' and carefree as it seemed.  The storm clouds were always there waiting to disrupt the reflection, but they hadn't yet evidenced themselves.

Little did I know, that withing a few years, I would have a daughter, my former relationship would reveal itself as having a weak foundation, and just about everything else I took for granted would change in a my life.  Much of what seemed permanent and important then, now I know to have been temporary or passing and unimportant.  But, so it is with life's rich experiences.  You don't always have a sense of what really is until long after the fact.  However, looking back you realize that if you had looked closely enough, you'd have seen the storm clouds and recognized things for what they really are/were.  Maybe that's why wisdom is more often associated with older people.  Older people, have had the opportunity in many cases to experience that carefree optimism, but also have seen much of that optimism struck head-on by life's storms.

But, I digress.  I have come to recognize that when facing life-changing events it is inevitable to do reflecting and perhaps some soul-searching.   Since the day I met you, you have always has been one to not only accept me, but to understand me and enjoy me for who I am.  I hope you can say I provide the same.  After a moment or two to consider the reflection in the water, I realized that it is okay to remember and if necessary mourn the losses of  the soon-to-be old life, while embracing the new life with you and your kids.  We can't and shouldn't worry about relitigating the past, but we can and should embrace the future God has put forward to us.

I wave goodbye to the reflection, but that doesn't mean I will forget it, it just means I choose to embrace the unknown future with you, my lifetime partner.  But, I embrace it with the the hard earned wisdom of what love is truly all about.  I intend to use the wisdom God had blessed me with to embrace the new life He has set before me.

Love,
Your husband Rich