Letter To My Sons - Nov. 4, 2020

Dear Boys,

As you know, I always do my best thinking when I write it out. This morning is no different.

This morning, I’m thinking a lot about America, and the American Dream, and what those things mean, going forward. I’ve been thinking about your great-great grandfather who was gassed in the trenches during World War One, and whose hair turned white as a result. I’ve been thinking about your other great-great grandfather, one of the last of America’s iconic, old school sheriffs. I’ve been thinking about your great-grandfather and your great-great uncle, serving in the Air Force and the Navy respectively during World War Two, and their experiences in the skies of the Pacific and on the shore at D-Day. I’ve been thinking about your other great-grandfather, a moonshiner who defied not only the law, but his fellow white southerners, to befriend and do business with people of color. And I’ve been thinking about your Papaw, and his time in Vietnam, and his time on riot duty in Detroit and Washington D.C. afterward, and how the latter may have messed with him more than the former, and how those two things were a bigger education than anything he learned in that little schoolhouse in the mountains of West Virginia.

And I’ve been thinking about one of my favorite writers, Hunter S. Thompson. In Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas, he wrote:

***

History is hard to know, because of all the hired bullshit, but even without being sure of “history” it seems entirely reasonable to think that every now and then the energy of a whole generation comes to a head in a long fine flash, for reasons that nobody really understands at the time—and which never explain, in retrospect, what actually happened… There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning.

And that, I think, was the handle—that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting—on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave. . . .

So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark—that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.

***

Now, what he was talking about in that passage was all the hope and seemingly unstoppable social change of the Sixties, and how it all eventually seemed to fizzle.

He was talking about the death of the American Dream.

All my life I believed in what this country supposedly stood for. No, America wasn’t perfect. Far from it. But when I joined the Navy like your great-great uncle and traveled the world and got to experience other countries for myself? No, America wasn’t perfect, but it still had the potential to be so one day.

I have always believed that change comes in generational increments. I am old enough to remember when most of my gay friends were closeted, and when the halls at school would fall quiet as soon as our one lone black student walked to his locker. I’m old enough to remember when the beginning and ending of most people’s understanding of the trans community was to equate it all with drag queens and Boy George. I’m old enough to remember when it was a big fucking deal that Captain America got a black partner named the Falcon, and when straight white guys who — a year before — would have been aghast at listening to black music or anything not overtly heterosexual were blasting Prince’s Purple Rain in heavy rotation alongside Motley Crue and Quiet Riot, and admitting that this George Michael guy in Wham had one hell of a set of pipes.

The problem with thinking that change comes in generational increments is that as you get older, you become complacent. And that is a mistake that I have made. For too many years, I assumed that things were getting better — that we had moved beyond those things I remembered. That we had evolved, as a society. But things have not gotten better. In fact, they’ve gotten worse.

I was talking with a friend this morning. He’d been up all night, watching the election results and drinking. I’d gone to bed around midnight and was just waking up to see the latest. He feared that the country he believed in when he was younger didn’t exist anymore. That it had gone backward. He felt that a cancer had taken root deep in our nation’s soul, and it was malignant. I told him that I agreed with him, and that I don’t know how we get it back. I told him I was terrified for the two of you, and your kids (my future grandkids).

And I am.

It’s very easy for people from all walks of life to feel that the American Dream is dead. There has been a very slow and deliberate undermining of our institutions and laws. It stretches all the way back to Kennedy’s assassination and it culminates with this current election cycle. We no longer trust the media, law enforcement, government institutions, the scientific and medical establishments, or the promise of state’s rights. We talk about the Constitution and cling to the Bill of Rights, but too many people in this country are eager to ignore both if it means scoring points for their side. This has destabilized our government, and I fear that ultimately, it is leading toward totalitarianism.

So, yeah, that’s why Dad is scared for you both.

But then I had some more coffee and a shower, and I remembered something another friend said to me over the weekend. We were talking about the election, and an op-ed he had written for a newspaper last week, and he told me to be of good cheer, because things might yet break our way.

He’s not wrong. Because change happens in generational increments. In the years ahead, it is your turn. Just don’t make the same mistake your father made. Don’t get complacent. Don’t just assume that things are getting better for everyone. Understand that as my sons, you both have a certain amount of privilege, and while things may be okay for you, they might not be for your fellow Americans.

When I had my accident a few years back, the three of us all came to realize that I am not always going to be here for you. I told you both then that the secret to being a good parent is to simply be better than your parents were. If you had terrible parents, be better. If you had good parents, be better. But there’s been another piece of primary advice that I have repeated to both of you over the years, taken from one of my favorite comic books — Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon’s Preacher. And I know you can both roll your eyes and quote it at me in that “This again, Dad?” tone, but I’m going to repeat it today, regardless.

Always be a good guy, because the world has too many bad guys.

That’s never been more important than it is now. I am deeply proud of the good guys you both are. I am deeply proud of your kindness and empathy, and of your thirst for knowledge and understanding, and for your devotion to assisting the betterment of those around you. I’m proud of how you’re both aware that America is different, depending on who you are or where you live, and how both of you have worked to change that in your own way, when most of your friends are going to parties or playing Fortnite. I need you both to stick to it in the years to come. Continue to stand up for those around you, and for yourselves. Continue to know what’s right, and what you believe. Continue to question and to learn. Continue to educate yourselves not just through academics and school, but through living and exploring the world and talking to people who are different from you. Continue to recognize other good guys not by their color or gender or religion or nationality or political party, but by their actions. Continue to find the common denominators that all humankind share, and celebrate those things. Continue to reject dogma and blind partisanship. Continue to stand against hate and cruelty. Continue to stand up to bullies.

Sometimes it will be hard to do that. There have been times in the past when it seemed that by doing those things, I was somehow in the minority. But I did it regardless because that’s what good guys do. I suspect that in the years to come it will only be harder. But I know that you have it in you. You have the strength and the wisdom and the empathy.

Change happens in generational increments, and though things seem dark in America right now, I am of good cheer, because I have faith in the changes your generation will enact. I am proud that — no matter how many bad guys seem to be braying and breeding — there are two good guys who will know when to make their stand, and do their part to stop the grim backward slide.

Love,

Dad