Trees Must Bend
After saying good-bye to Dan, Ben was quiet on the drive home. After several attempts at conversation, Kate gave up. They rode most of the way in silence. But patience was not Kate’s strong suit. Finally she exploded.
“Ben I can’t sit by and see you turn away from Dan like this. You’ve got to realize that there are other beliefs in this world besides your own, and they might possibly have value! We can learn from our children if we are willing to listen and try to see things through their eyes. Sometimes we have to bend to keep from breaking. Like a tree in the wind.”
Ben grumbled something about being so open-minded you can be empty-headed. But then he said in a softer voice, “He has your spirit, Kate. He’s quite a guy isn’t he?”
“Yes, he’s quite a guy. Do you think you could tell him that some day?”
There was no answer. You can push a mule only so far, thought Kate.
Soon, Dan went back to Chile.
In 1973, a few years later, the overthrow of Chile’s faltering government by the military was in all the papers. There was a long, anxious period of no word at all from Dan.
“No letter again today,” Kate told Ben one evening at supper.
Ben’s big fist came down hard on the table. “He needs to come home, back where he belongs. He could do just as much good here. But he has to have these wild ideas about changing the world. He’ll never learn.”
Kate didn’t mention the mail again after that outburst, but she noticed that Ben checked the table every evening as soon as he came in from the field. She suspected he was just as anxious as she was. But they suffered separately.
When a letter finally did arrive, Dan wrote of the takeover of his school by the military. Any efforts to bring about social justice were being crushed. Because the school was trying to help the lower class, the military government considered it a threat. Then, all of a sudden everything changed. “We have to completely remake our lives and try to find meaning in other types of work,” wrote Dan. “If you are dedicated to the poor and to social justice, you are called a Marxist or a Communist. If you respect those who do manual labor or do it yourself, you are suspected of being a revolutionary. And possibly the worst of all is that because of who I am, my past and my education, it is hard to live up to my convictions.”
Ben was shaken by Dan’s words. He was beginning to wonder if he did have all the answers. He had been more comfortable before. He knew what was right and what was wrong, and he lived accordingly. Why wasn’t that enough? He had done nothing to deserve the doubts that were playing havoc with his peace of mind. He hated being unsure almost as much as he hated being wrong. He had thought that having a priest for a son would be a comfort in his old age, but that didn’t seem to be in God’s plan. Dan was about as much comfort as a burr in a saddle.