His name was Aaron.
I was 14 and a regular volunteer at a nursing home about a mile from my high school. I walked there after class once or twice a week to help the activities director run the bingo game, or gather people to listen to someone play the piano, or I'd set up the ramp for wheel chair bowling. But mostly I just liked to hang out there and play with everyone.
Aaron was one of my favorites. I have no idea how old he was but by nursing home standards he was pretty young. He grew up in the Deep South and had polio when he was a boy. His emaciated legs left him wheelchair bound but his deep booming voice and sense of humor filled any room the moment he entered it. We hit it off immediately and were always joking and kidding each other.
Somewhere along the line he asked me if I cooked, and even at that age I did. I brightened up, "Oh, I should make you something!"
"Oh! Make me a pineapple upside down cake! Oh, I love that."
"Okay!"
But the thing is, I didn't have the slightest idea what a pineapple upside down cake was. Never had one. Never saw one. Back in the 70's I couldn't just Google it and find the recipe.
I had promised him I would do it because I really wanted to do something for him and had unwittingly commited myself to something I had no idea how to do. I felt terrible. I was intimidated, embarrassed and felt like I was going to let him down.
What did I do?
I did what a lot of you do. I avoided the situation.
I stopped going to the nursing home. I don't think I was even fully conscious of what I was doing. It was winter and I used the excuse that it was too hard to walk in the snow down a busy street in the dark after school for a mile but the truth is I was avoiding Aaron. I didn't know how to admit that I didn't know how to do what he had asked. I didn't want to see him disappointed. Didn't want to admit my ignorance and inadequacy. I just couldn't face it.
When I did go back, some time later (a month or two?), I found out that Aaron had died in my absence.
That was over thirty years ago and I have never forgotten him. And now maybe you will think of him from time to time, yourself. I have since learned how to make an outstanding pineapple upside-down cake and wish every time that I could share it with him.
For many years I felt so deeply guilty about this and such a sense of shame that I never shared this story. That I was a kid was little consolation to me. I had avoided someone I loved because I could not face my own inadequacy and I never got to see him again. That was a hell of a price to pay for the drama of my ego.
To stay in shame and guilt does nothing, though, but breed greater avoidance and self-deprecation. It does nothing to further one's learning and bestows no grace on anyone, least of all the one you feel you have wronged.
Many people are hesitant to let themselves off the hook, though, feeling some debt of low self-esteem must be paid. Some sentence of psychic punishment must be endured, in order to make up for the transgression.
Not so. All that does is serve the ego even more in a sick and, I dare say, narcissistic way. "I'm the most terrible person who ever lived" is still about status, isn't it? "I can't get over what I did because it was so bad for them" is about your power over someone's happiness, yes? For all I know, Aaron never gave a second thought to the cake. I don't know and I never will. The point is I had failed myself even more than Aaron. I didn't step up to the relationship in the way I wanted to think I could. I dropped a ball I asked him to toss me and I failed in my own estimation.
The only solution was to have the courage to look at that honestly and to commit to trying harder to overcome my ego so that I didn't become the victim of my own internal drama in the future because frankly it cost me far more than I ever want to pay again. I had to make the decision that love would be greater than fear or live with the consequences.
I make that decision every single day.
His name was Aaron.
I was 14 and a regular volunteer at a nursing home about a mile from my high school. I walked there after class once or twice a week to help the activities director run the bingo game, or gather people to listen to someone play the piano, or I'd set up the ramp for wheel chair bowling. But mostly I just liked to hang out there and play with everyone.
Aaron was one of my favorites. I have no idea how old he was but by nursing home standards he was pretty young. He grew up in the Deep South and had polio when he was a boy. His emaciated legs left him wheelchair bound but his deep booming voice and sense of humor filled any room the moment he entered it. We hit it off immediately and were always joking and kidding each other.
Somewhere along the line he asked me if I cooked, and even at that age I did. I brightened up, "Oh, I should make you something!"
"Oh! Make me a pineapple upside down cake! Oh, I love that."
"Okay!"
But the thing is, I didn't have the slightest idea what a pineapple upside down cake was. Never had one. Never saw one. Back in the 70's I couldn't just Google it and find the recipe.
I had promised him I would do it because I really wanted to do something for him and had unwittingly commited myself to something I had no idea how to do. I felt terrible. I was intimidated, embarrassed and felt like I was going to let him down.
What did I do?
I did what a lot of you do. I avoided the situation.
I stopped going to the nursing home. I don't think I was even fully conscious of what I was doing. It was winter and I used the excuse that it was too hard to walk in the snow down a busy street in the dark after school for a mile but the truth is I was avoiding Aaron. I didn't know how to admit that I didn't know how to do what he had asked. I didn't want to see him disappointed. Didn't want to admit my ignorance and inadequacy. I just couldn't face it.
When I did go back, some time later (a month or two?), I found out that Aaron had died in my absence.
That was over thirty years ago and I have never forgotten him. And now maybe you will think of him from time to time, yourself. I have since learned how to make an outstanding pineapple upside-down cake and wish every time that I could share it with him.
For many years I felt so deeply guilty about this and such a sense of shame that I never shared this story. That I was a kid was little consolation to me. I had avoided someone I loved because I could not face my own inadequacy and I never got to see him again. That was a hell of a price to pay for the drama of my ego.
To stay in shame and guilt does nothing, though, but breed greater avoidance and self-deprecation. It does nothing to further one's learning and bestows no grace on anyone, least of all the one you feel you have wronged.
Many people are hesitant to let themselves off the hook, though, feeling some debt of low self-esteem must be paid. Some sentence of psychic punishment must be endured, in order to make up for the transgression.
Not so. All that does is serve the ego even more in a sick and, I dare say, narcissistic way. "I'm the most terrible person who ever lived" is still about status, isn't it? "I can't get over what I did because it was so bad for them" is about your power over someone's happiness, yes? For all I know, Aaron never gave a second thought to the cake. I don't know and I never will. The point is I had failed myself even more than Aaron. I didn't step up to the relationship in the way I wanted to think I could. I dropped a ball I asked him to toss me and I failed in my own estimation.
The only solution was to have the courage to look at that honestly and to commit to trying harder to overcome my ego so that I didn't become the victim of my own internal drama in the future because frankly it cost me far more than I ever want to pay again. I had to make the decision that love would be greater than fear or live with the consequences.
I make that decision every single day.