Sins of the Father, Sins of the Son

A Brush with Death

I can still remember the first time I wanted to become a priest.

It was back during the bad days, back before I realized how twisted and cruel the world could be when the mind is shrouded with the innocent outlook of a child. I was a courageous and adventurous ten-year old boy, willing to take any risk or conquer any feat in the never-ending pursuit of thrill and excitement.

I sat on the beach in the back of my childhood vacation home, nestled against the yawning brown stretch of Whitewood Lake in Badger, MI. The lake was surrounded by monstrous vacation homes owned by wealthy doctors and lawyers and businessmen; the rest of Badger was fairly poor, a small town in Nowhere Michigan located thirty minutes or so south of the Mackinac Bridge, the bridge that connected Lower Michigan to the Upper Peninsula.

My father was a prominent Endocrinologist in the suburbs of Detroit; he had purchased the land, bulldozed the original home, and built a giant vacation home on its foundation. My mother and I would spend summers here and my father would join us when he wasn't on call.

At that time my father wasn't with us because he was working (years later I found out he was most likely having sexual relations with a pretty young nurse, the one he ended up marrying after my parents divorced). My mother had gone next door to the neighbors to return a weed whacker she'd borrowed the week before. She had explicitly forbid me from entering the water until she got back, but really, where was the fun in that?

I sat in the sand with nothing but a damp swimsuit on. The sun was blazing that day; I turned my back on it to protect my eyes from the incinerating rays. The familiar scent of sunblock was thick in my nostrils mixed with the fishy smell of the lake and the humidity was causing my lower back, armpits, and forehead to sweat profusely. Sand clung to my hands and feet as I dug a hole with a small plastic toy shovel; my mother had asked me if I was digging a hole to China and at the time I had wondered if it was really possible.

When I grew bored I shielded my eyes with my hand and gazed at the anchored raft that bobbed lazily up-and-down on the gentle waves of the lake. It was thirty or forty yards out from where I was sitting; it looked closer than it really was, which is why I had rubbed shoulders with death that day. We had an old, metal canoe that I would use to paddle out to the raft; despite being a strong swimmer for my age my mother wouldn't let me go without a lifejacket, which annoyed me verily.

The raft seemed to be calling to me. C'mon Stanley, you're a strong swimmer, you can make it. As adventurous as I was, I possessed the uncanny ability, even at that young age, to be mindful of the consequences that could potentially follow my actions. I was wild at heart, but I minded my mother, even when she wasn't there to scold me. That's what made my decision to attempt an unsupervised swim to the raft that much stranger, the fact that I hadn't pondered the consequences beforehand-it was out of character.

I scanned the neighbor's house for my mother's presence. She was still inside. I turned and dove into the water. The lake floor was covered in thick patches of seaweed and other vegetation, so I began to kick as soon as I could to bring my body horizontal to the floor and avoid stepping into the slimy green tentacles that danced just below the water's surface. My face twisted in disgust as the seaweed tickled and caressed my chest and legs; it felt like the flicking tongue of a snake or the clammy feelers of some abominable lake monster salivating at the thought of a tasty snack floating on the water's edge.

I forced the fearful thoughts from my mind and paddled harder. As the bottom of the lake sank away the seaweed disappeared along with it. I looked up and saw that I was already halfway to the raft. I can do this, I thought, I'm going to make it! My ears were filled with the sound of splashing water and the mechanical hum of motorboats and jet skis bouncing rhythmically across the lake.