On My Worst Day

by John Lynch

  “Lynch, you think you’re so damned funny. You think everything’s a joke. You know how to get others to screw around, until my good players forget why we brought them here. Lynch, you’re like a cancer to a team. Did you all hear me? Players like Lynch are a cancer. They poison the water and others don’t even notice it. Well, that’s not the way we won a national championship when I played first base here, and it’s not the way we’re going to play ball now, dammit! So, Lynch, you decide what you are—a ballplayer or a comedian. … All right, everyone, get to work.”

  It’s a uniquely horrible feeling to be shamed as an athlete. Something in your masculinity, in your very person gets diminished. The respect and hard-earned trust between ballplayers is experienced at every level. We were used to getting called out for not running hard on an infield popup. But none of us were prepared to have our personhood attacked. This coach knew what he was doing. He was ostracizing me from the rest of the team. Hanging out with me would risk becoming this coach’s next target.

  That was the last day I would enjoy playing baseball. I would leave the game forever three weeks later.

  John, I formed you to encourage community—to affirm, bless, enjoy, and bring out the best in others. When you run up against an insecure person who can coach only by threatening and belittling, your motive will always be misunderstood. And you will get hurt.

  This moment will help develop a conviction you will teach for the rest of your life; people work best and hardest in a place where they know they are valued.

  I am going to surround you with some strong friend, who will protect you as you model and teach this way of life.

  None of this will help you much for about twenty years. What happened today will wound you. You will have no one to protect you. Until this moment, you have respected and obeyed even bad authority. But this will change you. It will give you increasing permission to mistrust all authority. You are about to enter a brutally hard time of your life.

  I’m here. One day, you’ll understand I suffered under insecure authority which ultimately tried to destroy one who would threaten it with good. You’re in good company today. You just don’t know it yet.

  By the way, that coach, he knows he’s wrong. He will go home after today’s practice and sit in front of a television set and know he’s wrong. You’ll be teaching this way of life to his sons and daughters. Hold on, kid.

  Awakening: In an environment of law, every motive is suspect. In an environment of grace, good motive is presumed.

  October 1972

  We are out to dinner this evening, Arlene and I. Recently, things have not been going well with us. But nothing has prepared me for the words she says to me tonight. …

  “John, I think we should break up.”

  She has seen enough. She has known me for six years now. We’ve been together almost every day. She loves me and deeply enjoys me. But I am too much work. I have not learned how to be secure dating this uncommonly beautiful girl. She has grown weary of defending herself. My insecurity and shame are now disrupting my world at its very core.

  How hard it must have been for her to prepare to say those words! How long did she know and not tell me, afraid of hurting me? In the moment, I’m not mature enough to tell her how brave she is.

  Everything happening next is a frantic blur. I pay the check before our meal arrives and drive her home in the rain. Neither of us speaks a word. There is only the sound of windshield wipers, mocking me. I drop her off and stare at her one more time before she walks out of my sight.

  I drive wildly back to the fraternity. My best friend is not in his room. I bang on his door like a deranged man, yelling at the top of my lungs. Then, in my shiny white shoes and dress slacks, I run through the streets of Tempe, moaning out loud, “This time it is really over.”

  As long as she was in my world, I could make sense of life. She was not only a girlfriend. Her affirmation and smile were how I knew who I was. Now suddenly I am alone. Another thick layer of shame is being formed on that run. To have someone know me up close for a long, long time. For that person to know the deepest, most real truths about me, to know my dreams, my secrets, my weaknesses … and then choose to no longer be with me. To not be enough for that person. Where do I go? What do I do with the rest of this life? Who is built to withstand such pain?

  I discover myself in a park, miles away, panting and drenched.

  Awakening: Rejection can tempt me to spend the rest of my life proving I’m worth loving. But it will never convince me.

  The most darkness-defying risk a human can take is to believe, even in this moment, this is true: In my freshly proven shame and sense of failure, I want to turn away from it. But to do so is to deny the reason Jesus went to the cross.

  On my worst day I am: adored, enjoyed, clean, righteous, absolutely forgiven, new, acceptable, complete, chosen, able, intimately loved, smiled upon, planned for, protected, continually thought about, enjoyed, cared for, comforted, understood, known completely, given all mercy, compassion, guarded, matured, bragged on, defended, valued, esteemed, held, hugged and caressed, kissed, heard, honored, in unity with, favored, enough, on time, lacking nothing, directed, guided continually, never failed, waited for, anticipated, part of, belonging, never alone, praised, secure, safe, believed, appreciated, given all grace, all patience, at peace with, pure, shining, precious, cried over, grieved with, strengthened, emboldened, drawn kindly to repentance, relaxed with, never on trial, never frowned at, never hit with a two-by-four, at rest in, receiving complete access, given gifts, given dreams, given new dreams, continually healed, nurtured, carried, never mocked, never punished, most of my humor enjoyed, not behind, not outside, given endless affection.

  It doesn’t always much feel like it in the moment. This is the depth of His love, whether you or I feel we deserve it or not. “Deserve” has long ago left the building.

  1973

  The combination of Arlene leaving and my baseball career ending do me in. Within a few months my clothing styles change. I grow my hair long and I move out of the fraternity. Without debate, I give myself permission to live a life I previously never considered. I spend more time with an older friend, who introduces me into a counterculture lifestyle. I’m eating tofu and lentil beans with curry. Soon I’m trying out TM and studying the teachings of Baba Ram Dass. I’m checking out nearly every hip manner of spirituality I can locate. I’m now smoking pot daily and will soon aggressively plow my way through all manner of psychedelic drugs. I’m reading Carlos Castaneda, Richard Brautigan, Kurt Vonnegut, and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. I try dating girls I knew from the sororities, but my heart’s not in it. They’re far too much part of the “establishment” for my new thinking.

  Dad has taken a promotion to General Electric headquarters in Connecticut. The next time my parents see me, I will present an entirely different son. One of my strong regrets is forcing them to react to my new directions instead of giving them the gift of walking with me through it. I will do this to them over and over through the next decades. Near the end of his life, my dad will tell me he wished I hadn’t imposed my newfound faith as a line-in-the-sand declaration. “Do you know how hard it is for your son to defiantly tell you he now believes differently than you, without ever giving you the chance to enter the conversation?”

  John, you are trying to navigate life without anyone standing next to you. You are afraid of being hurt. You think you are more open-minded, but are actually closed to everything but bluffing. You are open to all manner of lies. You will try nearly everything, except me. Tonight, as you lie in bed, I am trying to help you know I’m here. I’m not angry, I’m not disgusted. I’m waiting. This next part of this story will be horribly hard. But I promise, I will not let a minute of it be wasted. After it is all over, you will wake up and still be right on time.

  1973

  In two semesters, I change my major from Political Science, to Psychology, to Recreation, then English. My major at this moment
is Speech Communication, with a minor in Drama. In the theater, I discover the vehicle I will communicate from for much of the rest of my life. In my first acting class I discover an uncommon ability to bring printed words alive on a stage. I discover a professor and mentor named Dr. Witt. He’s a short, rumpled, pudgy man in his fifties, with a bushy mustache and wild hair. He’s an eccentric, brilliant, accomplished stage actor and director. I have been spellbound, watching him act and direct actors.

  In his Beginning Acting class I perform a soliloquy from Long Day’s Journey into Night. As soon as I sit down, he dramatically pops up, and slithers up close to the class. He puts his forefinger to his lips, tilts his head to the side, and whispers:

  “Shh … For a moment, try to absorb what happened. That, right there. What you just watched. That was acting! This is why I love teaching. For moments like this. Where someone with no training shows up and brings something alive and real to this stage. The rest of you dullards move from one piece of furniture to another, reciting words as from a recipe card. This young man made me believe him. He believed himself. Whatever it is he understands, the rest of you need to discover. Or your only role in the theater will be as prop-handlers in a cafetorium production of Rippen.”

  … I sit there staring, realizing in that moment, this is the gift I would carry for the rest of my life. I only needed another to see it in me.

  I love everything about taking on a character: the preparation, the memorization, blocking, self-directing, getting into character, and then playing it all out in front of others. No net. The audience and actors create a moment which wouldn’t exist otherwise. Both are indispensible to the other. The only movie where I’ve seen this truth captured is Shakespeare in Love. We are watching the beginning of the first ever performance of Romeo and Juliet. It is sputtering out of the gate. The play is given up on by nearly everyone within five minutes.

  … Then a vulnerable line is believably delivered. And a spark catches. In moments, the audience is now trying, through nodding and leaning, to call out to the actors: “We’re here. We’ve bought in. We’ve got you. Run with this! We’ll catch you if you fall. Please, give us something which will help us transcend our lives. We will do our part.” The actors soon find their footing. A permission from trust has been forged. Something palpable and tangible, wild and unbridled is being created that never existed before this moment. Everyone knows magic is happening, and no one will allow this spell to be broken. …

  I’m not really an actor, at least not in the classical sense. I just think I am comfortable being John Lynch in different outfits. I can convince you I believe I am who I am portraying. That’s all it takes for an audience to buy in and allow you to take them to another place, to another way of seeing.

  Theater is not only what takes place on a stage. You don’t have to be an actor to pull out a memory and bring it to those who were not there. Whenever that takes place, something magical happens. It’s the key to great teaching, storytelling, parenting, songwriting, or opening your heart. To take yourself back into a redemptive moment and replay it. It inspires and frees others. It’s about as close as transcending into the eternal as we get down here. When you can get out of the way of your self-consciousness long enough to convince another you are there in the moment, it allows them to be transported to places they might otherwise never get to go. … All of it is exceedingly life-giving.

  With all the pain and ugliness of what is coming up, I remain grateful that God uses this time to teach me how to be me in front of others. I learn a craft I will get the privilege to perform the rest of my life, to one day help free others into grace.

  You will never be able to quickly tell a wrench from a pair of pliers. You will never successfully work on anything electrical your entire life. But this I have given you to do. Do you know how much I enjoy watching you unwind a piece, while I sit in the audience with others, allowing myself to be transported into the scene you create? Yes, me. That’s what love does. It trusts another to benefit from who they are. Bravo, my friend. Bravo!

  1975

  No money I’ve ever possessed was spent as well as the $225 I paid for that blue 1960 ragtop VW Bug.

  I graduated from college in May. While most of my friends were transitioning into careers they’d been interning for, I pointed that car and her misfiring cylinders toward Santa Barbara. Several years before, during a spring break trip, the fuel pump in my ’65 Chevy Nova went out and had to be repaired in Isla Vista, outside of Santa Barbara. I spent three days there with a friend. I drove away in love with all things beach town.

  For the next several years I lived with only what my VW could carry as I waited tables from Santa Barbara to Laguna Beach.

  I developed a predictable pattern: show up into a new town, sleep in my car, find a waiter’s job, move in with other waiters. I loved being the winsome new guy with stories to tell of the open road. I was made for waiting tables! You’re given money for helping others enjoy their time. For a performer, that’s easy money. We ate the food guests left on their plates. At a nice steak and fish house you could score lobster, crab and steak all evening long. Ramen during the day; surf and turf at dinner.

  I stayed in each town until things got too complicated. Then I’d pack up Blue and move on.

  I loved my car. I drove her long distances, mostly at night. She couldn’t handle the desert during the day. I propped up the engine cover an inch or so with a fishing rod, so she wouldn’t vapor lock. My 6-volt battery spent more time dead than alive. I learned to park on slants, so later I could push her with the driver’s door open, hop in, drop into second gear, lurch her into life, and off down the road. A hippie’s dream.

  I’d drive through the night, with her ragtop wide open, creating radio talk shows. I made up an imaginary talk show host, who’d take calls from all manner of imaginary people.

  “Hello, this is Bob Abernathy. You’re on the air. What’s your gripe; what’s your complaint?”

  “Yep, Bob, thanks for the handle. I’m Floyd McCutcheon. I’m driving a big rig outta Sioux

  Falls, heading to Barstow on a blind flip to Chi town.”

  “What you carrying, Floyd?”

  “Bearings, Bob. Lateral cinch bearings for farm equipment. You use ’em to modulate your flash point while galvanizing sheet metal into bevel housing conduits. Try torquing an aftermarket adaptor without cinch bearings and you’ll be pulling rivets out of your Ditch Witch like silt from a frontload grain harvester. You know what I mean, Bob?”

  “So, Floyd, what’s your gripe; what’s your complaint?”

  “Well, Bob, it’s this whole liberal, Trilateral Commission nonsense. I don’t see how we can sit by and watch these Commies slip through the slats, like so many cam-adaptor freeze plugs. Next thing you know, Congress’ll be letting them special interest groups sell our children to outsourced plantation bosses in Paraguay. You know what I mean, Bob?”

  … There is no accent or voice I use today who didn’t first call in to Bob Abernathy’s show.

  That car taught me to love road trips, seek out diners, enjoy cow-shaped creamers, eat pie, make small talk with locals, smell night air, watch stars over me, form new dialects, and be comfortable alone, with myself … driving along, waiting to meet Everyman.

  I still love all of it.

  Awakening: God enjoys the tastes and enjoyments I cultivated in my unbelieving days. He only wants to enjoy them with me and discard the ones that hurt me.

  John, when you were forced to sell Blue for rent money back in Connecticut, I made sure she had a great final owner. An older widow in upstate New York. She saw the car sitting in front of a Chinese restaurant with a For Sale sign on the front windshield. She’d driven past it every day for months. She loved that car. She used to be a hairstylist for the Yardbirds. The bass player had one the same color you repainted yours. One day she said to me, “If that car is still there a month from now, I’m going to take it as a sign you’d like me to have it.” People are
throwing that kind of nonsense at me all the time. I don’t want to encourage it. Next thing I know, I’m being asked to make the sunset a certain color. Anyway, for her, I made an exception. I wanted your car to have a great last home. I’m sentimental like that. So sue me.

  For ten years she drove that beauty from her farm outside Mount Kisco into town and back. Her dogs loved the open top. They put their paws on the back of the front seats and stuck their heads out the top of the car. The car never had a repair. I thought you should know.

  1977

  Early on I drove with friends to Las Vegas. Later I got a ride with near strangers. Eventually, I hitchhiked by myself.

  I still don’t know why Vegas draws me. I’ve been told a dozen reasons why it shouldn’t. Maybe it’s because I started going there back in the early ’70s, when attractive cocktail waitresses would come to your chair at the slot machines and kindly offer you immense free shrimp cocktails.

  Even the bathrooms were over the top. Every casino on the Strip had bathroom valets! They would buff shoes, light cigarettes, or whisk suit coats. I always wished I could borrow a coat, so I could get a whisking and maybe a story from one of those friendly old black gents. Each had an entire table of elegant and expensive male grooming accoutrements: witch hazel, hair sprays and gels, mouthwash, deodorant, cologne, gum. And combs waiting in a giant cylinder of bright-blue sanitizer. It was all so completely opposite of my wooden-crate décor of madras curtains and beanbag chairs. It was so completely otherworldly for me—a flannel-shirt-wearing hippie in this sparkly leisure-suit town.

  I had the bad fortune of winning five hundred dollars the first time I went. I thought this was how Vegas worked. But, almost every following trip, through college and beyond, I would wager and eventually lose most of my money for the month. I learned in those days how to live on potato salad for weeks at a time.