Steve Berman Potery

A Letter to my Father

Dear Dad, I’m sorry to have gotten so far behind
in our correspondence. Indeed one might say a lifetime behind. Today however, eighteen years to the day
since you moved on, seems a good time to write.

Eighteen you may remember, spells Life in Hebrew
numerology. And so I’m hoping you’re enjoying a wonderful afterlife, benefitting from the distance between your timeless world and our world, so caught in time’s seductions and illusions, and in the violence that we humans, even after so much painful history, have still not learned to lay aside. I’m glad too that with your having dedicated so much effort, passion, and intelligence toward the creation of a world where peaceful ties and globally agreed on restraints between nations make wars, such as the one you were caught up in, back in the year that I was born, forever a thing of the past. I’m glad too that you’re not here on this plane to witness just how far things have gone south since your departure.

I remember how, in the spring of 1962, we two took the train from Moscow to Kiev. A peaceful trip. I never knew what your business there was, but I do remember visiting an historic monastery. After you died the family uncovered the second diary you kept during our Russian stay, recording (I imagine for your own private purposes) your frequent talks with Russian Orthodox priests. Now, thanks to Mr Putin’s MRGA dream, Ukraine is struggling to survive a bloody war, one with no end in sight.

I’m sitting here, thinking of all we did together over the years: the year in Palo Alto with trips to Half Moon Bay; the drive that year up to San Juan Island for Christmas with Uncle John and Aunt Kathy; the picnics on the Vineyard when you had time off in the summer; the Raleigh 3-speed you bought me when we moved to Newton and I entered the 3rd grade; our Oedipal chess games; the year in Switzerland when I learned some French and got to ski in the Alps; and then the year in Russia, which was also life-changing. I suppose my competitive but also emulative impulse is what led me to choose Chinese language rather than following you in Russian studies. It was also a tribute to your work, since my initial thought was that I might somehow contribute to peace between the US and China. But once I’d made the choice to leave the academic life and follow what I still see as my true calling, the life of a musician, I felt your disappointment and lack of comprehension. I remember your saying “the piano or violin I could understand, but the guitar?”. In retrospect I did far too little to explain or to reveal myself to you. And for that I’m truly sorry. Perhaps you would have understood me better had I told you that I admired you most when – both at the Vineyard sunday sings, and at our family Christmas gatherings – you led us with your singing and your accordion. For you perhaps that was a minor gesture compared to your serious work, but for me it was deeply meaningful. In fact it became the foundation, along with your sister Ruth’s music camp, of my real work in the world. Not an international career, but still a respectable place in the communities I’ve lived and worked in. And for me, who found social interaction a mystery and a challenge, it was, I believe, a way to have deeper ties and friendships than an academic career could have offered me. I say these things now when it no longer makes a difference (or does it?), wishing that I’d had the wisdom to share these thoughts with you decades ago. In any case, as I think of you tonight, on this anniversary of your “going home to Jesus”, my heart is full of gratitude for all the love, the family life, and the adventures we shared. My sweet wife Carroll reminds me often of how warmly you and my mother welcomed her when she and I first came together to Marthas Vineyard. No child, could hope for two more loving, kind and gracious parents. And so I like to imagine, despite the gospel’s report about no marriage in Heaven, that you two have found even greater love and joy together, sharing in the life eternal.

Your son, Stephen