John Updike, describing the post-coital moments between a nearly-impotent middle-American businessman and a prostitute in “Transaction,” from Problems and Other Stories.
Many years ago, I stole this book from my father’s bookshelf. The variously sorrowful, comic, and acerbic telling of this story has stayed with me as exemplary of both Updike’s talents and his weaknesses, and I’ve always liked it. It is a masterful and unpretentious exploration of alienation, and it’s also hilarious.
At the time, I was amused that my father and I had both read something this graphic, sordid little tale. But I was more surprised when I noticed that the book was a gift to him, and on the front page was a dedication: “To R——, from Mother.” While I have no idea whether my grandmother ever read “Transaction” or the other marvelous stories in the book, it was nevertheless a reminder -as much of Updike’s writing can be for the young- that the generations previous to our own lead lives as rich in emotion, frenzy, despair, and tumult as yours.
The other morning, I had a conversation with my father by phone. Conversations with my parents are always fascinating, for various reasons: they are both sagacious, engaging, and reflective people, and have had rich lives. In addition, my father shares (or perhaps inspired) many of my interests.
Walking through an empty park, I talked with him about the dubious practicality of implementing spiritual or philosophical wisdom in one’s life, how hard it is to distinguish the meaninglessly ethereal from the actually relevant. For example: we know from the intellectual and spiritual traditions of the world that money, status, and power don’t matter, yet how hard it is to let this knowledge guide us away from our stagnant jobs, dead relationships, and fearful attachment to possessions!
My father’s comments about the tension between abstract wisdom and ordinary social pressures in his own life startled me with their frankness and made me smile: it was like hearing a secret. Our parents are not always so fully human in our eyes. Learning that our elders were once precisely like us does not merely change how we think of them, but how we think of ourselves: all that we think we believe is frangible, all that we assert is negotiable, all that we are will change.
This dynamic of continuity between generations and discontinuity within individuals fascinates me; it is the primary human concern of art, philosophy, and religion: what do all humans experience? Who do we become over time? It was to this that my mind was drawn when I read about Updike’s death. He was ten years older than my father.
