Nothing Is Impossible (6 page)

If someone had told me before my injury that you could teach a kid to ride on his own just by talking to him, I would have said that was impossible. Timing is very important: words can only have a positive effect on others if and when they are ready to listen. And we have to choose our words carefully, particularly when we are the voice of authority for people who are vulnerable. In the first weeks after my injury, I was like a child and the
doctors seemed like parents, while the nurses became older brothers and sisters. I hung on every word and tried to interpret the expressions on their faces. Everything they said and did had an enormous impact on me. I remembered all of it; sometimes I replayed scenes over and over in my head. When I was told that my spinal cord had been severed and I would never recover any sensation or movement below my shoulders, I was haunted by those words for months. When I was told that was incorrect, my spirits rose again with the possibility that I was on the road to recovery.

The experience of feeling like a child gave me a new perspective on being a father. I became acutely aware that virtually everything that parents say and do has a powerful effect on our children, even when we think they’re not paying attention. We have to constantly monitor the level of communication and be ready to take action if a child is tuning us out or having difficulty expressing his or her feelings. During Matthew’s freshman year in college we had a few awkward phone conversations. He didn’t sound like himself. Even though he said everything was all right, I could sense that he was telling me what he thought I wanted to hear. I invited him to come down for the weekend just to hang out and maybe go into the city for dinner or a Rangers game. My real agenda was for us to spend time alone. On Sunday
afternoon we sat together in my office for nearly four hours. I began the conversation simply by asking him to tell me everything that was on his mind. I told him he could say anything and I promised not to interrupt him.

The floodgates opened, perhaps because I removed any resistance he might have been expecting. He covered issues ranging from problems with his professors, other students, the challenges of college life in general, to aspects and moments of his childhood that he had never brought up with me before. I was surprised by much of what he said, particularly with regard to our relationship. I suggested that a tendency to be too polite might have been the source of a communications breakdown when he and Al were young. Time and again I would ask either one of them what they would like to do and get the same response: “I don’t mind.” Often we ended up doing what I wanted to do and they dutifully tagged along on long bike rides, mountain hikes, and offshore sailing in foul weather. When I asked them if everything was okay, the usual reply, even through their teenage years, was “Fine.”

As Matthew went on that Sunday afternoon I realized I could have done a better job reading between the lines. As I listened I reminded myself that none of us has the right to refute someone else’s experience or perception. If a child says that when a parent did
X
or said
Y
it caused him pain, the parent must not say that it isn’t true. I think we should explore what happened and try to find out what caused that feeling. The worst thing we can do is to say, “That’s wrong, you’re exaggerating, you’re rewriting history.” Many times the only thing to say, as long as we really mean it, is “I’m sorry.”

I believe that becoming a parent is a gift, even though parenting means taking on an enormous responsibility. It’s a miracle that a child can come into the world and instinctively give us unconditional love. If we can return that kind of love and provide a nurturing environment, the responsibility becomes less challenging. I was on my feet when Matthew and Al were born, and thought I was ready to be a good parent; certainly I would try to make their childhood in some ways different than mine. For the first two years of Will’s life, all was well. The children were thriving, and I felt the privilege much more than the responsibility.

When I decided to live my new life, the weight of responsibility was suddenly overwhelming. But because all three were a vital part of that decision, simply by showing (as Dana did) that they loved me as much as always, I was able to overcome feelings of guilt and inadequacy, which actually made me a better father. I’m very grateful for that, although I wish I could have learned the lesson the hard way.

D
uring the last few years countless numbers of people have remarked, “Your faith must be a great help as you cope with your ordeal.” Then they ask, “What is your religion?” That used to put me in an awkward position, because I could tell they wanted to hear that I am a deeply religious person. The truth is that I only found a religion very recently that I can reconcile with a lifelong quest for the meaning of spirituality.

Religious studies were integrated into the core curriculum when I was in the eighth grade at Princeton (New Jersey) Day School. Religion was also mandatory in ninth grade; after that it was optional. The two-year course was an introduction to the world’s religions, and the history of those religions most closely associated with contemporary American culture. I enjoyed learning
some of the basic precepts of Eastern religions such as Taoism, Shintoism, and Buddhism. I liked the idea that all living things are sacred and that there are gods in trees, flowers, the earth, water, and sky. But I found many of the teachings and much of the history of Western religions quite disturbing. In my early teens I sang in the choir of the Presbyterian church, and was intimidated by frightening images projected by some of the hymns: “God the Father Almighty”; “Onward Christian Soldiers Marching as to War”; “the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword.”

It seemed to me that this God probably loves us—His children—but uses scare tactics to keep us in line. If we are virtuous and righteous in His eyes, we are safe. He will protect us and deliver us from evil. But if we transgress or simply fail to live up to His expectations, we will be punished accordingly. That dynamic too closely resembled my relationship with my own father; why would I voluntarily choose to re-create it?

Occasionally I attended Sunday school before the main service in an attempt to broaden my perspective and to please my stepfather, Tristam Johnson, a lifelong member of the church. Unfortunately I didn’t learn much in Sunday school because the teacher was former senator and pro basketball star Bill Bradley, who was a
Princeton University undergraduate at the time. My friends and I often went to Mr. Bradley’s home games on Saturdays and then managed to steer the conversation away from the Bible to basketball on Sunday mornings.

The religious studies in school, combined with a thirteen-year-old’s burgeoning desire to butt heads with authority, continued to drive me away from organized religion. Our class learned about intolerance, oppression, persecution, and the accumulation of vast wealth by the church hierarchy at the expense of the impoverished and uneducated faithful. We learned that religion started wars, that the Great Crusades of the Middle Ages were actually imperialist conquests justified in the name of Christ. We read about sixteenth-century explorers and missionaries to the New World who believed it was their duty to claim as much land as possible for their countries and to convert the “savages” to their faith. In biology class, we learned about birth control and family planning; when we discussed contemporary Catholicism in religious studies, many of us struggled to understand it. We bombarded the teacher with questions: How can priests be marriage counselors if they’ve never been married? Since poor Catholics in developing countries are forbidden to use birth control,
is that why they have so many large families living in terrible conditions? Aren’t overpopulation and world hunger going to be huge problems when we grow up?

In addition to the influences of church and school during my formative years, my father’s atheism was an important factor. Not only did I grow up without a foundation in religion, but I lacked any sense of spirituality as well. I was preoccupied by the here and now, running on ambition and self-reliance. As I moved on to college and then to New York in pursuit of an acting career, I wasn’t looking for answers to the Big Questions: Why are we here? Do we have a purpose? Is there a “right” way to live?

In the fall of 1975, I was living in my own apartment on the Upper West Side and in rehearsal for
A Matter of Gravity
, a Broadway-bound play with Katharine Hepburn. I had just turned twenty-two and was rather proud of myself. And why not? I had earned a B.A. from Cornell, been a graduate student at Juilliard, appeared in several off-Broadway productions, and gained notoriety as a likable bad guy on a daytime TV series. In my spare time I was taking flying lessons and fully enjoying my life as a young bachelor in the Big Apple.

One afternoon on my way to the grocery store, I came across a young man standing next to a sign on the
sidewalk that read,
FREE PERSONALITY TEST, NO OBLIGATION
. Figuring I had nothing to lose, I followed his directions to the sixth floor of the prewar apartment building behind him. The door was unlocked, so I opened it and found myself in the New York headquarters of the Church of Scientology.

The whole place was buzzing with energy and activity. In the main office area about thirty people were working at their desks or gathered in small groups, engaged in quiet but intense conversation. They all appeared to be in their late twenties or early thirties, ethnically diverse, clean-cut, and neat. The men wore shirts and ties and the women were dressed in modest skirts or slacks. In a far corner, six Scientologists sat facing each other in two rows of three. None of them spoke; everyone stared intently into the eyes of the person opposite. They were clearly not distracted by the ebb and flow of workers in the office behind them. I was amazed by the apparent depth of their concentration, even as I wondered what the purpose of staring at each other was.

A young man much like the one I’d met on the sidewalk, of medium height and build, wearing a crisp white shirt and a conservative pinstriped tie, came forward to greet me. He gave his name, shook my hand
warmly, and never broke direct eye contact as he asked how he could help. I told him I was interested in the free personality test, to which he replied, “Of course. One moment, please.” He stepped away briefly into the office area and came back with a form for me to fill out. The next thing I knew, I was seated at a desk in the reception area writing down my name, address, phone number, social security number, profession, date of birth, mother’s maiden name, and more. In answer to the question “Are you affiliated with any other church?” I wrote “none.”

I handed back the completed form and waited while he looked it over and conferred with several of his colleagues in the office. They must have reached a consensus fairly quickly because in just a few moments he came back with another form, which turned out to be the actual personality test. He invited me to return to my seat and respond to all the questions carefully, thoughtfully, and truthfully, taking as much time as I liked. There were no right or wrong answers.

As I looked over the test, I wished it were multiple choice. I wasn’t expecting to have to write twenty short essays about myself. I wondered who would grade the paper: Was there an official tester who was solely responsible for evaluating the personality of every passerby who came in the door? I reminded myself that
the test was free and there was no obligation, so why not just fill in the blanks, get the results, and make a quick exit.

It turned out not to be quite so easy. I spent forty-five minutes actually trying to do my very best. When I turned the test in to my host, I thought I had submitted quite an objective assessment of myself. What more could I do, especially considering that there were no right or wrong answers?

I had hoped to get the results that afternoon, but I was told that there wasn’t enough time for them to review my test before the office closed for the day; I would have to come back tomorrow, but not before eleven A.M. Luckily my call time for rehearsal the next day wasn’t until after lunch, so I was free to return. In hindsight, I wish my rehearsal call had been first thing in the morning.