On Owning Your Magic

Somewhere in my family’s archive is an old picture of my grandfather in his early 60’s, swinging shirtless from the rafters of a picnic pavilion with one hand, holding a beer with the other, knees pulled up to his chest, mocking a chimpanzee. Grandma, a devout Catholic woman, is standing next to him, arms crossed, donning her characteristic look of disapproval.

I’ve searched high and low for the picture but can’t find it.

I loved grandpa (we called him PaPaw because that’s all my sister – firstborn grandkid – could come up with when she was learning to talk), though I never got to know him very well. He was a self-made successful businessman who grew up in the depression era and vowed to be nothing like his father. I was intimidated by his strength and usually didn’t know what to say when I was around him.

Regardless, when he walked into a room, or setup his Waterpik on the kitchen counter to spray his grandchildren while they watched TV, or yelled “Where’s the beef!” at a fancy restaurant (well within earshot of MaMaw), or cut his oldest grandson’s cherished two-dollar bill in half, saying “I’ll double your money!” he was always more than a mere family member.

Just before he died, his grandchildren gathered in his hospital room, most of us for the last time. He was tired but managed. Near the end of our visit, he sat up, swung his bare, atrophied legs over the edge of his bed, locked eyes with me (something I’d never experienced) and said, “Mark, you’ve always had this facade of being… well… sort of a dumbass. These days I’m convinced otherwise.”

I had recently set out to start my own church, and I guess his inner entrepreneur felt some connection with me.

Either way, it was one of the most memorable compliments I’ve ever received.

To all of us, PaPaw carried weight, importance. He had a presence that you could feel when you were around him, one so profound that I can still feel it when I see a picture of him. One of my cousins recorded a conversation with him just before cancer became part of his life. His voice is broken and tired, but entirely possessing of its power.

What Papaw imparted to us is something that defies natural law; a thing that exists and seems to have a life of its own, though we can’t see it or quantify it in a laboratory.

I can’t think of a better word to describe it than “magic.”

There would’ve been none of it if he had played the victim like his father did, gambling the family into oblivion. I’ll wager that few have magical memories of my great grandfather beyond the way he ruined everything.

Papaw, on the other hand, stayed in the game, not perfectly by any stretch – he was a deeply flawed human being. But he worked, stayed invested in his marriage, and lived with the best commitment to his family that he could manage. At the same time, he found a way to be who he wanted to be, letting his rowdy parts off the chain from time to time, and we loved him for it.

Because of the way he positioned himself, his grandkids experienced a power that has rippled far beyond his grave.

I’ll argue that we all possess something similar; a wizardry of sorts that does something really special to the people closest to us. As long we’re willing to play the game, they get to feel it, for the rest of their lives.

It doesn’t require any special skill or effort beyond us being the best version of ourselves that we can manage.

Here’s another example, just because it’s funny.

I have an old friend (“Reggie,” to protect the innocent). My favorite memory of him is the time when we were in a church staff meeting and the weekly prayer bulletin was making its way around the table. These meetings were always a little too serious, so I was surprised to see Reggie with his head down, convulsing, trying desperately to keep it together.

He slid the notes my way and pointed to the first item on the list of prayer requests.

One of the congregants, Richard, had suffered a stroke. That’s not funny, I know, and thankfully he was OK, but the memo read “Richard had a massive stroke.” Because an older person penned the note, it didn’t say “Richard,” it used instead the once common shorthand that is also a common term for the male cha cha. It was impossible to read that phrase, sitting next to a guy 10 years my senior, and a true badass when it came to getting things done, still convulsing in the middle of a serious meeting.

The pastor of our church, a much more serious fellow, kept asking, “what’s so funny?”

I had to leave.

In the years that I’ve known Reggie, he can’t seem to manage to be anything other than himself.

People who persevere through life while also mining the truest version of themselves, bring something into our world that’s much needed. Sure, they’re entertaining to be around, and typically don’t have a problem with you being yourself, but they also, unwittingly, unleash something that travels far beyond them.

Magic.

On the other hand, folks who quit, play the victim, blame others for their problems, or on the other extreme get so serious about everything that they can’t let themselves out, keep their magic in the closet.

It’s there, but you can’t have any.

The cosmos seems to want that: people who are too scared, discouraged, angry, insecure, apathetic, etc., to fully express who they are. In their defense, and from personal experience, it’s too often difficult to slog through the day’s challenges with a good, hopeful perspective, believing that being yourself won’t get you in trouble.

I often wonder how PaPaw managed it. His life, especially the early years, was difficult. If anyone had cause to play the victim, it was him. After his middle-age, odyssic search for meaning and significance, and not finding much, he decided instead to put his nose to the grindstone when it was time for work, and swing from the rafters when it wasn’t.

I’m thankful that he did.

For me – up at 5 AM, hiding in the basement to finish this post, having just spilled coffee on my laptop, convinced while I’m wiping it up with my bathrobe that today is going to be yet another fascinating journey through the depths of mundanity – it’s good to consider that I’m having the same impact on the people in my life.

It might be that my presence, appropriately applied, even when I’m not doing big things, has power.