I’m going to begin this with an uncontroversial take. I know, you’re supposed to begin these little essays with some controversial hot take to grab the reader. My not-so-hot take for the day is that everyone should read Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. This book has enjoyed a bit of a revival as a piece of feminist literature. Frankenstein has stood the test of time as a gorgeous piece of literature. But it’s my opinion that this deserves to be read over again throughout one’s life because, like a religious text, it meets you where you are at different times in your life and speaks new truths.
I’m in the stage of my life when I am fledging my children. I have two out of the house with one more to go. An interesting thing happens as you watch your kids become adults. We begin to see ourselves, the good and bad, in the behavior of our children. My kids carry so many of the good things we taught them, but they also carry some of my bad traits. My paralyzing fear of failure and rejection is on full display in my kids. I hate this for them. I see my temper and perfectionism (they are intricately and impossibly entangled) come out in my kids. This is hard to watch.
My kids are an estimation of my successes and failures as a parent. I put this flesh-and-blood being out there in the world and their struggles are a judgement on my own efforts at parenting. Like Viktor Frankenstein, my creatures have been released into the world to discover who they are and what role they will play in the history of humankind. And like the creature, their struggles are made worse because of my own shortcomings as a father.
I did a hell of a lot better as a father than Viktor. My kids aren’t plotting to ruin my life and kill everyone I care about. Although, Milo is only 16 so we may not be out of the woods there.
It is appropriate to expand this judgement metaphor into our vocations and interactions with others. All that we do echoes into eternity. From the way we treat our neighbors to the way we do our work, there is something real that is forced into the world and it lives on in the ways that people perceive us and the consequences of our choices.
My children are the echoes of my own choices and regrets. But they are loved and they know they are loved. Frankenstein’s creature struggles with finding love and it is, perhaps, the thing that we forget to nurture in those around us.
One of the most gut-wrenching confessions of the creature (and there are many) is his declaration that, “for the sympathy of one living being, I would make peace with all.” And then the threat that follows, “I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe. If I cannot satisfy the one, I will indulge the other.”
Please remember that all of our actions echo. They either increase love or pain, isolation or community. It’s not just about raising our kids right. But we also must consider how we move through the world as creatures who desire love, but who also have the capacity for hatred and evil. If we give enough love, it will come back to us. But if we act in rage and hatred, that will echo too.