Sunday, July 17, 2011

Intimacy with Enemies: "You Don't Know These People!"

The title of this piece is slightly misleading. The term "enemy" is not meant in the broad sense. This is not always something that involves malice. "Enemy" actually refers to that tiny thing inside of all of us that clashes with other people (and sometimes turns it's wrath inward, but that's another essay entirely). The only thing that matches the intimacy of sharing love, is sharing a battlefield, literally and figuratively. For me, this brings home the idea that love and war are not opposites, but variations on the same basic passion play. The closeness that comes with so much as a brief aggressive exchange with a stranger is not to be taken lightly. I've examined this concept in my life and observed my varying degrees of success in handling it. The lines are clearly drawn in the workplace. Socially, meaning outside of work but not inside my home, the same rules apply. Surprisingly enough, I am finding that the same axioms can be followed at home.
In my experience, the place where people are most likely to abandon any kind of code of civility is at their places of employment. The reality of it all is that it is an unnatural environment. Wildly different people gathered in a structure of some sort, all trying to make money while at the same time trying to give each other the impression that they are "team players". Signals get crossed from time to time. The basic problem is that most enter this environment, wanting it to be a certain way without effort.
Working and making money with other individuals requires remembering one simple fact: You do not know any of those people! For over six months I worked very closely with my wife and realized that the woman that I shared a home with was very different at work. She was strict whereas I was more loose. We switched roles at our apartment. One realizes how foolish it is to fight with co-workers with this in mind. Those postal workers cowering under their sales counters ducking bullets from a former colleague had no idea if it was some off-color comment they made next to the coffee machine that caused the shooter to go off the deep end. An argument requires a knowledge of a person that one generally does not have under those circumstances. You should no more verbally tussle with a co-worker than you should bed them. The next time someone who works with you attempts to engage you in verbal (or God forbid physical) combat, say something like, "That is a little more intimate than I would like to be with you. Let's re-visit this later." The uneasiness will be palpable.
In our society, if one craves altercation, there are fixes abound. The young often are casualties of violence as a result of basic misunderstandings because they can't see the whole situation play itself out beforehand. I once knew a young man who kept lots of money laying around his apartment and had a lot of "traffic". I remember commenting to my wife that he was " leaving steak out for wolves." I could not understand how he could not see this. The environment we lived in had a sort of undercurrent of violence that was somewhat legendary. Sure enough, he was robbed and murdered soon after I left that area. Someone with "traffic" has many, many casual yet intimate encounters a day with people of varying trustworthiness. A lazy eye soon becomes a closed one.
"You don't know those people!" Once again, this is the rule of thumb. You either prepare for anything or do not engage, period. With the rise of mixed martial arts, a combination of all the fighting disciplines, and more firearms than ever before, starting a fight is a gamble of extreme proportions. Of the aforementioned dangers, firearms are by far the most dangerous because children as young as 14 carry them. If combat is unavoidable, one must get to know their target better than they know their own children. As dramatic as this sounds, it is very necessary. Ultimately, the best defense is kindness (yet another cliche that is inescapably true). Treating people with respect does greatly decrease the chances of something bad happening. Where the danger lies is in everybody's different definitions of respect.
The family unit is the ultimate intimate relationship. My single friends giggle when they hear me speak of the pressures of being "head of household". They barely conceal their pity. They often say that they want a group of people who know them deeply, and vice versa. A cheering section of dependents. They speak of hookups with strangers and the "emptiness" they feel. "At least your wife and kids REALLY know you," they say. . .
" I don't know these people!". With every day that passes, I am confronted with the realization that my family is not just a group of cheerleaders for Team I, but individuals with their own ideosyncracies, hopes,dreams, pet peeves and annoying habits that are ever-evolving. The more I try to settle into their way of being at one moment in time, the more confused I end up being when I find that things have changed. The closest relationships are not among people that know each other inside out, but those that are willing to ride the waves of change with each other, no matter what.
There are new experiences to be had daily when it comes to dealing with human beings. The very technologically advanced society that we live in today has made it possible to have more personal interactions than ever before. The boundaries that protected us previously are slowly disintigrating. Life itself is becoming more intimate. It is a time where the wisest of us realizes that understanding people is an ongoing process that one can never take a break from. The "enemy" within only is so because of a lack of acceptance. As we get closer to each other, through the Internet and a global economy, we are forced to re-evaluate our ways of interacting. Proximity makes us feel like we know each other better than we actually do. There is a wall of assumptions keeping us from really knowing each other. It was Abraham Lincoln who said, "The best way to destroy an enemy is to make him a friend." This can only happen with an honest view of ourselves and in turn the world around us.