When you are talented for and have made the better part of a lifetime breaking men – even if legitimately – you always had to be careful not to use that talent at the wrong time, because even the people you loved would try you … .
Captain H.F. Lee had the mayor of Big Loft on his personal cell phone, because L in the interim mayor's name -- D.L. Garner Jr. – was Lee, and not a casual usage of it. Captain Lee's grandfather, Horace Fitzhugh Lee, had a goodly number of sisters, and one of them was the mayor's grandmother. The two men were cousins, a fact not known by most, and they had quietly renewed the strong family bonds they had enjoyed as children during the crises in Big Loft that had led to both men coming to prominence.
Mayor Garner, however, had fallen seriously ill in the middle of December – the flu had capped off the end to a devastating year in which he had to manage a city in crisis and a bruising divorce from a wife deeply invested in the status quo he knew he had to get past. He had given her everything they had accumulated in 20 years to shorten the time she and her powerful relatives and friends had to make trouble for him while the proceedings lasted.
Of course, getting everything material so quickly was even more infuriating to Mrs. Garner, but at that point her ex-husband had turned the tables, since it was now clear she and her branch of the Lofton family were “wedded” to the corruption and that had been their motivation all along – the things she had gotten from him were cold comfort when he exposed her entire branch and allowed them to be humiliated in the public eye. So much for her social climbing – she was done with all that.
Yet at the end, D.L. Garner Jr. had fallen ill and into a deep depression that had lengthened his malaise … he was still not back at work in the first full week of January, apparently had not seen the news, and was not even sufficiently engaged to sense the lies being told him in the reports he did get.
Captain Lee had quietly spent a good deal of time with his cousin, and knew he had been in a bad way physically, mentally, and emotionally in December. When he did not hear anything from his cousin on the first Friday of the year despite the controversy around his report, he knew his cousin was still in a bad way.
But, time was up. It had been up on Tuesday. Malaise or no malaise – for the flu had come and gone – the mayor of Big Loft had to get back to work. Period.
Captain Lee was one of the very few people who might be able to strike the right balance to get him there.
“Hello … Harry?”
“Hello, D.L. How are you today?”
He sounded like a broken man and talked like a broken man … Captain Lee's anger with the situation at hand and his impatience with his cousin's absence from leadership competed with his compassion for that brokenness. He listened as the mayor described his situation and thus inadvertantly communicated: he was still in a bad way, and the people who were supposed to report to him were taking advantage of that fact. They were setting him up to be portrayed as powerless and useless in the crisis.
“Have you seen any news this week, D.L.?”
“No … I really need to keep away from the constant goings-on … one of my aides was just saying today that negative energy is so draining … .”
“What have your aides been telling you this week?”
“They are all struggling a little without me, but you know, things are moving forward … I've got good systems in place.”
S-e-l-f-c-o-n-t-r-o-l … Captain Lee prayed mightily for help with that, because he didn't think he could get any angrier than he had been when he called, but he had gone right back up again in his fury that his cousin was being manipulated and that his cousin was playing right into it.
“Are you on your regimen, D.L. – faithfully?”
“Well, you know, I have my pills, but you know, what really helps me feel better is just lying here and letting the winter go by … a glass of wine sometimes helps too … .”
Oh no. The alcohol-depression cycle – alcohol was a depressive anyhow, and even a casual drink occasionally could deepen the cycle and also interfere with the proper working of anti-depressants.
“You know how Elvis had that song about the world going away and getting it off his shoulders? That's a good medicine – the best, actually. I've really needed this time to rest and just recover and just have time to just deal with all the pain … the city stuff will still be here next week, or next month, and so … Harry?”
Captain Lee took his time speaking, lest he give away his fury … family expectations plus decades of military service did not allow him to be able to endure the thoughts of those who wanted to extend their dereliction of duty. However...
More advanced techniques of staying calm … Captain Lee focused his attention for a moment on a gift his fiance had given him … a beautiful succulent that he cared for meticulously … this cool green growing thing that in the hottest of desert conditions kept its cool flourishing ways.
The succulent was both a compliment to him and an inspiration to him … how to not only hold things together but to be a Spirit-filled source of refreshment so people didn't need him to be the only one to hold things together but could receive what they needed to grow and be integral … or heal, and become integral again.
“D.L. you know that I respect you in the midst of everything you have been going through, right?”
“Yes, Harry … that's one of the things that kept me going before I got sick, and hearing it makes me want to get up from here a little more. It means a lot to me.”
“You know that I understand what depression can do to any man, right?”
“Yes, Harry … your understanding is another thing that helped me get through the fall, and your sharing your stories with me and how you learned to overcome through and with is a real inspiration. I'm going to be using these techniques when I do feel ready to come back.”
“You know that I love you like you were my own brother, right?”
“Yes, Harry … you've been so caring, and so compassionate … sharing your apartment, your clothes, everything with me in those first bad weeks, and even wanting to be here and be around me in the state I've been in since December … I know you love me, and I want you to know I love and appreciate you too, man! You've always been such a friend when I wasn't messing it up chasing fame and fortune and politics – it was me that messed things up with you and Uncle Horace and the rest! I realized all of that – how I'm the one that made the decisions that have gotten me here! I've just been talking to God and getting things straight with me, and ...”
S-e-l-f-c-o-n-t-r-o-l … Captain Lee knew his cousin was in a cycle, and because they differed in personality, the cycle of depression ran differently. The mayor was generally mellow in basic temperament where his cousin was more dynamic – and because the dynamic cousin knew that, he also knew he couldn't blow his cousin out with his dynamism and actually snap him out of things. He had to lay it on just right, and had been setting it up gently, including letting the mayor ramble … ramble while cars were still burning on the backside of the ridge …
“All right, D.L., since you know all those things about me, and our relationship, please understand what I am about to express to you next in those terms.”
He paused for a moment, and then went from 0-100 in a smooth acceleration.
“Get out of bed, take your meds without any alcohol, and TURN ON THE NEWS, D.L!”
“All right, Harry, please don't yell … I'm going … I'm going.”
Ten minutes later …
“What in the world?”
Two minutes later …
“These people have been lying straight to my face for two days – the city is burning, and they're playing me for a fool!”
“In writing?”
“Yes! Beautiful reports, too! They're playing me! But playtime is over!”
Now that sounded like the Donald Lee Garner Jr. that Big Loft needed in its mayor.
“I'm calling an emergency meeting at City Hall at 7:30, Captain Lee – be there, and bring your reports and other data!”
“Yes, sir, Mayor Garner.”
“And Harry?”
“Yes, D.L.?”
“Thank you, cousin, for loving me enough to get through to me. I'm surprised you didn't come over here and kick my – well, you know.”
“That was my next step, but I just got back to the precinct, and it's a long drive at rush hour. I also respect you and love you enough, in the midst of what you are going through, to try the kindest method first.”
“I'm glad I'm still the kind of person that you think is worth that much, Harry.”
“You've never let me down, D.L.”
“Right. Time for me to kick some you-know-what, from the Legrees to the third degree – this is ridiculous!”
“I knew I could count on you, D.L.”
Photo by Kari Shea on Unsplash