Toward Commitment Read online

  Dialogue on Profession

  JOHN: The topic of “profession” gives me a chance to advance one of my pet theories. If one were to have asked me, “What was your profession?” I would have said immediately, Practicing law. But of course that's profoundly wrong. In fact, I had and have at least three professions, or what should be considered to be professions, all demanding knowledge, discipline, and experience. In my case, those two additional professions were husbanding—being a husband to you, Diane—and parenting—being a father to David and Jennie. Of course, our culture doesn't regard husbanding and parenting as legitimate professions, no more than it does mothering. It just occurred to me: suppose Harvard College should announce that part of its undergraduate curriculum would include Parenting 101. It would be laughed at all over the planet.

  DIANE: Well, society seems to say parenting is so important, and we must appreciate the role of the parent, yet there's no effective recognition of parenthood.

  JOHN: There's a vast degree of hypocrisy here. People from the president on down talk about being a good parent as well as being a good spouse. But in terms of marshaling the available resources, so little is done in a structured way that would begin to give young people some preliminary sense of what faces them, what the demands will be, and how they can cope with them.

  DIANE: You're now getting into the demands of parenthood. But in terms of a professional life, I've always felt that part of your sadness, anger, and depression was that, in fact, you chose the wrong profession for yourself. Back in college, you were a Greek and Latin major, and at first you considered teaching. Then, as you explained it to me, you believed that teaching would be too insulated a profession. You shocked your parents, and even yourself, by opting for law school. You hated law school, every aspect of it. You then went to a law firm on Wall Street, and you left that for government service in Washington. You loved those thirteen years of government service. But the practice of law in the private sector was never something that really made you happy.

  JOHN: I would agree, but I'm trying to assess the impact my profession —the law—had on our marriage. Do you think we would have had an easier marriage if I'd chosen a different profession?

  DIANE: Well, if you had chosen a different profession, we would probably have never met, so that's a moot point. But what I'm saying is that you are basically a scholar. You love to study, you love to learn. And I think that part of your own frustration was the fact that you chose to practice law. I had the luxury of choosing or falling into a profession I absolutely adored.

  JOHN: But looking back, the happiest years of my life as a lawyer, namely, my years in government, were probably the most difficult years of our marriage. It was because I thoroughly enjoyed what I was doing in government and believed so strongly in the programs I was working on that I took away so much time from being husband and father.

  DIANE: I fully agree. You were happiest in your professional life practicing law in government, but you were also engaged in the practice of making policy during those years. I also think you're right that those were the most difficult years for us because you were so totally involved. Once you moved into private practice and had to worry about fees, billable hours, and clients—all that seemed contrary to what you, John Rehm, were comfortable with. I think the practice of law became almost distasteful to you. There was no more of the kind of fun you experienced in the government. Do you think that's fair?

  JOHN: Yes, but let's return to the central issue. How does a young family cope with having either one or both spouses so dedicated to their profession that some kind of deprivation is going to be inflicted upon the family because they will be spending so much time at the office?

  DIANE: It's never perfect, I'll grant you that. There are certain sacrifices that have to be made. But they can be eased if there's an acknowledgment that, even with this ongoing tension and pressure, home life is as important as work life. I realize the pressures are always there. I think of Jennie and her husband, Russell, two physicians, who've now said they're going to take one day off per week so that they can be with their children and have more time as a family. I think—I hope—young people are acknowledging the problem, and moving more in that direction.

  JOHN: Greater accommodations are being made today. I look back on the year 1962, in particular, when I literally spent almost every day of the entire year working on what became the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, which was President Kennedy's major piece of legislation in the international field. If I was to remain thoroughly involved in that significant project, I didn't have much choice but to spend virtually all my time at the office and then come back on weekends exhausted, when all I could do was to sleep. How could we have coped with that any better?

  DIANE: You made the decision that you would give everything you had to that project.

  JOHN: And that was expected of me at the time.

  DIANE: That was expected of you at the time. But later, do you remember what Governor Herter said to you when he was the U.S. Special Trade Representative and you were his general counsel?

  JOHN: He said family must come first, and job second. I understood that, but rightly or wrongly, I felt powerless. If I was to be a key player in the enactment of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, then I couldn't afford to set aside time for the family. Diane, you don't know how trapped I felt, but that was the only way I could see to go. I so believed in the project, and the project would after all be temporary, only a year long, and after that I imagined we could return to a more normal and more sane lifestyle.

  DIANE: But it never happened.

  JOHN: So what is this poor young man to do? I feel so sorry for him, because he's so trapped. He's doing his best—trying to do his best—to meet all of these competing needs and con- flicting demands. It's really tough.

  DIANE: I understand that it's tough, and I understand that, looking back, what you're really saying is, “I feel sorry for the memory of myself in that situation. I feel sad for myself because I didn't know how to cope.” What about me? How sad do you feel for me that I went through those years, from the time those kids were little until their adolescence, practically alone? You can't convince me, John Rehm, that there couldn't have been a way for you to be a forerunner and to say, “I need to be with my family this weekend, and therefore that's what I'm going to do.” I'm so impressed with young men and women who do that today. I also recognize that the first man who did that in your law firm was ridiculed by some. He said, “I have a brand-new child. I'm only going to work part-time.” And your partners were aghast. There's a new culture at work, and I thank heaven for it.

  JOHN: Do you recall your encounter with Abe Chayes, the legal adviser of the State Department?

  DIANE: At one point you had promised to devote the entire weekend to our family. We had plans to go off on a picnic, to do some sightseeing with the children, and then a problem arose at the State Department.

  JOHN: We were working on a set of regulations, which never came into being, to control shipping to and from Cuba.

  DIANE: So I'm making all these plans, and all of a sudden you come home on a Thursday night and you say to me, “Abe Chayes wants me to work this weekend.” And I say, “Well, you promised us that you would not work this weekend, and I believe you should abide by your promise.” At which point you went back sheepishly into the office on Friday and told Abe Chayes how upset I was. He picks up the phone and calls me. He says, “Diane, this is Abe Chayes. I really need John this weekend.” And I say, “Well, Abe, I really need John this weekend.” And he said, “OK, look, I promise you that if you give me John this weekend, you can have him for the next two weekends.” He made that promise, and he kept it.

  JOHN: I was in his office at the time he made the call. He thought it was going to be a piece of cake. Of course, I couldn't hear what you were saying, but I could see he had an easy look on his face at first, and then it became more tense and more surprised. I don't think he had ever faced this kind of vehe
mence from the wife of one of his lawyers.

  JOHN and DIANE: [laughter]

  DIANE: Sweetheart, it was tough, and I understand that, but I felt you gave your entire emotional and physical being to that office.

  JOHN: I suppose we could ask whether I really did need to devote all of my time so monomaniacally to this project. Was I getting out of it something I badly needed, in spite of the harm it was doing to our relationship?

  DIANE: In my work, the balance between professional and home life was uppermost. I began doing some runway modeling, and then volunteer work at various organizations, and ultimately the volunteer work at WAMU, which thrilled and enthralled me. It was all I could think about, I was so excited about the possibility of doing some work through a medium I adored. But I had to arrange my volunteer life, which became my work life, around the needs of the family, and that was what I did. I was both mother and, early on, a professional volunteer.

  JOHN: But wouldn't you agree you had greater opportunity than I did to shape your schedule to begin to accommodate your increasingly professional life to your home life? I think you had greater latitude to do that than I did.

  DIANE: Absolutely. By the time I took the full-time job at WAMU, as host of the morning program Kaleidoscope, Jennie had just gone off to boarding school and David was in Paris. I didn't feel constrained at that point. But in recent years I've experienced some of the same professional pressures you endured: the greater the success of The Diane Rehm Show, the fewer hours seem available for family life. So, ironically, I am somewhat in the position you were in.

  JOHN: Which better enables me to help you safeguard time for us.

  Religion

  John

  From childhood up to the time of my marriage, I probably attended church only a very few times. When I did, my attendance was a matter of social obligation, with no religious overtones whatsoever. Indeed, those few occasions served only to sharpen my disdain for institutional religion.

  My father and mother were brought up in the Lutheran and Episcopal traditions, respectively. By their account, they experienced, and were repelled by, the horrors of orthodoxy. Accordingly, following my birth they readily agreed that I would be spared such contamination as baptism, confirmation, and communion. As an adult, I would then be free to make a mature and unbiased decision about such matters. As I grew up, therefore, the Bible in our house was at best a work of literature.

  Once we decided to marry, Diane expressed her desire for a church wedding. She had grown up an active participant in a variety of church-related activities. As an agnostic, I was opposed to a Christian ceremony, since I viewed Jesus as no more than a shadowy historical figure. I wasn't prepared, however, to deny the existence of any kind of God. As a result, Diane and I were able to settle on a brief service in a Unitarian church.

  After David and Jennifer were born, Diane very much wanted them to be baptized in her Syrian Orthodox church. This presented a serious problem for me, since I couldn't accept any of the beliefs underlying baptism. I finally relented for two reasons. First, Diane felt so strongly. Second, as infants, they could not grasp, and therefore could not be affected by, the Christian dogma. They too, I reasoned, could make up their own minds when the time came.

  Primarily for the sake of the children, the four of us began attending a liberal Episcopal church committed to social causes. Consistent with my muddled monotheism, I did not recite the Nicene Creed or other Christian passages, nor did I participate in Holy Communion. I was more comfortable with the Old than the New Testament. Diane, meanwhile, threw herself into a number of projects and became an influential parishioner. The marked difference between Diane's activism and my passivity created a tension between us. This tension grew as our involvement in the church spread to social functions among the parishioners. I fitfully resented the time we devoted to so many aspects of church life. I felt that Diane demeaned herself and, by extension, our family, by her participation in the life of at best a silly, and at worst a destructive, institution. In my eyes, it stood for hypocritical self-righteousness and did not deserve support.

  In June 1979 I experienced an overwhelming seizure by, and understanding of, Christ. The conversion was profound and led to my baptism later that year. It also prompted me to obtain a master of theological studies degree in 1990. I think that, for some time, Diane did not know what to make of my conversion. Although we were now both Christians, the radical nature of my faith, in contrast to Diane's more conventional belief, was at times divisive. In particular, as an insider I was now even more critical of the institutional church and its corruption of Christ's teachings.

  Our spiritual journeys began and indeed progressed in distinctly different ways. We still part company over theological issues, since Diane is more of a conventional theist and I am in the mystical tradition. The former assumes a caring God, while the latter, to my mind, speaks of a more abstract power. Yet today we together gratefully observe the essential Christian ceremonies. These include the celebration of holy days, like Christmas and Easter, the singing of hymns, the participation in the Holy Eucharist, and the offering of prayers.

  Diane

  My faith in God has been a part of me ever since I can remember. There has never been a time of doubting or questioning. There has never been a time of anger or blaming. I have simply accepted God as a central part of me, a voice, a shape, a spirit to whom I give thanks each and every day, and from whom I ask help and guidance and care for those I love, and for those around the world. My prayers are an integral part of my daily existence, as I walk through our garden, as I walk the distance between my office and the studio at WAMU, as I gaze at our children and grandchildren, and as I read the newspapers. There are always reasons to pray, and they are a central part of who I am.

  I was saddened by John's lack of interest in and even hostility toward the notion of having a specific religious affiliation early on in our marriage. It was difficult to understand why he seemed to have such antipathy toward something that was so deeply embedded in my heart and in my culture. But realizing that he had no interest and did not particularly favor my moving toward any church affiliation, I did not wish to create a problem between us. However, when David and then Jennie were born, there was no doubt in my mind that they should be baptized. I could not relent, even though I knew John would not fully participate in the ceremony or accept the ritual behind it. In fact, John was intellectually drawn to each baptism, but had no feeling about the idea of blessing an infant as a child of God.

  Once the children began school in the mid-sixties, I made the acquaintance of a number of parents. One couple in particular talked to us about their Episcopal church in Washington, St. Patrick's. Its rector, they informed us, was deeply involved in the civil rights movement, to which they were not particularly sympathetic. However, the parish was thriving, with many people, old and young, drawn by the influence of the Reverend Thomas Bowers and his wonderful wife, Margaret. The two were quite a pair, warm and welcoming, drawing parishioners into what felt like an enormous family with a primary goal: desegregating the parish, the Church, and the country.

  Slowly, we became involved in church activities, attending not only services but social functions organized around the parish. These were days of energy and excitement for me, getting out of the house, meeting new people, attending retreats, and pursuing more deeply my examination of our marriage.

  Getting to know other couples, watching their interactions, being part of their social circle, seeing a different way of being in a marriage—all of this came to me through those early years of church affiliation. The ideas I heard and the actions I observed began to change me and my outlook on our marriage, our life together, and the prospects or possibilities for my own future.

  Dialogue on Religion

  DIANE: Religion is one of those areas we didn't really talk about at all, except that I knew, vaguely, that you were not particularly interested in participating in church activities. Initially, for me, it
was a kind of relief, because I had come out of a marriage where the church was the center and the focus of the community. To that extent, I was relieved not to be involved with any church affiliation.

  JOHN: Looking back on our marriage, I recognize that during the first twenty years or so, religion was a divisive factor in our relationship. Whether you were going to church regularly or not, you were clearly a Christian in the full sense of the word. You accepted the Nicene Creed. It was meaningful to you. Until my conversion experience in 1979, you can say I was atheist or agnostic. I certainly had no use whatsoever for the institution of the Christian church.

  DIANE: But this is the case in many couples' marriages, where one may be particularly filled with the idea of God and religion and the other is not. What you're saying is that you found yourself deeply resentful.

  JOHN: Yes. It was really your decision to begin to take the kids to church, and I didn't object particularly. I figured they could handle that on their own. But your involvement in the church grew, and you became more active by serving on committees and the like. That left me nowhere. I didn't believe in what was said during the church service. I didn't participate in its functions. At one point I was asked to serve on the vestry, until the rector found out I hadn't even been baptized. [laughter] So, until my conversion experience, I was vexed and annoyed by the degree of your participation and activity in the church.

  DIANE: But was it my social involvement or was it my emotional involvement that vexed and annoyed you? I think this was something that really bothered you, that became far more symbolic to you, far more emblematic of our division. You almost wanted to keep me from the social, emotional, and intellectual involvement of the church.