I Got Plastered and My Dad Tossed an Egg at Me

It still ranks as one of the top five worst days of my life. I sat on the basement couch, sobbing on my girlfriend’s shoulder.

Earlier, as I was leaving my 1950s-built dorm on a Christian college campus to lead a boy’s group at church, I heard a loud noise from a room at the far end of the hall. I put on my resident assistant “hat” and strode to the room.

Knocking on the hollow steel door, a voice yelled, “Enter!” I opened the near bulletproof portal to see a roomful of guys sitting around the perimeter. 

I instructed them to keep the noise to a reasonable level. I shut the door, and something slammed into it from inside—likely a ball being passive-aggressively thrown at me.

Instantly deciding to flex against the perceived disrespect, I forcefully flung the door back open. I still don’t know how the room’s main occupant—an athlete—had made it from where he had been to where he was when the edge of the door slammed into his hand.

He looked with shock at his throbbing dominant hand then flew into a rage. 

He took both hands and, as he showered me with screaming, slammed, reopened, and slammed the door at least three times. Plaster from the ceiling above dusted me with white powder.

I thought it wise to retreat. Like a zombie, I staggered to church to teach boys how to be like Jesus.

After church, I found myself at my parents’ house, sitting on the basement couch, which was actually an upcycled old church pew. I sobbed uncontrollably, drowning in remorse, hypocrisy, shame and fear. 

What if I had badly hurt that star athlete? Would he miss a game? Would he ever forgive me? What would my reputation be as the story spread?

Suddenly, the basement door opened onto the open-air stairwell. My dad’s footsteps resounded. 

Before I could stop myself, I sobbed again. His footsteps stopped. He turned and went back upstairs.

The next day, I found a letter with my dad’s handwriting in my campus mailbox. My father taught at the college, so mail from him arrived quickly.

I opened it to find a sketch of an eggshell with a vestigial crack, indicating a chick beginning to hatch. Below the drawing was an original haiku. 

My dad taught language arts and utilized his fascination with haiku as a teaching tool. Later, I would ask him to redo the entire format in calligraphy so I could frame it. 

I regularly share a picture of it with counseling clients I know are comfortable with the religious theme. Careful to contextualize the story, I’ve even had some atheists say they appreciate the sentiment of the power of something beyond ourselves being worth striving toward.

Dad wisely chose not to be nosey. He didn’t ask what was wrong. It was obvious something was wrong, so he just sent a note of encouragement. 

Before I even read the poem, I breathed in the wisdom of the sketch of a hatching egg. I knew that Dad knew I would understand the significance.

Seeing a chick hatch is frustratingly hard to watch. We are tempted to help the little creature by gently releasing it. But that’s a deadly no-no.

Why? Take a deep breath. 

Feel your lungs grow. That requires muscle. The struggle to get out of the egg builds the chick’s strength. 

Without the struggle, it will lack the strength to breathe and will suffocate. Struggle serves to give the emerging being the strength to thrive.

Dad was telling me, “Whatever is going on, I have to let you struggle through it, and I’m confident you can and will emerge.” That confidence was paradoxically, protective.

Today, yet again, I found myself sharing a picture of my framed copy of Dad’s message with a client. Today, yet again, a client somberly nodded and committed to leaning into life’s struggles when they read Bernard Bull’s 5/7/5 stanza:

The struggle brings strength.
The easy way brings weakness.
God’s way makes beauty.

When I returned to the dorm the night before I first read the haiku, I took a deep breath, steeled myself and went to the athlete’s room. I apologized. 

He was still angry and told me I was too uptight and needed to chill out. He was right. I still struggle with that, but people tell me, even with some slip-ups, that I’m getting better.

The necessity of struggle–I guess that’s why the Apostle Paul said, “I have fought the good fight.”

Moving toward abundant life is a struggle. Yet, it’s a necessary struggle that yields the beauty of fluffy fledglings who can both struggle and feel protected. In our God-allowed struggles, we human fledglings can find assurance in Psalm 91:4: “(God) will cover you with pinions, and under (God’s) wings you will find refuge.”