Fear Is a Swallow in a Boarded-up Warehouse

 

The alert tone startled me as I sipped lukewarm coffee in my patrol car.It was almost 3 AM, and the radio had been quiet for some time. After the alert tone, the dispatcher’s voice reported an alarm at the only gun shop in town.I poured my coffee out the window and sped toward the gun shop a few miles away, located at the rear of a shopping center. The streets were nearly empty, save the occasional deer and skunks foraging the city while people slept.My Sergeant also responded to the alarm call.There was no need to use sirens, as the streets were quiet and we wanted the element of surprise. Burglars sometimes have lookouts, so our approach into the shopping center was surreptitious. We drove our patrol cars in via a dark, rear entrance.Once on scene, we notified dispatch and stealthily walked to the gun shop’s entrance. We found the front door damaged and ajar. With side arms and flashlights drawn, we cautiously peeked inside.All of the display cases were smashed, with shards of glass scattered around the carpet. The Sergeant and I entered the shop, crouching, service weapons at the ready, and painstakingly searched the crime scene. We didn’t know if the burglars were still there.I was a rookie back then, and I could feel my heart pounding.

Fear is a tricky human emotion

Police officers receive a great deal of professional training, to keep them safe in potentially life-threatening situations.

The training begins with the police academy, but it continues throughout an officer’s career. Because, as the years click by law enforcement learns from its tragedies and mistakes.

We watch training videos of officers murdered during car stops. We study critical incidents and officer-involved shootings, to learn which tactics work best, and the mistakes that can get you killed.

And we learn that fear, when properly managed, is your friend.

An article about fear in Psychology Today notes:

Fear is a tricky human emotion. It can paralyze you. It can keep you from your dreams. It can keep you small.

It can also keep you safe.

Fortunately for the Sergeant and me, the gun shop was empty.

We photographed, processed, and secured the scene. Dispatch notified the shop owner, who met with us later. Regrettably, many guns were stolen.

There would be other scary calls in my law enforcement career, from high-speed chases and violent arrests to barricade situations and even a shooting with a deranged gunman.

Fear accompanied me in all these incidents, but so did my professional training and experience. I learned how to breathe properly and rely on my training. I learned how to handle adrenaline and dangerous incidents.

But there are other kinds of fears.

No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear

When I was 13 years old my father suffered a heart attack in front of me at home.

It’s one thing to feel fear for your safety. It’s an entirely different kind of fear when you face the potential loss of someone you love.

I remember my mother calling 9–1–1 as my father looked up at me from the couch and said, “Keep a stiff upper lip, Johnny.” I remember later after the paramedics came, we drove to the hospital.

Dad was in a hospital bed.

He vomited into a receptacle. My Mom sat by his side, holding his hand. In a weak voice, he gave her instructions in the event of his death.

“Don’t let them sell you anything expensive. Get a cheap box for me. Sell the cars, get something more affordable,” Dad said.

It was all so frightening.

Don’t be afraid of your fears. They’re not there to scare you. They’re there to let you know that something is worth it. — C. JoyBell C.

We had lost pets in our family, so I had some understanding of loss. But the prospect of losing my father produced an insurmountable fear in me.

No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. — C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

Thankfully, Dad survived and lived well into his eighties.

Eventually, later in life, I would confront the loss of loved ones. I would feel the fear and emotional pain, unrelenting in the beginning. But I began to see that the fear reflects the love.

The greater the fear, the greater the love.

It makes it real

There’s a lovely scene in the movie about C. S. Lewis and his cancer-stricken wife, Joy Davidman, when they’re honeymooning in the country.

A rainstorm forces them to take shelter in a garden overhang.

Lewis tells his wife that “I don’t want to be anywhere else anymore.” He’s truly happy. But then she says, “You know, it’s not going to last, Jack.” He tells her not to think about that (her cancer prognosis) and spoil the moment.

She responds, “It doesn’t spoil it. It makes it real.”

She goes on to tell him that the pain he will feel later when she’s gone, is a reflection of the happiness they feel now.

It’s the same with fear. It makes it real.

It reminds us that we’re alive.

My life is better left to chance

Two years ago, when my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer, fear once again burrowed into my being.

During the initial weeks of tests and doctor appointments, I grappled with the possibility that I could lose my wife. And with it, all our hopes and dreams for the future.

It wasn’t easy, but I reminded myself that the fear was a reflection of our love. Thankfully, my wife’s cancer was caught early, and she was successfully treated.

Country music artist Garth Brooks sings a song called “The Dance.” It’s a beautiful song about life, echoing the old adage “Better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”

The lyrics to “The Dance” include the following:

Yes my life is better left to chance. I could have missed the pain but I’d have had to miss the dance.

The writer John A. Shedd wrote: “A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for.” Similarly, we may be safest when we don’t act or live fully, but we were not born to live under rocks.

Life is meant to be lived.

What is it the wind has lost?

The other day my doorbell rang and I found a package on the bench.

I opened the package and remembered what I bought online a few days before. It was a slim book of poetry titled, “Braided Creek: A Conversation in Poetry” by Ted Kooser and Jim Harrison.

I own many of Jim Harrison’s books and was curious about his collaboration with the poet Ted Kooser. The book is unusual in that the authors don’t tell us who wrote which poems. But it doesn’t matter.

I flipped to a random page and read the following poem:

Fear is a swallow

in a boarded-up warehouse,

seeking a window out

We are all like that sparrow. Trying to escape our fears, seeking a window out from the pain and sorrow that fear often brings.

But sometimes fear holds us back.

As Hunter S. Thompson once wrote: “So we shall let the reader answer this question for himself: who is the happier man, he who has braved the storm of life and lived or he who has stayed securely on shore and merely existed?”

I flipped to another random page in Braided Creek and landed on the following poem:

What is it the wind has lost

that she keeps looking for

under each leaf?

Perhaps the wind is looking for love? Adventures? Hidden treasures? The wind doesn’t concern herself with fear. No matter what, the wind keeps looking.

Perhaps we should do the same.

Before you go

I’m John P. Weiss. I write elegant stories and essays about life. If you enjoyed this piece, check out my free weekend newsletter, The Saturday Letters.

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This post was previously published on Medium.com.

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Photo credit: Nico Meier

 

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