Conscious Choice: You Can't Imagine the Love You Feel

January 2002 | Choice Books

You Can't Imagine the Love You Feel

by Mark Harris

In late November I had the chance to hear Studs Terkel speak on his latest book, Will the Circle Be Unbroken? Reflections on Death, Rebirth, and Hunger for a Faith. The occasion was a conversation between Terkel and the Reverend Ed Townley, minister of Unity Church in Chicago, whose own near-death experience is one of sixty-three featured interviews in Terkel’s new book.

Terkel took the Unity stage on a bright Saturday afternoon to a burst of enthusiastic applause. I’d heard the legendary Chicago writer speak once before, in the mid-1990s at the San Francisco Book Expo, but this time was different. This was a hometown crowd and a smaller, more intimate venue. Admittedly, it doesn’t always take much to earn a standing ovation from a Unity crowd, but the response from the large audience was definitely deserved.

At age eighty-nine, Terkel has returned to deliver one of his most compelling books, a triumph of thoughtful, inspirational reflections on the matter of how we feel, react, and think about death. It comes not only in the wake of the September 11 tragedy, and the war in Afghanistan with all its death and destruction, but the death two years ago of Terkel’s wife of sixty years, Ida Goldberg. Accordingly, Will the Circle Be Unbroken? has taken on a relevancy perhaps neither Terkel nor his publisher could have originally anticipated.

Remarkably enough, the book’s prologue, which was completed before September 11, begins with the stories of Tom Gates, a retired New York City fire fighter and cop, and his brother Bob Gates, a retired emergency service officer. As a rescue squad worker Bob handled the "floaters," the people who had drowned, and the "jumpers," those who wanted to jump off a bridge or a building. In an interview done a year before the World Trade Center attacks, Bob shared with Terkel what he called his "World Trade Center caper."

It’s the story of the dramatic rescue of a young man who had somehow climbed out on the window washer’s ledge — 110 stories up. The fellow was upset because he was born Jewish but was now a Christian and he blamed the Jews for Christ’s crucifixion. Gates recalls how he had yelled to the fellow, looking down from a vantage point above, "Well, suppose they just gave Jesus seven and a half to fifteen years? We wouldn’t be Catholics today." Hearing this, the man of the ledge said, "That’s an interesting question, I’d like that fellow to come down here and talk to me."

So Gates attached himself to a safety hook-up and lowered himself down onto the narrow ledge. He handed the fellow a cigarette, then quickly grabbed him in a bear hug. Gates was worried that the man might have had a knife or would try to grab him. He was confident in the routine safety procedures, he tells Terkel, but being 110 stories up, well, the thought did cross his mind that this was a life-threatening situation.

It’s a trademark Terkel-sponsored tale. There’s no great self-conscious lesson here, only the power of a man’s unique experience, delivered in human terms and with blunt honesty. That’s pretty much the spirit of the book: frank, unadorned, and straight from the gut. And it all gets under your emotional skin.

A few celebrities appear (novelist Kurt Vonnegut and folksinger Doc Watson), but for the most part this is the voice of the everyday world, stories of ordinary people with extraordinary things to say. It’s also heavy on the Chicago contributors. As I was reading, I was reminded of the old union movement name for all the unsung, rank-and-file heroes, those ordinary folks who sacrificed and struggled for their cause but got few of the accolades. The "Jimmy Higgins" of labor, as they were once known, and here we have a chorus of Jimmy Higgins put beautifully into words. They stand in rank-and-file tribute to our most essential hopes and faith, to the very human aspiration to make our lives anthems of dignity and meaning— and, when the time comes, to die with dignity.

Will the Circle Be Unbroken? stands as an antidote to our culture’s tendency to disenfranchise grief, as one writer put it, turning our awareness away from what makes us afraid or uncomfortable. The stories here bring us home to the experience, in ways full of solace and dignity, and with an innate respect for the diversity of who we are. From the everyday work of doctors and nurses to a Hiroshima survivor, the mother of a black boy crucified by white racists, a gay male transvestite, or a woman who spent two years in a coma, Will the Circle Be Unbroken? explores reserves of beliefs, opinions, and experiences as wonderfully alive as they are uniquely individual. Running through the diversity of voices gathered here is the thread of our common humanity, our shared sorrows and universal fears and dreams.

The prologue begins with the tales of two men, a cop and a fire fighter, the epilogue ends with the tale of two women, lesbians who share a remarkable story of love and family. It’s an appropriate way to structure the book, I think, reminding us that perhaps in the end the circle of our humanity and hunger for faith does remain unbroken. The story begins with the name Ron Sable. He was a well-known gay political activist and physician and once came close to being elected a Chicago alderman. Sable, who died of AIDS in 1993, also believed strongly in the political right of lesbians to be mothers.

Accordingly, in the early 1980s he made the decision to donate his sperm to two different women, Kathy Fagan, and Linda Gagnon, both of whom desired to become mothers. The women, who lived in different cities, did not know each other. Yet within months of each other they had given birth to boys, each fathered by the same man.

When Sable later became seriously ill, the two women decided in the crisis of the moment that it might be good to meet. On Easter weekend in 1993, the last year of his life, Ron Sable rented a house on Lake Michigan. There two young boys and their mothers and one man came together for a sad and wonderful weekend. An amazing, intense weekend. And something else amazing and not expected happened — the two women fell in love.

It’s a bittersweet, moving story. The two women became partners, and with their children began to build a new life and family together. And Ron Sable, this man who was dying, this man who had fathered two children for political reasons, came to love these boys, Matthew and John, deeply, as only a father can.

And then Ron Sable died.

Delivering simple, heartfelt testimony to the power of love, and how it can change everything, Linda Gagnon’s words bring Will the Circle be Unbroken? to a powerful conclusion.

"Ron gave me my entire life," Gagnon tells Terkel as they sit in his kitchen. "He gave me everything. He gave me my whole life. [near tears] He gave me Matthew, who is someone I would go through a burning building for. I would die for him. Unless you’ve had a child, you can’t imagine the love that you feel for a child. Ron gave that to me. And he gave me Kathy. She is the love of my life. We will be together until death parts us. So he’s given me everything. And he never asked for anything. He gave me Matthew because I asked him. And he gave me John. He gave me my family. He gave me Kathy because I think he knew I needed her. I think he knew we needed each other. It was difficult being a single parent. He knew. He was involved in both our lives. So he engineered it. He wanted this, he wanted us to be together. And we accepted his gift."

As Studs Terkel declared on the Unity stage, after sharing this story, now that’s family values! Actually, that is love. It is also what this book is really about. As the novelist Arundhati Roy once wrote, we have to learn to "speak joy in the saddest places," to not turn our backs on those who suffer or are in need of justice. We can’t let life’s pain and all the sorrows that surround us conspire to defeat us.

Will the Circle Be Unbroken? speaks of such joy, and beautifully so.

Will the Circle Be Unbroken? Reflections on Death, Rebirth, and Hunger for a Faith, by Studs Terkel. The New Press (2001).

Mark Harris is a Chicago-based writer. Visit his Web site, A Writer’s Voice.

Recommend this page to a friend

Top Ten pages recommended to friends: