In-depend-ence

Apparently, when I was a toddler, as I tried to keep up with my two bigger brothers, I tended to want to be more grown up than I was at an age where you counted months instead of years.  We lived for a time close to my dad’s mother, Grannie, and when I was grown, she would always remind me of that little boy, and how she observed that even while I was walking away from her, she would see my diaper-clad independent rear end, moving as fast as I could…
Three of my greatest loves in this world are God, of course, my wife Cheri, of course, and the study of words.  To me, there is incredible power in knowing not simply what a word might mean, but also from where it came, and what it meant originally.  On this fine Fourth of July, I propose we take a little time, and look at our national forming word:  Independence.
“Independence” is of course a Latin-based word, meaning simply “the opposite of dependence.” That seems a bit too simple.  “Dependence” from Latin dependere, and pendere, means “to hang down, or to hang.”  The image that comes to my mind is that it seems, when we are dependent, that we have no firm footing.  A baby is dependent, and spends more time hanging from its mother or father than scooting around.  It can’t fix a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, manage a bank account or drive a car.  Every one of its needs must be met by force that cares for it.  Dependence, however, is not the natural, life-long state of the human.  From an independent diapered baby’s bottom, every step the child takes is a sustained effort to do things by herself, himself.  When our son, Adam, was about two, and we were visiting my folks, my sister Amy took him to go to the bathroom.  After he was done, Amy, without thinking, flushed the toilet.  Wow – did that set Adam off!  His defiant statement to his aunt was, “Adam do it!”  It was his independent right to flush his own toilet!
And so it goes throughout our childhoods, our teenage years and beyond.  In the child/teenager’s eyes and mind, it’s simply a matter in the natural order of things – I will do this, on my own.  Of course, to the loving and caring parents, who for years have given their time, energy, resources and an overabundance of love, the growing independence is viewed as a dagger through the heart, and a the sense of being rejected, or set aside, and “Can I have the car keys?”  Hopefully, every one of us will go, or has gone through that process.  How sad, when because of physical or mental or other struggles, a human being will remain dependent on others for a lifetime. They seem to always be hanging in mid-air, unable to get their own footing.  The blessing, of course, is that they would be surrounded by those who love and care, and who will allow themselves to be the footing for the one who will depend on them.
So, the opposite of dependence – is freedom.  Interesting that if you were to look up “independence” as a Latin term, it would be libertas, or for our ears, liberty.  Freedom from control or influence of another.  Someone has said that independence is an achievement, not a bequest.  Yet, let’s be honest, and recognize that the path to independence is long and rarely fully achieved in any lifetime.  Sure, I can “take care of myself,” but I still often miss both my mother and my father, and the time past when I could talk with them, sit with them, be cared for by them, and be dependent at least for a time on them.
Today is a celebration of the political and economic liberty we achieved from England 244 years ago.  We should not fool ourselves, though, by thinking that we completed the task and now need no one as Americans.  Truth is, we need each other, we need the nations and communities of the earth – and we will never outgrow, or out-achieve our dependence on God, who continues to provide us with each breath we take, each beating of our hearts, each tear and each belly-laugh, and each event of our attempted independent lives.  The best perspective to carry with independence is humility.  As proud as we might be, the pride must never forget the gratitude that should come as we consider the Gracious Gift of the God who will never let us go.
 
(Another) Word(s) for the day:  zenith and nadir.  These two words are inextricably bound, usually in talking about astronomy.  “Zenith” means the highest point you can observe of a star or planet traveling over you.  From the Latin, cenit, we actually have the origin from perhaps the first astronomers, the Arabs, as the word, samt ar-ras, means “the direction of the head.”  Strangely enough, “nadir” is simply the opposite – nazir as-samt, which means “the lowest point.”  Of course, we have claimed those words to also talk about those “points” in our lives where we soar, or where we crash – where we are totally independent and feel the wind in our face, and where we only taste the dust of the earth after a spectacular failure in our lives.  Both are critically important experiences of life.