In an episode of one of the many cops and robbers TV shows I watch, one of the main characters told someone she was interviewing that she was going to find the person who had committed a crime. She said, with theatrical emphasis, “I promise you.” When I hear that “promise,” the cynic in me (wait, you say: CJ a cynic?) responds with a contemptuous snort through my nose. (The Cynic takes over my body and uses my nose to snort.)
“My dad doesn’t make promises,” I once overheard my youngest daughter say to one of her childhood friends. “He makes firm commitments.” Hearing Lauren say this made me believe that at least one of my three children had learned something that I felt was important for them: A promise is something that must be kept, no matter what. Promises should not be doled out like candy. If someone should require of me reassurance about some future behavior, I refuse to “promise.” I will agree to whatever the plan might be, and make every effort to be where I should, when I should; do what I’ve agreed to at the agreed time or, deliver whatever was requested.
I’m not sure when I developed an antipathy toward the concept of promises, but it is a long-held aversion. I may have used the word “promise” in the vows spoken at my first wedding in July 1969, but I don’t think the justice of the peace required the word at my second marriage in September 1987. But I’ve become adept at avoiding using that specific word when assuring someone — especially children — that I will do something. And if a little one should squeak at me, “Do you promise,” I solemnly say, “No. But I make a firm commitment.”
The ways we come to some deeply held beliefs can be curious. When I think of how I evolved into someone who is an avoider of promises, I remember having a thought about a certain circumstance: What if I promise to bring my kids their favorite fast food sandwich and get hit by a car while crossing the street? I had shown appropriate care and caution before stepping into the street, and still — was struck by a car, causing the bag of fast food fat to fly into the sewer and sending me to the hospital. My kids don’t get the sandwich and I have broken my promise to them. As Kurt Vonnegut’s character Unk said in The Sirens of Titan, I can claim that, in my failure to keep my promise, “I was a victim of a series of accidents, as are we all,” but the sting of a promise to my sprites being broken cannot be soothed by literature. “But you promised!” they would cry. Or so I imagined.
Now, the exclamations of “pish!” and “tush!” and the sounds of sucking teeth are audible to me across the reading divide, as is the click of rolling eyeballs; I can also imagine that the force of the roll is twitching the head of the eye roller. Some may cry aloud, “Cop out,” or craft cogent mental arguments rebutting my logic. Should they be presented to me, these things will not change my worldview; I cannot be nudged from my position. (Is this cognitive dissonance? Discuss among yourselves . . .)
In the song “If You Love Me, Really Love Me,” Esther Phillips sang, “If you want me to I will/You can set me any task . . .” My children and grandchildren love me, so they can set me any task, and though I will not promise, I will do.
cjon3acd@att.net