Still another reminder of my fruitless search for fulfillment in position and prestige was a letter I had gotten from my mother. She lived in the viewing area of the television station where I worked. Just the week before the Indy 500 Mother had written:
Dear Bonnie,
It's awful that you're right here in the room with me every morning and I can't say a word to you. Sometimes when you look at the camera I try to imagine that you are talking to me.
How is the job coming along? I wonder about all of you constantly. I'm proud that you have the ability to do the TV program. You do so well; it's something to be proud of.
You have the opportunity to do many things. And I hope you will have the wisdom to sift out the uplifting things from the shallow and empty, and hold yourself up high. Many people are watching, and you have a chance to build a good image before them.
I pray for you, that you will not let anything pertaining to your job come between you and God, or hinder you from doing His will. In other words, honor and glorify Him, in all that you do. (Colossians 3:17)
I also pray that you will not let your job hinder you one minute in your role as a Christian wife and mother and that you will have the wisdom to bring up your
children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I love all of you and want you to be saved when you die. How terrible and awful it will be to fall in the hands of the
living God unprepared. I hope you can come to see us soon.
Love,
Mother
The letter had not had as much impact on me last week as it did this week when I reread it. And I thought of her words so many times. Was that why I was so unfulfilled?
I had met all of my worldly goals. I had my picture in the paper almost every day for some activity or place where I was speaking, providing a running commentary for a fashion show, or interviewing a TV guest. Life was empty -- like a beautiful soap bubble that glistens in the sunlight. It has all the colors of the rainbow, but when you touch it there's really nothing there. Day after day I'd have the thought that tomorrow, or very soon, I would make an impact on people's lives. What I was doing at the television station and what I had worked for all my life would then become meaningful. Yet when the next day came, and liquor and "joints" flowed, all the duress and pseudo-happiness I'd become entrenched in netted me only the stark reality of depression.
After Tony's recuperation, I had resumed my role at the television station and gradually seemed to forget the horror of the Indy 500 accident--and why we had been there. I fell right back into the old ways of seeking what I now recognize as those Poverty P's--power, position, and prestige. I sought power by wanting to be the Woman of the Year; position by being the only woman on the TV station in our area; and the prestige which accompanied both.
The next year I secured radio-television credentials to cover the Republican National Convention and also was elected as a convention delegate from the First Congressional District of Arkansas -- overdoing anything and everything was so typical of me. I was on the bus that the Zippies attacked in Miami Beach. Fortunately we got through that experience without anyone on the bus being seriously injured.
In all my frantic busyness, I neglected my husband and family. I was demanding success for me, through me. As I looked at my goals (gold Mercedes, white mink coat, diamonds), they seemed empty of any long-range benefit. So I worked even harder to get into more meaningful things, like participating in the Little Rock dinner held in honor of James H. Patrick, recipient of the National Brotherhood Humanitarian Award of the National Conference of Christians and Jews. I thought perhaps if I did more to "help" the community, I would "help" my own satisfaction.
As our marriage drifted progressively further apart, I never knew what Tony was doing. Of course, he could read in the paper or see on TV what I was doing, and I thought all the time he was proud of my involvement, my activities. I didn't know he was sad and jealous inside. He didn't like being "Mr. Bonnie Libhart." But I was so wrapped up with me; I didn't realize his ego was dying. I thought Tony was vicariously enjoying my position on TV as if it were his own.
Tony's extreme dissatisfaction with his life and his job led him to write the company owners and ask about their plans for his future advancement. The firm's vague answer opened the door to our next plans. A Texas company had offered me a position as their first woman executive. We had opened a distributorship for the company in Arkansas and had done quite well. Tony and I decided my job offer would give him an opportunity in a new area. After all, to succeed in his own eyes he had to get away from the town where he'd been "Bonnie's husband." So I accepted the position as a development director with the Texas company and we moved. Tony was pleased to land a job with a smaller company, which he thought he would enjoy more. But it was MY employer who financed our relocation.
People asked about my husband's plans, and I replied I was the one who was moving, and the family moved with me. A women's magazine wanted to do a story about the fact that we moved with my job, but I kept procrastinating. I was proud of being the first woman executive with the company, yet at the same time a nagging guilt feeling reminded me I had not been submissive to Tony. I was calling the shots for our family and it didn't feel good.
Why?
Our arrival in Waco brought a few new challenges. In the circles we were introduced into, it seemed that if our family had not lived in the city for several generations, we were not considered "insiders." Well, if we couldn't be members of the inner circle, we could at least be successful. And if success was to be determined by profit, perhaps what we needed was to make more money.
As a result, I worked hard and the president of the company sent me a note that said:
Re: Being a Champion again
Bonnie, what are we going to do? Two-thirds of the department's production from a 100-some-odd-pound gal!! Congratulations on the practically $50,000 production cash in the pay period! I'm excited to see you back on top and the leader, where you belong.
I'm counting on you to maintain this position. It is approaching Thanksgiving and we have a lot to be thankful for ...your future in this company...
This was the kind of motivation I lived for! I enjoyed the fact that I had the position of leader. I always wanted to win. Way down inside of me, though, the loneliness grew.
One autumn, searching for something deeper, something of lasting value, we attended an Institute of Basic Youth Conflicts Seminar at the local convention center. In one of the sessions the instructor talked about a new concept--new for me at least. He said that when wives submitted themselves to their husbands and the husbands were submitted to Christ, the wives were under "God's umbrella of protection." What a strange concept, I thought. Could there be anything to this method? Probably not, I decided defensively. After all, I was interested in adding to my own power and prestige. And yet something new
