Secretariat - The Dilemma between Family and Legacy

I admire horses. In fact the very reason why I ride the Motorcycle is because the Motorcycle is the closest modern man can get to riding a horse. It is common probably knowledge that 'Secretariat' is an excellent movie about the most legendary Horse that ever lived. Here, I do not want to write about the obvious. I want to write what the movie has to do the dilemma that most people face between caring for family and following life's passion.

The movie has a spin that makes the viewer realize that the real hero of the movie is not the horse but its owner, Debbie. The movies starts off showing her as a home maker with a successful attorney for a husband and four kids, two of them adolescent, one of them almost outright rebellious, all of them still in school. Debbie is at a stage in a woman's life where the demands of the family is more than the demands of any full time career.

Unexpectedly her mother dies, and she goes back to her parent's ranch . She remembers the tender memories of her childhood with the horses and how her father loved them and was so proud of the legacy of having bred the finest horses. Her brother suggests that they sell off the horses with the ranch, pay the taxes and continue on with their own lives. Being a Harvard economists, he sees liquidation of assets as economically most sensible. Debbie a plain a simple homemaker, with a heart for horses, is unwilling to let the legacy of her father fade into oblivion.

She remembers her father telling her about horse racing, "it is not about whether others think if you have won. It is not even about whether you think you have won." She wants to attempt to build upon the legacy of her father. This means that she has to spend time in the ranch away from her family. Her dilemma is between catering to the demands of her family and building upon her father's legacy.

She chooses to make her father's legacy her own. Consequently, she shuttles between the Ranch and her family for many years. The Ranch looses money, the horses do not have a good trainer and she misses not being with her teenage daughters who are becoming more beautiful by the week. She cries over the phone, she cries in her bed alone, for missing the most important moments in her kids life. But her passion to keep the legacy alive keeps her going.

Her husband tells her that she can't have her spending his money on something that seemed only to be a huge drain. She hangs up the phone. It is at this stage that her brother makes a second attempt to convince her to sell off the ranch and the horses and get back to her "long neglected 'duty' as a mother and a wife". She replies, "Next time you talk to me about my duties as Mother and a Wife, you'll be a stranger to me".

Her life is split between her home and the Ranch for about three years and she against all odds, breeds the most legendary Horse that ever raced in recorded history. Her 'Secretariat' becomes a National Phenomenon. I was talking to someone at Church and he told me that he remembered the horse 'Secretariat' when he was a kid.

As I was watching the movie, I realized that the suspense wasn't really about the horse. I knew the horse would win, after all there cannot be a movie if it didn't. I was really curious to know how choosing the tougher option between family and her legacy affected Debbie's relationship with the family.

Her husband loving as he is, is getting impatient. I was brazing myself for a confrontation and a breakup in that family, similar to the one that happens  in the movie, "Nothing But the Truth", where a female reporter takes a stand upholding a journalistic principle and pays a huge price. She gets pilloried for sticking too much to her passionate principles and being a unfit mother and wife. Eventually, her husband dumps her. But this never happens in 'Secretariat'.

What happened in 'Secretariat' is beautiful. The result of her choice and shuttling between priorities, initially appears to have the effect of being estranged from the family but as time passes, her passion and legacy gets 'inherited' into her family. Her husband and children 'share' into the legacy she is building. The kids are overjoyed about the 'Secretariat'.   They are proud that their mother was bequeathing to them a great legacy. Her husband is at her back. Even her brother realizes that she made the right choice. She is known in the racing circles as the most attractive owner any horse ever had.

I think, herein lays the answer to the dilemma that many face when it comes to being with family and following ones passion. The essence of family is 'sharing'. All our successes, joys and sorrows are 'shared' and that sharing is what gives meaning to life. There are times when someone in the family feels a deep passion for something, at such times, a family that is true to its essence of 'shared experiences' can be a source of strength and meaning (not a liability) to helping that person to 'move out' achieve that which is passionately pursued and make that a part of their 'shared' legacy.

I believe family has this unique characteristic because the family was created by God to be a well-spring of joy and strength that results from shared experiences which becomes the 'bedrock' for men and women to 'move out' into the world and exercise their dominion over it making life more beautiful and more cherished for many, and most specially for the family itsef.

God Himself has His essence in the 'shared' experiences of His Triune nature (Father, Son and Holy Spirit). The Triune fellowship is His well-spring of joy. In fact, when God created the world, He did not just say, "I created the world". He rather said, "Let US create...", true to His Triune shared creative experience. He 'imputes' into the family, a part of the divine nature of being strengthened by 'shared experiences' and 'moving out' to create a legacy.

The family is thus a reflection of God's Triune nature of shared experiences and creative legacies. That is the reason why God wants family and procreation to be sacred rites. In as far as a family reflects the 'shared' experience within and 'moving out' - the creative legacy of the Triune nature, it shall be the most beautiful transcended experience of life. One does not have to chose between family and legacy. Rather, they mesh with each other and enrich each other as a true reflection of the Triune Creator's nature manifested through creative legacy strengthened by shared experiences.