Friction in Parenting

I have often wondered what it is that makes parenting so hard. Why it is that something as simple as taking a family photo is so difficult. Perhaps, even those of you with no experience in this area, or distanced from it by several decades, might see the haggard mother at the grocery store, and wonder what it is she does that is so overwhelming to create such a miserable impression upon others.

            On of the best pieces of writing in helping me understand why parenting appears so simple, yet becomes so hard, comes from a man named Carl von Clausewitz, a military writer from the 1830s. In his masterpiece, On War, he includes a short chapter on what he calls “friction.” It is the best explanation of the experience of dressing four children in the morning that I have discovered. So, here, for fun, I have taken Clausewitz’s chapter and substituted parenting terminology for military terminology. I’ve also updated some of the illustrations to make the parental situation a little more clear. Enjoy.

CHAPTER VII.

Friction in Parenting

As long as we have no personal knowledge of Parenting, we cannot conceive where those difficulties lie of which so much is said, and what that genius and those extraordinary mental powers required in a Parent have really to do. All appears so simple, all the requisite branches of knowledge appear so plain, all the combinations so unimportant, that in comparison with them the easiest problem in higher mathematics impresses us with a certain scientific dignity. But if we have seen Parenting, all becomes intelligible; and still, after all, it is extremely difficult to describe what it is which brings about this change, to specify this invisible and completely efficient factor.

Everything is very simple in Parenting, but the simplest thing is difficult. These difficulties accumulate and produce a friction which no man can imagine exactly who has not seen Parenting, Suppose now a traveller, who towards evening expects to accomplish the two stages at the end of his day’s journey, four or five leagues, with post-horses, on the high road—it is nothing. He arrives now at the last station but one, finds no horses, or very bad ones; then a hilly country, bad roads; it is a dark night, and he is glad when, after a great deal of trouble, he reaches the next station, and finds there some miserable accommodation. So in Parenting, through the influence of an infinity of petty circumstances, which cannot properly be described on paper, things disappoint us, and we fall short of the mark. A powerful iron will overcomes this friction; it crushes the obstacles, but perhaps the child along with them. We shall often meet with this result. Like an obelisk towards which the principal streets of a town converge, the strong will of a proud spirit stands prominent and commanding in the middle of the Art of Parenting.

Friction is the only conception which in a general way corresponds to that which distinguishes real Parenting from Parenting on paper. The Parental machine, the Family and all belonging to it, is in fact simple, and appears on this account easy to manage. But let us reflect that no part of it is in one piece, that it is composed entirely of individuals, each of which keeps up its own friction in all directions. Theoretically all sounds very well: the father/mother of a family is responsible for the execution of the given task; the family is glued together into one piece by its discipline, and as the parent must be a person of acknowledged zeal, the machine spins with little friction. But it is not so in reality, and all that is exaggerated and false in such a conception manifests itself at once in Parenting. The family always remains composed of a number of persons, of whom, if chance so wills, the most insignificant is able to create delay and even obstruction. The difficulties which Parenting brings with it, the bodily exertions which it requires, augment this potential for chaos so much that it may be regarded as the greatest causes of stress in Parenting.

This enormous friction, which is not concentrated, as in mechanics, at a few points, is therefore everywhere brought into contact with chance, and thus incidents take place upon which it was impossible to calculate, their chief origin being chance. As an instance of one such chance: clothing. Here a clutter prevents shoes from being discovered in time, and those shoes prevent the family form leaving at the right moment; there the rain prevents a family from arriving at the right time, because instead of for three it had to search for jackets perhaps eight minutes; the family charges ineffectively because it is stuck fast in heavy chaos.

These are only a few incidents of detail by way of elucidation, that the reader may be able to follow the author, for whole volumes might be written on these difficulties. To avoid this, and still to give a clear conception of the host of small difficulties to be contended with in Parenting, we might go on heaping up illustrations, if we were not afraid of being tiresome. But those who have already comprehended us will permit us to add a few more.

Activity in Parenting is movement in a resistant medium. Just as a man immersed in water is unable to perform with ease and regularity the most natural and simplest movement, that of walking, so in Parenting, with ordinary powers, one cannot keep even the line of mediocrity. This is the reason that the correct theorist is like a swimming master, who teaches on dry land movements which are required in the water, which must appear grotesque and ludicrous to those who forget about the water. This is also why theorists, who have never plunged in themselves, or who cannot deduce any generalities from their experience, are unpractical and even absurd, because they only teach what every one knows—how to walk.

Further, every Parenting is rich in particular facts, while at the same time each is an unexplored sea, full of rocks which the Parent may have a suspicion of, but which he has never seen with his eye, and round which, moreover, he must steer in the night. If a contrary wind also springs up, that is, if any great accidental event declares itself adverse to him, then the most consummate skill, presence of mind, and energy are required, whilst to those who only look on from a distance all seems to proceed with the utmost ease. The knowledge of this friction is a chief part of that so often talked of, experience in Parenting, which is required in a good Parent. Certainly he is not the best Parent in whose mind it assumes the greatest dimensions, who is the most over-awed by it (this includes that class of over-anxious Parents, of whom there are so many amongst the experienced); but a Parent must be aware of it that he may overcome it, where that is possible, and that he may not expect a degree of precision in results which is impossible on account of this very friction. Besides, it can never be learnt theoretically; and if it could, there would still be wanting that experience of judgment which is called tact, and which is always more necessary in a field full of innumerable small and diversified objects than in great and decisive cases, when one’s own judgment may be aided by consultation with others. Just as the man of the world, through tact of judgment which has become habit, speaks, acts, and moves only as suits the occasion, so the person experienced in Parenting will always, in great and small matters, at every pulsation of Parenting as we may say, decide and determine suitably to the occasion. Through this experience and practice the idea comes to his mind of itself that so and so will not suit. And thus he will not easily place himself in a position by which he is compromised, which, if it often occurs in Parenting, shakes all the foundations of confidence and becomes extremely dangerous.

It is therefore this friction, or what is so termed here, which makes that which appears easy in Parenting difficult in reality. As we proceed, we shall often meet with this subject again, and it will hereafter become plain that besides experience and a strong will, there are still many other rare qualities of the mind required to make a man a consummate Parent.

The Christmas Promise

This year I’ve been participating in Biola University’s Advent Calendar. Each day we are invited to reflect on the season through a piece of scripture, poetry, prose, music, and a work of physical art. This morning we were presented with John August Swanson’s Peaceable Kingdom, representing Isaiah 11 and the “wolf lying down with the lamb.”

At the center of the night scene is a young boy, holding a small light in an open meadow, surrounded by animals. Off in the distance, others roam a forest path, following the direction of their own light; but save these few wanderers, the forest is empty. They wander alone, but the meadow is exploding with life. Roaming eyes cannot find a place to rest which is not already occupied by some creature, drawn to the light of the little one. What a menagerie it is! Swallows swoop and play while owls perch and watch from the trees. A peacock nestles by the warm rump of a lion. A raccoon playfully sniffs at a viper. At every turn, a situation which this world tells us is full of danger is possessed with a sense of joy and community. All the while, the small light of the small boy spreads illumination further than seems possible, and all of these new-found animal friends frolic in its glow.

                I sat staring at the painting and listening to the musical selection for the morning, when my little Adam trundled over and climbed up into my lap. I removed one of my ear-buds and held it to his ear. He looked at me in surprise, then his face lit in a smile. He also took in the painting, and began pointing and exclaiming as he picked out first a horse, then a chicken, then a monkey: “Dat! . . . Dat! . . . Oooooh, Dat!”

                This is the promise of Christmas: the breakthrough of child, not from a different time or place, but from the land of light, and he, shining in the darkness, calls out to creation to come and dance and sing in his glow. Here we find the dangers and enmities of the world melt away. The slave is our brother. The enemy is our friend. And in that we find a joy which we did not know. The strong embrace of the bear gives the warmth for which we’ve yearned. The hawk and rabbit are the playmates each has always desired. Off in the distance, the Philistines turn their backs on the carnival, using their own lights to peek into the wasteland, proclaiming that their imagined salvation is around the next corner, under the next bush; but the thing they’ve been seeking is not somewhere ahead. It has already arrived. There in the meadow, around the light of the child, a new kingdom has been born. Those of us who submit to the draw of the light are asked only to dance and play, to celebrate the light of the son, and revel in the oddity of it all, “Dat! . . . Dat! . . . Ooooh, Dat!”

On Teaching Vocabulary to Children

I’ve been reading The Hobbit with my oldest two sons. It’s uniquely enjoyable with each one for different reasons. Jacob, my oldest, is at the age where he can read a paragraph or a page to me, but still encounters quite a few words which are new to him. We reached the part in the book where Bilbo walks down the secret tunnel into the heart of the Lonely Mountain to face the dragon Smaug for the second time, while the troop of dwarves who have traveled with him hang back in the distance, their usual practice. The dragon knows, or guesses, where the dwarves are and refers to their “skulking” in the shadows.

                I knew that “skulking” was a new word for Jacob. After he sounded it out and read it, I asked him what he thought it meant. I chose to use an approach to exploring meaning called “fittingness,” which I first encountered in the writings of Nicholas Wolterstorff.[i] It goes something like this: many things in this world seem to have a natural relationship to one another, even though we can’t objectively quantify that relationship. We might say that blue is sad, red is angry, and yellow is happy. Of course, that’s ridiculous. Colors are merely reflections of light and have no direct relationship to emotions. Yet, the descriptions I listed “fit” with one another, don’t they? They fit together so well that corporations spend fortunes on attaching their brands to specific colors to inspire feelings and behavior. So, I told Jacob that “skulking” is one of those wonderful words in life that sounds like what it means. What does “skulking” sound like? Is it happy or sad? Confident or nervous? Open or secret? Light or dark? Is it trustworthy or tricky? Jacob struggled with this a little. That’s not surprising, it’s a rather intuitive and circuitous way to get at meaning, but ultimately he decided that “skulking” was being dark, sad, nervous, tricky, and secretive (yes, he had a little help from his father).

                Wolterstorff’s “fittingness” is a fun way to get kids to venture out and take a stab at unfamiliar words, but there is a better way, one I wish I had used with Jacob in this instance. Michael Polanyi describes it like this, “in order to analyse the use of a descriptive term we must use it for the purpose of contemplating its subject matter, and an analysis of this contemplation will inevitably extend to the contemplated object.[ii]” The weak point in my exploration of “skulking” with Jacob was that I focused his efforts of understanding on the word itself, when Smaug used the word to describe the actions of others. Our journey, fun as it was, required a good bit of guesswork and a few intuitive leaps. It may have been a nice mental exercise, but discovering the definition of “skulking” shouldn’t have been that hard: it was plain as day, or at least plain as those sad, nervous, tricky, and secretive dwarves. Perhaps the best way to define “skulking” was to ask Jacob who Smaug was referring to when he used the word, and what they were doing that caused him to use it. The dwarves were afraid and hiding in the shadows, happily allowing a little hobbit to do their dangerous work for them. They were “skulking.” To take the conversation to the next level, I could have asked what Smaug hoped to gain in the conversation. He was trying, and succeeding, to sow seeds of mistrust between Bilbo and his dwarf friends. Smaug was describing the dwarves as untrustworthy, and “skulking” is not a term that describes those we trust.

                In summary, I offer two ways help children explore new vocabulary beyond simply telling them the meaning of a word:

1.       “Fittingness” What does the word sound like? What does it feel like? This is something of an obtuse and roundabout way to get to the meaning of a word, but it requires a good bit of imagination and creativity. Probably one best used with close adult guidance and best left for fun explorations at home.

2.       “Subject analysis” What is the word referring to, what is it talking about? What is that thing doing? If your child can describe the subject of the word, he’s probably got the word’s meaning as well. It’s just a matter of making the connection.

One of the benefits of reading Tolkein with five and seven year-olds is that I can be confident it won’t be long until we have the chance to explore the meaning of an unfamiliar word again. Until then, good luck and good parenting.

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[i] Nicolas Wolterstorff, Art in Action (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1980), 96.

[ii] Michael Polanyi, Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy, (Chicago, Chicago University Press, 1974), 116.

If We Cared

In the 2012 elections, candidates for federal office spent an estimated $7 billion. If we took that money and gave it to the charity Compassion International, they could sponsor almost the entire under-18 population of Liberia for eighteen years. What we spent on what to most of us is little more than a distraction and a hobby could have provided life changing assistance to a generation of an entire country. And we could do that every fourth year. If we cared.

"He's not dead," I thought to myself, "He's just asleep." He looked asleep. His body lying there limply, face down, arms straight down his side. I've seen that posture every day for years. He had that "lumpy" toddler look with his oversize head and buttocks that always seem to project straight into the sky, like two peaks in a mountain range of cuteness. I looked at his tiny shoes and thought of the thousands of times I'd wrestled shoes just like that onto feet that just weren't ready for them. I looked at him and thought of my own toddler lying asleep, likely in the exact same position, upstairs. But, he wasn't asleep. Aylan Kurdi was dead. His body was lying facedown on a beach in Turkey, his face half covered in water. His father had secured passage with some smugglers the night before to get to Greece. The family was fleeing their home in war-torn Syria and facing the harsh reality that no one wanted them. During the trip, the waves had become too big for the overcrowded boat. The smugglers jumped overboard and the boat capsized. Aylan, his mother, and his 4 year-old brother drowned. I can't imagine what the loss of even one child does to a father. I would imagine it would unravel my entire world, but to lose your entire family in the cold sea . . .the weight of your wet clothes dragging you down as you frantically grasp for your children . . . I don't want to imagine that.

I'm typing this sitting in my new house. We didn't need a new house. The old house would have served us fine for the rest of our lives, but we wanted more space. Abdullah Kurdi wanted a home where his family wouldn't be bombed. Our house had older carpets, so we are ripping them out and replacing them with hardwood. Oh, how I've patted myself on the back for that. My kids won't have to play on cloth that smells like dogs. I've saved thousands by doing the work myself, and been blessed by the help of dozens of friends. Abdullah Kurdi fled his home to find safety in a land that didn't want him and failed. What pride has he left? If I cared, I'd rip those carpets from my home and sell them for whatever money I could find. My children would eat oatmeal for three meals a day and gratefully play on plywood floors so that a child in Syria could breathe and his father could have the same pride in his family which I have. If I cared.

This morning my family will go to church. We will sit in a multi-million dollar facility and wave our hands in the air as a band plays and words are projected onto the wall from high-definition projectors. We've patted ourselves on the back for that too. We've created a wonderful place for people to experience God's Kingdom. Yet, no one created a space for Aylan Kurdi to have oxygen. When I was a kid I went to churches made of cinder block with concrete benches. The metal roofs turned the buildings into ovens in the 100 degree heat, and a seat inside was considered a luxury. People sat  in the aisles and crowded every door and window for hours to hear words sometimes not even spoken in their language. If we cared, we would strip our houses of worship of all the trappings of wealth and sell them to ensure no child ever struggles to find safety again. We would throw ourselves on the ground and beg the forgiveness of the Almighty for our selfishness. We would hold million-dollar fundraisers for others and lament with tears when we had to keep even the smallest amount to fix the holes in the roof of our own sanctuary. If we cared.

I suppose it's all just emotion. Thousands have died fleeing the conflict in the Middle East. Fleeing an organization which, I pray to God, is the worst I will see in my lifetime. Thousands have died fleeing, that doesn't include those who never had the chance. Why do I care now? Because I saw a picture of a child who looks like mine and met death in a place I'd go for vacation? I suppose. This one thing I know, the only difference between me and Abdullah Kurdi is fortune. I was born here, and he was born there. I lead my family with pride and his world has been destroyed. I look at the body of his son and weep tears of anguish and guilt and gratitude and know I should have done so much more for him. If I cared.

Four Kids Who Live in Your Town

This is the story of four kids who probably live in your town. I know, because they lived in mine. Their names are Al, Darren, Jake, and Emily.

Years ago, a family moved in next door. They looked a little rough, talked a little rough, and smoked a little much. We had no idea how rough they were. They had two little boys, Al and Darren. The kids were cute, and. . . kids. They were just two little kids. At first, they kept  to themselves, but that didn't last long. The yelling and fighting and a drinking soon spilled onto the streets and the sidewalks. Dad had a problem. With alcohol? Yup. With drugs? Probably. With mental health? Definitely. With Violence?

And in it all were those two little boys.

We tried to be good neighbors, but how do you do the white suburbia neighbor thing with a drunken redneck wrestling six cops on the sidewalk? You want to know? You get real honest. While other neighbors ignored Dad, threatened Dad, called the cops about everything Dad did, I looked him straight in the eye and told him the truth. We know what goes on in that house, and every time we hearing the yelling, the screaming, the smashing of objects (of people?) we will call the police. Because of two little boys. You know what? Dad kind of respected that.

Those boys got older. They made friends. Another boy, Jake, started hanging around the house and before long a girl, Emily, too. I only got to know one of them well, Al. The others were too young or busy or whatever, but Al would tell me things. The things he told me. Imagine laying on top of your drunken father, pinning him to the ground, because you thought he was going to kill your mother. You aren't a man, you're a kid, and you are doing this. Al tried to get out of it, but he had no idea how. Maybe he wanted normal, but he'd never seen it. He tried the military. We went running together to get him in shape, but he barely cleared boot camp. He couldn't get out because he didn't know where, or what, out was.

I'm not sure when that ignorant bastard Heroin showed up, but he did.

One night, we were sitting in our kitchen and heard it start next door. It was bad. We were in our house with the windows closed. They were in their house with the windows closed. And we heard her screaming. That's when it all broke. Dad in jail. Mom in the hospital. They all just disappeared.

After that I didn't see them for months, but then Al would pop up now and then. He bumped around in different cities fathering different children. One day, he showed up at my house looking for a place to live. His brain was fried. We didn't want him in the house, so we put him in the backyard and gave him some pizza while I made some calls. He said he forgot something at a friend's house and left.

The next time I saw him was at Darren's funeral. Al's little brother overdosed on Heroin. I went to the memorial service and gave my condolences.

The next time I saw him was at Jake's baptism. While in prison, Jake met a pastor, and Jesus. Upon his release, he wanted to be baptized. I spoke with Al. He read in the Bible about a baptism by the Holy Spirit that can heal. He was praying for one for himself. He knew that only a miracle could save him from his addiction.

Last month, Al died. Almost exactly a year after his brother. Emily is currently fighting for her life in a coma. This week, Jake was arrested with thousands of dollars in cash and several hundred bags of heroin.

Who are these kids? Are they despicable scum bags who you'd avoid on the street? Yes. Have they made terrible choices and bought into foolish lies? Yes. Are they just kids who needed a Mom and Dad and got a nightmare instead? Yes. Are they people who desperately need your prayers and, God forbid, you kindness as well? Yes.

The most haunting thing about these four is that they are literally our neighbors. Yet, I couldn't do a damned thing to save them. What's worse? I don't think I tried very hard either.

How Siri Made Me a Better Dad

Several months back, I was facing a small emergency at my part-time job. At the moment I learned of the issue I was driving and didn’t have any free hands. “Aha!,” I thought, “This is the perfect time for Siri.” For those of you who don’t know, Apple’s Siri is a voice-activated feature on iDevices which acts as something of a personal assistant. You can ask Siri to place phone calls, send messages, even tell you the date of the last Space Shuttle launch (that one comes in handy if you have a Kindergartener). Apple is known for technological advances and ease of usability, right? Imagine my surprise when Siri proved to be completely useless. It could not identify any of the people I was asking it to call, and the entire situation ended with me yelling at my phone and Siri promising, “I’m trying to be helpful.” Seriously, my phone said that to me. The entire situation reaffirmed my suspicion that most claims regarding the ability of technology to actually improve our lives are mere marketing hype. However, there is one very specific situation where technology has improved my life. It’s made me a better father, and it is all thanks to Apple’s Siri.

The Problem

                I’m a Stay-at-Home Dad raising three young boys. Discipline is a big deal in our house. Not that I’m some sort of brutish dictator, but with these three little ones you’ve got to be on top of things. I like to use a variety of disciplinary tools, but by far my favorite is the time out. Our household policy is simple, when you commit an infraction you sit on time out for one minute for every year you’ve been alive. So, our three year-old sits for three minutes, our six year-old for six, etc (I have yet to find a way to earn myself a 36 minute time out, but one can dream). This might seem like a simple policy to execute, but it is harder than it initially appears. I used to use the timer on our microwave to measure these time out minutes, but that only works when you are close to the microwave. It doesn’t work upstairs, in the backyard, or at the park. Additionally, when you are dealing with one child who is screaming because he was hit over the head with a plastic helicopter, one who is screaming because he did the hitting with the plastic helicopter, and a third who is screaming because – well, because everyone else is screaming – that walk across the room to the microwave suddenly becomes a whole lot more difficult.

                Without a reliable way to measure time, the lengths of prescribed time outs became very inconsistent. Maybe you are able to accurately estimate when three minutes had passed in your mind, but I’m not. When someone is screaming in my face, I tend to think the three minutes has passed pretty quickly. When I am upset with someone, I can make that three minutes last forever. In the end, the actual time was based on my mood, and my kids picked up on it. Soon, every time out became a festival of whining and harassment. My boys learned that they could manipulate Dad, and that Dad was the only factor controlling when they could return to whatever they wanted to do. If they could make time out more miserable for me than it was for them I would end time out early. They were completely correct. And life was hell.

The Solution

                I’m not sure when I figured it out, probably while exploring the date of the last Shuttle launch, but I found out that there was a person who would set a timer for my whenever I wanted for as long as I wanted, and she lived in my pocket. With the push of a button and one little phrase, my time out problem was solved. “Siri, set timer three minutes,” changed my life and made me a better Dad. The boys know that time out lasts until the phone chimes. That knowledge alone has reduced the time out whining. Sure, we still have time out battles, but those battles typically focus on real disciplinary issues, not my inability to discipline consistently. Siri goes with my wherever I go, upstairs, outside, in the grocery store. Problem solved and Siri can now claim to actually be helpful.

A Truth, a Blessing, and a Hope: Three Things Every Child Needs to Hear Every Day

It’s a sobering feeling, sending your child away. That first morning dropping them at school or putting them on the bus is a reality check. At least it was for me. My moment came a few years ago as I dropped my oldest son off for his first morning of preschool. It wasn’t the first time he had been away from me, but this was different than a morning in Sunday School, a night with the babysitter, or a weekend at Grandma’s. For the first time, I was putting my child into the hands of people I didn’t really know and a situation where I had little influence. There’s a lot that can go wrong. The media has done a thorough job reminding us that every time a child leaves our sight we may never see him again, and even though I am something of an emotional curmudgeon, that idea sometimes brings a cold dread into my heart. More than that, I had no guarantee that these “other people” took the responsibility to guide my child into adulthood seriously. I had no guarantee that they didn’t harbor hidden desires to damage and harm him for their own pleasure. I had no guarantee that he would make friends and discover all the joys that come with that. Maybe people would be mean. I had experienced some of that as a child and desperately wish my sons will be spared those experiences. But they won’t, will they? People will be mean. People will harm them. People will put their own desires above the well-being of these little ones. I have zero control over that. On that first morning, I came to the realization that the only thing I can control is the last words my child hears me say before I let him go. So, that morning, and every morning since, I grabbed that little man by the shoulders, looked straight into his eyes and whispered three things:

A Truth: I Love You

     For several years now, I have volunteered working with young adults. I have worked with some great young men and women and some damaged young men and women. I have seen the addicted, depressed, and mentally ill. I have seen the long-term results when a person has never received the affirmation that they are loved. It’s as if the foundation for all of life has been pulled from beneath them and every event, every challenge, is a threat to the very core of their being. These people flounder and wander. They are lost, because they do not know that they are loved. I would trade all the wealth in all the world to save my children from that life. The truth is that we are all loved. You are loved. I am loved. They are loved. The foundation of the Universe, the truth that is holding it all together, is love. If you have not faced that reality in your life, I encourage you to explore the person of Jesus Christ and reflect on his love for you. You are loved with a ferocity that is both terrifying and wonderful to experience. Whatever happens in the next day, whatever wonders or tragedies befall you, one truth does not change. You are loved. So, I grab my son by the shoulders, look straight into his eyes and whisper, “I love you.”

A Blessing: I Am Proud of You

     There is a wonderful practice in some cultures, well attested to in the Old Testament, of an aged father calling his sons to him to receive a blessing before he dies. By no means does this practice need to be restricted to sons! A blessing is an affirmation of a person’s strengths and a prediction of the continuation of strength into the future. A blessing tells a child that the parent believes in her strength and is excited to see that strength shared. A blessing is a statement of pride. This child of mine has something to offer the world, and I want him to know that. I am proud of him.

     Now, am I always proud of my child? No and yes. There was the time we were at the grocery store. My hands were full at checkout and a woman in a wheelchair in the next aisle dropped her purse on the floor. She could not reach it and I asked my son to go and help her. He did not go. I was not proud of his actions in that situation and I let him know that. There are times when we will not be proud of the actions of our children. They will make poor choices. They will pursue lies. They will hurt others. In those situations we must express our own hurt and disappointment to them, but does that negate the blessing? Does the fact that my child sometimes acts in ways I wish he didn’t mean that I no longer believe that he was made for a purpose and has something positive to offer the world? Does is negate my belief that he has the power to turn to a different path and change? No, my pride in his potential and my blessing for his future thrive, even if he struggles. So, I grab my son by the shoulders, look straight into his eyes and whisper, “I am proud of you.”

A Hope: You’re Gonna Have a Great Day!

     I have complete control over my love. I can offer it or withhold it at my choosing. I only control half of my blessing. I offer it, but my son must accept it and live in it for it to come true. I have no control over the hope I offer to my son every morning. It is just that: Hope. I hope that life treats my children well. I hope that they find a community that loves them and supports them. I hope they find their way into places where they can potently exercise their gifts in the service of others. I hope that their dreams succeed. I hope they find confidence in who God made them to be despite their own shortcomings. I also hope that they never feel hunger or poverty, that they never experience life on either end of the gun, and that they never have to stand against the toes of bullies and speak a truth I wish they did not know. But I cannot control these things.

So far, life has treated my children well. School has been an eye-opening exploration of knowledge. Friends have been kind and generous. Whatever bumps life has given us have, in hindsight, been mild. There is no guarantee that tomorrow will continue in the same way, but we hope. If life brings hardship, we continue to hope that it will work out for the good. This is a legacy I want to pass to my son. So, I grab him by the shoulders, look him straight in the eye and whisper, “You’re gonna have a great day!”

The Legacy Continues

     Our oldest son is in kindergarten now. When the weather is nice we walk to school. He rides his bike, our middle son rides with training wheels, and the youngest is pushed in the stroller. It is a great way to start the morning, and as we wait in front of the school I grab the oldest by the shoulders and share my little message. Last week, our middle son had the chance to attend a one-week preschool preview before beginning in earnest in the fall. As we stood outside waiting for the classroom to open on the first morning, I felt a tug on my sleeve. I looked down to see my son; jacket zipped to the neck and backpack snuggly tightened on both shoulders. He looked so ready for life, yet so tiny at the same time. He looked up and me and said, “Daddy, can you look at my face and tell me your secrets?” So, I knelt in front of him, grabbed the straps of his backpack, looked straight in those wonderful little eyes and told him, “I love you. I am proud of you. You’re gonna have a great day!” And. . . he did.