A Life of Gratitude

Boys Will Be Boys

I was away from the house for a bit this weekend when Katie sent me this picture of the boys.  I replied that it was the perfect picture for a poster detailing “boys being boys.”

A good friend recently posted pictures of her daughters’ high school and college graduations on Facebook. I was reminded that the days of our “boys being boys” are fleeting. Being aware of that helps turn simple mud puddles into awesome memories.

If the art of manipulation is a sign that mud puddles will soon be a thing of the past, Elliott is about to be a very clean boy.  You see, Elliott has gained a good understanding of which of his requests in our house will be met with a YES, and which will die at the hands of the dreaded NO.  So dreaded in fact, he has adopted a strategy that bypasses all roads to denial.  Here is an example that took place at a recent bedtime:

“Dad, nobody drinks chocolate milk at bedtime.” 

It is important to note here that this could not have been mistaken for a question. Elliott was stating a fact that he was begging me to prove wrong.  I didn’t bite.  So he went on to phase two.

“Hey dad, I have an idea.  I have juice in the mornings.  Maybe I could have juice tomorrow morning, then chocolate milk the next morning, then juice the next morning, then chocolate milk the next morning, then that would be a new pattern.  At this point, while I could still recognize the “non-question” that was being buried beneath a pile of pattern poop, I should have issued a generic no and ended the whole scheme.  Whatever you’re after Elliott the answer is no.  But I wasn’t big enough.  I couldn’t resist. I was drug into the world of four year old logic like a fall nut gets whisked away in a squirrel’s mouth.  But I had him where I wanted him. Playing the pattern card was about to be a big mistake.

“Elliott, do you even know what a pattern is?” (I promise God, if he quotes Webster here he gets chocolate milk three meals a day for life).

“Yes,” he answered.

“Would you mind telling me what a pattern is?” I asked.  Oh, I couldn’t wait to hear his definition.

“A pattern is when you have juice one morning, then chocolate milk the next, then juice the next, then chocolate milk the next.  That’s a pattern.”

So much for asking him to use it in a sentence.

The next morning, I heard some rustling around in the kitchen.  When I investigated I found the refrigerator door wide open, and Ian standing with a half gallon of juice in his hands.  He had a strained look on his face that reminded me of one of those guys on the World’s Strongest Men attempting to lift a Volkswagen higher off the ground than the rest of the competition. 

“Ian, what are you doing?” I asked.

“Getting some juice.”

“Why don’t you just ask?”

Just then Elliott showed up from out of the blue.  Like a ghost, only more haunting and less invisible.  And he decided to answer for Ian:

“He’s afraid you’ll say no.”

Fleeting, I keep reminding myself, Fleeting.

Mother’s Day 2011

 

Elliott brought the above Mother’s Day card home from pre-school this week for Katie.  He obviously had some help writing the answers.  That is not Elliott’s handwriting.  And when the response to the first question is my mom is 14 years old, you can assume the answers were not censored.

So to clarify a few things:

Katie is not 14.  It is true I married a younger woman, just not that young.  In fact, Elliott is closer to 14 than Katie.  I am now fully engaged in a panic attack thinking of Elliott as a 14 year old.

Answer two. If you look at the portrait that Elliott drew of Katie, you might be hoping he didn’t draw this based on a memory of the two of them playing together.  He is obviously too young to understand that you don’t get tricked into answering questions that make you identify a point during any woman’s day or life when she looks prettier than she did or will.  We’ll work on that one before he turns 14. 

Answer three.  If I were ever forced to come up with a list of the 2 million things I think Katie most likes to make, airplanes would not show up on that list.  Elliott clearly knows something I don’t.  Somewhere along the way they had an airplane making session that left quite an impression.

My mom always says: “Good job eating dinner.”  I about fell to the ground when I read this one.  Elliott, you don’t eat dinner.  Remember.  You don’t like food, especially when it comes in bulk proportions like meals.  I get where he is coming from on this one, though.  Because on the two or three occasions in his life when Elliott has eaten dinner, we have quickly thrown together awards ceremonies that make the Academy Awards look like a day at the library. 

The last one, my mom is funny when she laughs – I couldn’t agree with you more little buddy. 

We go out of our way to fill our house with laughter, and there is no doubt the boys have a mama who helps lead that charge.  There is no clearer indication of the success of this mission than Ian breaking into one of his deep, lingering laughs.  It is by far the greatest laugh I have ever heard.  Sometimes you wonder if he’ll ever stop.  He usually does, just seconds before we do rock, paper, scissors to see who will change his underwear. 

Ian has this serious side as well.  He was in the back yard playing this week when I heard him yelling for me.  The daddy chant I call it.  So when I finally responded, I found Ian standing, looking very intently into the seat of his swing.  “This bug isn’t moving daddy,” he said.  I knew Ian well enough to have no clue whether he was concerned that this dead bug was borrowing his swing, or that the thing died before he could tell it good-bye.  Katie has passed on her love of nature to both of the boys, and Ian embraces it.  In the middle of a recent foot race down the sidewalk with Elliott, Ian stopped dead in his tracks to look at a worm that had about as much movement left in it as the bug resting in his swing.  Elliott wouldn’t have forfeited victory if an elephant had been lying on the sidewalk, let alone a dead worm.

After the victory celebration, though, Elliott would be begging his mama to help him spell worm, and look it up in books to learn everything he could about a worm, and to draw a worm - because you now know that Elliott is quite the artist.  And no matter how tired mama is, she’ll do all of those things.

I believe that mothers are the last remaining thread holding our families together.  So many things are changing about the dynamics of a family, mainly who and what makes up a family, and who has what it takes to live up to the responsibility of remaining a part of that family, but a mother’s love is constant.  I believe that because I see my wife’s love look like that of my own mom’s and Katie’s mom, and that of my grandmothers’ before.  When things get challenging, especially when it comes to the children, mom is there.

I have an awesome wife.  I thank God for that every day. 

But I am certain that one day Elliott and Ian will recognize that I do have flaws in my life.  They will begin to question how on earth their dad latched on to the perfect wife, the perfect mom.  They may even quietly, and I am sure in good humor, call it a miracle.  I know I sure do.  I hope on that day they too will give God all the thanks he so deserves for making their mom the thread that holds our house together. 

 

 

Osama Bin Laden

EASTER 2011

 

I woke up yesterday morning with every intention of writing an update about the boys.  I already had the picture above posted and waiting on a few words from me.  Things have been busy around here, so waiting lasted longer than I had planned.

Yesterday I sat down at my desk prepared to crank out some thoughts about the awesome Easter we had, as well as the recent weekend I spent alone with the boys while Katie was out of town (I had much appreciated assistance from grandma and grandpa).  Believe me, I had plenty of material.

My writing didn’t get very far, though. I fired up my computer.  I opened up Yahoo to do my morning scan of the news.  And that’s when I saw the headline:  Osama Bin Laden was dead. 

I am now fully aware that my reaction was inconsistent with those of other readers.  I understood the magnitude of the news, but as I read on, I was surprised to discover that people across the country had filled the streets in celebration.  I got that response, I guess.  It just wasn’t mine.

I couldn’t help but look back up at the picture of our two boys.  Two boys celebrating Easter.  I couldn’t help but notice their innocence, maybe as clearly as I ever had.  It is an innocence that Katie and I foster.  It is supported by loving circles of family and church members and teachers and friends.  We are raising them to love and appreciate those circles and many beyond.  I am the first to recognize that guarantees nothing.  It does, however, expose them to far less hate than other children their age.

In lands far away, and in communities very close to home, many children are being raised in homes filled with hatred.  They are taught that violence is a tool for that hatred, and they are assigned targets at which to direct it.  These targets represent differences in religion and color and size and sometimes just simple opinion.  By the time many of these young people become adults, their decisions are almost entirely guided by this hate.  Every bit as much as Elliott and Ian’s will hopefully be made in love.

I have worked with many troubled youth.  I have come to understand that being raised in hate is far more challenging to overcome than it is to continue the momentum of love that defines many of our childhoods.  The more intense the hate, the bigger the challenge.  It certainly doesn’t guarantee dire consequences anymore than raising our boys in love assures a happy ending.  But it does define the starting point.  And I happen to believe that head starts exist in worlds beyond schoolyard foot races.

I had to wonder what kind of starting point Osama Bin Laden had.  I have no idea, but I wondered.  I believe adults can put us on a path to killing someone as fast as they can put us on one to love that same someone.  Even planes and buildings full of someones.  It isn’t an excuse.  It doesn’t re-classify killing innocent people as anything but evil.  It just makes it a little more comprehensible.   And maybe just a tad easier to skip celebrating the bullets that shatter one of the many, many faces of evil.

I also had to be thankful for a moment that I was raised in a home where I was taught at a young age that the value of my present and eternal lives are defined by a man who had already been killed, not by a list of those who needed to be.

And finally, I had to take one last look at the picture above and own the responsibility that, as parents, we will ultimately define the contrast Ian and Elliott see between love and hate.  I pray it will be quite noticeable.