Today has been a very beautiful day here in the Low Country of SC and I have been enjoying each moment to the fullest. I have been fortunate this last year and a half to have had an 8 to 5 job on a regular basis with weekends and holidays off. I can remember a time not too long ago where I had to work 7 am to 3 pm and 3pm to 11 pm at a security job while working another job fixing computers during the day. I worked seven days per week for months on end and we still struggled to make ends meet. I have friends that are still doing that drill so I know how fortunate that I am.
Every day is a gift from God. Our lives are special and they are interconnected one with another and they mean something. How much value and quality of life that we experience is partly up to us. Every day we have to approach our day with the right attitude and spirit. Life happens to everyone and sometimes bad things do happen to good and bad alike. How we deal with those events in our lives defines our core values and character.
One of the things that make my life enjoyable and complete is knowing that God is control and not me. If things were left up to me I would find some way to screw things up royally. Luckily for us God is in control and he has a purpose and meaning for our lives. I attend Grace Fellowship Church on a bi weekly basis and I rub elbows with other likeminded folks that are just like me. Living one day at a time and doing our best to build our faith in who God is in the world we live in.
My family also makes my life complete and they add substance and adventure to my life. Every day is an adventure in our household and you never know what might happen. If you do not believe that having a family can be an adventure then you are not the parents of a teenage son or daughter. That fact alone makes life very real for me in many ways. As a single person all I had to worry about is my needs. I can determine what I want to do and when I want to do it with regards to my free time. I do not have anyone to answer to nor do I have to consider their feelings. If I want to take off for a day and go wherever and stay there however long I would not have to worry about somebody worrying about me or being upset that they did not get to come along. When you take on the responsibility of being a parent your ability to do this gets tossed out the window. You may think that I am complaining about this but I am just trying to reflect upon the fact that single folks do enjoy some added freedoms that we married folks do not.
My family makes me complete because they are a part of me and I am a part of them. We are intertwined one with another in soul and spirit. Individually we are unique and separate people but together as a family unit we are a team with a single focus. We are responsible for loving one another and living in harmony with one another. That task in and of itself can be a real challenge when you have teenagers. As a family we are constantly growing and changing as people and therefore each day brings forth new challenges. I guess you could say that as our family grows older together every day could be a chapter in a book. As a single person in the family we write our own unique chapters as a family unit all of our chapters put together would make a novel or a series of books. My family makes me complete because I know that they love me. They care about whether I come home or not. They care about whether I am happy or sad. My family encourages me by affirming my position in the family as the father of my children and husband to my wife.
My family challenges me to live up to a certain standard. They need for me to be the best dad that I can be, the best husband I can be, the best provider I can be and the best leader that I can be. Sometimes when I think about all of this is sort of scares me and makes me feel inadequate. I wonder if my wife and kids are really getting everything out of me that they should be.
In years gone by the father figure was known as the guy that showed up at the end of the day and ate dinner with his family and then flopped down in front of the television set. This dad and husband was providing for the physical wellbeing of his family by providing a pay check and roof for everyone to live under. This type of dad was also mostly emotionally absent and not engaged in the life of his children much less the needs of his wife. This type of dad and husband did his part and then the rest of his time was his to do with whatever he wanted.
My son challenged me this weekend with regards to me being a dad. From Friday night on he started to beg his mom to take him to game stop. Justin wanted to trade in one of his games that he is bored with for something new for his game cube. Katy and I spent Saturday doing the typical things like paying bills, buying groceries for the week and then we watched a movie. We try to get together as husband and wife for one day a week to enjoy each other's company away from work and the kids. It is vitally important that couples do this because we sometimes forget that there was a life before the children came along. Justin wanted to get a ride to Game Stop and mom and dad wanted to collapse in their recliners and get some siesta time and be lazy. I took Katy home after our movie and snack and took Justin to the Game Stop. My desire was to dump him off at the front door while I remained in the truck in a semi horizontal and conscious state while he did whatever he was going to do. As luck would have it my son engaged me and told me that he would need for me, the adult, to go in and conduct the business of trading in his game and getting credit on the Game Stop Discount card. Before I knew it the commitment to be merely a chauffeur turned into much more. I was now engaged in helping him find the right game for the home computer. As a child I never really experienced being the child and having my dad want to be involved in what I was doing even if it is just for fun entertainment. I found that I was forcing myself to choose to enjoy the fact that I have a son that loves his game cube games. My challenge is to teach myself how to be interested in the things that make him happy. As a dad I find myself using a ruler to gauge everything as either safe or unsafe, wholesome or dangerous. Instead of analyzing everything that he is doing as a child I have to find a way to engage him in his world so that I can be a part of it. Once I do that I can learn what makes him tick and he will learn how to trust me and make me more and more a part of his life.
We chose the game of choice which turned out to be something less than I would have personally chose for him but I gave him the latitude to indulge himself and get the game anyway. So, I was chauffer, financier and also the software installer/trouble shooter when the game did not instantly work after loading five cds on our home pc. After it was all said and done, several hours later the game just would not work. We need a better computer with a much better video card to play this game. What is more important than the game at this point for me is that I did spend the time and I invested that time in my son. We were not successful in the end result of what he wanted but at least he saw his dad taking part in his world.
My daughter, the alien, challenges me on a day by day basis. My alien is 14 years old and I know that I know it is only going to get worse. One of the things that always comes back to haunt parents and make their lives a living adventure (hell…) is that our kids are always a chip off the old block. It has been said that familiarity breeds contempt. Our kids are unique individuals that are learning how to become adults but unfortunately they also have the same quirks and character traits that mom and dad do. You look at your child and recognize those things that drive you crazy about yourself. You find yourself eyeball to eyeball with yourself and it drives you crazy. My dear daughter seems to have many of my traits. Kristina Lynn is very smart, almost too smart for her own good. Kristina is definitely a strong willed child who likes to do her own thing. One of the things that Kristina loves to do is to challenge her boundaries and our authority as parents. My pastor likened parenting to that of a coach at a basketball game. The parents are the coach and the kids are the ball players. The game has rules and the kids are going to play ball (live life). Our job as parents is to set boundaries and when the child goes out of bounds or commits a foul our job is to lovingly yet sternly hold them accountable for the rules of the game.
I find it much easier to relate to my son Justin in his world. Heck, every man has a little boy living inside who loves to play and mess around with all of his toys. How does a dad get engaged in the life of a teenage daughter? I find it more than a challenge on most days especially since the teenage daughter seems more interested in doing everything she can to alienate herself from the rest of the family. I understand that she is coming into her own and becoming a young adult soon as she learns how to walk through adolescence. My challenge has always been to find a way to make her comfortable to talk to me and her mother. I am hopeful that between the ages of 14 and 18 she will figure out a way to develop her interpersonal skills and allow us to be a bigger influence in her life. All we can do in the mean time is to make ourselves available to her as much as possible.
One of the other things that make my life complete and gives me a lot of joy is all of my many electronic toys. OK ok, a little humor here. I do enjoy all of the toys that I have accumulated over the last several years however they do not give me the satisfaction that I receive from all of my friends. Toys come and toys go however there is nothing more important to me than good friends. I am so blessed to have good friends. I thank God for them each day and pray for them every chance I get.
Did I tell you that I love bowling? If not, I do. In the last couple of weeks I have been bowling my average and more. Last week I bowled a 145 average and tonight I bowled a 156 average which is very good for me.
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