And yet we've met so many people we've loved. And been to so many wonderful places. And then we had to leave them all.
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| Tarague Beach, Guam |
Daily I am confronting my need to control everyone and everything in my household. I snap at the kids and the husband when plans for the weekend fall through. No camping trip in Sequoia this weekend. No swim team for the summer. I keep trying to direct the kids toward what I want them to do - read this book! Clean your room! Draw a picture for a card! Get off the computer! Think about what you want to do with your life! I feel like the scroogey dad in that old Twisted Sister video.
It's a good thing we have a baby in the house because those tense moments are punctuated by coos and gurgles - we're all trying really hard to get the baby to smile. Half an hour can pass while we make faces over her or watch her make faces. Baby TV.
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| Almost caught the smile! |
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| Picking matching outfits. |
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| She must have said something really funny. Or pooped. |
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| Most photographed baby ever. I keep finding more photos on my phone. |
Over the weekend we watched Forest Gump with the older boys, and I started to feel weepy. Not so much because of the movie - I'm not one to succumb to tearjerkers, although I love when Forest runs - but because life is changing so rapidly, both my home life and life at large. I had forgotten some of the overtly religious moments in that movie. Mrs. Gump talking about God. Lt. Dan challenging God in the hurricane. Forest's loyalty to his friends and family. References to fate vs. free will. Could that movie be made today? Is it going to be harder and harder to make movies in which a Christian worldview is a given?
A radio interview on NPR with two pot smokers made me realize yet again how that less and less is taboo. Fewer things are scandalous. As the concept of sin disappears so does drama. Will metaphysical conflicts like that of Lt. Dan lose their ability to cause suspense? Will art and literature no longer be created around the conflict between man and God - will that interior conflict no longer mean anything if communal faith is banned from the marketplace?
In the newspaper I came across the quote from William Faulkner from Requiem for a Nun that captures some of the melancholy of the weekend: "The past is never dead; it's not even past. If it were, there would be no grief or sorrow." No doubt art and literature will continue to play around the drama of love and loss.
And the conflict between parent and child still exists. In our home, the conflict is almost all within me for now. I want my son to make his own decisions about what and where he studies, but I also want to make that decision for him. I struggle to find a balance between guiding and controlling. The next year will test my resolve to be a source of guidance and encouragement. These little boys, and their siblings, have been a source of delight all their lives.
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| Delighted by cake. |
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| Good kids. |
1 comment:
Your boys will have to Break Away from their mom. But the fact that they are good kids and well prepared for making more and more of their decisions doesn't make the emergence any easier. I noticed with several of my kids that there was increased tension of this sort in the months before they were leaving home, so that by the time they left, I was so glad!
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