Always Teaching

I hope you had a happy Father’s Day. I absolutely did. I got to spend time with my wife and sons and just couldn’t have asked for more. I also had a reminder that as a parent, you are always teaching.

My sons got me two gifts, and they were great. Don’t worry, I’ll share. I opened up my present to find a sweatshirt and a hat from my high school. How cool is that? Go Wildcats!

My wife told me that I had mentioned a number of months back that you can get everything online now. I said I bet I could even get myself a shirt from my high school. My son replied with a surprised look and said, “Really? Why would you do that?” I explained that nothing is more formative to most of us than our high school years. Yeah, a lot of things happened in grade school, but I couldn’t remember half the kids I went to school with, much less some of the things we did.

But I remembered high school. I remember recess, how loud the lunchroom was. How they ran the air conditioning in the gym for 2 straight days before any event that we held there: band concerts, plays, and proms. I remember trying to figure out how I could pass trigonometry. How our history teacher would give us a quiz on Fridays, just for fun, on current events. I watched the evening news every night, because I was that kid. I answered so many questions that in the end, it was me against the room, and I rarely lost. I remember how people laughed: Jill with her whole face, Jan would snort, Brent would giggle, Andy would guffaw, and Chuck would sweat. I remember how Robby and Royce would make me laugh so dang hard, and it took all my wits to make them laugh.

I learned from those gifts that my kids do listen to me. Even when I thought Luke would forget that conversation by the time we had dinner. But he didn’t. I told Jackson once that my dad would sing I’ve Got A Lovely Bunch of Coconuts, and months later, he randomly asked me how pretty were my coconuts. That just made you laugh, didn’t it? I howled.

Luke told me he wanted to have a bunch of kids and hoped he had daughters. And he wanted to have his first kid before the age of 30. He has an older dad, and whether I knew it or not, I was teaching him that he wanted even more time with his children than I may get with mine. Jackson told me he wanted his kids to be honest and find comfort in their faith. That is something I have made a goal since their birth. They both look at adults in their eyes and answer in understandable voices. If you have or remember raising teens, you know that’s not always the case. But that’s how I try to greet everyone.

I do my best to treat their mother with respect. Luke told me he wanted daughters, and he wanted to make sure any boy that comes around met his standards of how to act. The lessons are always there.

I guess my message to you is simple yet profound. Try not to waste a day. Even the days when nothing happens. You’ll be surprised to find out how many memories are created on those days.