Evolve Now

Childhood

When I was a kid my dad always used to say that in his next life he wanted to come back as one of his kids. This was his way of letting us know how great we had it and how crappy he had it as a kid. Yes, we (me and my two twin brothers) did have it pretty well. We grew up in the 80’s, everything was bigger and better. We had music, dance, gymnastics and tennis lessons, we were able to join the ski club in high school, I was an exchange student in Costa Rica—twice, we had a nice house, two cars, plenty of toys, books and clothes and pretty much everything we wanted. (Well I didn’t have my own car and we all went to state schools for college—but let’s not be greedy.) We went out to dinner at fancy restaurants (because that was my dad’s business) and ordered whatever we wanted. We were encouraged to try new things—I had developed a taste for lobster by age 3, and were allowed to taste wine with dinner and even very watered down cordials like Bailey’s and Chambord.

But those are all things money can buy. The three of us also spent a lot of time by ourselves when our parents were working or went out. My dad worked in restaurants so I only saw him on Saturday afternoons and on Sundays until I was about 14. He was always at work and when he was at home he seemed to always be looking for something to bitch about—too many lights on, too many kinds of juice, or not enough appreciation for him. My point is he saw only the positives and had a really skewed view of “how great” it was to be one of his kids.

Yesterday, darling fiancé, Angel babe and I were sitting at the breakfast table having blueberry pancakes (yummy!) and we were asking Angel babe what was his favorite thing he had ever done in his 4 ½ year life. As we began to name some choices—go-kart racing, vacation in Florida, camping, vacation in Gatlinburg, TN (staying in our own cabin with a hot tub), playing Blastball, various MLB baseball games, movies, board games etc. fiancé stopped and said “Wow Angel, you’re a really lucky boy.” My mind raced back to my childhood and my dad saying the same thing, I took a deep breath. Yes, he is a really lucky boy but not only because of all the cool stuff he gets to do but because he does all of that cool stuff with both his mom and dad and because we really love hanging out with him. It has been a long, sometimes very rocky road, to get to this point—but it has all absolutely been worth it. All of the hours of anguish, hurt and doubt over the last four years as fiancé and I figured out what kind of relationship—if any—we were going to have with each other, all of the self-doubt and anxiety about the decisions we made as young parents, all of the fear I felt when I was single and pregnant have brought us to this point where the highlight of the weekend is playing Candyland and Shoots and Ladders for hours.

posted by Rissa Roo @ 10:25 AM