My Story

Stuff about my life. The good, the bad, and everything in between.

Nighttime

/ Clay D. / Leave a comment

I slowly open the back door of my house and step outside, careful not to awaken any sleeping souls. As I step across the threshold into the spring night, a cool breeze caresses my face.  The myriad stars are tiny points of light on the sky’s black canvas.

Another day is nearly over, written in the history book of my life, never to be opened again.  It can and will be recalled, but never reopened, never relived, never improved.  It is truly wonderful to pause and reflect, stretching my thoughts and dreams past the mere happenings of the day.  This was only one of the thousands of days of my life, quite unremarkable from all the others.  Yet, as I reflect on it I am glad it is over.  Even as a twinge of anxiety about tomorrow slyly pinches me, I am grateful that I can say I have survived this day.

Ah night!  Such a wonderful time.  The world sleeps as I stand still in blissful solitude.  Nighttime is truly my time.  That’s when I’m free to be myself, left alone with no interruptions, able to ponder my existence.  When others retire for the night, that’s when I come alive.  Recognizing the opportunity for solitude, my mind awakens from its fog and I make the most of these times simply to think, read, or just sit.  Alone at night is when I feel the most natural and comfortable.  There is no one to interrupt my flow, no one to compete with my thoughts.  My thoughts are mine alone.

As I stand on my deck and look out across the neighborhood at rows of dark houses, their occupants nestled in and slumbering away, I feel superior.  I don’t need sleep at this particular moment.  In a few minutes perhaps I will, but not now.  I win, as it were.

In a few hours, when the sun is peeking above the horizon and showing itself for the first time that day, these same people will begin to stir, will renew the process of convening for the day.  They will once again form little groups in offices and workplaces across the city, repeating their daily rituals. They will compete among themselves to put forth the newest and best ideas, in hopes of solving the problems of the world, and perhaps gain notoriety, fame, and ultimately riches.

But that is all for later.  For now there is simply darkness and quiet, peace and bliss…

To Hair is Human, to Relive Divine

/ Clay D. / Leave a comment

I love heavy metal from the 80’s.  It is my all-time favorite genre of music, and I like all kinds of music.  However, it is always what I go back to, time and time again.  For me, there will never be better music than this – good ol’ Def Leppard, Motley Crue, Poison, Scorpions, Cinderella, Guns ‘N Roses, Skid Row, and a slew of others.  Oh yes, I know this music is routinely derided, deemed devoid of any meaning or substance.  It is often referred to as  “hair metal” or “glam metal”,  but understand this:  we never referred to it like that.  It was simply “heavy metal” or just “metal”.  Sure, there was harder music like Metallica, Megadeth, or Black Sabbath.  That was metal also, just not what I generally liked.  I remember the term “New Wave of British Heavy Metal”, referring to Def Leppard, Iron Maiden, and other bands from across the pond.  I don’t know if the metal coming out of Los Angeles had a specific moniker at that time.  As far as the term “hair metal”, I can hardly stomach it.  It demotes the music I love to something only as important as what’s on top of the band members’ heads.  I was not even familiar with the term before the late 90’s, or even 2000, although I’m sure it had been around for a few years.

For teenage me in the 80’s,  heavy metal was all the world.  It was what I longed to be, but could not be.  Growing up in a small, rural, conservative area, to conservative parents with high standards for both morality and academics, it was very hard for me to rebel on any significant level.  When I was first introduced to this music by way of Def Leppard’s “Pyromania” in the spring of ‘83, I quickly became enamored with it.  I gobbled up any bit of news, photos, or anything related to the bands I loved.  Mostly, this came in the form of magazines such as “Circus” and “Hit Parader”.  From these magazines I carefully cut out pictures of my bands, taping them to my bedroom walls.  Within a year or so, my room was almost completely covered with images of long-haired, snarling, writhing musicians.  I’m sure my mother hated all this, and I can’t say that I would have blamed her.  I don’t remember her, or my dad ever saying much about it, however.

The reason I could hardly blame her is because deep down I know that it really is not the kind of music I should listen to.  When I accepted Christ at the age of 15 in 1985, I began a slow change.  Pretty soon I began to feel a disconnect from heavy metal.  The images on my bedroom walls didn’t hold as much value or place for me anymore.  Before long I realized they needed to come down – so they did.  I also got rid of the metal albums I had, mostly LP’s.  I remember leaning them up against the base of a tree in my backyard and blasting them into bits with a shotgun.

I wish I could say that was the end of the story, but it is far from the end.  Over the last 27 plus years, I have wavered in my faith, and consequently my passion and desire for metal has waxed and waned as well. I have never been able to divorce myself fully from the music that I love.  There have been, and are, times in my life when I really have no desire to listen to Motley Crue, or Poison, or Guns ‘N Roses.  But then, circumstances will change in my life, leaving me in a state where I want to reach out and reconnect with all that I loved as a teenager.  Perhaps my adult life has not been as fulfilling as I dreamed it would be when I was a kid, so I attempt to relive my youth in the music I dove into at that age.  Whatever the reason, it has been a long struggle to try to find a place of balance in my life between the music I love and the Christian principles I hold close to my heart.

Recently I have been watching a lot of old metal videos on YouTube.  It gives me a release and helps me relax and unwind.  The world just seems a lot better when I have some loud 80’s metal on my headphones, and I can watch the videos I used to wait for patiently when all we had was MTV.  The raw energy and feeling in those songs strikes a chord with me.  I can truly relate to the drama, the edginess, and all the emotion gushing forth from the metal from that era.  There is nothing better.  In fact, it is hard for me to keep writing this, because I want to go plug in my headphones and rock out to some Skid Row or Motley Crue right now.

That is the struggle I have dealt with all these years – trying to do what I know is right in my heart, trying to keep my thoughts positive, and live my life according to how God wants, while at the same time longing to emote along with the bands I love – maybe even rebelling against society along with them.

Maybe that’s why I’ve always loved this music.  I’ve never really felt like I fit in with society’s image of what I should be.  Even though I’m academically talented and try to maintain high morals, maybe I never wanted to be and do these things.  Perhaps in a different family, with different parents I would have lived a much different life.  Maybe I would have been more like Judd Nelson’s character in “The Breakfast Club”, rather than Anthony Michael Hall’s character who he picks on.

This loud, raucous music spoke to me perhaps in a way that pop music never did.  Eighties metal fit perfectly with me, solidly between the likes of Madonna and Michael Jackson on the one hand, and Metallica and Motorhead on the other.  It was over the top, but not so much so that the whole ship went down.  Being a Crue fan placed me squarely on the edgy side, but I was not so dark as a Megadeth fan.  I could be rebellious while also maintaining my self respect.

Face

/ Clay D. / Leave a comment

I gaze at my reflection in the mirror.  I wonder who I am, if I am worthy.  I wonder what other people think of me.

I was probably a preteen when I remember first staring at myself long and hard.  I was riding down the highway with my older brother, peering into the car’s mirror.  I remember thinking that I had soft, feminine features.  I didn’t look like a man.  Of course, I was not a man, not like my brother was, but I felt that I should have looked more masculine.  My pudgy, round face and red cheeks were completely opposite of how I wanted to look.  My narrow, pink lips and long eyelashes (the ones my mother had always made such a fuss over – “Look how LONG they are!”) certainly did not help my cause.  In fact, after I had stared at my face for quite awhile, feature by feature, my visage sort of morphed into that of a girl.  My mind asked, What if I was a girl?  This face would be OK if I was.  I would make a better girl than boy.  

And no, I am not transgender – never have been, never will be.  It just seemed at this time that my face was not suited to sitting on a boy’s body.  The rest of me was very boyish.  I was husky (fat if you will), with broad shoulders and strong arms.  It was my soft, fragile face that belied me.

Even today, if I pause long enough to study my features in the mirror, my face doesn’t look strong.  I still have a chubby face and rosy red cheeks, only now I have crow’s feet, bags under my eyes, and graying sideburns to go along with them.

I suppose everyone says it at one time or another, but this face has seen a lot.  For 43 years it has presented me to the world, everyone who I have come in contact with.  It’s been with me through all the bad days, as well as the few good ones.

I have a small scar right beside my right eye.  When I was about four, I was running in the back of my father’s drugstore, where all the medicine bottles were kept on tall metal shelves.  I tripped and smacked my face right into one of the shelves.  I cried, man oh man did I cry.  They were huge, soppy tears that went on for a good while.  I don’t remember anything about the incident after that, but I must have gone to the town doctor to get stitches.  At any rate, the scar is not something I ever thought about growing up – it was just part of me, not something to be embarrassed about.  Later, in my teenage years, someone asked me about it, and I told them the story of how it happened.  Then I realized that the scar kind of made me bad, the good kind of bad.  I had a war wound in a visible place, almost like a tattoo must make you feel when you show it off for the first time.

I have another small scar below my lower lip.  I have no idea how I got it.  I don’t remember getting it – I just remember one day looking in the mirror and there it was.  How could I never have noticed it before?  I do not know.

My nose is crooked.  I noticed for the first time in high school.  My girlfriend’s friend was looking straight on at me in class one day when she remarked, “Your nose is crooked.”  I went home and looked in the mirror later, and agreed, that yes, it is indeed crooked, pointing slightly to my left.  It’s not extremely noticeable, but easily spotted once you’re looking for it.  Once again, I don’t know if it has always been like that, or if some long-forgotten face smash left me that way.  To this day, my wife swears that she broke my nose when we were wrestling one night, and that it has been crooked ever since.  Yes, her foot whacked me soundly right on the side of my snout, causing a loud “pop”, but my nose was crooked long before that night.

I have a unibrow.  It first became prevalent when I hit puberty.  My father used to say that it made me look mean, like a bulldog I’m guessing.  He meant it in a kidding sort of way.  As I went through high school and on into college, I became more self-conscious of it.  The thought of shaving it never really entered my mind.  That was just something you didn’t do.  If you had a unibrow, then you had a unibrow.  Finally, in my senior year of college, as I was making arrangements to attend seminary (which I never did do), I shaved it right before heading to the seminary for a get-acquainted weekend.  I wanted the people there to think I was a happy, light-hearted person, and I thought that shaving it would help lessen the impact of my thick eyebrows and my eyes, which I thought sat too far back in my head.  I don’t know if it worked or not.

My left earlobe is bigger, redder, and puffier than my right one.  I first noticed this about 16 years ago.  I was looking in the mirror and as I was studying the symmetry of my face, I noticed that there was no symmetry in my ear lobes.  Somehow, without my knowledge, the left one had developed a noticeable droop and was puffier than the other one, like some sort of amorphous blob.

I may have other notable facial characteristics, or perhaps they are already there and I haven’t noticed them yet.  At any rate, my face, as with all faces, has evolved into something more than what it once was.

When we’re children, our faces are bright and smooth, without the cares of the world chiseled into them.  As we go through life, our faces grow and change along with our minds and the rest of our bodies.  They become layered with age; we have wrinkles, moles, freckles, scars, and sun damage that all add to the painting that is our face.

A great artist begins his portrait with a one dimensional drawing of a face, then one by one paints in the features that make the individual unique.  The experience of life does that same thing to our faces. They have much more and are much more in our later years than we can ever imagine as a child.  It is fascinating to me to look at an adult’s childhood picture, with its young, clean face, and see how time and genetics have layered on the characteristics that slowly transform a girl into a woman and a boy into a man.

Who knows what my face will look like in 20 or 30 years?  It will still be me, only with more stuff added on.  Just as my face right now is the most complex it has ever been, my face then will be an even more complex masterpiece, slowly created through the process we call living.

A Special Night

/ Clay D. / Leave a comment

My father was not one to laugh a whole lot, at least in the company of others.  Most of the time he seemed weighed down by the pressures of his life – our home, his business, other financial matters perhaps.  It is for this reason that I so fondly remember those few times that he laughed heartily around us.

One of these times was the first night that our home had cable television.  Our tiny, rural town had just been connected to a cable network and our house had been hooked up earlier on that late September afternoon in 1982.

We had experienced cable before, especially me.  My sister had gone away to college a few years earlier and when I went to visit her, I would always stay up as late as possible, watching HBO and whatever else I could find on her TV.  I was especially excited because we now had not one, but three premium movie channels to choose from, as well as several other standard cable channels of that time – TBS, USA, ESPN, and others.

That night came our first opportunity to dive into the world of cable television together as a family.  The movie “Airplane!” was on HBO.

Mom and I were watching it in our den and Daddy was watching it in his room.  He always watched TV in his room by himself at night.  I think that was his way of escaping away by himself.  He had to deal with people all day at work, so that was his time to relax and be himself.  As my mom and I watched “Airplane!”, every so often he would walk through the den and ask us if we’d seen such and such part of the movie.  Yes we had.  A couple of times we laughed about one scene or another.

Finally, he decided to stay in the den and watch the movie with us.  He rarely sat down in the den at night.  Come to think of it, he rarely sat down in the den at all.  At any rate, I remember thinking that it was nice that we could all sit there and watch TV together. We three kept laughing at all the funny parts of the movie.

Finally, one scene pushed us over the edge.  We lost it when a lady on board the plane has a panic attack and the stewardess (as they were called in that day – now they are “flight attendants”) begins slapping her face to calm her down.  The camera pans down the inside of the plane, and we see a line of people waiting to get their turn at her.  They are all holding something – a wrench, a baseball bat, a crowbar .  The three of us were rolling with laughter.  I looked over at Daddy and he was laughing so hard he had tears in his eyes.  I remember that he had to take off his glasses so he could wipe them with the handkerchief he always kept handy in his pocket.  I don’t think I ever saw him laugh so hard as he did at that moment, either before or after.  It was a great evening to be together as a family.

Every time I think about “Airplane” that special night comes to mind.  It reminds me that there are many good times to be had in life.  Sometimes they’re planned, and other times they just happen.  And sometimes you don’t realize they’re happening until long after they’ve ended.

Baby’s Feet and Baptism

/ Clay D. / Leave a comment

Recently I was sitting in church at one the many round tables situated in the room.  Directly in front of me a young mother had placed her baby in its car seat with its tiny feet pointing in my direction.  As much as I tried to ignore them, I was captivated by the precious, perfect little feet.  The child, who was probably only a few weeks old, was covered with a blanket all except for his little feet.  They were poking out and squirming back and forth innocently.  Try as I might, I was drawn in by the simplicity and innocence of these tiny feet.  Of course, they reminded me of my own children’s feet many years ago.  Something about the little feet and toes, coupled with just barely being able to see the child’s perfectly round little head, brought me extreme joy.  The innocence and beauty of the scene captivated me.

On the screen in front of the auditorium a video clip from the previous week’s service played showing a special needs boy being baptized.  Watching him proclaim his faith in Jesus and knowing that he was now a part of the kingdom of God brought was a big joy point for me.  I found myself in tears (small as they might have been).  My emotions were stirred by the combination of the baby’s tiny feet, along with this young man receiving Christ.  I didn’t fight the emotion, or the tears, but allowed myself to experience this moment fully.  I dabbed at my eyes without embarrassment, living fully in the moment.

An Answer to The Lazy River

/ Clay D. / Leave a comment

Wow.  There is so much hurt in that piece.  So much pain shows through.  I must have really been hurting when I wrote that.  But it was the truth – that is how I felt at that time, as well as many times before that and many times after.  It is hard to know how to formulate an answer to that diatribe.  It is all so raw and heartfelt.  If I were reading it and knew that someone else had written it (instead of me), I wouldn’t want to jump in on top of him quoting Bible verses and telling him how he’s wrong.  That wouldn’t do any good at all, but would most likely alienate him more, driving him further away from God.

I guess one of the first things I’ll say in response is that God has been gracious in allowing me to see a different way to look at life and life events over the last few months.  Don’t get me wrong – it’s not that I’ve got everything all figured out by any means.  But I have been blessed to read books, listen to audio, and take part in exercises that are designed to give one a more proactive, healthier approach to dealing with life.  I’ve still got a very long way to go, but just learning about these methods and beginning to use them to a degree has already made a noticeable impact on my thought patterns.

Life may still seem like a lazy river full of people from all different walks of life, but I would say that now I view the scene much differently.  If asked to describe the lazy river experience now, I would say first of all that there’s much I don’t know and don’t understand about the “ride”.  I don’t fully understand why we’re all on the ride, other than that God created us and started us all at the beginning of the ride.  For many different reasons (reasons that have taken up books and books of explanation), we don’t all begin with the same equipment, and along the way our experience may change dramatically, either for better or for worse.

For example, at the beginning of the ride we may be floating merrily along on a fine inner-tube, only to have it punctured by a low-hanging limb or other unforeseen object, leaving us drifting in the water.  On the other hand, we may find an orphaned pair of sunglasses lying on the edge of the water and, stretching with all our might, manage to snag them as we pass by.  Now we have protection from the sun for our weary eyes.  Are these all happenstance events?  I believe ‘no’ is the correct answer, as God orchestrates everything in our lives according to His will.  We will never understand it all while we’re alive on this earth, and maybe we won’t even understand once those of us who have chosen Christ reach Heaven, but it is truth to say that God’s plan includes us, and in the end all works out for the best to those who have placed their trust in Him.

Yes, I know this all sounds very high and mighty, and I struggle with this truth often – very, very often.  But somewhere deep down inside I know that this IS truth and that if I hold fast to it, I will be OK.  Quite often the flesh part of my nature is not satisfied with trusting in God, and instead wants to rebel and whine about why something is the way it is when it doesn’t make sense that way.

But in the end I must simply trust God.  What other choice do I have, or anybody else for that matter?  We are here, like it or not, and I believe it is in our best interest to align ourselves with the Creator of all this that we see.  But it goes beyond merely aligning ourselves with God.  We are commanded to worship Him, giving Him the honor He deserves.  We are His created beings, designed and built to worship and serve.  Now, I will be the first to tell you that these ideas often do not sit well with me.  God knows this, so it’s no surprise to Him.   For a good part of my life I have felt that I was entitled to do my own thing.  So that’s what I have done, for the most part.  Oh, I’ve tried to include God along the way, hoping that His plans would fit in with mine.  Sometimes they have, but it seems like more often than not I am on my own, wondering what ended up happening, and wondering why God did not give me clear direction.  Obviously, this is no way to live.  Unfortunately, this has pretty much been my story since my late teen years.

This is why I say that we really have no choice but to try it God’s way.  He tells us over and over in the Bible to trust Him.  Proverbs 3:5-6 is one of my life verses.  It’s the one I go back to time and time again when I finally realize that I don’t have all the answers and that maybe there is a better way.  “Ooooh yeaaaaaah – trust God.  I had forgotten all about that. Let’s give it a try.”

I can’t say that every situation has always worked out the way I wanted it to or thought that it would, but somehow everything has always worked out.  Most of the times the terrible outcomes that I’ve built up so much in my mind never come to pass.  It seems that it’s not so much that there’s increasing suspense, with a grand moment waiting to find out the outcome of a situation.  It’s more like the whole thing evolves into something different, so much that the original fear and anxiety melt away as the situation becomes something else altogether.  This is simply my casual observation, and may not hold true for others.

Back to the lazy river analogy.  As I’m floating along, I simply must trust God that He knows what He’s doing.  I believe it is to my advantage to praise Him and thank Him throughout the ride.  By acknowledging His workmanship in the beautiful clouds overhead, or the birds chirping in the trees along the bank, not only am I give Him honor and praise, I’m also helping myself by keeping my thoughts focused on the positive things in life, instead of the negative.  It is no coincidence that this action agrees with Paul’s commands in Philippians 4:8 to do just that.

No only is it disobedience to God in the form of envy, it will do me no good to look around at the other riders and compare my circumstances with theirs.  No matter if they appear better off, or worse, I will have more joy and worship God more fully by showing my gratitude for what I have, trusting God all the while.

At the end of the lazy river ride, however, is when the fun really begins – at least for those of us who have made Jesus our Lord and call ourselves Christ-followers.  We will all have to wait patiently and endure until that day..

The Lazy River

/ Clay D. / 1 Comment

Below is a piece I wrote a few months back, when I was in a much different place spiritually and emotionally.  I’m posting it here now because when I recently went back and reread it, I was stunned by the raw emotion within it.  I have edited it only slightly for content, so please forgive the grammar.  I have written a response to this piece, which follows this post.

 

I want to believe and trust in you Lord.  I want so badly for this to be the norm to be who I am just like it was years and years ago – back when it was easy to trust you and I didn’t question everything.  I just took your word as it came, realized and accepted that the promises were for me and carried on with life, trusting you for things. Oh, it wasn’t always that easy and simple – by no means was it that way.  But at several points in my life it WAS that way, I did trust you and feel one with you, believing that you had my best interests at heart, believing that you loved me and cared for me.  I guess deep down I still believe those things – that you want only the best for me.  However, it’s so easy now to doubt all that.  I’ve been through so many trials, so much heartache, so much pain and numbing depression for so long that I can’t help but doubt, can’t help but wonder what the reason is for all this.  I wonder what purpose you could possibly have in mind for all this.  I wonder why you don’t make it all go away.  I believe that you have the power to make it disappear once and for all.  You have the power to enable me to enjoy life, to begin each day knowing that there’s a reason, a purpose that I got out of bed, that it’s not just another random day in my boring, monotonous life.  I believe that you can do all this, so why don’t you?  Why don’t you allow me some happiness like I used to have in my life?  Why did I have to peak at 13, 14, 15?  I’m now 42 – that’s a long time to struggle and be unhappy.  Yes, I’ve had a few good times, but they have been few and far between.  And lately they’ve been very few with a lot of in between.  I remember Daddy sitting on the carport almost every night after work, after a swig or two of whiskey.  He’d drink coffee and smoke, just staring off into the distance toward the end of the lot.  What was he thinking about all these years, when he was 50 or 60 years old? – after I’d already come onto the scene.  Was he pondering his failures in life?  Was he wishing that he’d never contracted TB and had to leave the city, bitter that he was living out his life in a podunk little town?  Probably he thought about all these things and many more which I’ll never know about, never coming close to thinking about.  What deep, dark secrets had he packed away in his head?  The bigger question is this: will I be doing this same thing for the rest of my life?  Will I sit and stare and ponder and regret and wish and hope – not dreaming, because those days are long past.  It is too late for dreams now.  They are things for youth, those who have energy and zest for life, those who have not been weighed down by heartache and pain and disappointment and depression for decades.  For years now I have sat outside, mostly in the evenings, pondering, regretting, mournful about the past, bitter about the future, feeling stuck in a drab, joyless existence for the rest of my days – feeling powerless to change anything in my life, resigned to accept what I’ve got and drift along with the current through the rest of the lazy river of life, until I reach the end and have to turn in my innertube.  It’s not been a fun ride.  I thought these things (life) were supposed to be pleasant, relaxing, enjoyable.  I look around and see others taking pleasure in their ride.  They’re laughing with family and friends, enjoying a cool drink along the way, kicked back on their innertube, sunglasses and sunscreen on to protect them from too much of a good thing.  Then I look at myself — I have none of those things.  Yes I have a family to enjoy (which I do), but no cool drink, no sunglasses, no sunscreen.  I’m squinting from the glare all the way around the path.  And I’m not even on the innertube, just holding on with one arm while in the water, shoulders getting more and more sunburned.  Yes, there are others I notice who don’t even have an innertube.  They’re dog paddling, trying to stay afloat and conserve their energy at the same time, hoping not to get a cramp before they reach the end.  Looking at their plight does, in a way, make me thankful for my innertube to hang on to, thankful for my family to talk to.  But, it also causes me to question the ride, the whole experience.  Why do these people have so little, when others have so much?  Why is that elderly man so miserable on his journey, fighting to keep his head above water with nothing to grasp on to, when just a few feet away a 20-something sips his lemonade, holds hands with his young wife, and playfully dangles his feet in the same water which threatens to overtake the old man?  Why was he not given an innertube as well?  It doesn’t seem fair.  Oh, I know – nobody ever said life was fair.  But what about the fact that none of us even asked to get on this ride?  We didn’t sign up for it, not me, not the old man, not the 20-something.  We all just somehow found ourselves here, only in vastly different circumstances.  We didn’t ask to get on the ride, and we can’t get off the ride (oh, there’s a way, but it’s not desirable).  The old guy can question aloud why he didn’t get an innertube, but nobody has acknowledged him yet, much less given him any relief.  I’d like to have some sunglasses, even a cheap dollar store pair, but so far nothing.  I squint while another smiles with ease.

At Church

/ Clay D. / Leave a comment

As I was sitting in church this morning, I looked over at the pew across the aisle.  I noticed a cute little baby girl standing up in her father’s lap.  She was not more than a few months old.  Of course he was supporting her so that she didn’t go tumbling over into the pew in front of them.  She was having the time of her life, laughing and giggling while her father was singing.

My mind drifted in thought as it often does.  Pretty soon I was no longer concentrating on the song we were singing, but instead was lost in thought while staring at this young family across from me.  I thought about how basic the father’s role was at that point in his daughter’s life.  At that moment, his was almost entirely a physical role – he was supporting her upright and keeping her from falling and hurting herself.  Of course he has other roles:  food giver, diaper changer, bread winner.  But as the years progress, his role will evolve dramatically in her life.  Soon, he’ll be filling a much more emotional need for her.  She’ll actively realize and appreciate the security he provides in her young life.  But, as she grows and matures, reaching her teen and young adult years, his role will continue to evolve, becoming that of advice giver and an ear to listen to her problems as well as her joys.  As she becomes a mature woman, perhaps with a family of her own, he will no longer provide much if any physical protection for her, but will support her almost entirely in an emotional role.

I thought about my own life at that point.  Both of my children are teenagers, my son in his late teen years, and my daughter in her early teens.  When my son was about 17 or so, it seems I more or less checked out of being an active parent to him.  Perhaps deep down I thought that he was close enough to being an adult that he was capable of making his own decisions – I don’t know what the reason was.  If that was all that would be enough.  However, I also unconsciously stepped back from the father role with my daughter as well.  I figured, I believe, that if one child had made it this far, then surely the other one must be ready as well.  For the last couple of years I’ve been on autopilot.  I’ve felt like a father not so much of teenagers, but of young adults who don’t need me as much.

I realize now how wrong I’ve been.