It is hard to be a parent when I am an imperfect person. So many attributes that seem necessary to be a good parent are absent in me. I am slothful, I am impatient, I have a temper and I am inconsistent. Oh I could go on and rattle off a hundred other failings that are probably causing my children to grow up warped. About the only thing I have going for me is that I do feel love for them.
Snow fell last night, not much just a dusting. Over the past several days the temperature has been unseasonably warm and all but the dirtiest and most densely piled snow has melted away. Looking out on the street scene nature has on the night of the 1st day of the year given use a clean crisp skin for the world.
While I made no real resolutions the snowfall is reinforcing something I feel everyday before my children get up. With each new day there is hope that I will push back my failings and provide them with a real parent's care and wisdom. Today, tomorrow and a hundred other tomorrows I will try and be the best parent I can be for them.
2 comments:
...and we keep on trying, and trying, and trying. It doesn't matter if they're 1 or 12 or 25 years old...they are born to make us see the good and the bad in ourselves, sometimes-I-think. Happy New Year!!! Whooo-eeeee!
And what you will learn when you get to be my age and have grandchildren is that, when that doctor/dula/whoever introduces you for the very first time to that little human thing for which you are at least 50% responsible, that person needs to tell you that you will remain responsible as long as you are breathing. And all you can ever do is the best you can do. And it will never, ever be good enough.
But with grandchildren, you can send them back to their parents..............for whom you bear such responsibility as described above and let THEM try to make sense out of it all.
And so the tradition continues.............if you are lucky.
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