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From Father To Son
How I thought about the job of being a parent
It will likely be years yet before you consider becoming a father, but you’re already a man. The last twenty-five years have been the most wondrous of my life, and I write these words in the hope that if one day you also become a father you will likewise embrace the change and discover the astonishing journey for yourself.
For embracing parenthood is the prerequisite. I’ve seen too many people who look to maintain their pre-parenting existence, as if children could be relegated into the same sort of category as hobbies and household chores. I’ve heard too many people complaining about the inconveniences children inevitably create: the noise, the mess, the chaos. As a result, these parents struggle against the reality of having children in their lives and neither achieve their goal of living as much of a pre-parenthood existence as possible nor do they truly discover the joys that children can deliver, sometimes at the most unexpected moments.
Parenthood is for each of us an undiscovered country until we embark on the exploration for ourselves. Each child is born with its own personality, which means that it’s easy for the child’s personality and the parents’ personalities to clash. But no one gets a choice. The child, helpless and fragile, has been born and there’s no return policy…
