Life Lessons From A Work At Home Father
by: Chas Brothers
Even at my age, there are still many things about life I’ve never been able to figure out. One of those things is innocence and exactly when or why we lost it.
I remember taking my niece and nephew to one of those fast food places that has this built in playground and it was magical! In that moment in time and it that place, the world was perfect. There was a very wide diversity of cultures, income levels, education, you name it but to these children the only thing that mattered was playing and helping each other get over the hurdles of the various play equipment. At that moment, the world was perfect.
I never had much experience with that sort of thing when I was growing up so I was somewhat ill equipped as a father when it came to playing with my children. All I had ever known was strict discipline, ethics, rigidity – perfect military material! I guess it’s of little wonder that my second marriage to a former Marine was all but inevitable.
My kids needed someone to play with and I needed someone to teach me! The most hilarious thing I can recall about this “initiation” period was when the 6 of us sat down to play a game of Life. It was my wife’s turn and when she picked out her driver, a lovely pink peg, my oldest son mentioned rather strongly to her that she had incorrectly placed her peg in the driver’s seat.
My eyes nearly fell out of my head as he scolded this former Marine on driving arrangements and the difference between men’s and women’s duties – man I’d like to have died! So now I’m thinking great, I’m counting on my kids to teach me how to play and they don’t know how either!
As a follow up, my wife the Marine showed mercy and let my son live – I on the other hand lost 5 inches in height from the look she gave me and experienced partial hearing loss in the right ear!
Eventually, things got turned around and I had a blast. There were so many things I never got to do as a child so I was going to make sure I did them with my kids. I made snow angels, caught snow flakes with my tongue, jumped in mud puddles, and squeaked my shoes through the store really loud!
I began to appreciate things and slowly began to understand about taking time to stop and smell the roses as you might say. All of us have jobs and all of us have days that are better than others but, what about the good days?
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Life Lessons From A Work At Home Father
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