When our children are born we always look forward to the milestones of their lives. Their first words and their first steps are things that we usually write down in a kind of scrapbook to keep track of their achievements. When they get a little older we keep things like their first drawing or a card they made for us. When they start school, we make a place for all the little projects they created to take home and give to us. Once they’re in high school, we keep their report cards and progress reports and love getting those stickers that say, “Proud Parent of an Honor Roll Student.” They get accepted into college and we are overjoyed, become successful students, graduate and find a great job, get married and live a productive and independent life. We talk about our children with our friends and experience the pride that only parents can feel. It is something that comes from the depths of our soul. To use a Yiddish term, kvell of our children. Everything they do makes us feel like we did a good job raising them.
I have that feeling every day for my own children. I know that Sarah is only 17 and Grace is only 11, so my work is not done yet. But, one of the things that I’ve noticed as they’ve grown is that now it’s not so much the pride that I have for them, it’s the pride that I wish they had for me. When I look at my life I ask myself, do you have something to be proud of? I’ve been married twice, the divorces were the result of affairs, and both of my daughters know it. I support them, but I always seem to have some financial problem that prevents me from having disposable income that they always seem to ask me for when I don’t have it. Yes sir, I have made my fair share of mistakes, and my struggles go with the territory.
Don’t get me wrong, I do a lot of things well. A good friend of mine once told me that even bad parents do some things that are right. I don’t think he’s a bad father. I wish I was a little smarter sometimes.
My youngest daughter, Grace, spends a lot of time with me and tells me all the time that I’m her best friend. Sarah, who is 17 years old, is becoming more like a woman every day and has started to seek more advice from me every day. I don’t know when the tide turned and I started looking for my children’s approval. But I know one thing, I want it. Not that I’m going to go out of my way to get it, but my children’s feelings for me as a person and as a parent mean more to me than you could imagine. I think that all parents want their children to speak well of them and they want their children to have that feeling inside of them that they are glad to have you as a parent.
I recently wrote a book and sent it to a publisher. Both of my children knew I was writing this book and wondered what I was going to do with it. Grace was with me one morning and we were getting ready to go to school. I took out the garbage, looked at my front door and found a package there. I assumed it was from a collector. I opened the envelope and found a letter and contract inside the publisher telling me that they accepted my book for publication. My best friend Grace was standing there with me to celebrate. There was nothing like it. Having Grace there at that time meant the world to me. My oldest daughter Sarah was in school. A little later, I took a chance thinking that she might be at lunch, and that she might answer her cell phone, and she did. I told him that a publisher was accepting my book. After she finished screaming, she said to me, “Dad, I’m so proud of you.” I hung up the phone and cried. It was as if I had made the honor roll and the roles were reversed, when she told me how proud she was of me. As we grow older, our children will always compare our accomplishments, behavior, and attitudes to those of other people and other parents. I want to give my children more things to be proud of before I go home to be with my creator. My daughter told me that she was proud of me because I wrote a book. I hope that one day she will be proud of me for who I am as a father and, more importantly, because I am her father.