Can I really lie to my kid about the behind-the-scenes action of his competitive sports team? Can I really pretend that what his coach said wasn’t really what was said? Can I feign belief to enable him to continue to play the sport?
It’s a leap of faith, having children and raising them and ensuring they go off into the world hopeful and not utterly jaded. The jadedness can come later in life, right?
Do I bear a grudge against my parents for fostering my belief in the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus and, when it comes right down to it, God? Or do I realize that what they did was done mostly to enable me to experience pure and utter magic and glee and beams of fantastical lights as a kid?
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I write everything down, in my personal blog and in notes, so my three kids can hand over my scribbling to whatever practitioner of psychiatric healing they seek once they reach the age of maturity. Most of my scribblings I post upon my blog. Those with more local relevance — and those with far fewer obscenities and raw anger — I post on this. Musings that my fellow residents can relate to and nod their heads with understanding and can comment on here.
I wrote something of an extremely personal and painful nature the other day, and I sent it to Brent Ainsworth, the illustrious editor of this little Patch of our world, for him to respond to. He suggested I not post it, really. He suggested that I let it stew for a day or two, and then throw it out there for the (Novato) world to see, if I still felt ready to face the ensuing reaction.
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I let it lay there all of five hours before I said, “Print it, baby.” (I didn’t really say “baby,” so no need to worry Brent’s loved ones.) And he agreed to do so.
But time has a way of moving on and altering how we view things. Truly stand-up folks overseeing the idiots out there step in and rectify seemingly un-rectifiable situations. While these folks wade into the crud and waste of others’ doing, tick-tock goes the posting clock for those who don’t heed their mothers’ (aka editors’) advice.
It truly is good advice: write it all down, and then let it sit for a day or two. And then burn it.
