During college, I spent one winter vacation working construction for my step-father. My most vivid memory of that month is my step-father racing across the top of a cinderblock wall, with only the concrete floor, twenty feet below on either side, as a safety-net.
I do not like heights, mainly because I can’t stop my psychoses-ridden mind from detailing the vivid side-effects of extreme heights. My son does not share this apprehension.
Last Friday, after work, Ian and I went to the City Museum, which has to be my favoritest place on earth. I’ve written about it before; a welded tangle of planes, cranes, and rusty, twisted iron.
Yes, planes. Two, actually. The City Museum boasts two Saber 40 fuselages, which have been stripped and strapped to steel towers. Neat! This was the first time Ian’s been able to climb well enough to reach them. Ian spends the majority of his life doing as he’s told, so of course I planned to follow where he led. Straight to the planes.
I should’ve known what was coming when he chose the most difficult climb to the top.
There’s a spiral staircase rising to the platform of the first plane, but there’s also a cramped, wonky alternate route - somehow appropriate for my son - which follows a series of small, iron plates up and through the center of a cage. The plates aren’t level, so it feels as though you’re constantly slipping. Neat!
‘Where are we going?’
‘I don’t know, kiddo. That’s kinda the point.’
So he climbed, and grunted, and shoved his way to the top. Bear in mind, Ian’s been fairly hesitant about climbing recently; complaining that he can’t, whining, pleading for help. I’d be more sympathetic, but the McDonald’s PlayPlace ain’t Mt. Everest. But that day he didn’t ask for help unless he really, desperately, daddy-heart-attackedly needed it. He just grabbed whatever he could, and pulled.
We reached the first plane, and Ian made a bee-line for the cockpit. The plane doesn’t have much, but all of the cockpit’s controls are still in place. Buttons that click, switches that flick, pedals that sway. After a few dive-bombs and loops, Ian wanted to head to the next plane.
The City Museum is all about convenience, and you can climb from one plane to the other. Leading from the cockpit window of the lower plane to the wingtip of the upper plane is a ‘wrought-iron slinky‘. Even though this route was his idea, I wasn’t sure Ian was up for it. So I encouraged.
‘Ian, hurry! We have to rescue the people in the next plane!’
‘Okay! Don’t worry! We’re coming! Hold on!’ And up he went, climbing pinky-width spirals of wire with gaps large enough for his leg. My eyes were wide, and my mouth was ajar. Very ajar.
Another point of the City Museum is that it never really ends. You just keep climbing and walking and crouching, choosing left or right or up or down. It’s all about prepositions. After several more rescue missions - during one of which the plane exploded - we made our way to the opposite wing, which is joined to the side of the museum by another, longer slinky.
And herein lay my problem.
I’m terrible with distances, but the gap between the plane and the museum is at least a mile wide. Maybe two. Well, at least a hundred feet. The planes are the highest point of the museum, a few stories up. And beneath this mile-wide, mile-high tube of whisper-thin metal strands is…nothing. Nada. Bupkis. No towers, no pillars, no pile of big, fluffy pillows. Just a lot of air, followed by a lot of metal.
Unfortunately, I didn’t notice this until Ian and I were halfway through. Like all men, he moves without thinking, so I was doing my best to make sure he was stepping in the right places, holding on, maintaining his balance. Really, we were having a blast. Then I looked up.
I noticed that, apart from its ends, our slinky tunnel was supported only by a thumb-thick wire welded to two cross-pieces, the wire itself being supported by yet another wire running from the main building to somewhere in the depths of tetanus-wielding fun. Then I looked down. I shouldn’t have looked down. It’s in all the movies. Don’t. Look. Down.
And suddenly Ian became my guide and inspiration. When I talked to him I was talking to myself (’You can’t fall. Just hold on. You’re such a big boy!’), and his hand holding mine was my hand holding his. Fathers can’t freak out. We’re not allowed. Daddy is strong and brave, and knows what he’s doing. If Daddy can do this, so can I.
I was thankful that Ian couldn’t see my face.
Suddenly we were on the other side, me having to lower Ian the last few feet. He started to move on, but I hadn’t finished climbing down yet.
‘Wait for Daddy, Ian!’ He did.
I dropped, and squatted by his side. I was so proud. We hugged, we cheered, we high-fived.
‘Gimme fin.’ Slap. ‘Gimme noggin.’ Bonk. ‘Duuuude!‘
Ian is well on his way to a shining career in welding or tight-rope walking. I’m happy enough behind a desk.
Posted on Flickr by moominmolly on 4/23/06.
Last week, in a clash of finite patience and unnecessarily sodden pull-ups, some words were said between my wife and my son. I don’t know what these words were. I wasn’t there, and I haven’t asked for details. The important thing is that Ian decided to become a Big Boy, and that no longer would he need a diaper. And he hasn’t.
We spent Easter weekend in Des Moines: a six-hour drive from St. Louis, and nary a wet diaper. It was a weekend of dry nights, dry days, and the diaper bag intentionally left behind.
‘Did you grab his bag?’
‘Nope.’
And there was no sense of dread, no rising panic, no last-minute inventory of the weekend’s supply of pull-ups. Again and again, there was only the sweet sound of my son’s voice: ‘I have to tinkle.’
I was sure the return trip would cause Ian to stumble. We took the long way through Kansas City, to avoid afternoon storms along our regular route, and we left late in the day. A seven-hour drive, with Daddy in a hurry and reluctant to stop. The test had begun.
Ian fell asleep at once. Hard. He woke two hours later, ankles crossed. ‘I have to tinkle.’ One nice thing about being a boy is that, in a pinch, the world is your bathroom; especially when the Next Rest Area is twenty-six miles away. One more stop several hours later, and we arrived in St. Louis with the tell-tale planets still visible on Ian’s Toy Story pull-ups.
In my vicarious browsing of other parents’ potty-training experiences, the common factor always seemed to be that success was by choice alone; and so it was with Ian. Until he made the decision use the toilet, all we could do was encourage, wipe, and wait. And wait. And wait.
It’s easy to be over-confident, and I’m sure we’ll have an accident now and again, but in the meantime we’re so, so proud. Ian’s proud, too, and I think that’s the neatest part. He knows he’s being responsible, and knows that it’s important. We’ve been giving him two M&Ms for a dry diaper, but this weekend he didn’t ask for them. Arms raised in triumph, pants around his ankles, Ian shouts, ‘I go tinkle!’
My mother-in-law says that she recalls her daughter’s last diaper change as bittersweet. It was a milestone, but those special, intimate bonding moments between parent and child were gone. I’m keeping an eye out for the bitter, but for now all I know is that our house hasn’t smelled this sweet in three years.
I’ll admit it: I’m a snuggler. I crave physical affection, and have a high tolerance for hugs, hand-holding, and the general infringement of my family’s personal space. Some days I can see the restraining order in my wife’s eyes.
By default, babies are designed for snuggling. They’re small, squishy, and warm. Their smell chemically induces adults to pick them up, hold them close, and sway back and forth. Plus, it’s not as though babies have a choice in the matter. What are they gonna do - jump?
Well, yes. Eventually. When Ian finally gained some measure of control over his flailing limbs, I was worried that our snuggling days were over. It wasn’t that he wouldn’t snuggle; he just had better things to do. A few moments - minutes, if I was lucky - and he’d twist and be gone from my lap. This is why babies bounce, and why God invented wall-to-wall carpeting.
Until recently, Ian was pretty much an involuntary participant in our snuggling. We’d grab him as he ran by and throw him onto the couch. He does like to snuggle, and after a while would burrow into my side.
Not long ago, a few weeks or a month, I noticed that I wasn’t just snuggling - I was being snuggled. During one of our Daddy Nights, Ian stood in the booth at Applebee’s and wrapped an arm around my neck, drawing me closer to him. ‘You want to color with me?’ His breath was warm on my cheek; we colored, and the arm stayed.
This gesture has since become his preferred (and my favorite) method of showing affection. When I kneel to play or talk or demonstrate, Ian’s arm will curl around my neck, fingers gently digging into my skin, until we’re check-to-cheek. ‘You’re my best friend.’ Well, no. I’m your father. But this isn’t the time to argue.
This morning Ian woke up crying; something to do with a booger. I brought him to our bed, Kelly shared her pillow, and Ian turned toward me. He pretended to close his eyes; I could tell, because he was squinting. I was warm and sleepy - is there a better time to snuggle? I took his arm and put it around my neck; his fingers tightened. He smiled and pulled his other arm from under the blankets, the fingers of this hand curled to form ‘I love you‘.*
Yeah. That’s the stuff.
* Yes, ‘I love you’. Not ‘Rock on’.
We travel every few months, or so, often with Kelly’s parents. It’s usually the case that we’re quietly confined to our room once Ian goes to sleep. Baby monitors don’t work well in hotels, unless the rooms are quite close; that’s assuming we remember to bring one in the first place.
We recently joined a family mobile plan with my in-laws, which included two new cell phones - both with speakerphone capability. Soon after, I wondered if we could use the phones as an impromtu baby monitor.
I’m always the last to know:
‘If you don’t want to pack the monitors when travelling, though, you can instead use your cellphone. Call your spouse’s phone with your own, put them both speakerphone mode, leave one in your child’s room, and mute the other.’
Some Lifehacker caveats are making sure you have unlimited minutes, keeping each phone plugged in, and a warning that some companies automatically disconnect a call if there’s no activity for a certain amount of time.
‘Train a child in the way he should go,
and when he is old he will not turn from it.’
Proverbs 22:6
Our Senior Pastor is teaching a weekly class on ‘Godly Parenting’, and this week we covered the passage above.
Intimidated? Does this mean that I and my wife are solely responsible for ensuring that our son stays on the straight and narrow? Well, that’s not very reformed, now, is it? Thankfully the Bible isn’t as simple as we, and God makes up for our failings.
So what does this passage mean? I have no idea. But here’s an imperfect summary of the discussion.
Dr. Doriani says that, in Greek, the phrase ‘the way he should go’ is literally ‘his way’; and considering the source, I’m fine with taking his word for it. His way? Whose way?
God’s way? Well, of course. We should all learn and teach the ways of God, as best we can; this goes without saying. But in this context, and grammatically-speaking, ‘God’s way’ doesn’t make sense. We have the pronoun, ‘his’ (or ‘he’), the antecedent of which can only be ‘child’. (Though I like to think that God is always implied in scripture.)
If ‘his way’ refers to the child’s way, we’re left with two options. First, ‘his way’ could mean our child’s wants. We could teach our child to follow his desires and impulses. That just sounds like a bad idea; I can understand why this would be translated as ‘the way he should go’.
Second, and finally, ‘his way’ can be taken to mean the child’s tendencies and preferences - his distinctiveness. Dr. Doriani used the example of a student he knew who preferred to sleep on the floor. That was simply the young man’s way. Teach my son the ways of God, and to follow them in his way. Neither mine nor my wife’s, but his way.
I like this interpretation. We are all unique, and God has given each of us our own special talents. Why these gifts if we aren’t intended to use them for His glory? This interpretation teaches us to celebrate the blessing of diversity, and to help our children develop their own special relationship with God.
What does this passage mean to you?
Why am I spending so much time squatting on bathroom floors? Find the answer in my latest post on DadBloggers:
‘Once Ian’s atop the toilet, I’m faced with a delicate balancing act: little boy, big hole. At first I tried to help by holding him under his arms, but that’s no way to relax. And relaxation, I’ve found, is the key to success. In the end, I bit the bullet and let Ian hold himself up by grasping the toilet seat. I know, I know. But this is war.’
(Case photo from the Daddy Detective.)
Despite how we may feel as we leave the hospital, there’s more to being a father than keeping your kid alive. Really, all good fathers recognize this. There’s so much to teach, and precious little time. For the fathers of sons, one of our responsibilities is to teach our sons what it means to be a man.
As if we have a clue.
But if we don’t teach, someone else will - and that can be a bad thing. There are so many conflicting views of masculinity that sometimes it’s hard to know where we stand. Should we listen to Oprah? Dr. Phil? Our fathers? Wives? Desperate Housewives?
During our vacation last week, I saw a guy wearing a t-shirt that read, ‘Yes, These Clothes Can Be Torn Off’. Don’t listen to that guy.
Until we find the definitive expert on manhood, we have guys like Joel to get us closer:
‘Between the contradictory role models of “new-age sensitive man” and “clueless Tim-Taylor man,” it’s no wonder today’s boys don’t know what a man looks like. I’ll give you a hint: neither one is accurate, because they’re both self-centered and immature. The one is whiny, the other overblown, but both of them are completely missing what a man is and does.’
(Joel gets bonus points for quoting Say Anything….
