I took my son to the park in northeast Ladoga this past weekend. My parents met us there and we ate Bojangles on the metal bleachers at the basketball courts after we ran around for a while. Mary was meeting with a study group for her anatomy class that she was taking at CPCC and she was angry at me that the day had turned into a family get together. “I could have taken so many pictures, why didn’t you tell me you were inviting them?” In all honesty, I hadn’t thought to call my parents until I was passing the sign that welcomes drivers into town on the highway. It was a good day, too. My son loves his grandmother and even though my dad and I were on the basketball court with him, he ignored us and insisted that my mom play too. We mostly rolled the ball around until some kids politely asked us to move so they could play a game.
My son, Zach, is five years old and it still blows my mind that he is a part of me, that I made him. I don’t know what kind of child I was growing up, but my son has been a handful since we brought him home from the hospital. He didn’t cry all the time, but when he did, he was so loud that even though my girlfriend let me sleep while she went to calm him, I wasn’t able to fall back to sleep and eventually I would go and help her with him. I loved watching Mary with our baby, she looked so beautiful. She would sing to him softly after a feeding, and just like that, he was snoring softly and sound asleep. As he learned to walk, he always found the loudest things in the apartment to smash together or toss around and he developed a habit of swinging at people he didn’t know when they picked him up. He doesn’t do that as much anymore.
Watching him in the park this past weekend, I was amazed at how fast time flies these day. When I was a boy, I couldn’t imagine being in my late twenties; it felt so far away and I never thought that the time would come when I would be a grown up. Maybe it feels that way in your youth because you have so much ahead of you and as you get older, you get sacked with more things that require your attention and the worry of addressing those things eats away at the hours of our day, or numbs us with routine that makes every day bleed into the next.
I wonder what wisdom I will pass down to my son when he grows into a teenager and then into adulthood. I don’t think I’m old enough to be wise, but my years have afforded me some measure of insight that I hope to continue to build upon. I think I will tell him to find good friends that he trusts and to never let anyone take advantage of him. A good friend can be hard to come by, so I will tell him to never take anyone for granted who shows him kindness above and beyond the common courtesy most acquaintances offer. Friends make life easier, there is no doubt about that, but he will have to know that there are always people who will say anything to get something from him; some call them the soul eaters. But it’s important that he doesn’t let those people turn him off of humanity for good.
Is it hypocritical for me to give my son life lessons that I have never demonstrated comprehension of in my own life? Because while I know the importance of community, I’m not very friendly to my neighbors. I don’t know a single person that lives in my apartment building, despite the fact that Mary knows everyone well enough to say hello when they pass in the parking lot, and the old woman in the apartment below us invites us to dinner every now and then. Mary has eaten with her, but I always have an excuse to miss it. I am different in Ladoga, where nowadays I drive around the city when I can looking for people to talk to, for people to help. Maybe that is the only place the lesson means anything to me, where I was born and where the majority of my life story was written.
If I am a hypocrite, so be it. If my son can be a better man than myself, he will be, I will make sure of that. My father taught me that my own limits should not define my children and I believe that.
When we were ready to leave the park, the sun was still out and my son was chasing the basketball in the grass like he was playing soccer. I picked him up and we said goodbye to my parents; my son insisted on a hug from his grandmother and cried when I finally pulled him away. I wonder if my son would rather grow up in Ladoga? I could get Mary’s house a lot sooner because nice houses are cheaper there than in cities closer to Charlotte, and Charlotte itself. But she would not go for that, not right now anyway.
I can’t say that this little project has laid all of my worries and apprehensions to rest, but I feel more in control if that makes any sense. I feel like I can do whatever it is that I feared I couldn’t before. I still can’t clearly see my future, but I can see myself and Mary happy, our son older, and friends and family around me. And I know that I will be a lucky man if that comes to fruition. But new questions have sprung up as well and I am always worried about the guns that I have stashed in my house and car. I am not that person, so easily frightened that I would be willing to put my family at risk. But I also will not be easily outwitted or overpowered and Mary and I have been going to the gun range steadily since I bought the guns. We keep them locked away so even if my son stumbles upon the case, he won’t be able to open it. If you’d have asked me about five years ago if I’d have a gun, let alone three, I would have laughed at the question. I used to think, and part of me still does, that even if responsible people own guns, there’s no way to ensure that those guns won’t eventually fall into the wrong hands. I was all about disarmament back then. But responsibility changes a man. I hope I never have to shoot anyone, but I will without hesitation to protect my family.
The key to all of this is to never stop moving forward. Once you stop, it all catches up and seems overwhelming. But a man who is maturing and gaining wisdom with each new year, will grow to accommodate the new concerns that plague him and though his life won’t be without difficulty, he won’t get in his own way or defeat himself either. I will not defeat myself.
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