“I found your website today,” my son told me. He searched for it during computer time at school when they are given time to read and learn on their own. He searched for it last week but didn’t know the address. I showed him when he told me that he couldn’t find it, and he remembered. “I didn’t show anybody. I want to tell everyone you are making a book, but I didn’t.”
Some people think I’m tough, but I’m really not, not when there is no reason. My eyes warmed. I experienced an emotion I didn’t hide, nor force to rise, but allowed to be exactly as it came—gratitude.
My son makes me feel special. To be recognized and to see someone seek to discover something that you value, it always makes me feel special—especially when it is my son. As a father, there are a lot of learning moments, for parents and child alike. There are times you wonder if you are appreciated, if your efforts are seen and noticed, and the times when we witness that they are, it comes in a wave of humility and gratitude.
I believe there are times children help their parents as much as their parents help them. I have felt this in my own life, in certain stages, through certain events, and for my oldest son, I’m grateful. He asked me to make a book, to chase a dream I’d left to die, and in doing returned the dream to me. From that, I made a website, a place to further share words and thoughts and try to spread a little good. All of this came of my son’s beginning request.
I showed him a digital proof of my book last night. It is the one he asked me to write, and he did not put it down. To see him value what began from him, again, filled me with gratitude.
I sometimes wonder what my children think of me, if they are proud. In a world of materialism and its measures, I wonder if the way we live and what we have is enough. Maybe I shouldn’t, but I do; and when he shows me that I matter, in as simple of a way as this, I know that it is.
We are both blessed. We are both special, as simple as we may be.