I Have Sent 10 Children Out Into the World (c) 2008 - Bob Boisvert
My oldest child, a son, lived at home until he was 19 ½ years old. His
mother and I desperately tried to get him to leave the nest after he
graduated from high school but he clawed his fingers across the floor
as we dragged him towards the front door, resisting every inch of the
way. We bid him welcome to the world when he joined the Air Force as a
weapons loader on B-52 bombers. He came home for a short time, to aid
his family after his mother died and his enlistment ended. After he
was sure we were safe and taken care of, he made his way back out into
the world. He married a great lady with a wonderful little boy.
The next, a girl, stayed behind in Norway when her mother and I got
married and moved to the States. The daughter settled into her life
without her mother and after a few tentative steps into the world, she
met and married a wonderful man who takes care of her and keeps her
safe and warm and dry. This daughter, of all my children, was the
easiest to raise. When she came into my life she was already potty
trained, had a driver's license and a good paying job.
Next came a son who screamed bloody-murder for his independence as
soon as he graduated from high school at age 16. His mother and I
managed to sit on him until he was 18-years old and within a couple of
weeks of his birthday he bolted for the door. He used to say that I
didn't approve of his quest for freedom...until one day he remembered
exactly who had driven him up to Utah and didn't make him pay for any
of the gas. When I dropped him off at an apartment filled with college
students... I consider that to be his release onto the world. He
honorably served a mission for our church, returned, got an education
and an incredible job filled with challenge and potential.
Then came a daughter that had initially stayed behind in Norway. It
wasn't many weeks until she came trotting behind her mom to America.
She made some life-decisions that made me scratch my head in wonder.
One day she woke up and said, "This is insane." She picked up the
phone, called her mother and said, "I need some advice, Mamma." Within
a week she was home and within another week she had met an incredible
man who swept her off of her feet with a storybook romance. I feel I
released her to the world when she and this knight-hearted man got
married.
Behind her was a son that came from Norway and desperately wanted to
go on a mission for our church. In spite of an initial disappointment
about his assigned destination, he realized the Lord would never send
him somewhere he wasn't supposed to be. He went out into the world
with his scriptures, two suits and an incredible commitment to do the
Lord's work. After his mission he came home with his head held high,
met a young lady and chased her until she caught him.
Next was a daughter that relocated to the States with her mother. But
she only stayed for a few weeks before she headed back to Norway.
There was a boy in her life and fortunately he was a good, honest and
loving companion. There was no formal, "Welcome to The World"
ceremony...one day she belonged to us and the next she was functioning
in the world.
My youngest Norwegian son came to America and had quite a bit of
culture shock. But once he got his feet planted on the ground he did
OK. He made his way into the world when he decided to join the US Army
as a paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne Division. He sees action in
Afghanistan but always remembers to call his mom and let her know that
he is safe. One of the proudest moments of my life was when I stood
next to him in a crowed mall as an impromptu crowd of people thanked
him for his service to the USA...a country that he is not even a
citizen of. He too walks tall as he moves through the world.
The youngest son took a long time to finally crawl out from under the
protective feathers of his mamma hen. He took several big jumps out of
the nest, but the first time he would stumble, he would run back home
and climb back into the nest. A few months ago he announced that he
too would make his way into the world clothed in the uniform of a
soldier. I took him to the recruiters' this morning to go to the Army
induction processing center. Before I left I gave him a big bear hug,
looked him straight in the eye and told him how proud I am of him.
The two youngest girls ran off into the dark of the night at age 15,
flipping me the bird, telling me that I was a horrible parent for
making them go to school, not allowing them to have sex and not to use
drugs & alcohol.
My children have introduced me to, and made me interact with many of
the most interesting people in the world. These people include
teachers, temple presidents, skater-boys with their hats on sideways,
credit union loan officers, vice-principals, judges, hillbilly parents
that insisted that "you and the little mrs." should join them for a
bar-b-que on Sunday, squeaky-clean-well-scrubbed, bright-eyed young
ladies & young men, overly-tattooed druggies, bill collectors, mission
presidents and their wives, OB/GYN doctors, drywall repairmen,
assistant district attorneys, public defenders, social workers, soccer
and baseball moms, emergency room doctors and nurses, probation
officers, bishops, DMV clerks, airline attendants, insurance
adjusters, and many, many, MANY police officers.
I have laid awake half the night worrying before a big homework
assignment was due while my darling child lay fast asleep and snoring
in their bedroom down the hall, driven halfway across the state to do
research for the dreaded 5th grade California Mission Report,
scratched my head at the untimely and unfortunate demise of a tank
full of tropical fish when my son decided to do a science experiment
and turn the tank's heater way up, read "Herman The Hamster" so many
times I still feel ready to squash the little fury rodent, read
"Charlotte's Web" to my small children and cried just as hard each
time I read about Charlottes' babies, frothed at the mouth and chewed
on the carpet when I opened the phone bill and found that it was for
over $900, picked out little pieces of bread and cookie crumbs when my
baby asked, "Dwink Daaady Dwink" and I broke down and shared my soda,
had epithets thrown in my face because I wouldn't give up the keys to
my truck, tried not to explode when I discovered that not one but two
times my children lit a twisted up wad of paper-towels and ran through
the house so they could look like the Statue of Liberty and then when
it burned close enough to their fingers they dropped it and the
burning mass continued to burn and scorch the flooring, spent a small
fortune in Legos and sacrificed these many pieces of plastic to the
vacuum-cleaner-gods, taught four of them to drive a manual
transmission and replaced the clutch in my truck four times,
emphatically taught five of them to correctly enunciate the TR sound
when trying to say the word "truck," listened to hundreds of hours of
their music which sounded shockingly similar to a pair of wet cats
stuck in a rotating cement mixer, had hundreds of dollars of change
"liberated" from the secret hiding place in my truck, "babysat"
several of the most miserable excuses for God's sorriest animal called
"dog" and last but certainly not least, changed hundreds and hundreds
and hundreds of diapers.
Back in the 1970's, someone wrote to Ann Landers and begged, "Will you
please ask your readers the question: If you had it to do over again,
would you have children?" She asked the question in her column and in
an informal, non-scientific poll, 70% of the respondents said that
having children wasn't worth it. (over 10,000 readers wrote back to
Ann) (http://happilychildfree.com/ann.htm)
I have waited for over thirty years, since the 1970's, to be able,
qualified and given the opportunity to answer this question in an
authoritative way:
Was it worthwhile to be a father to a tribe of 10 children?????
I can answer that question with a single pair of words ….
ABSOLUTELY YES
And I would do it all again in a heartbeat!
No comments:
Post a Comment