Saturday, July 9, 2011

What We Signed Up For

A co-worker is scared to death of having children. Interestingly, she would be a fish out of water if her life were free of chaos-I tell her that her life seems like her desk. Yet, she is scared of the labor-intensive eternal investment called parenting. And it is labor intensive. With friends in town, we took the train to a museum, fought through the crowds, and made it out safely with tired kids. Two kids fit in the double stroller, but another tripped and fell. So, I carried him on my back while pushing the double stroller as we walked a significant distance to a train stop-my friends had their hands full too. My co-worker crossed my mind a couple of times. Then we all went out to dinner. My son turned to me and asked, "Why are parents so bossy sometimes?" I said, "I don't know. I guess we forget that you don't understand that we have a schedule to keep sometimes." Then I asked, "Why do kids ask so many questions?" He responded, "I don't know. I think we're just curious." Thus, the labor is both physical and mental, and of course emotional. Is there an adequate way to describe it to my co-worker? It would probably scare her more. I did tell her, however, that we choose our investments. And we typically labor diligently to make them grow. A career is wonderful, social position is good, but to me a family is the best investment of all, the only one that is eternal, and worth every ounce of labor we put into it. I don't know if as much could be said of the other investments out there.

No comments: