FATHERS, DON'T LET YOUR SONS GROW UP

CAN YOUR SON DO THIS TO YOU?
MINE DID!

I'm serious.  Don't let it happen.  If you do, you will not have any fun.  If you're too serious they'll never razz you over the peccadillos that they knew should be kept away from their mother, i.e. your wife.  If they don't like you they'll never let you take them to the top floor of the Bazzillionaires' Hotel for their first legal alcoholic drink.  If you're too tough on them for no reason, they'll never go to college for fear that you'll hound them to death to graduate Summa Cum Laude.  If you lord it over them, the first time you accidentally get drunk in front of them, they will laugh at you instead of with you and you will have lost one of the richest memories that any father could ever want.  You have to learn to give them some space when they are young.  Like my two guys.  They went to high school and they had to take a foreign language.  There were three choices, French, Spanish and German.  I told Belle, their mother, He is going to choose German because he knows that I don't know one single syllable in the German language.  He comes home from registration and she asks to see the schedule.  Sure as God made little rain drops, he chose German for the foreign language.  When she asked why, he gave some cockamamie answer like, "Ya kin never tell, I could work for a European company some day."  I came home from work and she tells me that #1 Son had chosen German for his foreign language.  I say, "Of course.  That way he won't have to put up with me forcing him to speak French or Spanish here in the house."  He laughed.  I laughed.  Belle couldn't figure out the Father-Son humor of the moment.  His younger brother did the same thing.

Fathers have to understand that boys don't really like to grow up.  It's not enough fun.  Fathers themselves, if they are true to their male nature, have really never grown up.  Why then put the burden on the sons?  We know that the sons are going to want a "Harley."  We know that they're going to want their 30-06 for moose hunting.  We know better than to choose ash grey when we buy them their first auto.  Two doors, or course.  Five speed, "natch!"  

Look at the picture of the door in the right side margin.  That is their legacy to our house.  The cartoons on their bedroom door.  Had I and they grown up, we would not have this treasure.

My boys were in the 7th and 6th grade respectively one Summer.  They wanted monthly bus passes so that they could cruise the city with their friends.  We knew their friends.  We said "yes" with no further ado.  We gave them some rules of the road, and off they went.  About six weeks into the Summer break the elder of the two asked me why we allowed them to do what they asked.  He said that it was puzzling to him to see us enjoying their reports when they got back home every day.  I told him that it was because we trusted them and that we were enjoying the fact that they were learning something that many other young children would not.

He just shook his head, said, "Thanks, Pa." and that was it for the rest of the summer.

So, it's fathers' day.  I don't believe in these special days.  Everyone knows it.  But they treat me nicely anyway and I let them think that I like it.  What I really like about it is the freedom that we have in our father-son-friend relationship.  I'm glad that I never grew up.  I'm also glad that I did not lay the expectation on my boys to do something that I did not really want to do, and therefore did not do.  Because of that, I can tell them ANYTHING, and they trust that it is true and straight from the heart.