Years ago while cutting the grass, my three year old daughter shouted out to me while standing on the porch. “Look, Daddy, bug, bug!” The urgency in her voice prompted me to stop what I was doing and run to her aid. But before I could get very far at all, she put her foot down hard and announced, “Dead bug!”
Parenting can be like the cowboy in the old western who is asked to boil water because someone is having a baby. It isn’t that you need boiling water to deliver the baby, but the cowboy needs to have something to do while the baby comes.
As important as nurture can be and is, there are times when what our children most need is our support and presence. They will do the rest.
It is a privilege to see the fruits of support and presence as our children grow and become adults, and to see how they adapt when they are parents. There is nothing like being a parent, unless it’s being a grandparent! It’s support and presence in another generation…and dimension, too. What a privilege to see your grandchild come into the world. I was there, and held her first…then passed her off to her daddy, who stood next to me, shaking like a leaf. Such a blessed memory!