Patience is more than a virtue

18 more days.  In that much time, my daughter will come home from a summer filled with friends – old and new, a new crush, a happy smile, and a lot of dirty laundry.  And I can’t wait.

Some of you may already know my daughter’s affinity for music.  Her playlist is mostly filled with the songs and genres she and her peers listen to, but occasionally she doesn’t mind listening to one of her dad’s favorite “oldies”.  It’s rare, though, that she likes a band that I liked first – if anything, it’s the other way around.  And it’s lightning-strike-rare that she would EVER care to go to a concert to see someone I like.  Well…before she got away for her summer activities, she was actually EXCITED to go see one of my favorite groups, Train, perform when they came through town.

That little girl probably doesn’t know it…but she made my day.  Heck…she made my year…

We enjoy some of the same songs, but her favorite is “Drops of Jupiter” (video link below).  Well, she’s more industrious when it comes to her concert-going than I am, and she’d found the playlist for the night and noticed that her favorite song would be the last one of the night.  So much for her Dad’s “let’s get outta here before traffic gets bad” M.O.  We were staying til the end.  And honestly, for making this memory – I cared less about traffic and more about just seizing that time.

If anything, that song depicts to me a stage of life I’m watching her go through.  She’s all over the place this summer – and while she only enters high school next month, it feels like she’s practically headed off to college tomorrow.  I know God’s preparing me for something.

She acts like summer and walks like rain,

Reminds me that there’s a time to change,

Hey, hey, hey…

Since the return from the stay on the Moon,

She listens like Spring and she talks like June,

Hey, hey, hey…

I see my oldest needing me less and less.  And I’ve heard before that it makes parents do their own bouts of soul-searching.  I’ve defined almost 15 years of my life now as trying to be a good parent…no, a great parent.  I haven’t always succeeded…and things certainly aren’t what I thought they’d be…but are they ever?  And I can’t help but mix in all the desires to know what tomorrow holds for her…and her brother…but also…FOR ME?  My soul-searching journey is once-again kicking in, and I’m wondering where the next stop will be.

It’s a conundrum, really…wanting to look into tomorrow while holding so tightly onto today.  It’s a challenge in every corner of my life.

A friend whose spiritual journey I respect quite a bit recommended a daily devotional series on the topic of not living life by emotions – but the app was filled with several applicable series that piqued my interest.  The first in the series?  “The Prophet with the Blues”.  Often quoted and oft-used for inspiration, Jeremiah was one of those “gifted” with the ability to see into the tomorrows of centuries ago.  And guess what?  He wasn’t crazy about his ability.  In Jeremiah 9:1, he laments “Oh, that my head were a spring of water and my eyes a fountain of tears!”  He saw his people held captive, cities plundered and burned, military disaster, etc.  He also saw the successful arrival of Jesus, so I guess you could say he saw the good and the bad.  Still…I considered after my reflection that getting through each day as gracefully as possible really ought to be my goal.  Concerning myself with too much of the future…the KNOWING HOW IT TURNS OUT AND KNOWING IT NOW attitude needs not be even in the back seat – but left on the side of the road for this particular journey.

Easier said than done – that’s for certain.  In fact, that may be the only thing that IS actually certain.  And that’s where faith steps in.

My faith has to be that the steps I’ve taken to prepare my kiddos for life have all been received and implemented.  What I teach them from this point forward is to have faith.  Just because they can’t see more than a step or two out in front shouldn’t freeze them.  Instead, their confidence in their own abilities coupled with their own fledgling faith in God will get them to the other side of life’s most troubling waters.

One other poignant line in that song speaks to an issue of pride:  The singer sings, “Did you miss me while you were looking for yourself out there?”  After laying out all the jet-setting of the love he watched walk away, all he wants to know is that somewhere along the way, maybe she missed him.  I struggle with that not only with my kiddos, but with friends and family at times, too.  If I feel that way about family and friends, I can’t imagine how God must feel about me.  Funny thing is, if I’d consult him while I’m out “looking for myself out there”, perhaps I wouldn’t be looking so much!

I’ve made pretty good strides at times in my faith, but I also take a few steps back every now and then.  It’s part of the human condition.  At the end of the day, in every person’s life, we do our own version of jet-setting through the galaxy and try on our own to experience some pretty amazing things – sometimes we succeed, sometimes we don’t.  Sometimes things are everything we could’ve ever imagined…other times it doesn’t live up to expectations.  I do know this, though…the things I’ve believed in most…where I’ve committed it to prayer, and believed that no matter what, everything would work out as it should, it’s always worked out exceedingly well.  There are times I look around and realize what I’m missing is my most important relationship – the one with the very God who put me on this earth.

It reminds me to “act like summer and walk like rain” – and to remember it’s not all that hard to change my own impatience to an excited expectation of things to come.

Patiently, excitedly expectant of what tomorrow brings,

Tim

PS – here’s the video of Train’s “Drops of Jupiter” for those who want to watch.