November 15: Not Always What They Seem, Lessons, Greatest Poems

It is an important and popular fact that things are not always what they seem . . .

That statement is really true.  Tonight, you are probably expecting me to write again about my close friend who's making bad choices.  You're probably expecting to write something dark and a little bleak.

I promise that this post will not be depressing.  In fact, I'm not sure what this post is going to be.  Usually, when I sit down with my laptop to write these little thought bubbles to send out into the world, I have already planned out my subject for the day.  Not this time.

It has been one of those days where I have been busy from the moment I got up at 4:15 this morning until now, 10:47 p.m.  In between those two times, I worked.  After work, I worked for another two hours.  Then I attended a high school performance of The Addams Family Musical with a good friend of mine.  Now, I'm home, in my pajamas, feeling a little exhausted.

I sometimes worry that, in my busyness, I neglect being a good father for my kids.  Some days, I don't even see my daughter until right before bed, if at all.  On late teaching days, my son is in bed before I get home.  I have always worked really hard to support my family.  Two, three, four jobs at a time.  My tax returns bulge with all of my W-2s.  That is my normal.

We aren't rich.  Sometimes, we have to live on Ramen for a couple days and have our Internet and cable shut off because we aren't able to pay the bill every month.  Christmas and birthdays aren't extravagant affairs, and vacations are, for the most part, pretty simple.  And what have my kids learned from watching me work and work and work all these years?

I can't really say definitively that my kids have learned anything by watching me live my crazy life.  I can, however, tell you some of the lessons I hope they have learned/are learning from me:

• Sacrifice is necessary.  You have to do things you don't like sometimes for the people you love.
• Hard work is nothing to be ashamed of, whether it's teaching at a university, registering patients in a medical office, or scrubbing toilets.  
• Passion is as necessary as water to survive.  Find something to be passionate about--writing poetry, playing music, running marathons, or reading the complete works of Dr. Seuss.  It doesn't matter.
• Kindness is more powerful than hatred.  Be kind to everyone you meet.  
• Hope isn't dreaming.  It's believing that people, and the world, are inherently good, to paraphrase Anne Frank.  
• Laughter can cure almost anything.  Broken hearts.  Broken relationships.  Broken people.
• Selflessness doesn't mean losing yourself.  It means finding yourself through loving another human being.
• Failure doesn't define you.  How you deal with failure does.
• Love wins.  Always.

If my daughter or son is reading this post right now, know that your dad always tries to do his best.  He loves you more than you will ever know.  Deeper than space.  Longer than time.  Brighter than beginnings.

You will always be Saint Marty's greatest poems.