Letter to Daddy

Dear Micah and Liam -

It’s Father’s Day, 2010, and I want to tell you something about the amazing man that you have the privilege of calling “Daddy”.

Of all the decisions I’ve made in my life, save the one where I dedicated my life to God, choosing to marry your father was the absolute best one. There are so many reasons why he is the right choice for me as a partner, but that’s another letter. This is the time to focus on why he is the best father for the two of you.

10. He lets you be who you are. While I’m more concerned with milestones and developmental markers, your dad is more concerned with letting the true Liam and the true Micah shine true.

9. He’s not afraid of disciplining you. But he doesn’t go overboard; instead, he uses it to shape you as young people, so that you learn valuable boundaries.

8. He wants you to be citizens of the world. Your daddy is passionate about being green, supporting companies that are kind to people and the environment, and doing what we can to protect the earth that God has blessed us with. In other words, he’s making sure you have a great world in which to grow up in and eventually raise your own family.

7. He wants you to be well-rounded. He wants to introduce you to new things, new people, new places. One of the things he is best at is adjusting to life wherever he lands, and I know that he is working hard to instill that same thing in you.

6. He’s living a little bit of his childhood again through you, which makes him very understanding. He likes to watch Disney movies to you, take you to Disney, talk to you about cars and trucks. He’s meeting you where you are, and enjoying every minute of it.

5. He wants you to learn about Jesus. It was your daddy’s idea to get Micah his first Bible when he was just over a year old, and we’ll soon get one for Micah. He’s the one that sensed that starting you that young with the Bible was one of the best things we could do for you and he was right. Micah, you now cherish that reading and love picking out which Bible story we’ll read each night. Liam, I know you’ll soon know the same joy.

4. He loves showing you off to other people. The joy he finds in you is written all over his face when he introduces you to new people, or shows you off to people who haven’t seen you in a while. He’s proud of who you, how much you’re learning, and how fast you’re growing.

3. He loves your mother, and he’s not afraid to show that and speak of it. In doing so, he’s not only modeling what it means to be a great husband, but what it means to love in general, because real love isn’t afraid to make an occasional public display and it’s not afraid to be honest. Your dad is the best model of this that I know.

2. He loves you with all of his heart. I can see it in the way that he plays with you, takes you places, even watches you during children’s time at church. Visible love is a unique gift to offer your children, and your father gives it to you in spades.

1. He genuinely likes you. If they’re good parents, dads can say that they love their children. That almost always comes with the territory. But only when they’re great parents, can dads say that they like their children.

And you can tell that he likes you by the amount of time that he chooses to spend with you.

So what I want you to know is that you are truly blessed. Really and truly. And I believe that God chose you to be his children for a reason. He needs you and you need him, and on this Father’s Day, I am grateful on your behalf for the wonderful man I get to call husband and you get to call Daddy.

We love you, Daddy!

Mommy

Honesty

"Honesty is the best policy."

Undoubtedly, this is a saying that you will hear, and maybe even speak, many times through the course of your lives. It's been around forever, but lately I've been thinking about how often the advice is actually heeded - or not.

I'm listening to a book on CD while in the car. Usually not with you guys because your constant chattering makes it hard to listen to anything but you, and I'd rather talk to you anyway! But when I happen to get away by myself, I listen to this book. Like many other novels, the main character is keeping a major secret from those he has grown close to in the small town where he lives. The secret is eating away at him and, while I haven't finished the book yet, I know that at some point towards the climax of the book, the secret is finally going to be spilled with uncertain consequence.

The thing is, this secret isn't that big of a deal and while I'm enjoying listening to something that doesn't rhyme or doesn't have Mickey Mouse's voice anywhere in it, I'm struggling to figure out why this main character just doesn't come clean with his secret. Or why we all don't.

I am convinced that when something major happens to a person, he needs an outlet to process what's going on. That outlet doesn't necessarily have to be a person - he could start a blog! :) But keeping big things inside and not working through the feelings and effects that are natural part of a life-changing event is just not healthy. Furthermore, depending on what the secret is, keeping it usually only ends up hurting those we love, those who have trusted that they are part of an inner circle where truth reigns.

Don't get me wrong. I think that there is a time and a place for full disclosure. You might not want to walk into your job one day and spill your deepest, darkest secrets to your spouse. You probably shouldn't confide the things you keep closest to your heart to your college roommate on the first day that you meet him.

However, your spouse and those who you have chosen to trust as close friends deserve your honesty. They are expecting it from you as part of the unspoken deal we have with one another when we make relational commitments with one another. And inevitably, it's more painful to have the secret forced out than it is to just put it out there and learn to live with it. And if there's one thing I know, it's that the secret will always come out.

So as you grow, and as you learn to develop deep relationships with one another, with us as your parents, and with people you choose as your friends, remember that honesty still really is the best policy. Some adages actually are true.

Love,
Mommy