No surprise there, I suppose.
It is our house...
Dinner was rushed and the McMonkeys were starving. Pleads came from the dining room " Can we please say our Prayers ourselves, then eat"?
No big deal. We do this, not often, but as often as the bubs all converge, starved, and not everything is plated up, in time...
" Go ahead", I yell over my shoulder ( sometimes they hear, sometimes they don't).
This time they all heard, and as I'm putting food on the remaining plate, ( mine) accusations are bellowed across the table, directed ( supposedly) toward the offender, but mostly funneled purposely toward the kitchen opening, and my ears.
One of the McMonkeys had decided to eat without praying, and one of the others HAD to let me know. I'm not sure if he was actually concerned for his siblings spiritual health, or just wanted to get his brother in trouble. My guess would be 95% the latter and a possible 3% the former.
The other 2% is factored in for margin of error...
So, I'm running, just trying to get the menagerie fed, and this philosophical quandary drops into my lap, before I can even say my own prayer and eat.
...and I'm kind of starving...
Part of me wants to ignore this entire situation and tell the little tattletale to mind his own prayers...
I justify that, by thinking no one should be forced to pray, that it should be about a personal spiritual connection between that person and God; and that all three of these kids are old enough to make the decision themselves ...
I told you I was hungry, right?
I stopped. I breathed. I prayed, not over this meal yet, but over a situation that had me perplexed and unsure...
And I was hungry...
I looked my non- praying son in the eye and asked him if he was grateful to God for the food we were given? He said yes, he was, but that he didn't feel he needed to offer thanks.
Stomach grumbling, I contemplated...
I informed him that if he wasn't grateful enough to offer thanks, he did not have to eat. I explained rather calmly that this is something we do as a family and it is a requirement.
Then I said my prayer, and ate.
So did he...
Im nowhere near100% sure I was right or wrong, and quite sure the margin for error in this situation greatly exceeds the earlier 3%. I just don't know... One more of those daddy "Limbo" zones...
A funnier thing happened Sunday morning.
Not funnier, just un-expected ...
It was Father's Day and the previous non- praying son was excitedly helping me fix breakfast. My Wonderful Wife had offered to do the cooking, but she likes the way I do the bacon.
(A little secret. That is part of the reason she loves me. She will agree, wholeheartedly, specifying that it is just a small part, but we both know it's a little bigger part than either of us like to admit)
Breakfast gets plated, and the same son wants to say the prayer. He begins and his voice breaks a little. " And thank you for making dad be our dad" he finishes...
He bowed his head and covered his eyes with his T- shirt, pressing the cloth against his face, to hide and soak up the tears...
The youngest started saying something, and I told him to be quiet.
I touched my sons shoulder.
A good dad might have said that its ok to cry, and made this a lesson on vulnerability. My son is much like me, uncomfortable with public emotion.
I mentioned how much that I liked his prayer...
I told him I loved it, and then I discreetly wiped my own eyes...
You know. Public displays of emotion,and all...
Someone made a distracting joke or a funny sound. We all laughed and joked...
I silently thanked God for my sons...
No comments:
Post a Comment