Starting High School

Last night, he asked to spend time with me. He wanted to schedule a time with me so that I wasn't so tired and could actually spend time with him. He selected 8 pm, and asked if that would be a good time. I said it would be.

Normally, my wife and I go to bed around 8:30 pm.

So at 8, he and I went to his room and started talking. Thirty minutes later, his mother came in and said goodnight. When she left, he got uptight.

"I never get to spend time with you," he trembled, and I could see the tears welling up in his eyes. "I had to go outside and walk. Why did I do that?!"
"Because you like to walk. Because you need to walk."
"Yeah, but I could have done it at another time, and now I don't get to spend as much time with you as I want!" He was having a mini-breakdown, and I thought that some of it was because of the small amount of time we were spending together, but most of it was probably a reaction to starting high school in the morning.

Today, he starts high school.
In two hours, he will be starting his freshman year. He will be a Frosh.

I hurt for him when he's upset. I hurt for our 10 year-old when he's upset. I hurt for my wife when she's upset. I have a lot of empathy, especially for those I love.

Before his mini-breakdown could advance any further, I told him that I wasn't planning on going to bed just then and I would be willing to stay up a little longer with him. He brightened right up and said that would be great.

It's hard to make sure your family is taken care of and you are taken care of. It's hard to get enough money to make sure all their material needs are fulfilled-- things like food, clothes, medicine-- as well as your needs. It's hard to make sure that their emotional needs are fulfilled as well as fulfilling your own needs. Used to be I would come home and jump straight into dad and husband clothes. I wasn't taking any time for myself. I wasn't taking any time to come down from work, traffic, my day of whatever. Recently (read: 3 days) I've been "taking an hour" for myself. I write, make music, surf the Internet, walk, ride my bike, do nothing for one hour. One hour for myself. It's been amazing to see the change one hour a day can make, and it was obvious to me almost immediately. And the goodness of that time is mostly a result of my wife allowing me to take that time for myself. She could easily tell me that it was selfish for me to take that time, or bug me during that time, or cry after I was done with it, tell me something like, "if you loved me, you would want to spend all your time with me." But she hasn't done any of that. And she has helped me protect that time when the boys are with us. And, of course, that makes me want to be with her even more. And it makes our time together even better. And it makes my time with the boys even better. But it's been hard to do. Families are hard sometimes. Life is hard sometimes. But it feels better when you start getting control over it.

I stayed and talked with him until 9:20. I couldn't hold my eyes open any longer than that. He was okay with letting me go at 9:20. He told me he loved me. I love that.

That was the last time I saw him before he became a high schooler.