Wednesday, March 18, 2009

What Are My Options, Really?

Its no secret that my life tends to revolve around my kids. I'm pretty sure I've mentioned that a time or two, right? I try, I really do, to teach my boys what's important in life, and how to distinguish between whats important and what is just filler. I try every day to ensure my kids know how truly, truly important they are in my life, and that they are my biggest priorities. I'm not sure I always accomplish that, but I know that I try.

I've always, ALWAYS believed that spending time with my boys comes first. It comes before doing the dishes, it comes before vacuuming the dog hair, and it comes before anything else. I never want my kids to struggle to remember things we did together, or good times we had. I don't want them to be writing my eulogy, saying "Well, we might not have gone on picnics, had amazing conversations about the smallest of things, or played hooky one day together just for the fun of it; but we always had clean spoons in the drawer."

A good friend of mine said something to me today that keeps playing over and over in my head. It's perfect, really. It's something that just says everything I try to remember every day of my parenting life.

Was today the best day of my life? If not, then I've failed.

It's that simple, and that complex. I am trying to make today the best day of my life, and of my boys' lives. If I step out my front door tomorrow morning and get hit by a bus, will today have been the best day I could have made it for them? Will I be able to leave them, sure in the knowledge that they will have had a lifetime of "best days" to look back on? Because if all they can remember about me is that I do the dishes every day, or that I'm a tyrant about the dog hair, then I've failed. I would have failed them.

Failure is not an option, here.

1 comment:

Karen said...

Oooh, that's deep. And profound. And possibly life-altering. I'll be adopting that. Clean spoons are overrated anyway.