Happiness Is Being a Grandparent
Posted: Tuesday, June 01, 2010
by Douglas Bryant
The Decal Factory
When I became a parent in my mid-twenties, I was not prepared for the significant reality shifts post childbirth. Before children (BC) when on a whim, we decided to take a, two-day weekend road trip to taste wine and culinary delights to break the boredom of the everyday. We as a couple embodied the phrase we work for the weekends.
Weekends was our time to be free of all responsibilities, and speak and live the immortal words of the over worked, under paid employees of that prison of work, TGIF, thank God it's Friday. The Friday evening ritual of casting off every vestige of the ordinary included our standard Friday night visit to a local eatery we were free to go so we went. I remember these days in a time long, long ago, but with hazy clarity.
Parents at all stages of their training say two phrases that seem to be common among all parents of the baby, toddler, and the teenager. The first phrase is uttered in the everyday frustration of your children helping you grow up, and in that training you say, when will this ever end. It is true that every parent loves their children because those very children not only grew up, but they helped their parents grow up. Therefore, it is with sadness that our children one by one leave the nest and then we utter the next phase, how this time slipped away so fast.
Why I love begin a grandparent because grandparents can again do anything they want. Take a weekend trip just because we are free to go, and not chained to the everyday of raising children. Grandparents have the best of both world's we can have the grand children over for the day or even sleep over, but we know that the grand children have live in wardens who concern and frustrate enough.
In closing, my wife and I loved raising our children and even more so love that in our children who are now men and women we have friends. The grand children remind us of the times of wonder and the discovery of small children, which we experienced, but as a parent did not appreciate, but as a grandparent is what makes us smile and laugh in the moment and enjoyment of the everyday. The grandparent has time to appreciate because we are not overwhelmed with the concerns and frustrations of the everyday.
The message to parents in all stages of instruction smell and gaze of the beautiful flowers of your children's wonder and discovery, because even though it seems this time will never end, it will and when it is gone it is gone. Even pictures do not reclaim the past only memories of your children's moments of wonder and discovery enrich your existence and make you ready to be a grandparent.
Doug Bryant
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Top-level comments on this article: (1 total)I believe that parenting is and will always remain the most difficult job, but I think your advice is great.JenniferThank you for your comment, I hope your training is going well, because being a grandparent is a lot of fun.Doug
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