Missed opportunities of being with your child are irretrievable. Your child will never go back in time no matter how many times you do. Only their shadows remain to haunt and point an accusing finger. If you are not a vital part in your child’s life, there will always be a void that no one else can ever fill. This space in soul of a child will ache and be painful for as long as child lives. Only your touch, your attention, and only you can soothe and cure. The responsibility is great but rewards are incomprehensible. You are not complete if there is a void in your child’s life.

Taking a rocket to moon is child’s play when compared to raising a child to adulthood. There are no owner’s manuals and no guarantees. There are only promises and assurances of tomorrow. Expectations may vary but there are no mistakes. You do best you can and that is all that is asked. Mistakes also pave way for growth but absence builds roadblock. Walls of years of neglect can be torn down with a kiss or an embrace. Past disappointments are just that - past. It may take time to completely undo what it may have taken years to build but labor is worth it. Your reflection will always be in your child’s eyes and your lifeblood flows in their bodies. Their hearts are equipped to forgive and forget, but they need to know you care. Feelings and emotions can be mended, but abandonment is an open sore that never heals.

On Father’s Day take time to know your child, be a vital part of his/her existence and be grateful that you have contributed to building of that rocket to moon.

(Written by someone who never knew their father)

HAVE A HAPPY FATHER’S DAY!

ENJOY!

©Arleen M. Kaptur 2002 May

A child is a mixture of generations before them and yet they have their own distinct impact on future. They may be small in statute but they are giants in creativity. They can fly on a magic carpet as easily as we drive a car. They can spin tales of delight, while we lament past. Children climb ladder of life and hope to reach their castles in sky. They are clever, original, and have a vision that they carry in their souls.

Where is point that we change from being miracle of a child to practical, down-to-earth, adult that tolerates no nonsense, is too busy to watch a firefly, and misses delight of a spider spinning his web? I don’t believe everyone attains this transformation at same time. Some blame it on life while others point to their parents, environment, or even their heritage. If we find that we can no longer sit down and find humor in a misshaped clay figure, or realize that crayon marks are not “outside” lines, but that they are only an expansion of what could possibly be, then take a child by hand and let them lead you back into a realm where anything is possible and everything is probable. Enter land where everything lends itself to be transformed into whatever you would like it to be.

So, why do we have a Children’s Day? Could it possibly be because we realize that we are children for such a short time and we are adults for rest of our lives? Do we feel in our hearts that we have to step back into a world where color, sparkle, and enchantment allows us to reclaim dreams, renew our hopes, and a small hand will help us find ourselves? Are we really celebrating children or does world need to realign its visions and build better castles in sky? Isn’t Children’s Day really a day for whole world to appreciate life and really see what it has to offer? Are we finally beginning to realize that we carry our childhood in our hearts and that when we rekindle our acquaintance with what we were, our steps are a little lighter, our smiles are brighter, and our world resembles a box of crayons. ©Arleen M. Kaptur 2002 May

(An excerpt from Celebrate a Child by Arleen M. Kaptur)