It has been raining a lot here lately, but a week or so ago, we had this beautiful spring-like day. I found myself up the street from my house sitting on a rock that overlooked a local lake. It was one of those calm and warm days where it’s easy to understand what it feels like to be a lizard perched on a rock soaking in the sun. As is the norm these days, I started thinking about my life over the past few years and evaluating my decision not to work.
For the record, I have not had a paying job in almost three years and there are days it weighs heavily on my mind. It wasn’t long after Deb’s passing that the company I had been with for almost nine years was acquired and moved from California to New Jersey.
Initially, I focused on the negative, which was losing my job just six months after losing my wife. But, it was soon clear that the acquisition was a positive thing and perhaps “meant to be” as it was time for me to start grief counseling and begin to deal with Deb’s passing.
I did go through the counseling process, and it was a big help. I was all business while Deb was alive, and it took me almost a year after her passing before I could talk about our experience. Basically, up until counseling, I just held it all in and lived with a daily anger that wasn’t fun to be around.
Let’s go back to the rock overlooking the lake. I sat there that day debating what my life had been for the past three years. When the company I worked for was sold, I told myself I was going to take a year off to be with Tanner and get my head straight. I recall being in counseling as the self imposed one year “deadline” was approaching. I was stressing pretty hard because the time had gone so fast and I wasn’t anywhere near getting back to work.
The counselor I was seeing at the time stopped me in my tracks and politely said, “The year deadline is simply something you set in your head. It’s not mandatory and there aren’t negative consequence if you don’t start work exactly as you had planned.”
Hearing him tell me that made sense. He was absolutely correct. It was simply a matter of perspective.
So, there I was, sitting on this rock and trying to put some perspective on the past three years. One view is simple. I have been lazy, unmotivated, and content with hitting the gym in the mornings and being there to pick up Tanner each day from school. Unfortunately, this cut-and-dry point of view, however inaccurate it may be, is something I do ponder. I have always been known to be tough on myself and on some days I can really be my own worst enemy. And it dawned on me that once again I had lost perspective.
Let me put this out there and see what you think. I have concluded that I have been very fortunate to spend the past three years in a position to take care of Tanner on a daily basis. On the micro side, I drop him off at school in the mornings; I will hit the gym, go grocery shopping, do the laundry, the dishes and work around the house until it’s time to pick him up. I’m guess I’m doing all the things Deb would be doing if we were living that traditional life of the dad working and the mom taking care of the house, etc.
But it’s the macro view of the past three years that I think really struck me and made me see how valuable this time has been. You know, there just aren’t many dads who can say they have been able to raise and bond with their child on a daily basis. Obviously, not working and maintaining a household takes a lot of money, but my new perspective is that the money I have spent over the course of three years is minimal compared to the lifelong payback I will get from investing this time in Tanner now.
I know he is my kid and bragging is easy in this situation, but the truth is that he is a sweet, intelligent, well rounded little guy and I’m not so sure he would be that way had I gone back to a 9 to 5 job shortly after losing his mom. As I write this, I’m starting to think I may have been a different person at this time as well had I gone back to work. Tanner and I have shaped each other over the past few years.
This one situation can be dissected and viewed in many different ways. You can imagine how one’s perspective on life may change when dealing with the death of a loved one. I vowed after Deb’s passing that I wouldn’t sweat over the small things in life. How could things ever be as bad as they were? Unfortunately, life catches us off guard sometimes and perspective flies right out the window. It happened to me just the other day until I sat on that rock. It’s ironic but maybe we have to lose perspective to find it.
