As soon as I set my backpack down on the dining room table I heard it – the most annoying sound in the world. And if you can’t admit that this is one of, if not the most annoying sound in the world, I believe you are taking yourself way too seriously as a parent (that is, of course, if you are a parent, and if you’re not a parent then this won’t ring as true, but it’ll still work). The sound was coming from the kitchen. The sound was the whining voice of my four year-old. “I’m so hungry… I want dinner… when are we going to eat?” Ever been there? It was only 5 o’clock.
My wife – who is so much more adept at this than me – said something along the lines of what we hope to say in situations like these (you know all that gospel parenting stuff about going after their hearts), “Honey, I love to give you good things, I always feed you dinner, and it will be ready in a little while.” Well, as you might have guessed, that didn’t work at all, so I chimed in from the other room, all the while unwilling to take the time to even walk into the kitchen and look at my daughter in the eye. You know, one of those quick and detached rebukes, the worst but most frequent kinds we give. “Ellie, you’re only thinking about yourself,” I hollered from the other room, flipping through the mail as I chided her, “and what you want. You need to think about others first, not yourself. Your heart needs to change.” Check. Case closed. That settles it. I am a good father who goes after his child’s heart.
Convinced of my awesomeness as a dad, I walked into the den. I saw my two year-old playing on the floor, and I thought to myself, why can’t Ellie be more like her? And then something so rare, so raw, so ridiculously gorgeous happened. I can’t begin to put it into words, but I’ll still try. It was tragic and beautiful and painful and magnificent, all at the very same time. As Ellie made her way around the corner – sulking, shuffling her feet, staring at the floor – suddenly she thrust both her fists down to her side (sort of like she was straightening her shirt) and with a muffled and sobbing sigh, she exclaimed, in a whisper (if that were possible), “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!” If repentance has a face I saw it.
Overwhelmed by her sorrow and my arrogance I raced over to her, tossed her up in the air (her head almost hit the ceiling fan), hugged her so tight that she said it hurt a little bit, and said, “Ellie, you’re sorry. I’m so glad you’re sorry. Daddy’s sorry too!” She buried her head into my chest. After finally managing to peel her face away from me, I told her, “God is throwing a big party in heaven for you right now.” She gave me this wry little smile – like she had just gotten away with something – only to put her head back down on my chest again. So we just sat there until dinner was ready. And it felt sort of like I was burying my head in someone else’s chest.
© 2006, Linc Ashby.
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