Comfort or self calming?

Father…

And son, 29 years later

    Newborn E, no smiles, startled on being awakened from a sound sleep; more important to convenience the photographer than the baby, right Mom?  Goes to show wrongheaded priorities right from the beginning. So sorry, son.  But your grandma got it right with your dad, her baby, A: eyes fixed on him, a little tickle, then  rewarded with a big smile.

     So a repeating question:  Are we put on this earth to fail our children?  I just heard my father‘s voice in my head and he was saying, “I’m sorry.”  I say the same thing to my children in my head so frequently, and I think about my siblings’ children, too:  So many disastrous missteps that their  parents  -I- cannot, could not, or would not prevent. We fail to protect them from errors of their ways or our own. 

   I remember the images of sweet, smiling infants, at least photos:  E, S, I, A, C, D, L, myself,  and I cherish them.  I consider my neighbor’s uber intense efforts to shelter her daughters and admire her for them, with hopes their lives will turn out better for that all-in mother love.  

     But we all suffer. Then laugh in the face of it sometimes, or die crying.  “Bible says, dust to dust. That’s why I don’t dust; might be somebody we know.”

     And, really, I think parental guilt may be what attaches me so closely to my little dog at this time of life.  And here I thought it was love!  Well, I’ve always acknowledged my lack of clarity on love.  Tut, tut.