Growing up
Guest Dad Joe Burris on helping his daughter, a soon-to-be high school student, navigate the road ahead:
Recently my 13-year-old daughter Nyaniso and I were dining in a restaurant when she announced what our family has known since she graduated junior high school last month:
“I’m going to high school next year!”
We began talking about it, and then it occurred to me that we really hadn’t talked about it. In an instant I began pondering what lay ahead, and soon it began to feel as if the whole thing had snuck up on me.
I thought about how, if all goes well, fairly soon my firstborn child will be learning to drive (gasp!), dressing for the prom, tossing a high school graduation cap skyward, picking a college, packing her bags and – whoa – leaving the nest.
And then I went from fast forward to flashback:
Shortly before my daughter was born the doctors came in and told my wife and me that my wife’s umbilical cord was wrapped around my daughter’s neck and that if they didn’t go in and get her immediately she would strangle. I can’t recall ever feeling so helpless.
But moments later, the doctors reached down into the birth canal and pulled out this 6-pound, 12-ounce bundle of blessings.
“Waaaaaaaaah!” she exclaimed as smiles filled the room and tears filled my eyes.
Then the bundle of blessings wouldn’t shut up.
“Waaaaaaaah! Waaaaaah! Waaaaaaaah!” The doctors seemed to get a kick out of it as the wiped red and beige gunk off her face and body. When they brought her to my wife and me, she quieted down.
I couldn’t take my eyes off of her as they wheeled her out of the delivery room, and in failing to look before me I ran headfirst into a low-hanging light. I hit the fixture so hard that I stood dazed for a moment, which frightened the doctors so much that they admitted me to the hospital for overnight observation. They ended putting my wife, daughter and me in the same room.
Suddenly, a 13-year-old voice brought me back to the present.
“Daddy? Daddy, are you okay,” Nyaniso asked, staring puzzled at me.
“Yes, Sweetie, I’m fine,” I replied.
The thought of her growing up fast has hit me the same way, as if I didn’t truly see it coming because I’ve been too busy staring at her, hoping that moments of feeling helpless are few and far between. But I know that it doesn’t have to be either/or: I can see her and the road ahead and do my best to make her capable and confident to one day walk it alone.
That thought left me content enough to finish my food before it turned cold.
