I Don't Know

The person who has best taught me how to say “I don’t know” is my grandfather, my mom’s dad. This despite the fact that I thought he knew everything when I was a child.

Grandad was one of my college professors. He taught Biology. Spring of my freshman year at Whitworth, I took Human Biology from him. The final paper was to be a for-or-against argument, one I wasn’t yet ready to write. So I wrote Grandad a letter, which was not the assignment. I explained the inner turmoil I was experiencing from what I had learned in class.

He wrote me a letter back. Here is part of it…

“We must all learn to live with dissonance. There is so much we don’t know. I firmly believe there are some things that are beyond knowing. I also believe that God intended that because he wants us to trust Him. Kyrsty, you must know that I believe without apology that the only acceptable explanation for the human phenomenon, biology included, is that God did it.

“As for the resurrection of the body, I don’t find that possibility any more miraculous than God having created us with all of our complexity and material uniqueness in the first place…

“I anticipate that both your wonder and awe of our God and the wondrous creation of His that is Life will increase as you continue to contemplate how ‘marvelously and wonderfully we are made’. I wonder why He went to all that effort just to erase it in eternity. What do you think?”

Grandad stretched us, taught us detailed and expansive information, shared his worldview and faith, and asked us to come to our own conclusions. My faith became my own after I took that class. And I learned to say, “I don’t know.” A sentence my children hear quite often.

Stage Mom

My 6-year-old son, Karsten, was just cast as Tom Cratchet in “A Christmas Carol”. I will join him on stage as the Ghost of Christmas Past. Now the hard work begins: NOT becoming a stage mom.

I thought I had it under control when we went to auditions. While Karsten needed help with lines (he is just starting to read), I did not want to “direct” him. I fed him lines with appropriate inflection and dialect, but did not coach facial expression or movement. He did beautifully! Ever the character actor at home, he was just as comfortable in front of an audience of strangers.

Then came callbacks. I helped him with his two small lines, then sat in the audience while he followed the other actors’ lead. He was great! Comfortable and confident, he came in on cue.

I had almost made it through the audition process without embarrassing myself. Then as the director looked around to choose another audition group, I blew it. I raised Karsten’s hand for him – a classic stage mom move.

Of course, he did not get called on. Nor did the director frown in our direction. But I had violated my pledge to not “manage” my son. It may seem like a small thing, but I read in my heart the desire to put my child ahead of the others.

We all want our children to have new opportunities and experiences, but sometimes our best intentions are tainted with our own ambition and competitiveness. It becomes all about us, rather than them.

Tomorrow is the first night of rehearsal. A new opportunity for me to launch my son and let him test his wings. I will be there to catch him should he fall. But I commit myself to not interfere when he soars.