The Great Divide
We dropped our son off at University a couple weeks ago. It was a weird feeling. It had nothing to do with the 4 flights of stairs we had to carry his stuff up to. That was a different, more painful, feeling. On one hand, I’m so proud that he has chosen a path and is entering a new phase on his way to independence. On the other, I knew it was going to feel emptier around the house without my boy to talk/watch sports with.
I started this blog in January of 2012. My kids were 1 and 3 years old, respectively. Older parents used to tell me to cherish the moments when they are young because the time was going to fly, and I’d nod my head and smile, not really too worried about that happening. To be honest, I never really felt like the time was passing by too quickly while they were little. It wasn’t until the last couple years that I have really started to feel like life is starting to speed up a bit more than I am interested in.
The kids are looking older, dressing like adults, going to parties, driving on their own, going to the casino… Watching my son’s final season in competitive sports brought out a decade’s worth of great memories, and dropping him off at university made me long for the days of helping him tie his skates or teaching him how to throw. My beautiful little angel of daughter, who used to dress me up in princess gear so we could disappear into a world of make believe, is now traveling the world as a diver and turning those stories into realities.
Somewhere in between the race car bed and university dorm, I lost track of where my stories of the kids ended and their personal stories began. I have always loved writing about them and incorporating them into whatever ridiculous ideas we could come up with when working with different brands. Now I find myself with the time to start writing again but with less of a story to tell, especially when it comes to fatherhood.
Then again, if there’s one thing I learned about storytelling from my many trips to Dad 2.0 Summit and Blissdom Canada, it’s that there are stories everywhere just waiting for someone to tell them. For instance, what do Bruno Mars, a blown out tire, a monsoon and a viral TikTok all have in common?? Actually…that one you’ll have to wait for!