The following poem has had a big impact on me over the last
couple of years. It helps me stop and
really think about my actions, the guarded and the unguarded ones. Am I the kind of dad that my kids look up to
because they’re too young to understand how hypocritical and hateful I am? Or, am I the kind of dad that my kids will
appreciate most after they have begun to experience life a bit?
What about my wife?
Does she dread the time of day that I come home because she knows she’s
going to have to shoulder some of the weight of the junk I’ve been dealing with
all day? Does she feel that she is a
better woman having been close to me for so long? Am I critical and overbearing or positive and
uplifting?
Only a
dad, with a tired face,
Coming
home from the daily race,
Bringing
little of gold or fame,
To
show how well he has played the game,
But
glad in his heart that his own rejoice
To see
him come, and to hear his voice.
Only a
dad, with a brood of four,
One of
ten million men or more.
Plodding
along in the daily strife,
Bearing
the whips and the scorns of life,
With
never a whimper of pain or hate,
For
the sake of those who at home await.
Only a
dad, neither rich nor proud,
Merely
one of the surging crowd
Toiling,
striving from day to day,
Facing
whatever may come his way,
Silent,
whenever the harsh condemn,
And
bearing it all for the love of them.
Only a
dad, but he gives his all
To
smooth the way for his children small,
Doing,
with courage stern and grim,
The
deeds that his father did for him.
This
is the line that for him I pen,
Only a
dad, but the best of men.
Only a Dad
By Edgar Albert Guest
Only a dad, with a tired face,
Coming home from the daily race,
Bringing little of gold or fame,
To show how well he has played the game,
But glad in his heart that his own rejoice
To see him come, and to hear his voice.
(We are all
tired. Crap happens at work. Sometimes it’s out-right confrontation or
conflict. Sometimes knowing the burdens
of co-workers or of people that report to you can be quite a weight to carry,
do you carry that weight on your face? Is the gladness in your heart able to
shine through the tiredness on your face?
After a long day at work do you come home and heap the stress of the day
on your family, or is your family the high point of your day? From the book “Happiness Homemade”, “They
[husbands] frequently come to their homes with clouded brows, bringing no
sunshine to the family circle.” “The
husband and father who is morose, selfish, and overbearing is not only unhappy
himself, but he casts gloom upon all the inmates of his home. He will reap the result in seeing his wife
dispirited and sickly and his children marred with his own unlovely temper” Maybe
you’ve gotten caught up in trying to provide a better life for your family and
in the process have forgotten how to drop everything else and let your face
show them the joy that they bring to your heart. You may not need to quit your job but you do
need to remember how to let that joy out.
I used to come home and talk about my frustrations with the guys at work
and how much I hated my job. My job is
challenging and can be very frustrating, but, it takes very good care of my
family. I’m in the job because I haven’t
decided to do something else. What
insinuations do I make to my family with my complaints about work? Whether I knew it or not, I was making it
clear to them that they were a burden. I
never said it, but it would have been easy to understand if the message they
got was that if it weren’t for them I could be doing any number of things that I
would love to do. In this situation I
have a responsibility to make a decision to be happy, change jobs or positions,
or all of the above. If the life I’m
providing for my family doesn’t give me a joy greater than the stress of the
job then it’s not the job for me.)
Only a dad, with a brood of four,
One of ten million men or more.
Plodding along in the daily strife,
Bearing the whips and the scorns of life,
With never a whimper of pain or hate,
For the sake of those who at home await.
(These 2 lines are
awesome and it will be a different world if we can just harness the power of
the implications of these 2 lines in our lives.
At a superficial
glance the first one could be depressing to most men. We want to stand out from the crowd. We want to be the best at what we do, to be
known for what we are capable of. I
spent years in my job trying to be the best.
It’s been years since I was employed at the floor level and I still get
challenges from time to time from people who only know of me and want to see if
they could keep up. This is an exciting
accomplishment, it would be a lie to say otherwise, and, yes it can be
difficult not to let pride get the best of me.
Here’s the truth though, if I left the company that I work for tomorrow,
it would keep ticking right along. Very
successfully at that. They wouldn’t even
notice my absence. Your career is probably
not how God wants you to stand out from the ten million men or more. The way you stand out for more than your
lifetime is to be great as a dad and husband.
Will you perform these roles in such a way that people will feel that
something is missing from their lives when you’re gone? Even just to leave a hole felt by those who
loved you would be failure in a sense.
You don’t want to leave behind a bunch of people that were dependent on
you, you want to leave those people with a mission and the skills and
confidence to carry out that mission. It
should be a feeling more of losing a fellow warrior or brother in arms.
The second line
reminds me to take ownership of my situation in life. Every situation offers me the chance for an
education. It may be an education in one
trade or another, or it may be an education in faith, or it may be an education
in self. If it’s difficult then you have
an opportunity to learn something about yourself in difficult situations. Pray and meditate on what makes it difficult
for you and what you need to get from the situation, then, if needed, move
on. Whatever you do, do it on
purpose. Don’t base your decisions on
emotion. If life is hard, if you find it
difficult to be where you are, then do something about it. Learn to be content where you are, find another
job, move to another state, get marriage counseling, start dating your wife again. Make life exciting, or less exciting. Just quit whining about it. I’m not suggesting that you never talk to
your wife about the issues that concern you.
There’s a difference between seeking council and whining.)
Only a dad, neither rich nor proud,
Merely one of the surging crowd
Toiling, striving from day to day,
Facing whatever may come his way,
Silent, whenever the harsh condemn,
And bearing it all for the love of them.
(It was mentioned
above but it’s worth mentioning again.
What burdens do you bear for the sake of providing all you can for your
family? As much displeasure as these
burdens may bring can you see them as a blessing in light of the joy that
providing for your family brings to your heart?
If not, start looking at other options.
Are you keeping your priorities properly aligned? Are you working a job that you and your
family hate because you are trying to maintain a certain standard of
living? See what you can do without and
fix it. Every job is going to have its
challenges, you need to find the one that won’t rob your family of you or you
of your family. But, don’t run from job
to job with no plan. The point is that you
will face challenges on this journey, you need to learn to see these challenges
as a kind of badge of honor. Could you
really appreciate the value of your family if you didn’t face some challenges,
if there were no sacrifice involved, in raising them?)
Only a dad, but he gives his all
To smooth the way for his children small,
Doing, with courage stern and grim,
The deeds that his father did for him.
This is the line that for him I pen,
Only a dad, but the best of men.
(“a
man is meant to carry such responsibility that he will descend into exhaustion
and resentment if he does not have the inner resources that come from living in
connection with God” Stephen Mansfield, Mansfield’s Book of Manly Men. It’s very easy for us to apply the ideas of
these deeds or responsibilities to our professional lives, but what if we did
well at our jobs so we could provide a stable life for our families and focused
all of our energy and desire to achieve greatness towards our family. Not to burden our families with expectations
of perfection. Here is a question that I
think illustrates where I’m trying to go.
If someone asked my wife or kids what they think my actions show is most
important to me, what would they say?
The 2 answers that should be most obvious to them should be “God” and “us”.)
