Time will tell

You wish for a happy future for your kids, don’t you?

When I had my first one, I used to whisper to him, “I’ll look after your every need.”

I meant it sincerely. In my heart, that was my intention, to care for his physical needs until he could care for himself, to play with him and talk to him forever and to make sure there were lots of opportunities to connect to his emotions and spirituality.

It wasn’t many months before, broken- hearted, I realized I could no more meet his every need than I could fly to the moon. In fact, it wasn’t many months before my hope became, simply, that he would live to grow up. He took such risks! Partly, this was because he had such a different temperament than I and, also, was absolutely fearless.

Thank goodness he did sleep on a regular basis because I certainly need to. Once he could walk, it took all of my energy just to keep him out of danger. I didn’t always succeed in that mission, of course. He thought he could fly like Superman so he climbed up on the deck railing (which put him about 18 feet off the ground) and leapt. I missed the whole thing while I was hanging out the laundry. It was years later before he told me what had happened.

Now that he is approaching middle age, he recently complained to me that he still is challenged in the foresight area - he often just goes ahead and follows his instincts. We’re both grateful he can learn how to be safe in the toxic environments of his work life. He welcomes the opportunity to pit himself against a physical challenge. He has clambered inside gigantic chicken eviscerators, cut apart gigantic bulldozers with a torch, dangled 200 feet in the air when he slipped off a grain mill ( thank goodness for the harness!) and presently operates a blast furnace and works with molten metal. He finds it satisfying work.

It has seemed to me during the past few weeks of the municipal election campaign that we are at the beginning of a new era. The race for the new office of mayor of the Municipality had set off some entertaining political shenanigans and the districts have been hotly contested as well. When you read this, we will know whether my prediction that we will elect a new kind of municipal council comes true.

It will take us a little time to get to know this new baby and for it to show its temperament. Let’s expect the councillors will have an appetite for challenge and will be prepared to consider the benefit of our collective foresight. What I’m hoping for is a municipal council who can agree on some common goals and talk to each other long enough to figure out a way of achieving those objectives.

I’m curious to find out how satisfying we find the developments of this election.