In our family we have a dinner-time ritual. We go around the table and share our daily high, low, and bronco. The high and low are obvious. The bronco can be whatever random thing is on your mind that you want to share. This ritual is a way of controlling the potential, verbal chaos that notoriously happens at a dinner table with a large family. But it is also a way of getting into the mind and heart of each of my children. It is a way of pursuing them and knowing them. Sometimes the responses can be quite interesting.
Yesterday was my third son's birthday. He turned 5 years old. He is full of life, always smiling and more than a little bit mischievous. But his passion in life right now is for John Deere tractors and combines. So, true to himself, he wanted yellow and green decorations (except that he changed his mind at the last minute and asked for a crocodile cake).
Early in the day we gave him one of his presents. It was a green, remote control combine - equipped with sound effects, lights and two interchangeable headers. Needless to say, we probably could have stopped there. For the rest of the day, he was transfixed! We charged the batteries several times to keep this harvester in the field.
At one point I ventured upstairs. I found him sitting by himself in his room, lights off, shades drawn, in the dark driving this combine back and forth. He was watching how the lights looked in the dark. I looked down at my son alone on his birthday but perfectly content. In that moment, I got down on the floor to engage with him in his world of fantasy harvesting.
So, if you ask me about my high, low, and bronco yesterday, I would have to say that the moment of playing together with a cheap, remote control combine with my son in the dark was a pretty good high.
I have noticed that we as adults often have an unfortunate position in life. Yes, we have significantly more knowledge, skills, and abilities. But that is also met with increased demands for our time, attention, and responsibility across the various spheres of life. Rather than being a tool to provide clarity, the points on the compass can become the nidus of an unending to do list. In the business of all that there is to do, it is all too easy to lose perspective and capacity to stop and enjoy this simple pleasures of driving a toy combine.
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