In the midst of all of this, my oldest son Josiah was rapidly approaching his 18th birthday. He’s excited, as he should be. As his father, I am struggling trying to rectify the truth that my little baby is now a legal adult, preparing to move hours away for college. Life has been weighing heavily on me for several weeks now as I watched my brother descending in his final days. Josiah walked up to me in the kitchen on Sunday. I was standing there, trying to figure out what to pack in an emergency last-minute trip down to see Chris before it was too late. This beautiful man child said something about feeling bad because his birthday is this week and he was worried it would be a distraction - or that it may always carry the stigma of whatever happened with Chris. I looked up at him. He is so tall and strong. He has Chris’ longer hair and shorter height, with my burlier body. My coloring and Chris’ aptitude for science.
Tears collected in my eyes and I told him. “Eighteen years ago, the worst thing that most of us will ever experience happened. Our worlds were in ruins along with those towers. And you came along that night, bringing joy to so many as they looked at you and realized that love and hope were still alive. And I have no doubt that your turning eighteen will serve the exact same purpose. Your whole life has brought joy to us. It makes sense that your day to become a man will bring joy in the midst of pain.” Then I hugged him. Hard.
When Josiah was in fourth grade (I think), we were experiencing some parenting challenges. He wasn’t a naughty kid; he’s NEVER been a naughty kid. He just was growing up and we had never had a fourth grader before. Especially one that frequently appeared to have left his brain in another part of the house. We wondered if maybe there was something we were missing - something medically off. So at his annual checkup, we asked Dr Michael Middleton that very question. He laughed. “No. Nothing wrong. He’s a very normal ten year old.” We felt better, in some ways, and we felt irritated in others. If this was normal, what exactly does that mean for us? We were frequently at our wits’ end. Okay, fine, I was frequently at my wit’s end. Josiah and I are NOT the same people, but we have enough overlapping characteristics and qualities that it can be like dragging the rough sides of two pieces of sandpaper across each other. I probably made some sarcastic comment (you already figured that, I’m sure). Dr Middleton looked at us and said one of the most insightful things I had and have ever heard. It changed how we (I) parented forever. “You are not trying to raise a good ten year old. You are trying to raise a good man. And there are going to be times where raising a good man will cause problems with your ten year old. But remember the end goal.”
Go back and read that again. Brilliant stuff. America has become an instant-gratification society. If a football coach doesn’t win in year one or two, he gets fired. If a company doesn’t make enough money in a quarter, the board gets canned. If a school, church, politician, girlfriend, spouse, kid doesn’t show the results expected, they are tossed in favor of something better. Thank God Almighty that He doesn’t treat me that way - and that my wife didn’t treat me that way. We were falling into that pattern with our kids, though. There were many times where we were getting super frustrated with our two year old or six year old or twelve year old. They didn’t live up to the image that somebody had put out there as the way a kid that age should act. And that leads to exasperation and anger and panic.
My wife watches a lot of Gilmore Girls. On repeat, every night, even when she falls asleep. As a result, I have seen every episode many times - probably more times than she has seen them, actually. They play when she falls asleep and then they play again the next night when she watches them awake. And the next one plays when she’s asleep, and so on. Anyway, there is a storyline with Luke (the Diner owner and Lorelai’s soulmate) and his idiot nephew Jess (Milo Ventimiabdulaoblingata at his most irritating - yes, worse than Heroes). Jess is a punk. And the town hates him, deservedly so. They want him gone. And Luke finally snaps in a meeting and says, “If I remember correctly, I was a trouble maker and a rough kid. And I made a lot of bad choices. But now I don’t think I turned out so bad. A lot of people made sure I didn’t turn out so bad. And I am not going to let that kid fall through the cracks.” THAT is the “raise a good man” approach. And (spoiler alert), he succeeded. Jess turns out to be a pretty good man.
All of that is to say my priorities changed that day in that office. As frustrating as things could be, the goal was to raise a good man.
So now I look at my high school senior, my legally adult son, and I think Heather and I succeeded in raising a good man. No, he isn’t a good man. He is a GREAT young man. His story isn’t done yet. He is just starting on the adult path, but I am so very proud of where he is now and where he is going. He is kind and compassionate. He hurts when people he loves hurt. He takes care of us and his sister and his brother. He gets angry at injustice. He is not perfect. But he has noticed areas he needed to improve and he has worked very very VERY hard to do better. His freshman year was rough academically and socially. But he buckled down and worked hard and got organized. He took on aggressively difficult schedules, all while doing band. He practice his instrument every day until he went from being the “kid from South Carolina band” (that was an insult in Texas) to the head of the lower brass choir, district band member, and the de facto leader of his section here in Columbia as a new student. He passed every AP test with 4 or 5 - meaning he earned college credits in all of the subjects. He scored high enough on the SAT to assure that a big chunk of his college is going to be paid for immediately - in state or out of state. And he is pursuing a path towards Vet School. By all of those standards, he is a success. He has done well.
But all of that is just surface stuff. Lots of kids do that stuff and turn out to be the kinds of people who exacerbate the disease of hatred and ignorance that is destroying our country. They are the ones who Apostle Paul describes as speaking with the tongues of angels and dining with kings but not having love. THIS is where Heather and I are the most proud of Josiah. He is a GOOD man. He cares; he loves; he serves; he hurts; he gives. A few weeks ago, when my brother was starting to get into bad shape, I got off the phone with him and just sat there on the couch and cried. Josiah came downstairs and saw me sitting there. He started crying and came sat next to me and hugged me. He just held me, knowing that I needed that. This high school senior who should have an adversarial relationship with his parents (according to most stereotypes) sat there holding his dad like it was his job to comfort ME. Last night he and his siblings were arguing over who gets to have me and Heather stay with them when we are old. As he has been considering becoming a veterinarian I have been trying to make sure he understands it isn’t just playing with animals. I’ve told him he is going to have to do surgery on animals and see animals hurting and put animals down. He will have to give pet owners terrible news. He has looked at me and said, “Yes I know. And they’ll need someone like me at that time.” He’s just like his mother - the doctor who deals with kids with death sentences and fights their disease while bringing them hope, dignity, love. I have no doubt Josiah will be an absolutely incredible vet.
Josiah is a collector. He got that from every side of his family, I think. He collects Funko Pop figures from Marvel and Jurassic Park and a few other franchises. It has been interesting as we have watched him start collecting and as he has moved into a serious collector. He has an eye for things. He has become a member of that collecting world, contributing on message boards and hunting down pieces he is searching for. These aren’t always for him, mind you. He knows what every person in his family is drawn to and knows the exact date every one of those pieces go on sale. He has searched down exclusive and hard-to-find figures for his parents, siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles. When you combine that attention to detail and the gift-giving love language, you get a very special present giver. One of the best stories in his collecting was when we wandered into a Half Price Used Books store in Sugar Land. He always checks the Pop walls and stands. This time, he saw a Game of Thrones character that he recognized as pretty valuable. It was on sale for five bucks. He got it and then flipped it online for a very exclusive and expensive Marvel piece he wanted and sixty dollars - that he turned into two other hard-to-find items. I’ve enjoyed watching him (okay, fine, enabling him) as he became a grownup in that world. This once timid kid calls stores all over, negotiates sales and purchases, and does it in a respectful and thoughtful manner. He’ll never try to buy out a store’s stock because he knows there is a kid like him who is going to come along and want that piece, and he wants that kid to be able to get it.
I’ve been wrestling with grief over my brother for several days now. People ask how I’m doing and I don’t always know what to say. Sometimes I’m numb. Other times I hurt. There are times when I am just confused. Mostly, though, it feels like a part of me got ripped out. Today was the first day I’ve been alone since this all happened. I was worried about how it would go. But I went and sat at my computer to write about my son. And just like I told him, it brought me joy and hope and healing. When I focused on him and the man he has become and the man he will be, I was excited about the future. He is going to bring so many people joy in the worst of times: when their pet is sick, when they are brokenhearted, when the world seems to have forgotten them. He is going to bring them hope. It is what he always has done. That’s a man to be proud of.
