In haste, I catch another angel, put out another fire, try to perfect a deity with my clay hands. Fatherhood is fashioning the future with the past as your only reference. You tend to fill in gaps of memory with imagination. Father is a mystic that changes diapers one minute and changes minds the next, still get some shit on your hands either case but, that's what daddies do.
The less ego, the more you have to give "I want you to be better than me". Couldn't have said that a 17 or 22, but at 32 or 40, of course. I see my own limitations and push my offspring past them. I surgically remove those handicaps with spankings, lectures and exposure to parts of the world I didn't know at that age. I stand on myself and left you up over my head.
"What do you see?"
"Ok, I don't understand, but go for it. Just remember what I taught you."
They come back with little treasures from atlantis, college and friendships with age-old enemies. Strange writings on stones that can be read by younger eyes. I trust the currency I provided will spend in the future. It came from my flesh, pounds of it.
"Daddy, we don't do things like that anymore."
Like VHS tapes, some of my knowledge becomes obsolete and I fight with myself to accept it. My shrunken ego wallows in the past and brushes off the Now as an illusion. My higher self rocks back and forth and listens.
"So, how do things work now?"
Now, I'm the old man being taught by the future. Ego goes to the grave long before me, but I don't miss him. Less tension now. Things are as they are, no interpretation needed. I just am. My children just are. There is enlightenment in just accepting what you experience as it is. Just rocking back and forth. Just listening, just being available when needed. Just fading into memory, becoming a ghost like my mothers and fathers before me.
Photo: Firetruck speeding passed me taken w/iPhone 3GS, Hipstamatic app (Melodie, Big Up)
