Today is my son James’ 26th birthday. So, in addition to the ordinary, material birthday presents, I thought I’d write this.
I keep saying he’s the bravest man I know, and I mean it. I also have a younger, slightly shorter brother named Jeff who is a police officer, so when I say my son James is brave, I don’t issue that compliment lightly.
First, the tough stuff, and if you’re reading this, James, please don’t stop until you get to the end.
James is not a person blessed with obvious and easily marketable talents. He battles with school, though he is chugging away at his college education. He battles with interpersonal relationships, though he is not unfriendly. He is reasonably athletic, though by no means a superstar in sports. In short, he appears to be unremarkable to anyone who gives him only a cursory look.
It’s precisely these battles that make him the special person he is. I’ve had some things come easily to me, and I’ve suffered for it. I struggled in college somewhat because high school was, for the most part, a breeze. On the whole, I didn’t know what it meant to work until I reached college, and then, I had to learn very quickly. I didn’t always succeed. It took me a long time to develop a work ethic, and most of the reason I finally was able to was because of people like my son.
He was born in trouble. He suffered from “failure to thrive” and was born severely jaundiced. Right from the start, this was a human being who was never going to be handed things easily. Just moments after his birth, he was told by an indifferent universe that he was going to have to work at things that almost no one else on the planet would have to.
And he did it. He does it every day. He gets up and faces a world that gave him very little, and he scratches and claws and fights for every single inch of progress or achievement he’s ever had. Sue and I provide him with what he needs to thrive, but we don’t solve his problems for him. He’s aware that he needs to work harder than most for what he gets, but he doesn’t rail at the universe for his situation. In fact, he laments that there are people who have less than he does.
I may have painted a picture of a total failure, but James is the farthest thing from a failure you’ll ever meet.
He possesses a nearly superhuman ability to know right from wrong in a moral sense. He can detect suffering in others, even when the wounds are invisible or the cries are silent. He just seems to know, without effort or fanfare, what is ailing someone else and how he can ease their pain. He doesn’t even need to think about it–his presence is calming and supportive naturally. His smile and laugh are evidence that the world should go on. I sometimes think about my own, rather insignificant troubles and inevitably compare them to my son’s, and, while I don’t exactly become ashamed at myself, I rally in a way I hope is even a fraction as determined as my son would be.
I’m old, and perhaps there are more yesterdays than tomorrows for me, but I still hope one day to be the man my son is now.
James, I love you. Keep on being the man you are. Happy birthday!
Be seeing you!
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