Take a Trip, Clear Your Mind...

After a couple of years of wandering aimlessly through a couple of different college programs, The Boy has decided to take a year off from his search of post-secondary knowledge. In hindsight, J and I should have encouraged him to do this sooner, as it would have save a lot of time, money and frustration by everyone involved, but as parents, you want your children to succeed, have more and do more than you personally.

During my generation, we finished high school knowing we were lucky to be heading off for college because many of our parents didn’t have that ability. They simply finished high school and entered the work force, got married, started a family, etc. A post-secondary education wasn’t expected from them, or in some cases it wasn’t even an option.

In this day and age, we expect our children to be destined for greatness and when greatness doesn’t come exactly how and when we expect it – on our terms and schedule, we become overly concerned that there is something fundamentally wrong with our children or we begin to second guess our parenting ability.

Having experience those exact misgivings, we’ve taken a step back and reevaluated what’s important. The Boy’s happiness is our # 1 priority. God knows, we don’t want him to pick a career path for the sake of shutting us up and be miserable for the rest of his life, which in turn will make him resent us.

On the other hand, he’s not going to be lollygagging about doing nothing but playing video games for the next year. J and I expect him to be a contributing member of society and with that will come a job - eventually.

But before the job, he’s gone off on a little adventure – to Ireland. He’s been saving for a couple of years for this one and is paying for it himself, so I wasn’t about to nag about the need to get a job over the need to travel. That would be downright hypocritical because we all know I would easily pick travel over a job.

So, with that said – he packed his bag, jumped on a plane and off he went to tour Ireland. He’s been gone since last Saturday and will be back this coming Saturday. It certainly isn’t a backpack across Europe kind of trip, but this is something that’s definitely out of his comfort zone.

I’m hoping somehow he’ll become inspired by his adventure and with that inspiration will come clarity - clarity on what he wants to be when he grows up or maybe he’ll choose the lifestyle I’ve always wanted for myself – beach bum extraordinaire.

Only time will tell how this adventure will impact his future and until then, we wait.