29/07/2023
His bedroom was a disaster. Usually some sort of weird smell. Up all night. Asleep all day. Dropped out in Grade 11. Worked part-time at a bakery.
And then, before his seventeenth birthday, he applied for culinary school, packed his bags, and moved into college residence.
I expected a phone call soon after asking us to please come get him. He’s not attending classes. There’s a weird smell emanating from his room.
But that call never came. Turns out, he attended all classes. Was a natural.
He did complain, however, that no one in the dorm would change the toilet paper roll.
After that, he bought a jalopy, packed a couple changes of clothes and headed west to visit a friend. Then he found a job. Nowhere to live, but a full-time job in a restaurant.
A series of terrible apartments, filled with unsavoury characters.
And then the realization that cooks don’t make decent money, no matter how high the restaurant ranks in glossy tourist magazines.
So Adam walked down the street to the nearest high school, finished enough courses to graduate, and then applied to college.
Fast forward years later and now he’s walking across the stage to receive his degree in political science from SFU. Lives in downtown Vancouver with a lovely partner and a dog named Tofu. Appreciates jazz and expensive pens and wandering off into the woods.
I bring this up not just because of all the warm and fuzzy feelings that come from seeing the kid do well, but to remind parents that things have a way of working out.
Maybe not how you imagined. Maybe there are some major hiccups along the way. Sometimes the best thing is to have them leave home early. Find their own way. Change the toilet paper roll. Buy a crap car. Live with unsavoury characters.
Or maybe the best thing is something else entirely. Every kid is different. Every kid needs a different path up the mountain. Swinging their own machete. A path of their choosing. They need to make mistakes.
Congratulations Adam. Proud of you.