Jake has been pestering me to fill out his high school registration form and because I am a) in denial that my baby Jake is going to high school and b) because I'm in denial that my baby Jake is going to high school, I'm putting it off for as long as possible. Instead, we sat down together tonight and watched the best of Chris Farley, Saturday Night Live.
One of my favourite scenes is during the "Chris Farley Show" (a spoof, naturally) where he interviews Paul McCartney and comments on one of his quotes: "The love you take is equal to the love you make." Jake and I talked about it for a bit and interpreted it as that we need to love as we want to be loved. We need to treat others the way we want to be treated. We can't expect the world to lick our wounds while we keep walking into the fire.
The kids know that I am easy-going and all-loving, and sickeningly so, but they also understand that if there's one thing on this earth that makes me homicidal, it's when someone parks in our designated reserved parking spot outside of our home. When we pulled in yesterday, I found a white domestic car parked in our spot, and I proceeded to furiously scribble a nasty note onto a piece of slurpee-stained napkin to leave on their windshield, but when the suspected assholes started walking toward their car I tucked the sticky napkin into my pocket and then went all like, passive-aggressive on them, killing them with majorly loud body language.
Did I feel better after that?
No.
I don't need to accept the bullshit that this world has to offer but I certainly do not need to seek it out, either.
It was a gorgeous sunny day out today and everyone was in a great mood. We piled into the van with skateboards and scooters and bikes and headed to the park but just as we were loading up the van, the same people from yesterday pulled in and parked beside us, in the regular parking spots. I gave them a sheepish smile and they nodded a graceful look in return and I knew that all was okay. Not just with us, but with the world. Because love doesn't merely exist with us, but in spite of us.
The love we make is equal to the love we take, true. But it's not a transaction or it wouldn't be love. Love is a gift. Love is grace. We accept it undeservedly and we give it unreservedly. But if we keep walking into the fire with the expectation that the world will keep licking our wounds then we will get burned. And we will lose our parking spot.
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