An Earned Moment

An Earned Moment

John Paul Derryberry

The blonde hair waived in the Minnesota North Woods wind. She hesitantly gathered herself at the edge of the stepping stone. She took a glance to the left and then to the right. She then glanced back at me to ensure I wasn't kidding when I said she could run to her grandparent's cabin without me. It was the cabin across the gravel, sandy driveway. Not more than 200 feet, and I could see her the whole time, but to this five-year-old, it appeared that I granted them permission to hike the Appalachian Trail by herself. One last deep breath, and she took off as fast as she had ever run.

Two days later, The sun-dyed brown hair was slicked back from the countless jumping off the lily pad into Leech Lake as my other five-year-old attempted to keep up with an 11-year-old she befriended two days earlier. The 11-year-old was ready to try to swim into the deeper water and play on the inflatable water trampoline that was hooked up late last night. My older five-year-old, full of nerves, tightened that life jacket and dove off the lily pad. She would not be left behind; she would attempt the trampoline. Within fifteen minutes, she was flying off the trampoline and landing all smiles in the cold early summer waters of Leech Lake.

And so went my week, watching my girls age in heartwarming ways. In a way that revealed that if Anne and I keep it up, we will have two girls who, at different times and in varied ways, can find their barrings and be brave. Life is suffering, messy, and confusing. Often, we are pulled in so many directions that we build up doubts about how we are doing as parents, co-workers, and significant others and just being okay with being who we are in our own skin. We need evidence that we are doing life well through the sadness, confusion, anger, joy, nerves, happiness, and every other emotion we traverse.

Those two little girls growing up in a matter of minutes was my evidence this week. This is different from some mushy post about what kids do for you. Whether we have children, are married, single, or something else, all of us need evidence we are living a life worth living. We all suffer through stuff. I have had many moments that paused the messiness for a moment of pure bliss. Whether on my yearly camping trip with my best friends, hiking with my wife, getting my brother to climb a mountain in Scotland, or on my long runs all by myself. It's about reminding us to take in the whole picture no matter where we are. Owning our screw-ups, strengths, joy, sadness, and living as honestly as possible.

With all our interconnectedness through social media, many must understand that life is about struggle. We are forced to think we must be happy because we have this or that, but the truth is we will cycle through about every emotion even if we are living our best life. It's a good thing; forcing happiness leads to unhappiness every time. Too many of us are faking a lot of stuff about life. Genuine experiences, honest candor, and working through suffering are not easy, but it's the best.

Watching my two girls through that lens revealed that I have made many parenting decisions for over five years. Some of them are great, and some of them leave a lot of room for improvement. But the totality of my wife's and my choices were on display, and it was good. More suffering will come our way, it always does, but my wife and I have loved them enough that at age 5, they took significant steps toward independence. They tackled different fears and trusted they could do something previously impossible. And for moments like that, life is worth suffering for because when the right moment hits, you know you earned the right to bask in all the feel-good rush of emotions we experience in that moment. It's real, it's honest, it's earned, and it's what life is supposed to feel like.