To Freddy who is turning three
HodgePodge by Charlie Hodge
I wrote this in the summer, but it seems fit to print it now. Happy third birthday to a young man (and relative) I know named Freddy.
With the intense heat and smoke in the air I will likely not be at your afternoon party in the park this weekend, however we will get together for snuggles and chuckles before or soon after. I did, however, want to send you this little note today because I know how easily ‘should ofs’ and ‘could ofs’ turn into regrets when time flies too fast and lives do not keep up.
This note contains a few suggestions you might want to consider as you venture down your path in life. It will mean nothing to you now, but hopefully your Mom will tuck these thoughts away someplace safe for reading later – perhaps in a few years when you can decide what to do with my advice. Here it is:
Timing is everything.
Timing is huge in life and I am glad you arrived on this planet before I left because I was waiting for a Freddy to show up. For a couple of reasons. Don’t misunderstand me, I love your sister Brenda, and your other infant relatives, but they are all girls. Now I really, really like girls as most folks know, however I must admit sometimes it’s just fun to have another guy to hang around with and do guy stuff. Like chase girls, make silly noises, and accidently knock things over. Also I have a few family heirloom ‘guy’ things I need to pass along the family chain to a member of the male side – and to someone I like. I like you.
Congratulations on picking a spectacular time of the year to be born. Well done. Smart timing. Summer in the Okanagan is wonderful and it brings out the best in everyone and everyone out – so I am sure your celebration at the water park will be a big hit. I imagine it will be just as chaotic and fun as your sister’s bash last week.
You can have your cake and eat it too.
Later in life people will try and tell you that you can’t have your cake and eat it too – but they are wrong. Sometimes you CAN have your cake and eat it too – and in fact should. This weekend I am positive there will be cake again at your birthday party and this time it is your cake, not Brenda’s. You can have it and you can eat it too, so that is proof of what I say.
This time if little Wally decides to take your piece of cake you can just cut yourself another one and not have to wait, or fuss, or fight over the lost cake.
Later in life there may be things that you want but you aren’t allowed or can’t have them for some reason. When that happens measure the reason and decide if it is worth the risk or time or energy or…. to change it. If not walk away. If it is worth it then plant your flag and stand by it.
Decide if it is a want or a need and then make your choice.
Keep on smiling and laughing.
When I think of you Freddy I visualize your full faced ear to ear grin. A happier face I have never laid witness to. If my mother was here she’d say you were the ‘apple of her eye’ or her ‘little apple face darling’. When you giggle I swear I see a part of her in you, but that is impossible. Still, I wonder.
But I digress – smiling and laughing is something that suits you well and will carry you far in this world. It can be an ugly, mean nasty, world sometimes Fred; full of mean people with bad intentions and no scruples. They cannot simply be smiled away, however it sure does help the will, spirit and soul – and really confuses the opponent. There are no easy routes, free rides or secret portals to a hassle-free lifetime – but I guarantee laughing and smiling most of the way sure beats being miserable.
Later in life when you get a tough job like being a reporter or a politician you can learn to suck it up and get through the lousy moments by smiling or laughing. It makes both winning and losing more palatable. Besides, it drives your critics crazy when you just keep on going like a little tank in a minefield with a grin on your face.
You sort of remind me of a tank right now. A rolly-polly bundle of love and energy just trucking along at full speed in any and every direction at the same time.
Best of all, Stanley – girls like a guy who smiles a lot and likes to laugh.
Try not to lie.
It’s not easy.
Most folks immediately respond that they don’t lie, never do. But that’s a lie. Humans lie, it is practically part of our DNA in fact they will probably discover that indeed it is. Regardless, humans lie. We all do. For some it may be just ‘white’ lies, or ‘little lies, ‘harmless’ lies… the fact is we do.
I’m not suggesting you need to be perfect and that you won’t occasionally tell a fib, but I am suggesting you must not let lies become a part of you, a habit. Don’t let them sneak in on your soul like dirt under a fingernail.
The problem with telling lies is that they usually hurt someone, and more often than not eventually the one who told them as well. You better have a good memory as well because once you tell that lie you will be asked often to repeat it.
Always say please and thank you.
Manners are very important and I, for one, like them. It rarely hurts to be polite and it is nice when people are polite to you. Being polite and courteous is important in all social aspects including employment, career, family and relationships,
Respect yourself. It is important to respect other people, their rights, their space, their faith, even their quirky ways. It is also very important to respect yourself. When you do it leads to making good choices. For you and others around you.
Respecting yourself helps avoid so many other pitfalls that will challenge or tempt you later such as overindulgence with drugs, alcohol or other ways to ‘deal’ with your choices.
Finally a word mentioned elsewhere. Choice.
Life is all about choice, Freddy.
You may not have a lot of say or choice in a lot of the things that happen to you in life, but you always have a choice in how you deal with them.
That knowledge itself will help you make good choices. Knowing you at least have a choice in your choice restores personal power and when empowered good choices are easier to make. It is approaching something from a point of strength not weakness.
Given a tough choice try and take the high road or the positive road rather than the negative. Choose good over evil, kind over mean, gracious over arrogant. That way, even if your choice eventually proves wrong at least you chose to be the best you could be and likely did less harm to others as well as yourself. You will have possibly gained their respect and certainly maintained your own. Remember the best choice or correct choice may not be the easy choice.
Choice is not easy but it is yours. And you will never get away from making choices so you may as well learn how to make good ones.
Even when your time on this planet comes to an end many, many years from now you will have a choice right until the end. You may not have a choice about when you die or what it is that takes you away from here, but you do have a choice in how you handle the departure.
But today is about you little man and your third birthday.
Soak it up, enjoy the sunshine in your day and your life, and if nothing else remember this – eat lots and lots of cake.
