Wins and Losses by Dr. Juan Harrison
Wins and Losses
You don’t hear as much about the nuclear family as you used to. Maybe it’s because it’s not as common as it used to be. I had the benefit of a stable family as I grew up on a farm. Circumstances moved us to the city where the family shrank. My father exited and poverty moved in. The farmer’s wife traded her cotton sack for a sewing machine. I grabbed a lawn mower and mowed my way into college. Almost 70 years later I’m still mowing.
In the 50’s and 60’s divorce was a rarity among my friends. My date’s parents would often ask about my father. I would tell em he’s deceased. Ironically to me he was. I don’t think I’ve wasted a second of my life in bitterness or self-pity. We were too busy just trying to survive on H.D. Lee paychecks and what part-time work us kids could find. I paid for my lunches, put gas in the family 57 Chevy, and worked my way through college.
God promised He would take care of the widows and orphans. In my case He sent a neighbor to play catch with, a fill-in grandmother to fish with, and untold people to provide me work to get to my destination.
One day not long ago uncharacteristically I gave a thought to my life without a father and all those other boys who had a similar experience. For a fleeting moment I wondered. I wondered what I had missed. I wondered what he had missed. In earlier stories I’ve simply said that it was his loss as he lost contact with his family and died a lonely death in a rural nursing home. It dawned on me that a lot of other boys and I were kinda at a disadvantage as we missed the knowledge, the blessing, the comfort and assurance that came from a guiding hand that a male role model can provide to a young boy’s journey into manhood. I’ve wondered what it would be like to enjoy father/son campouts. How fun it would be to hear my father’s cheering support for me at a ballgame or a hug at graduation from high school and college. I wonder what he would think as he gazed into the eyes of his beautiful grandkids that he would never get to know. Four of us stood at the hole in the ground to say a lonely goodbye to a man we barely knew.
I’ve told you to make lemonade from lemons. Wise parents coming into marriages must go forward with a determination to take any negatives from their upbringing and let them motivate us to have a do-over that could benefit our own offspring. A wise man once said the only real tragedy in life is to have a bad experience and not benefit from it. My mom did a great job filling in for two parents. I’m sorry she had to do that. I’m grateful that God let me share that awesome responsibility with a great helpmate. Being a father and grandfather has been the greatest blessing I could ever have had. When I think about what my father and other absentees failed to get to experience with their sons, I repeat my sad and lonely benediction, “His loss.”
By Dr. Juan Harrison
