There are many first posts, and we know when we post them, but few of us know what or when our “Last Post” will be.
So before mine, I want to jot down a few articles, essays, thoughts, and letters addressed to young people whose lives are just beginning.
This blog is for my boys.
It is all the thoughts, advice, feelings and information I really ought to share, but for which I can never find the right moment.
Of course, there never is a right moment for all the important stuff, and we spend too long waiting for or trying to create that moment. The moment is only ever now.
Writing things down makes them available for all moments; you can read this blog at any time. You can ignore the parts you think are wrong and the parts you don’t understand, and come back to them another time. Perhaps those parts will speak to you later. This is important because I’m pretty sure that many of the things I want to say to you are things that you won’t understand now, or won’t fully appreciate. That’s just because you don’t yet have the perspective, experience and maturity to understand what I mean when I talk about things like being a father or a husband or an employee or a church member.
I hope that you will grow to have greater wisdom and intelligence than I have, and you will be able to put me right when I write things that are wrong, or where my perspective has skewed my belief or understanding. I really really look forward to that day – when you out-grow me. … But that’s a topic for its own post!
For now, just know that this is your Daddy writing things that I want to say to you – both to you now and to the future yous.
Why am I writing this publicly? Two reasons: 1. In the hope that it will always be available to you. 2. Because there are boys who do not have Daddies, or who do not have Daddies as lovely as yours. I am not being egotistical or boastful – that’s just the way it is.
So, Benjamin, Matthew and Joseph, this is for me and for you and for anyone else who needs it.