Great Expectations

Today it hit me that the Little Badgers don't mind the unknown.  For them, pretty much everything is unknown, or at least unfamiliar.  Meeting new people, going new places, experiencing new things, all in a day's work for them.  They may worry, or whine, but they go forward, boldly.  Me, not so much.  I  can, and do let worry and fear keep me from new experiences.  Not just obvious experiences like trying a new food, or meeting someone new, but more subtle things, like running as fast and as far as I can, or truly opening my heart to someone.

I wasn't always this way.  When I was seventeen, I performed an entire concerto with an orchestra in front of a full concert hall.  I threw myself into experiences, with joy and with abandon.  Most things that were new to me were also exciting to me.  A little bit of scary, but a lot of anticipation, and both feelings were all part of the fun.  New experiences were blank slates.  More recently, however, I found myself somehow thinking differently.  The scary got bigger and the the anticipation got smaller until the scary is almost all there is.  Perhaps being a parent does that to a person.  Being a parent forces me to consider all scenarios, to plan ahead, and to be aware of the dangers in everything.  Popcorn, strangers, a stray dog, riding in the car, all contain hazards that could, in a second, take away or injure my children, the most important part of my life.  I can no longer turn a blind eye, either with willful ignorance or with careless abandon, to anything, and I think it's rubbed off on my own, individual, self.

I thing I miss most is that truly blank slate.  The unknown.  Just rushing off and doing something on the spur of the moment, with no prior planning or excessive worry.  Now, when I face an unfamiliar situation, I inevitably do my research.  I'll Mapquest the location, Google the menu, worry myself into a frenzy, and, as a consequence, create wild expectations.  I'll expect amazingly good things, or amazingly bad things.  And, as it turns out, not so amazingly,  I'll pretty much always be wrong.  Most of the time, new things turn out just fine, and my obsessive treatment creates a tunnel vision whereby I find myself unable to fully appreciate the experience.

My children instinctively trust me.  They know that, no matter what situation they find themselves in, I will be there.  It may be unknown, or unfamiliar, but it will be fine.  I think I need to start trusting myself the way that my children trust me.  I need to get back to that place where I was not afraid to jump, or to run.  I need to step away from the grip of planning and worry, and fear, that I find myself in often as a parent.  After all, if there's anything I've learned from the Little Badgers, it's that the most intensely-planned-for situation rarely goes as scripted, and that joy can be found in the most unexpected places.  Places where we found ourselves by chance, going boldly into the unfamiliar.