Talk about memories – today is my youngest son Nathan’s eleventh birthday. I wrote this article on his fifth birthday.
I remember the day he was born like it was yesterday. Of my four kids, he is the only one born after I received Christ (something I did shortly after his older sister was born), and I marveled at the grace of God in my life and in that moment. The room was filled with his mother, of course, me, my mother-in-law, my sister-in-law and various well wishers as the day went on. Shortly after Nathan was born, a family friend brought his two older brothers and older sister to the hospital to meet their new baby brother. It was, by all accounts, a momentous day and a memory I will hold on to for the rest of my life. No doubt, Nathan’s brother and sister feel the same.
Today, we have another a special day planned. We are off to one of the nation’s best children’s museums to play and learn and generally have a good time as a family. There will be pouting and probably some yelling and screaming. The kids will balk when they can’t have everything they want from the souvenir store, and mom and dad will likely be exhausted by the end of the day. We’ll find some place to have a birthday dinner and track down a cake somewhere to celebrate, and of course there are presents to open. My wife and I have worked hard, and spent a little bit of money, to create a memory that will, hopefully, make a mark on his young life and live with him as he grows.
The children’s museum we are going to is not in our hometown, so we spent part of yesterday driving to stay at a hotel. We got there about 20 minutes before the pool closed for the night, but I had promised the kids we would swim, so we headed down for our dunk in the pool. The time was short, and we didn’t do anything special (just threw a football around in the water), but I have found that those moments tend to stick with my kids as much as, if not more, than the manufactured moments.
Three Types of Memories