Early memories

My mom pointed out historical inaccuracies with two of my posts. In one regarding expectations, I said "I think the events took on even more significance in my mind since it was the kids' first time doing either activity and since my family never did this kind of stuff when I was growing up." And, in another regarding camping with JD, I said "This was JD's first time camping (my first time too)." Apparently when I was little, we did lots of fun stuff (including, but not limited to, going to the movie 101 Dalmatians and having a birthday trip to this scenic location in Germany). We also went camping a number of times. In her email, my mom went on to say:

I am sure I could come up with all kinds of things that Dad and I tried to do when you were young but reality is it would not matter. We all see the past through our own personal perspectives and what our expectations were … Like I said, this is not an emotional rant of why you and [your brother] did not get out of certain things what we had hoped. The message is only meant to try and help and I share it only out of love for you in case for some reason your children at a later time in life don't remember days or what you perceived as being happy days the same way.

A couple of things here. First, I have almost no memories from before I was seven. Therefore, whenever I make sweeping statements about my childhood, I'm actually referring to age seven onward. Second, when I say things like "never", I mean it figuratively, not literally. And, third, everyone's childhood has its good and bad aspects. That will be as true for my kids as it is for the rest of us. Our parents do their best given what they have, what their backgrounds are, and what challenges life presents. Just because their kids look back and have certain regrets or wish certain things were different (as I'm sure my kids will do too) doesn't mean that our parents didn't love us or didn't try their best to make everyday special.

I don't expect JD and AJ to remember baseball games or movies or camping or cutting the lawn. A lot of what I do with them is more for my benefit than theirs. It makes me feel like a "good Dad" to do fun things with them or to support their interests. 1-year olds, for example, don't want or need an elaborate birthday party. It's for the parent, not the child. My other goal with things like baseball games, camping, etc is to (a) establish traditions of doing things as a family that we can carry forward into the future (when the kids might otherwise be less keen to hang out with their parents) and (b) seed certain interests that might blossom a couple of years from now.

I actually wish I had more early memories. From what I can tell from photos and stories, it was a very happy time for me.