A WALK IN THE PARK A challenge to my child-raising skills

I have plenty of time for writing this evening since my kitchen is completely out of commission.

The sink has been taken out and moved to the garage, the stove pulled out of the island and slid to the center of the room, and carpenter tools and materials are strewn here and there. No meal preparation will be taking place in that room tonight.

My son Zack has become quite the handyman and we have hired him to do some remodeling. The benefits of this project are twofold and both areexciting for me. Along with getting some long-awaited new counter tops and a few other updates, it is the first time in a while that I have spent this much time around my boy. I watch in wonder as he seems to have morphed into a knowledgeable young man who cannot only take things apart (something he has been skilled at since youth), but now puts things back together again, and does it quite well!

I have never written much about Zack before because I wasn’t sure where to start - or to end, for thatmatter. I have often felt that giving a mother like me a son like him is good proof that God has a sense of humor. Having Zack has kept life interesting, to say the least, and given me plenty of chances over the last 28 years for … well, let’s just say … for personal growth opportunities.

I think it is safe to say that this boy - now man - has had one of the biggest impacts on my life of anyone I have encountered. I wouldn’t be the person I am today without his “help.”

Due to his curiosity, strong drive for exploration, resistance to doing things the “conventional way,” my parenting skills were challenged, my patience tried, my faith tested, my body aged and, ultimately, the love in my heart expanded. There are challenges to raising any child, my twogirls included, but in my experience with motherhood, Zack was in a league of his own.

My first-born was an easy-going, compliant little girl, setting me up for the illusion that raising kids was going to be a piece of cake. I knew soon after Zack’s arrival that I was in for a whole new ball game - one with every inning action packed and intermissions far and few between. After some of his adventures resulted in trips to the doctor’s office with one minor emergency or another, I soon figured out that divine assistance would be necessary to raise this kid. That realization served me well over the next quarter century because it kept me searching for wisdom and guidance and gave me peace to live through those years with,at least, most of my sanity in tact.

As I mentioned earlier, Zack has never been content to stay on the beaten path. Once he left the nest, he set sail for far off places, once traveling for a whole year before we saw him again. He climbed high mountains, kayaked in the sea, lived and worked in New Zealand and backpacked across Thailand with a small group of friends from other countries. Some of his scariest adventures - at least for me - included getting lost overnight in the Rocky Mountains, being the subject of a “missing persons report” in Hawaii, and being stranded above the Arctic Circle in Alaska. These were the moments that made me older but also enlarged my faith.

As I sit here typing at mycomputer while listening to the work going on in my kitchen, I am filled with that all-is-well-that-ends-well feeling. Zack is now married, living closer to home and I trust that he will soon have my new and improved kitchen put back together.

Although his throw-caution-to-the-wind, adventurous nature has been hard on this careful, nonrisk-taking mother at times, I am grateful that Zack followed his heart. It is probably a good thing that he did not always listen to his mother’s advice. Some of his best stories come from those experiences.

Annette Rowe is a freelance writer and a speechlanguage pathologist at Siloam Springs High School. She may be reached by email at awalkinthepark50 @ yahoo.com.

Opinion, Pages 6 on 11/17/2010