Sunday 27 June 2010

'Alongside' Conversations

Recently, I received a text message from my daughter. Verbatim, I quote…

‘Hey can you pick me up at like 4.15 and we can go for a drive yeah?? :)’.

She writes like she talks but… like there were not as many ‘likes’ as she like, usually like puts into her like normal-like speech patterns.

Do you resonate with what I’m… like, saying here?

Sometimes the best conversations occur when you are on your way somewhere. Let’s face it. The modern parent is a taxi service to their kids. And with my daughter being 17 years old, we are racking up the hours in her Learner Driver log book as well.

I find that no matter where we are at as dad and daughter (and sometimes that is a challenging place), driving alongside each other is pretty soothing. In Victoria (Australia), Learner Drivers have to spend 120 hours behind the wheel with a supervisor alongside them to be allowed to apply for their driver’s license. We could see that 120 hours as a massive hassle or, as an extraordinary opportunity.

What I am learning is that as we drive, there are quiet periods. Quite often my daughter will start talking about something a friend has said… something that is really capturing her at school – the important thing is that it comes from her first. It might be the motion of the car – it is carrying us somewhere – but talk can be different when we are side to side, not face to face.

As adults, often, we drive the discussion (if it can even be called a ‘discussion’). We bark the instructions and set the expectations. Leaving a gap for stuff to come up is key and even if your ‘parent-teenage child’ relationship is strained at times, I reckon regular ‘alongside’ time leaves that space for communication lines to have another channel.

Earlier this year, I read something on the day I started this Time & Space venture full-time. I was asked to consider what it is that I want to say to the world. Two things came to mind.

Firstly, we are not perfect. Our own parents were not perfect (and don’t we remember that), we are not perfect (and no doubt, our kids will remind us of this) and my prediction is that despite the fact that they currently believe that they will be the coolest parents to their own future kids, our children will not turn out to be perfect parents. We live in a world that assumes perfection - the media portrays images of super-parents and I believe that can put pressure on mums and dads trying their best with their kids. After all, my daughter gets 'L-Plates', then 'P-Plates' in her driver training but there is no license issued for being a parent!

The other thing I have to say is ‘half the battle is being there’. We may not be the most popular person in our kids’ lives every moment of the day but in time they will remember and put new meaning to how we hung in there and spent time alongside them.

Thanks for giving yourself the Time & Space to read this.

Bill Jennings

http://www.time-space.com.au

NB - Whenever I write about my kids, I always run the post past them first and get their 'OK' before I publish. Cheers, BJ.

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