Chasing dreams

My dad had a dream to run his own small electrical shop doing repairs and selling supplies.

He told me about it when driving me across country 30 years ago, taking me to my first year of college. Instead of chasing that dream, he made what he considered the more responsible choice. After he got out of the Navy, he took a job with Bell Telephone. The job offered good pay and benefits so that he could provide for his wife and family.

I was thinking about Dad the other day as I was reading through the post high school plans of members of the Class of 2021. This weekend marks two years since Dad died, and my memory of that long-ago conversation while traveling the Tri-State Tollway in northern Indiana brought with it some sadness not only at losing him, but about him setting aside his dream to provide for his children. His sacrifices were so that his children had the ability to chase their dreams, wherever they would take us.

This Friday evening, students at Rib Lake, Medford and Gilman will walk across a stage and receive a handshake and a piece of paper whose decorative calligraphy will proclaim that they are now high school graduates. For some, the diploma is a stepping stone to more schooling whether they pursue a trade or go to university. For others it is a gateway to employment. With jobs available for those willing to work, entering the workforce is a wise choice for many students who are perhaps tired of classrooms and assignments and who are eager to get started with their adult lives.

A shared commonality among these graduates is that at some level they have dreams and hopes for bright futures. Some dreams are realistic — a family, a solid career doing something they love, or at least can tolerate. Others may dream of being rockstars, racing legends or sports superstars. There is nothing wrong with these dreams, as long as they are tempered with reality and a good back-up plan.

What is important is that they are the graduate’s dreams.

As parents, it is our job to protect our children and support them as they grow into adults. It is only natural that we attempt to pass along the wisdom learned from our own mistakes and missteps. It is easy for us, as parents to live vicariously through them taking joy in their achievements and pain in their failures. The ultimate challenge in parenting comes with recognizing that your children’s dreams are not the same as your own and more importantly to know when to stand back and let them chase their dream.

Young children fall down, a lot. The more they fall down, it seems, the better they are at getting back up. There might be a few tears, a skinned knee or a bloody nose, but in the process they learn and grow.

It is inevitable that as members of the class of 2021 run after their dreams, some will trip along the way. Others will be sidetracked, distracted or find a new dream to chase.

You can tell parents of young children in any crowd, they involuntarily jerk forward when they see any child about to stumble or fall whether it is their own or someone else’s. The urge is equally as strong with newly minted graduates, to try to protect them and keep them from the grown up versions of scraped knees and bloody noses. As a parent of a teenager and a soon to be 21-year-old I know I am continually trying to find the balance between being there to help and support them as they find their own way, and wanting to fight their battles for them.

It is a hard lesson to learn that the forces that pull us down, also make us stronger and that sometimes the best we can do is to be there if they need a hand getting back up.

Brian Wilson is News Editor at The Star News.