The Clock is Ticking...Literally

Earlier this week, my wife, Susan, showed me a new app she has on her iPad.  The Legacy App, which you can get in iTunes or for Android, is a way of visualizing how much time you have left before your child graduates from high school.  I have three kids, but two of them are beyond high school now.  Only Joshua is still able to be heavily influenced by us.  The legacy app puts the stark reality right in front of us:

There isn't much time left!

What you see here is a screen shot, but the app is active, so the the numbers are counting down as you look at the app.  It's quite shocking, actually.  We barrel through our lives as if there is 'plenty of time', but it's counting down.  Second by second, minute by minute.  Susan and I have only 271 weeks left with him.

So today, we set aside our long to do lists, email inboxes and social media to take Joshua canoeing.  We drove to the Front Royal Canoe Company, rented a three person canoe and took a 7-mile trip on the Shenandoah River.  It was a perfect day.  We had a picnic lunch, navigated some low-key rapids, saw some fish and turtles, played word games and - most importantly - we actually had some meaningful conversation! No electronics, no interruptions.  Just us and our undivided attention on each other.  It was some of the best parenting we've done in a long time.   

It's so easy for us to slip into 'he's practically a teenager' as an excuse for allowing Joshua to not be with us and not talk to us.  "He'd rather watch his TV or play his games or be with his friends" we say.  But it's not true.

Yea, he protested before we left.  He asked us to let him stay home...alone...again.  But the secret that he doesn't want me to tell his friends is this:  Joshua enjoyed the day with his parents.  I'm glad, because the feeling is mutual.  And of the 1899 days we have left, we made this one count.  May these kinds of days increase, because the amount of time we have left with him won't.

Here are a few pics, in case you're interested.