A Father’s Day Reflection
There’s a certain magic to midlife. If, like me, you stumble awake every morning with stubborn aches born of injuries past or fresh, sore muscles from hard work, you may disagree. Our quotidien rituals get cemented over time; if our days are a garden, there are almost certainly overgrown patches — landmarks of past projects or childhood dreams long-since abandoned in the name of pragmatic progress: career, family, survival, struggle, and reconciliation.
Penn Jillette (of Penn & Teller) describes magic differently:
The only secret of magic is that I’m willing to work harder on it than you think it’s worth.
- Penn Jillette
If you’ve ever worked with a magician, you’ve seen this first-hand. A magician asks an audience member to choose a card, remember it, and put it back. The audience member is asked to choose a box of tea packets from a table on stage. The table is stacked with tens of boxes of tea, all perfectly sealed. The final reveal is staggering when the participant selects a box at random, breaks the seal, chooses a tea packet, breaks the seal, and inside is the card they chose.
That performance, measured in mere moments (seconds to minutes) is not the magic, it’s the reveal. The magic happened days or weeks before that moment:
- The magician carefully marked each card, stacked the deck in a certain order, and knows how to shuffle to maintain order. This takes years of practice.
- The magician uses the markings to know which sequence of tea packets can contain a given card to help guide the participant. Those “soft skills” take years to master.
- In order for the trick to work, the magician went to the store, bought a bunch of tea boxes, opened each one, opened each tea packet, and placed the correct card in each one. This took hours or days.
- The magician then carefully re-sealed each tea packet, then each box, and noted the arrangement. This took hours or days.
- The magician then booked a show, handled all of the contracts and money, carefully put the act together (including dozens of “tricks”, large and small), chose music, handled automation of lights and sound, and performed for 30, 45, or 60 minutes. This took days and weeks, and they do this over and over again.
The magic of midlife is that we have practiced patience and grit. We can visualize our goals and take small steps every day in the right direction. When we need adjustments, they’re usually small. What some see as a constant grind, I choose to cherish as my mission:
- I read the same book to my 4yo week-after-week until, like magic, he points to the words on the page and can begin to understand how to read.
- My wife and I work on 4 different businesses until, like magic, we’re suddenly enjoying the spoils of our labor and get a day to relax.
- Mundane moments around the dinner table talking about chores and expectations, week-after-week, magically reappear as we watch the family come together to take care of our house and have play time.
My Father’s Day this year is about enjoying the reveal. The “magic” has already happened through relentless investment and tedium.
My 6yo son asked me why we can’t feel the world spinning as we drove home from summer school yesterday. He’s learning about basic astronomy this summer. He knows me too well , I’m a sucker for a science conversation. We talked about gravity, scale, and how fast we’re all moving (thanks Google) — we’re spinning at about 1000 miles per hour! I asked him a question without knowing how it would affect me a few seconds later: “what would happen if the world stopped spinning?”
The challenge with midlife and its magic is found at the margins, when the realities of science and the inexorable march of time collide with our everyday — just like our bodies if the world suddenly stopped spinning. We would all be thrown into the nearest immovable, solid object at 1000 miles per hour.
My grandfather passed away as I was busy being in my 20s. My father passed away years ago, just weeks before our 3rd son was born. My step father passed away at the end of April, just weeks after we moved to Texas to be closer to our family. And last week, I learned that my mentor and coach died suddenly, unable to complete our work together.
These immovable impediments in life are, essentially, guaranteed. Some of them are slow — a cancer diagnosis, a history of mental illness, substance abuse that replaces time with pain. These jostles feel like bumps in the road while you’re talking to your son. Getting through the rough patches will take time, but you can keep moving and enjoy the ride. Others are thieves in the night, shattering our sense of security — they stop the world and we suddenly feel that we’re untethered for a moment.
This “natural order” of birth, growth, and death becomes a companion over time, but I haven’t yet found a way to keep the world spinning. This Father’s Day, I will be taking time to feel the spinning, the constant motion, and remember my leaders, mentors, and fathers who have passed. I hope you can, too.
Hallmark moments may be manufactured, but this year is different. I lost my “last father” a few weeks ago. I won’t be shopping for a card or making a special phone call. Instead, I will be volunteering my time (as I do every week) mentoring others. I will spend time with my children as they treat themselves to cake in the name of “Father’s Day.”
Celebration and mindfulness will be my portion this year. My thoughts and meditations are with my fellow mentors, leaders, and Fathers. No matter where you find yourself this Father’s Day, I hope you make memorable moments. Cherish where you are, and be grateful for the time you’ve invested with your parents, your friends, and your family.
Whether you’re nearing the end of your life or just starting a new family, I wish you peace, joy, and rest.
Enjoy making your magic, and don’t miss the reveals. Happy Father’s Day.
