Dear Nathan
As 2016 closes I look back on the year and I’m amazed that you’re now in kindergarten and growing up to be such an incredible person. I’m often awestruck at how we’re having full-on, real conversations – a five year old and a 40-something year old – about things as diverse as the sleeping habits of a triceratops and where we go after we die. And with every conversation, I realize that there are so many things that I want to teach you, show you, and open your eyes and mind to. Moreover, I realize that because none of us know how long we have on this earth, I want to make sure that somehow I have a way to pass on my knowledge, my stories, my hopes and my dreams, and my thoughts to you no matter what happens.
I have heard – in stories, in movies – of how a parent would write a diary or a journal that would impart on their child or grandchild all of their own stories and worldly wisdom, even if they are unable to do so in person. I know that we have many many decades ahead of us together, where as a father I will be able to have many deep and fun conversations with you at all stages of your life. But I still want to create a record of my thoughts so that you can learn from me even if I’m not around, and perhaps more interestingly, learn about what my thoughts were and what I went through to become the father that you will know me as, as you and I grow older together. This blog is an attempt to do that.
I am going to chronicle my thoughts and my discoveries to you here. I named this the “Path Of Awesomeness” because as a child, and as a young adult, I had very high flying ideas of what I’d do and what I’d become. I’ve done some of them, but not others. I achieved some of them, but forgot about or lost my way on others. I am now in my 40s, re-examining my life and rediscovering some of my old thoughts and aspirations and I am at a cross roads. One path on the road leads me to a place where I stay in my comfort zone, content and satisfied by not exactly completely fulfilled. Let’s call this the Path Of Contentment. The other path takes me on a road where I will most certainly be outside my comfort zone, a place where I will be stretched both mentally and physically, but a place where as I continue on this path, I will become more and more fulfilled, achieving more of the dreams and aspirations that I had as a youth as well as the new dreams and aspirations that I developed as an adult. I call this my Path Of Awesomeness.
Were it up to my usual lazier-than-I’d-like self, I think I may stay on the Path Of Contentment. But you inspire me. You motivate me to harken back to the strength and vigor of my youth and rediscover a new source of energy in me. So I choose to walk the Path Of Awesomeness, a path of discomfort and precariousness but also one of potential and wonder, because i want to be awesome. I want to be awesome for you, as your father and as your role model. I want to be awesome for your mom as her husband, friend, and compatriot. And I want to be awesome for myself so that I can be proud and happy of the person I see in the mirror everyday.
I don’t know exactly what I’m going to do to walk this Path Of Awesomeness, but as I figure it out, I’ll write it all down here. I’m sure I’ll screw up here and there, and I’ll write it all down here too. I’m going to write down everything so that you can learn from both my successes as well as my mistakes, so that you too will find your own Path Of Awesomeness. That is my purpose and my hope for this blog. If other people read it, I hope they too will chime in and give feedback so that you will hear and benefit from more than just your old man’s stories. I hope that you will find wisdom and inspirations from the sum total of all the writing here.