Why we need our children to make us better persons!

( This was first written in 2011.)

Back in Burma when I was growing up, we had a system in our family. My two sisters and I had to notify everyone when we left the house by yelling something like “Tharr Thwar Byee Ah May! (i.e., I am leaving mom)” and wait till a reply is heard. I think it was more of a safety check and a way of reporting to the parents that we were going out in case we needed permission. Years later when I started a family of my own, I insisted on continuing that tradition. But of course, here in the west, we tend to show affection to each other more openly compared to my childhood when respectful gestures towards parents were considered to be of more importance. When my daughter goes out, even just to the neighbor’s backyard to play with her friend, she says, “Bye Daddy, love you!” and I would reply “Bye Thamee-Lay, love you too!”. And likewise, when I step out of the house, I reciprocate by saying, “Bye Thamee Lay or Bye Mommy, love you!”. And they will reply the same. The only exception is when you leave the house angry such as after a quarrel. Then you can expect a quiet departure without any announcement! Luckily those episodes are far and few in between.

Our daughter Hannah turned nine this year and is in fourth grade now. Given her extracurricular activities and her ever increasing private tuition hours (Kumon Classes), some of the evenings can be quite hectic. Like most working couples, the wife and I have to tightly coordinate our work schedules and her activities so that one of us is always available to drive her around. Sometimes it seems things require the precision and punctuality of a covert military operation. We are talking in terms of a margin of error of 20-25 minutes that can make Hannah miss her lesson or practice. Thank God we live in a Midwestern small town of USA where traffic jams are almost nonexistent allowing us to eliminate at least that variable in our highly choreographed daily lives.

Mondays are my days when I am the assigned person to pick her up from school, take her home, feed her, make sure she finishes her homework and later take her to the ice rink at a nearby town. By the time she comes back from ice-skating, she often has just enough time to take a bath, get a light supper, and finish up home work for the next day before she goes to bed. School starts at 8AM in the morning and we can’t rely on the school bus since nobody is at home in the evenings to receive her from the bus. It is better we go and pick her up at the school where she can remain at after-hour care providing us some flexibility. Fortunately, I am a physician in a private practice where I can dictate my own working hours. I have instructed my receptionist to assign my last patient at 3:30 PM on Mondays so that I can leave work early.

This past weekend had been very busy for all of us. I was on-call at the hospital. Hannah had her school spelling bee contest and the talent show that required a few rehearsals and preliminary rounds throughout the weekend. No matter how many pages (beeps or calls) I received during the preceding night, I still had to get to the hospital very early the next morning to wrap up my rounds after which I tried to get home in time to attend her shows. She won a first prize in the talent show and a second prize in the spelling contest. By the Sunday evening the whole family was pooped. Hannah couldn’t finish some of her Kumon assignments that she had to turn in on Tuesday. And the Monday didn’t start out any better for me either.  Some patients arrived one hour later than the assigned time but still requested to be seen cramming all other appointments. Some patients were unexpectedly too sick requiring arrangements to be admitted to the hospital.  One demanding out of town relative suddenly accompanied the patient for the first time grilling the doctor needlessly as if he or she was the most compassionate patient advocate of the time and so on. When I left the office, I was drained and a few minutes later than usual. It was a rough day and I was cranky.  I still had incomplete dictations and electronic medical records that I intended to finish up later from home. I drove to Hannah’s school to pick her up. Once she was in the car, she realized that she left her jacket in her locker. She had to run back to her classroom to retrieve it. I gave her a lecture on “being a responsible person” in an inpatient tone. She listened quietly.

Once we got home, I sent her up to her room to do homework and change outfits for her ice-skating. I told her that the time was 4:30 PM. To get to the ice rink in time which requires about 30 minutes driving, we needed to leave home by 5:45 PM the latest. And she was to come down at 5:30 to have dinner that I was about to fix. At about 5:15 I gave her a reminder call to come downstairs in a few minutes. She replied that she still had quite a bit of homework to finish up. I told her that she might have to leave it unfinished and do it after she returned from ice-skating by staying up a bit late that night. At 5:30 I gave her another shout, a bit in a stern tone. She said she was wrapping up the last problem and will come down soon. Five minutes later she rushed down with her ice-skating gear in hand. She quickly ate the dinner while I helped her pack the skating bag. I reminded her that we were running a bit late. She also wanted some fruits so I had to slice some apples. And finally, when I thought we were all ready to leave, she asked if she could use the restroom. Of course, I couldn’t say no. The nature’s call takes precedence over everything else. By the time the car rolled out of our drive way it was 6:00 PM and we were 15 minutes late already. She realized that too.

I was upset about her lack of time management. I berated her with a few words. I usually try and succeed in not showing my temper in my conversation with her. But that day I gave into my ugly side, the sarcastic one. I asked her,

“Thamee, what grade are you in?”

She replied, “Daddy, what happened? Of course, I am in fourth grade!”

I continued:

“Oh, I was just wondering if you got demoted at school since you seemed not to be able to read a clock. I thought any fourth grader could read a clock”

She replied nothing and I carried on.

“What time does your ice-skating begin?”

She replied, “6:15”

“How long did I tell you the drive takes to get there?

“30 minutes”

“Then as a fourth grader can you tell me what time should we leave home to get there in time?”

“5:45 PM”

“Thank you Thameelay, I just wasn’t sure if you still remember the third-grade math”

She sat quietly. And after a while she asked if I could turn on the radio for her to listen Disney channel songs.

I said, “Sure of course Thamee-Lay”. With that I turned on the radio.

After one song, I spoke again.

“Do you think listening to the radio will make a car fly and gets to the destination sooner?”

“No daddy, of course not, why”

“Well, I was just wondering. Since you knew that Daddy was a little upset about this delay and you still cared to request to turn on the music, I thought you might be thinking music makes the car goes faster”.

For the next fifteen minutes of the drive, we both sat extremely quiet. I peeped at her from the rearview mirror. She looked remorseful. I started to feel bad. Finally, we got to the skating rink. Normally when she gets a little late to her activities or the school, she jumps out of the car and dashes to the building.  But today after she stepped out of the car, despite being late, she turned around and said,

“Bye daddy, I love you”. And then instead of moving forward, she hesitated a bit to wait for my response.

I was stunned. I wasn’t expecting this. I berated her and treated her sarcastically. I thought she would have slammed the car door as she stormed out. But now she is forgiving me. She is extending the olive branch. I felt suddenly small in front of her. Here a nine-year-old was showing more maturity than her forty something year-old father. I was thinking what I would have done had I been in her shoes, such as slamming the door angrily, yet she had been more gracious than me. And I had forgotten that she was only nine years old. What the heck I was thinking about time management when even some college kids can’t follow it? My frustration at work had spilled over to a child’s innocent life. How ugly? I stepped out of the car, gave her a tight hug and said,

“Bye Thamee-Lay, I love you too”.

Suddenly a smile appeared on her face. She realized her dad had forgiven her. She turned around and dashed happily towards the entrance. Tears welled up in my eyes. And that’s why the world needs children, to make us better persons!