Manning Monday

As I'm working through The Importance of Being Foolish, I'll keep on posting here.

Anyway, Manning says, "To become a little child again (as Jesus enjoined we must) is to recapture a sense of surprise, wonder and vast delight in all of reality. Look at a child's face on Christmas morning as he enters the living room transformed by the midnight passage of Santa Claus. Or when he discovers the coin under the pillow or sees his first rainbow or sniffs his first rose. Few of us catch our breath as they once did. The walk down the corridor of time has made us bigger and everything else smaller, less impressive."

This struck a chord with me - Rachel and I, especially, have been at odds a lot lately. I mean, she's nine - and she's a girl - and...I don't know.

Here's what I just realized as I read Manning. I'm lamenting her growing up. She doesn't light up at the simple things, she doesn't always come running to me when I come home, she argues with me sometimes (and, dangit, sometimes she's right) and...well, I guess I'm just missing my little girl who trusted me with everything, to whom I was superman and - yeah, I know, every dad goes through it, right? But it's no fun going through it... Man, I might not survive teenagerhood...

I guess more to Manning's point - how do we recapture the wonder? How do I keep Elie and Rachel, not from growing up - but encourage the wonder, the joy, the "vast delight in all of reality"?

Our society is geared toward pushing children from "childish things" to "grown up things" - but it appears to me that our society is geared more toward grinding out the wonder, the creativity, the joy.

And I guess what I want back most is joy...