There is nothing preternatural about parenting. You just gotta want it!
We lend an ear, and a hand;
provide comfort, and answers;
take them to soccer games, and to task;
teach them traditions, and to face the future;
tell them “yes, you can,” and sometimes “no;”
give them chores, and never make them feel like one;
nurture their minds whenever we can, and give them a piece of ours when we must;
love them, and love them some more.
The measure of a mother or father is not in the occasional sensational act, but in the unremittingly quotidian acts of the same quality;
not in the spoonful of sugar, ephemeral, but in the honey dripping from the spoon;
not in the face that launches a thousand ships, but in Penelope’s singular steadfastness;
not in sideways superpowers, but in the even loyalty to authority and vulnerability;
not in fashioning substance from shadows, but in steadily forging the long and meaningful.
Not in the virtue of the task, but in being worthy of it.