The picture above shows my oldest son and I out in the “Inland Empire” golfing at Eagle Glenn during Christmas break, which ventures into Cleveland National Forest. It is a cool golf course.
My lack of posting should not indicate that I am doing nothing. For there is activity in my life, even if my blog does not show it. The household is going through some real changes, as I rocket toward my fifth decade of life, and fully into middle age.
I was listening to Greg Laurie, one of my favorites because he is incredibly insightful yet very accessible to all that listen to him. He was describing a situation similar to myself in terms of his personality. However, he is almost exactly 10 years old than I am, so he is there roughly one decade before me. He says in his radio broadcasting that “50 is the youth of old age.” I will know youth next year.
While I am getting older, and I am finding out that I cannot do all of the things that I could do when I am younger, I am thinking that years upon years of supplementing my body with minerals and vitamins (and quite frankly drugs) that promote life extension is extremely helpful. As a side note, the one wonder drug, which I have preached about often, is Omega-3, or PUFA N-3, or what is commonly called fish oil. Because your brain is made up of this substances, and your body cannot make it, it only makes sense to provide a system of material to keep the brain refreshed. I feel as if my cognitive skills are very, very high.
As my children roll toward the driving age, with one actually driving, I am noticing some of the things that I have been told about from others. My girls are 100% girls with all of the odds and ends that come with this. Girls are simply wired differently due to estrogen forming their brains differently, and are much more introspective and critical of themselves and of others.
My boys, on the other hand, have their moments, but they are able to throw themselves into external activities. This makes my relationship with them more simple, as if I can find some type of a physical activity, we can relate. To stereotype, a potential true stereotype, women bond through talk. Men bond through working on something together.
My physical activity is now golfing because this an easy thing to do with my son. Over Christmas break, we did a lot of golf together. I hit from the longer tees, and often my son can beat me. Some day, I’ll be hitting from the shorter tees, and he’ll still beat me. Funny thing about being a Dad, you really don’t mind being beat by your son.
My youngest son is turning 12. I never thought that he had an particular athletic skills, and his hand eye coordination is not as good as my older son. However, he took up swimming, and really wasn’t all that good. Yet, by sticking with swimming, and hitting all the work outs, he has steadily improved. So much so, that he is now one of the better swimmers on the team, and recently moved up to being in some of the critical relays. I’m amazed at this change, and it goes to show that you should never under estimate the power of simply showing up and working hard.
The swimming has packed on some serious muscle, and he looks to be the potentially strongest of my kids. He really doesn’t even know his own strength.
My oldest son and I are hoping to introduce him to golf this summer so we can do a “man thing together.” While I don’t want to overly force, I know some times you need to push a little to get it going. So, I delayed his introduction until I thought that he was old enough to have cognitive skills to understand that the frustration of hitting a small white ball is simply something that takes time to over come.
We’ll see this summer.
