The ground is level at the foot of the cross....recovering addict rescued by the saving grace of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

Thursday, September 07, 2006

Honoring My Wife

I was listening to a radio interview with Rob and Dianne Parsons, who run Care for the Family in the UK. It is similair to Focus on the Family. Caroly Parson hosts seminars for stay-at-home mothers, where she discusses the many challenges of staying at home. More importantly, she tells the mothers how truly important their services are. My favorite line of the interview went something like this:

"When a person asks me, as a stay-at-home mom, what I do for a living, I like to tell them that I am a Social Director that is currently working with three age groups. The first group are infants to toddlers, which requires a certain amount of expertise in psychology and a lot of hard work. The next group is with teenagers, and I confess that this program hasn't been going as well as we would like. The last group is a gentlemen who's in his late thirties to early forties and is exhibiting all the symptoms of a mid-life crisis. This one requires a great deal of patience anda degree in psychology."

I loved that tale and to me it real captures the importance and complexity of what Mary does every day with the kids (except for the mid-life crisis, I went through that in my mid-twenties so I could knock it out while I still had plenty of energy). There are many times, particularly when money is tight (which is most of the time), that Mary questions the value of what she does. Nevertheless, she is working seven days a week, almost 15 hours a day! If I had to pay someone that it would cost me an arm and a leg. More importantly, everday she is developing our kids into mature, God-loving, adults (the next question is when will I mature?) and there is no greater accomplishment than this.

So, I just wanted to publically thank, my wife, and all stay-at-home mothers, for all the sacrifices they do. It may be thankless to some, but for those that it really matters to, we can't thank you enough.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi,
Found your blogsite addy on a list of Vietnam blogs. Just curious Mike, are you adopted from Vietnam? How does one contact you? I was born in Vietnam but have been in the U.S. since I was two years old. If you are, we have things in common. E-mail me.



Ray

Anonymous said...

Mike,
Hi, I tried posting and didn't see it on your blog site so I'm guessing it didn't go through. Name's Ray and I found you site in a list of Vietnamese blogsites related to adoption, Vietnam, etc.. I'm guessing you were adopted from Vietnam? I was born in Vietnam. I am half Viet and half Mexican American. We lost our mother and have lost a whole half side of our family history.... Don't know about relatives in Vietnam, ..I am also Evangelical Christian.

Ray
reymundo3vn@yahoo.com

Bhodi Li said...

Ray,

I had the comment moderation on, so and I think that your comment accidently was diverted. I turned it off so that shouldn't be a problem.

I was adopted when I was 9 months old. I am very sorry to hear about your mother. I also would be interested to hear about your experiences being Viet-Mexican, which I'm going to start calling Vexican. Our kids haven't gone through a major cultural identity crisis quite yet, but I'm sure it will happen sooner or later. We're both hoping that they don't, but you never know.

Mike
michaelpavek@hotmail.com