Author: Jason Zerbey

Posted on

Play Time

https://thewashingtonmail.com/dont-play-with-your-kids-seriously/

Biases up front:
-The author doesn’t sound like the kind of person I would spend much time around.
-I love play and put it at the center of my learning universe.

I guess the latter explains the former. Notice I said MY learning universe. I don’t dictate how my children learn best and I think that is the part of the article that I agree with: let the children play. This mother’s success came from listening to the needs of her children and setting boundaries.

That is a very difficult balance. Play can happen in many ways, but parents have to recognize their own needs and protect them.

I believe play is essential to growth and learning in all stages of life. I set boundaries while modeling my own play through soccer, writing, jiu-jitsu, or any of my varied interests. I don’t play games that I don’t want to and that models consent (I don’t just model consent, we often discuss it).

I strongly believe we all need more things in our lives that we call “play.” Maybe this author most of all. Does that mean you have to play WITH someone else? Of course not, but a life of little play doesn’t feel like a successful one to me.

Posted on

No Language is Safe from the Past

I came to her crying. It was Iggy Pop’s fault. A song, memories, a broken narrative.

I knew it was coming. “I Wanna Be Your Dog,” played on the drive to her house. I felt the desperation with which I begged God to save my wife three years ago. Bargaining. I ran through the stages of grief like a series of ineveitable, twisting rapids in six nights sleeping by her side in the hospital. Alone. So many people moving in and out, but lonely and only a nascent relationship with Jesus to comfort me.

Grief is a long river. The rapids are always ahead. No matter how practiced you become, they remain dangerous and unpredictable. The nasty bitch that Nature can be. Anger.

In traffic, on the way to see my girlfriend, I forged into the tumult. Better to welcome the ugly crying and regain myself before we were reunited.

Reunited. No language is safe from the past.

I didn’t lose it in the car. It waited until I was in her driveway. I was upturned as she wrapped her arms around me. Slow tears. Hot and heavy (no language is safe) tears.

She listened. She made me dinner. She made love with me. The guilt and confusion don’t go away, they take breaks.

Now I’m alone in her house, but not lonely. I have Mary in my heart. I have Kristen in my heart. I have Jesus in my heart. God has blessed me with Unending Love.

It’s so green here. Mary would have loved it. She would love how cared for her sons and I feel here.

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