Embrace Your Passions and the Ones You Love

​I had a chance to do some reflection this Father’s Day, which was actually pretty easy when you’ve got two great kids and a wonderful wife and spend a few hours at the botanical gardens enjoying the sights and slicing up your hands on some volcanic rocks. Anyway, I digress and I’ve barely gotten through the first sentence.

This was my second Father’s Day where I find myself lonely at the top. My dad passed away last year just about a month before the occasion, so that one I spent mostly missing him, and this year I had a bit more room to look within myself. For those of you who’ve been reading my blog, you understand what an impact his death had, and I think Father’s Day has forever acquired some small shade of melancholy for me, but it’s important to stay focused on my owns kids.

So this Sunday the time I spent with my family, and the thoughtful gift they got me (a framed photo of me reading to the kids before I head off to work) really got me thinking about what a huge part of my life my kids have become. Prior to my eldest being born more than four years, I couldn’t imagine throwing this much of myself into something.

It’s no secret that I have to carve out time for my writing. I have to wrestle with each day to get in my allotted amount of words. I need to steal moments to edit my novel which has been in its editing phase for about three years now. The only time I have left to do reading is on the bus heading home. Writing may be my passion but it’s not my day job. My day job allows me to do some writing. It certainly doesn’t let my mind go to waste and for that I’m thankful. Almost a year ago I’ve also landed the dream job of working at an academic institution, and being steeped in the culture here has provided no shortage of inspiration. So there’s no daylight left to complain, but neither is there time to fully absorb myself in my writing.

But what about at home? Why is it when I look back at my words-per-day tracker, the weekends end up being the least productive days? Well that has an even better answer. No matter what I do, no matter how many hobbies I’ve had and dropped over the years, nothing compares to the two little guys that call me “Bapa”, and occasionally “Daddy” just to annoy me.

It didn’t come easy. I say this honestly because I don’t want to take too much credit and also to emphasize that even something like love and devotion to your kids is a project you should never cease working on. My own wife can attest to the fact that I’m not always the best person at showing the people I love how much I care. I’ve had to learn this with my kids. Together we’ve built the foundation that is now our family and I wouldn’t have it any other way. When I get a FaceTime call on the bus as I’m going to work and see my kid crying because he slept through me getting ready for work, that is what my life is all about.

So if you’re following along with my writing, it may seem like it comes in drips. My novel is taking forever and I don’t exactly produce a steady flow of short stories. Yet with all that, I haven’t given up. I’m thirty one and even though my confirmation bias can pinpoint dozens of examples of writers who’ve already hit it big, I know it doesn’t work that way. Writing is a way of life, it’s a marathon. My writing shines brightly and bursts to get out, and alongside it there’s an even more intense fire in my life.

You can be passionate about more than thing, so don’t dare turn your back on what makes you happy.