Paul and I
Tyler and Lee
Taryn and I
Javan, Sara, HannahOn the way home form Christmas Camp, I had some awesome conversations.
Pete Geiger, Lee Walton, and Jenny and I discussed what exactly the relationship between and husband and wife should be, whether the man was the absolute authority, how the woman should be submissive (if at all), and what it meant to be woman or man (and we found out that no one knows and that we personally will just find out by trying).
I talked to Prusean about Sri Lanka and its politics. Christians cannot be president or prime minister. The civil war is over a group of people wanting to secede from the country. He wants to start an organization aimed towards people in their 20's and younger that will promote peace and an end to the civil war. He goes to a small Christian college in Boston and is double majoring in Economics and International Studies. Wow. By the way, he is from Sri Lanka.
More important though is that Shelly and I talked about our parents. We talked about how my mom makes me feel weird when she talks of how she wants to divorce my dad after mary graduates, how she wants me to set up an AIM/MSN account for her so she can talk to Phil, how Phil just got a divorce, how she wants to find out of if she likes Phil. How she wanted me to wear make up in order to attract a guy, how she pressures me to date, how she really pushed me to date Mason and how much pressure that put me under and how I almost did solely because of her nagging me about it and getting so excited that a guy might be interested in me even when I'm not in him. How she is worried that her relationship with my dad will make me marry someone that doesn't really care about me and will not be affectionate with me.
But alas, my family isn't the only one messed up, her parents just got a divorce 'cus her dad was having an affair and her mom talks to men on the internet now. Also, her husband's dad just walked out of their lives about 8 years ago and has disowned all his children. I hadn't told anyone about my mom thinking about Phil and wanting to see him until today on the bus when I told Shelly.
On my way home, when I was not in a conversation, my mind was consumed with the fact that I didn't want to go home, that I didn't want to see my dad, that I didn't want to see my mom. My dad just sits on his computer, but at least he doesn't nag me. I have to remember not to be so nagging -that's what Lee said he is worried about marrying (his nagging mother).
I felt like I would have been content to stay away my whole life, just live with the Northland kids.
3 comments:
A couple of comments.
First, i just can't get my head around how desperate your mom is to divorce your dad.
As far as i can tell from what you write, he is faithful to her, does not mistreat or abuse her and seems be supporting his family financially.
Second, i am amazed at how you seem strong enough to resist the mostly negative (not to mention un-Christian, un-biblical and utterly worldly) pressure and influence that your mom seems to be exerting on you.
Perhaps that is because the effectivenes of a mother's influence for bad on her daughter is much less than that of a father's bad influence on his son : what do you think ?
I'll be keeping you and your parents in my prayers.
Reading back over my post, I now realize that I villanize my mom by not ever mentioning all the great stuff she does (like organize letters and call people to raise money to buy my youth pastor a car so he can safely drive his two autistic daughters to their school, help my friend's parents get in a government program to help them buy a house, volunteer at church youth retreats, etc).
However, in response to whether a mom's influence for bad on a daughter is less than a father's on a son:
I think they are equal, but girls tend to have an advantage because it might be easier for us to balance out a mother's negative effect. That advantage would be, at least for me, the fact that I have had numerous older women as mentors that offer advice and help me understand. My guy friends say that it is hard for them to find older men that could take on a fatherly role for them, where as I have found that God has always provided someone for me to turn to (for now, though he may not in the future).
Also, as far as I can tell, girls have a bit easier of a time freely talking about our trials, and so we may not feel as isolated and we may get more support than a son would.
It's hard to say though, since everything is experienced a bit one-sidedly, aye?
Birader--
Though your question, I believe, was directed at my friend, I hoped you wouldn't mind my own interference.
My own opinion on the issue can wait, because I must first point out that it is extremely unsound territory you try to cover by using 'father-son' and 'mother-daughter' relationships. These typified ideals can't be used in any good reasoning because you've left the topic, though appearing broad, narrowed down to no more than a general expectation that involves no other factors.
In fact, in my own family my greatest influence has come from my father and my brother's from our mother, already turning your question, at least in my case, to uselessness. There are many other factors too, as there are no permanent 'mother' 'father' personalities that can be accounted for in every single family. There are simply too many different kinds of parents and children to make any vague inferences.
As to influences on parents to their children, again it involves so deeply the circumstance of the family that it is hard to answer anything so vague. In honesty, my hardest trial is ever to answer questions without specifications because there are thousands of different situations in which the question can be placed.
Establishing this, I cannot find my own idea of parental influences. I can easily tell you now that in my case, I will choose how I turn out, good or bad, despite influence. Though influence shapes us as our person our responses are entirely our own to choose as is our future. Though through the bad influences of my father's overbearing nature, smoking, drinking, and general unwitting cruelty have no doubt affected me in some way, it is in fact I that ultimately decides whether or not to include this influence in my day to day life. I can think of at the very least 50 terrible things to say to a person in five minutes of knowing them thanks to influence of my father, but I will not say a single one of them because it is my choice to block this side effect of a long acquaintance. Though, at will, I can recall this particular influence, I choose instead to stifle it.
I am big on choices. I am big on personal responsibility. I believe, in true response to your question, that a bad influence depends entirely on the child's choice to allow it to occur.
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