Phases

Recently I have been reading through some of my first journal, which I started writing in when I was eleven.  Some of it is interesting.  A lot of it is embarrassing.  When I was twelve I had this ridiculous crush on Devon Sawa (a popular teen movie star at the time, in case you don't know), and I was constantly writing about how I was so madly in love with him. 

I have to laugh at my twelve-year-old self because I was so sure that I was somehow going to meet him and marry him someday.  Also, I considered the biggest problems to be the fact that he was five years older than me and that I thought he probably wasn't a Christian.  I did not see any obstacle in him being a movie star or living someplace far away from me.  No, I was in love, and none of that mattered.  Didn't matter to me, anyway.  I wrote about it so much at the time that I almost feel sick reading about it now.  Fortunately, it was just a phase, and I soon moved on to having crushes on people I actually knew:)

I have no idea how this relates to anything, but I guess it just goes to show how much people change over the years...and how that is a good thing!  It does give me hope for my own kids.  They may not be in a stupid I'm-in-love-with-a-movie-star phase right now, but they are going through other, equally if not more, unpleasant phases.  Malachi whines so much right now that it sometimes seems like he knows no other form of communication.  Meanwhile, Israel breaks down into a kind of yell/growl and huge crocodile tears when things don't go his way.  Simeon is the only one that is usually fun to be around, but he's been sick lately, which has made him into a bit of a grump. 

The thing I have to remember is that old saying, "this too shall pass."  I have every confidence that Malachi can learn to stop whining, that Israel can learn to stop growling, that they both can figure out more effective ways to communicate (if not, I truly pity their wives!), and Simeon will get over his cold and go back to being his happy-go-lucky self.  It's all temporary.  What's hard with kids is that is takes so long.  You have to keep working with them.  You have to keep waiting and praying.  It doesn't happen overnight.  It takes time, but eventually even the most ridiculous phase will be gotten through.

This is what I tell myself, anyway.  Forge ahead.