Grace to My Dad and His Dad, and the Generations Before

There was an era when mommas stayed home with their babies and coined the word homemaker.

Norman Rockwell painted it. Somewhere between the end of WWII and the Vietnam war protests, the time when all the baby boomers were added to the world's roster.

Church going, God fearing, sweet loving families.

There were exceptions. Mine was one.

I was a latchkey kid decades before the phrase was common. Raised mostly by babysitters before I had the wisdom to handle a key to let myself in. It brought pain to us all. It wasn't that mom wanted to work. The one thing in life she wanted was to be with her girls. But a husband who couldn't keep a job forced her into the work place. Today, I can see medical explanations that kept us from being "normal". Be it ADHD, Asperger's, or some other undisclosed aliment that made life in our house strife filled, I can't be sure. But the facts are there. Research to identify the problems and help to rise above them was way off in the future.

Dad was a good man. He loved us and wanted to provide. His problems were also his dad's problems, both medically and emotionally, two of a kind.  How far back did the pattern go. Only God know the answer to that. Only God know the reasons why. All I know is that we really were dysfunctional as far as the standard of the time went.

Parenting is learned one generation to the next. If a solid foundation isn't present, how can we help but pass on mistakes? Do we stay stuck in a blame mode for our own problems being our parents fault? Do we blame God? If that is the road we take, we are just as guilty of the mess we cause as they were. But if grace is given and we take the higher road, we look truth straight in the eye and work to change ourselves.Make it better one moment at a time. We can't expect perfection. Small steps in the right direction will lead us to a new place in time. Give grace in the meantime.