Last week, I shared a piece called Presents, presence. It’s essentially a personal perspective on the matter of parents trying to make up for not being around by buying their kids stuff.
I’m happy with most of it, as it’s a logical piece of the puzzle I’m trying to put together here. There is, however, a part that hasn’t sat well with me since I hit publish, where I’m not sure that painted my dad in a completely fair light.
What happened happened, and my writing is an honest attempt at both telling and processing the truth. I do think that it’s helpful for all of us to recognize how easy it is to turn toward the material world when what we need is something deeper; it’s a very human flaw, and seeing it clearly—including the ways we’ve been hurt by it—is part of adjusting to do better. So I stand by the words that are there.
It’s the words I omitted that are bugging me.