Living In The Grey

“Parenting is not about creating perfect children. It’s about growing children who will make the world a little less broken.” — L.R. Knost

The Christmas season is over; a new year has begun. I know I’ll spend more moments than I care to admit getting the date wrong. It is the “grey” of winter. The Winter Solstice is behind us, and our Earth is slowly tilting back toward the sun. Days will lengthen, and light will linger a little longer—but the change is subtle.

Having traveled around the sun for a number of decades, I trust that much is happening beneath the soil of the frozen ground. Plants lie dormant, conserving their energy, awaiting a new season of growth.

Looking out into our yard, it appears as if nothing is happening. But the history of springs past reminds me that roots are pushing deeper, seeds are preparing—hidden and invisible to my eye. Transformation is already underway, just beneath the surface, waiting for more light and warmth.

I imagine no seed or root waits in panic, wondering if the grey of winter will last forever. No root or seed wrestles with anxious thoughts. There is a quiet knowing in nature—transformation is coming. It always does.

As a parent of four adults—some who have branched off to nurture their own families—I have held my breath in certain seasons, knowing I could not see the growth. I might not notice the changes that were coming, and the best thing I could do was wait. No good ever came from forcing a sprouting upward.

Take this job. Go to this school. Head in this direction. What’s the plan? Do you have a plan? Are you sure? I had to resist the urge to rush in with all my “wisdom,” holding back my parenting anxiety about seeds that had not yet surfaced.

I didn’t always succeed. With a pained expression and clenched embarrassment, I sometimes let my thoughts spill out—often met, and rightly so, with my young adults’ exasperation.

I’m grateful, though, that I can adapt—that I can unlearn unhelpful ways of responding to seasons of grey. Staying curious (a labour-intensive practice at times) about what I cannot yet see has taken work. But I’m learning to trust the ground we prepared through all those years together.

More and more, I believe it is enough to have nurtured these young men and women to be wise, thoughtful, faith-filled humans. Growth is already in them—they are innately wired for it.

We are in the winter season of “grey.” And as we wait for the earth to keep tilting toward the nurturing light and warmth of the sun, we’re reminded that parenting is seasonal too—a practice of quiet waiting and trusting that growth is happening, even when it’s unseen.