You'll be loved you'll be lovedLochlan's parenting style is overly-emotional, death-defying and fraught with danger and second-guessing. For his ease when he's with Ruth, without her he feels the weight of the entire world balanced on his shoulders. He abhors the thought of making a mistake or somehow choosing wrong, a decision which would then clearly open a Pandora's box of change that would lead her down a road he isn't comfortable taking, or some such disaster in the making. Any concern he's ever had for me as I grew up on the amusement circuit is magnified by no less than a million. He parents like a trooper. He worries like the best dad you ever saw. And there's never enough time, money or love, it seems. Sometimes he gets so rattled by the efforts he puts in that I have to remind him to relax, that Ruth is half-me, and therefore very resourceful.
Like you never have known
The memories of me
Will seem more like bad dreams
Just a series of blurs
Like I never occurred
Someday you will be loved
Great. Just what I need, he groans. And I am relaxed. Can't you see?
Caleb, in contrast, has a cool collectedness about him. Henry is the greatest asset in Caleb's portfolio and he is managed and disbursed as such, filed in the roster with a value of infinite. Caleb takes his disciplinary cues from Lochlan, figuring if Ruth can do x at y age, then Henry can too. He does not worry because he's well-insured and there is always enough money to buy time and love. For his ease when he's with Henry, sometimes he gets so wrapped up in being who he is and ruling the world that I worry that one day the time is going to come when I will have to remind him that Henry needs him, possibly more than Caleb's other assets and projects need him, also that Henry is human, and half-me, that he needs limits and direction and love without distraction.
Great. Just what I need, he laments. Also, you will never have to remind me.
But they were both reserved and honest with our parenting coordinators this morning, who officially signed off on us at Caleb's request, as a show of good faith to me that he plans to keep his promises. We're wasting their time at this point anyway. There weren't actually many hiccups once Caleb ceased trying to use Henry as a weapon. We've had separate court counseling as well to address our habit of using litigation to sort out our personal problems, Caleb because that's what he knows and me because it was the only way I could garner his full attention. It's been recognized that we don't put the children in the center of our personal conflicts. We're just high-conflict as humans, not as parents. But now that the money's in place, the schedule is in place and we have resources close to home that allow for in-house care anyway (Thank you August and Sam), we don't need to do this anymore. We're in agreement with each other and with Lochlan. And other people need these resources more.
It was just wonderful to hear that after five years we figured out how to maintain this, and that as thoroughly unorthodox as our environment is, they turned it upside-down and inside-out and finally admitted it's not unhealthy or detrimental to the upbringing of the children, something Caleb liked to capitalize on every chance he got, something I never believed for a second. This is Utopia, and now I have proof.
He's trying and now I have proof of that too.