It’s hard, as a parent, to avoid doing too much for my child.  For one thing, I hate watching her struggle.  It’s difficult to not step in and “right the ship” whe she can’t complete what she has set out to do, no matter how big or small the task.

It’s also tough for me as a perfectionist.  I’ve tried over the years to back away from a tendency to “tuck in the corners” of other people’s beds (speaking metaphorically, of course; I hate making beds).  I’ve forced myself into accepting the reality that life consists entirely of things that aren’t quite up to the highest standards.

I sat in church Sunday listening to a guest speaker named Johnny Evans speaking about encouragement, and he started down a path I thought I could complete before he did.  As he spoke of watching his daughter struggle running a race, I felt as if he was going to say that he ran out on the track, scooper her up in his arms and ran the end of the race with her in his arms.  That’s not where he went, though, and I’m glad to hear it.

How the story ended is unimportant to what I’m going to eventually get to in this post.  What stood out to me wasn’t that his young daughter was in a race, or that she was falling way behind everyone else, or that her partner in the race ultimately became an encouragement to her by jogging next to her and speaking words of encouragement to build her up for a relatively strong finish.  What stood out was the realization I came to: we, as parents, should never, ever attempt to finish the “race” for our children.  We are the trainers.  We prepare them for the journey, but a good parent knows when his or her role stops, and the child’s role starts.

If we weren’t all forced to learn how to do things on our own, we’d all still be getting fed by our parents.  We’d have a bunch of six-foot-tall, post-pubescent adults being carried around on our parents’ hips.  Instead, our parents equipped us for the future, but let us live through the highs and lows on our own.

So we tie bibs around our kids’ necks.  We show them how division works.  We give them a helmet, knee pads and a push down the street.  But the line between good parenting and coddling exists at the point where we hand them the spoon for the first time, or tell them to do their homework, or let go of the bike seat.

The fall will hurt, and we can’t absorb the pain for them.  But, once they learn to balance the bike, they can ride on their own.

Back to the race, and the metaphor that jumped out in my head: as parents, we run the first leg of the relay, not the last.  We do not take the baton and try to make up ground; we give it our all to give them a good lead, and let God take them to the finish line.

People who know me even slightly well know there are two things that I have openly claimed will make me scream like a five-year-old girl with pigeon poop in her hair: spiders and snakes.  And, I admit after reaching the two-year mark of what I hope will be a permanent residence in North Carolina, I am adding roaches to that list.  Fear not, my house is protected; if any of those little balls of pestilence managed to get within two feet of the house without dying, they won’t make it much further.  I will resort to uranium and plutonium to kill the little turds, if that’s what it takes.

So, it’s with that understanding of my hatred for a few things creepy-crawly that I point out the ironic fact that I love Verminators on the DIscovery Channel.  Sure, I get the heebie-jeebies about every 37.2 seconds during the show.  The roach infestations and the episodes highlighting spiders actually make my skin feel as if it is attempting to hide under my muscle.  But in the end, the exterminators win.

And, since I believe the only good roach is a dead roach*, I approve.

* – Actually, a roach in your house is a good roach too, because that means it’s not in mine.  I’m kind of cold like that.  But I don’t care — we’re talking roaches here.

If you’ve noticed (if you’re still there…), I haven’t posted much lately.  And what I’ve posted has been largely political in nature.  Not terribly good reading for the faithful few.

Here’s the problem: I feel a burden for this country.  I feel like we’re spiraling out of control into 1) socialism and then 2) destruction.  Maybe we’re on the verge of the Second Coming of Christ (one can only hope), or maybe we’re just reaping the rewards of pushing God out of our lives (probably more likely, I regret to think).

Can we be saved?  Yeah, but the burden is on us.  So when something really fires me up, I write about it here.  Unfortunately, the burden is so strong within me that I don’t normally have the inspiration to write more here.  I’m going to aim for changing that, though.

I have a project at hand that will consist of two parts.  The first part is a book I am currently planning.  The second is a companion blog that will allow me to further expound on current topics, while the book will address the universal demons living within the country and our government.

The final concept with all this is to show how, through prayer, worship and common sense, we can turn this country around before it’s too late.

I’m a Patriot; I love my country, and I believe God gave the United States to the world to be a beacon of hope and faith in a hopeless, faithless world.  Unfortunately, rather than overcoming the world (” … In this world you will have trouble.  But take heart!  I have overcome the world.” – John 16:33), we’re letting the world rapidly overcome us.

I invite you to help me change that.  So, to facilitate that — and to return InvertedMind to its original, nonsensical, light-hearted roots, I will soon be ending political discussions here on IM.  Unless, of course, it’s to point out something nonsensical and/or light-hearted.

And, without further adieu, InvertedMind will be returning to obscurity, ambiguity, infamy, olfactory, unsatisfactory, and a whole bunch of other words that don’t make sense here but do end in -y.