One night when my daughter was seven, she joined me at the table for dinner, passing out personalized "invitations" prior to taking her seat. My son was napping late and my wife was busy so it was just the two of us. I didn't read the note (invititation), but made a point to remind myself to read it later. Shortly after sitting down and realizing it would just be the two of us, she exclaimed with unmistakable sadness, "oh no! You and I are the only ones who will be there!"
I assured her there would be no issue with attendance without really knowing what she meant, though I strongly suspected it had a lot to do with the aforementioned "invitations."
The thing about invitations that always struck me is how temporary they are. The events to which we are invited will come and go, but once you miss an opportunity to accept or take advantage of an invitation, the moment is gone forever. There may be another day where you can go to an amusement park or another year you can attend an annual festival, but there are no guarantees when you consider the unpredictability of things. Even if you do go "next time," you still missed out by skipping "last time." My children, like everyone else, will live each day once, and only once, and I cherish the thought of being invited to be a part of them, for however long that lasts.
My "invitation" as it was written:
"Please come to my sing show. Anyone can try out. I hope you can make it."
There's a joke in Cameron Crowe's wonderful film "Say Anything (1989)," during their high school graduation, clearly poking fun at all the recording of events by well-to-do families with their 1980s camcorders. I never thought I'd be that guy: the father who is more interested in capturing a moment in time using cool tech than in experiencing that moment while truly in the moment, but I've been tempted. While I still record endless hours of my children's lives (because I'll never be sorry I have those recordings), I make sure I am not doing so at the expense of the moment. After all, I was invited.
