On Failing as a Parent
And the little mercies that help all of us move past our past
If you ever go to the Great Frederick Fair in Frederick, Maryland, and if you are there at night when the moon is full and the air smells of fried food and cotton candy, and if it’s a night when a musician is playing in the overflowing grandstand, there’s a secret you should know about.
Outside the grandstand, at the far right side, tucked in beside what used to be a tent where a political party handed out buttons and flyers, is a tiny alcove, an indentation in the chain link fence separating the race track and the infield from the midway. If you slip into this alcove, and you press up against the fence, and there aren’t too many other people taking advantage of this space, you can watch the concert from there. You can’t see very well, but you can get tiny glimpses of the performer, and you can hear the crowd.
These are the things you learn after 47 years at the Frederick Fair.
Leo has been a music fan for as long as he’s been alive. Mostly this comes from having four older brothers and sisters who are also obsessed with music of all types—Indie and folk and pop and R&B and rap. He was singing along with Pharrell William’s “Happy” when he was three years old. At the age of 9 he has memorized, for better or worse, most of the rap from “Spiderman in the Spiderverse.”
And he quickly fell in love with the upbeat rhythms of Toby Mac. It just so happened in 2021 that Toby Mac was playing at the Frederick Fair, this place my family operates a concession stand every September, and for a hot minute we considered getting tickets, just so Leo could see him in person. We went back and forth, back and forth. He’s only 7 . . . would he really want to sit there for a few hours? And the bigger question: it was on one of our busiest nights of the week—would anyone be able to get away from the tent and take him in to see the show? Could we spare the help?
Failing as a parent is inevitable, and this fact doesn’t change even as the children get older and the stakes get higher. Every time I think I’ve learned my lesson, every time I think I should be able to now navigate this parenting thing without royally screwing up, I just keep figuring out new ways to mess up.
All fodder for future therapy sessions, I suppose.
Maile and I do a lot of things right, too, and I’m proud of who my children are becoming, who they are. We have a strong relationship with each of them and fight for that every single day.
But parenting is being asked to make 1,000 decisions a day, and it’s simply impossible to get them all right. As they get older, the stakes get higher, and some choices are even lose-lose, or at least feel that way.
When Toby Mac’s music kicked on in the grandstand a mere hundred yards from where we were making soft pretzels, I saw Leo and immediately knew I had made a mistake. His eyes lit up, and he was more excited than I had ever seen him.
“Dad! Toby Mac’s starting! Isn’t that amazing!”
His little seven-year-old body started dancing, and he sang along with every song, from right there in our tent.
Why didn’t we get tickets to the show? I thought to myself. What a mistake.
We started taking turns walking him over to the little side alcove and holding him up so he could watch the concert through the chainlink fence. He kept looking at me with bright eyes, excited that he was actually listening to Toby Mac! And I couldn’t stop thinking of how we had failed him. Such a simple thing we could have done, and we didn’t do it.
For the last few years, whenever Toby Mac came on the radio, Maile and I would look at each other and shake our heads.
“Can you believe we didn’t get tickets for Leo for that show?” one of us would say, and that deep sort of disappointed sadness would pulse through me. Ugh. What a mistake. How could I have missed such an obvious gift to one of my children?
Then, a few weeks ago, Leo brought home a little book he had written at school.
The prompt at the top of the page was, “What is your best memory?” and he wrote this:
“One More Time” was shouted across the seats when I was at the Toby Mac concert. At that moment I was standing behind the gates to the concert. Then suddenly I heard Toby Mac’s voice and my heart started pounding. All of a sudden he started singing his first song and it was my favorite song it was called Till the Day I Die. Then my Mom and Dad were nearly asleep but I was wide awake listening to his beautiful voice. Later that night Toby Mac took a break so we did to. I actually stade awake for the whole concert. He finished his last song and then when we went home it was 10:00. Then I went to sleep. As you can see I had a lot of fun at the Toby Mac concert.
I think we can beat ourselves up for choices we made in the past. Ways we feel we’ve fallen short. Mistakes we made.
Many times, though, I think there’s another way of seeing things.
This is what mercy looks like.
That was beautiful. My kids are already "growed up." (My son had his 38th birthday yesterday.) Time goes by fast and you never know what they're going to take out of childhood with them. If you did it right, they'll be your best friends.
Yes. Mercy. You didn't fail. Leo was blessed by hearing his favorite performer in person, even though he didn't have a great view. And it's one of his favorite memories. Our Father is so good.