Broken – Inspiration

Often inspiration comes in the strangest forms. Look for it and you may never find it however when you least expect it the face of inspiration stares at you bluntly, begging for your attention. This week has been one of those times for me. I wanted to take a short moment to share my experience with you.

Yesterday the sun was shining all was bright in our world. Not a chance anything could go wrong. The imaginary bell goes off, signaling nap time in the otherwise ‘busy’ household. Preparation begins to get our angels in bed. The normal routines are followed and signs of difficulty sprout from our three year old. He fights with every once of his being to prove to us he doesn’t need a nap. Doing so only proves how tired he really is.

An hour passes, I hear a loud thump on the floor followed by a blood curdling scream. Any parent knows that when you hear such things your heart stops for that moment in time. Horrible thoughts race through your mind followed by an instinctual urge to do any and everything to protect your child. Today was no different.

As I reach down to hold my child, assessing the damage at the same time, I immediately see the agony in his eyes. The cry for mommy and daddy is bold, he needs help. Holding his arm to the side I quickly realize this isn’t the average blemish that will heal in a hours time. We need to seek help and fast.

Wasting no time my wife drives our child to the closest emergency room. Myself, staying home with our other two boys. Hours pass and the phone call comes in. Broken wrist in two locations, enough to make a grown man cry. The doctor fits a temporary cast for my son until he can make it to the orthopedic doctor the following day. As grim as this sounds my three year old immediately pretends his broken arm, temporary cast installed, is a super powered laser blaster and shoots the bad guys hiding behind the pale grey walls. His spirits high as if nothing even happened.

My other two children and myself sit outside on the porch awaiting the arrival of our injured comrade. Finally they arrive and we all go out to show our support. In the eyes of my three year old fireball he is the coolest cat in town. Thinking of himself as version 2.0 with special forces grade super hero arm installed we see nothing but smiles from cheek to cheek. In his eyes he is one super cool dude.

The next day arrives and the new full cast is installed. Due to the breaks the cast seems larger than his actual arm. As an adult the first thing we would think about would be the limitations this would bring into our lives. Being a child he explores new things he can do with his amazing super arm. Doing so my three year old child has inspired me to look deeper inside myself. Often we feel we are limited by our current conditions when we should be looking to make the most of what we are given. I may be his father but he taught me the lesson this time.