Chanie and her sisters get together every time one of them celebrate their thirtieth birthday. Her sister, turning thirty, lives in Virginia so Chanie has gone there for a few days, leaving me with Yosef and Nava since 9 am yesterday.

I am really enjoying the time with them. Caring for them, and being the only one to whom they turn to and depend on has been a bonding I have not experienced with them in a long time. Actually, since the last time she left me with the boys for a weekend in February 2009.

Here is a couple of things I have learned:

1. Your children require and deserve your full attention all the time. Sure they can play and entertain themselves, yet even then your mind is on them.

2. My Eureka! How on earth does Chanie get anything else accomplished? I am going to continue being "paralyzed" until she returns. She does not read this blog so I can say; my respect for her has grown to the 100th power! 

3. This is perhaps the most humbling. Chanie has told me numerous times that being a parent is the only thing you can do, because it takes up your entire being, mind and heart. I have heard it, seen it and agreed with it, but all this time it really never penetrated my "thick skull." Otherwise I would not be so surprised by what is happening to me since 9 am yesterday.

What this teaches me is that you may read and hear about something. Even be in the closest proximity to it. After all I have been a parent for 9 years. Mendel, our oldest, is 9 years old. Yet until you experience it, it will be foreign to you. No matter how smart and empathetic you are.

4. As long as I have other things on my mind and in my schedule I am cheating my kids of their father. Being a father requires your everything. Time goes by very quickly and before I know it my opportunity to be the father of their childhood will be gone.

 Don’t you love life, you always get to learn and laugh, at yourself!