This I Believe

Right and wrong. Good and bad. In an age when we parse politician’s sentences down to the syllable to determine their real meanings, these principles seem almost too simple.

During my time on this planet I have always tried to do the right thing. Occasionally I have made wrong choices. It’s not that I didn’t know better, but at certain times and for reasons that never appear as good in hindsight as they did when I made the decision – I’ve made some wrong choices.

When I was around 9 I hated taking baths. So I would fill the tub with water, pour in some of the dirt from my sneakers, and swirl it around with the wash cloth. It worked like a charm until my parents noticed a dirt ring on my bed sheets. In this case I knew it was wrong but I had decided that taking a bath was worse than the consequences of not taking one. My parents changed my perception of that rather quickly. I knew I was wrong but I did it anyway – the wrong choice.

As I grew older I became aware of this voice in my head that would speak up whenever I was faced with a right/wrong good/bad choice. When lining up in my head the bad choices I had made in my life (including the bathtub incident when I was 9) I realized that invariably I had made the wrong choice because I had misperceived that the “good” benefit would be worth the bad choice. That usually happened because I had wanted whatever it was more than I was concerned about it being wrong.

One of our greatest responsibilities in this world is to be a parent, because we get the chance to show our children right from wrong. Not just tell them – show them by our actions and how we conduct ourselves as adults and parents. As a kid I was lucky. My parents were of the “Greatest Generation”; the generation that lived through the Depression, fought a World War, came home (some of them) and raised families. Literally living a lifetime before they became parents they were the ultimate role models for responsibility and in teaching right from wrong. I didn’t know it until I grew up, but the fact that my parents taught me by their examples was as important – more, really – than what they told me verbally. My parents put that “voice” in my head and gave me an understanding of what was “right” and what was “wrong”. It is up to me to listen to the voice, but they put it there.

I didn’t live through the Depression or fight tyranny in a World War. I am a “boomer” and I’ve had all the advantages my parents never did. But I still need to be as good a parent to my kid as my parents were to me. So I try to teach by what I do as well as by what I say. I try to remember right from wrong and good from bad, and make the right choices. As a parent there’s no way I can be there for every decision my daughter has to make during her life. But if I do a good enough job teaching her, I won’t have to.