The Gift of Giving

Heather and I had the chance to go to the Reds game last night by ourselves. There were no diapers to change, no little mouth to feed, and no dealing with "hurricane time" (the time from when Corinne wakes up from her afternoon nap until the time she goes to bed where she literally tears through the house, getting into anything she can find, and making as big a mess of it as possible). It was just her and me, and great weather, and baseball.....and it was awesome.
Parenting changes everything. Your schedule changes (crazier), your free time changes (much less), the activities you're involved in change, places you hang out change, everything changes. You have to live a life of serving. You put their needs before yours, they become more important than you.
So when were offered free tickets (Thanks Ryan and Beth!) and free babysitting (Thanks Jim and Terri!) we jumped at the chance. And so Heather and I had the chance to go the game, and relax, and enjoy the awesome weather, and eat nachos with jalapenos (they were glorious), and we got to just enjoy each other. I've been to over 50 Reds games in my life, and I've never appreciated one as much as I did last night.
When you do something enough, and when you can do it whenever you want, on your schedule, when only what you want matters, you begin to feel a sense of entitlement. That you deserve things, that it's your right to have them. And then we get angry when we don't get them. But when you live to serve, you expect to give things up, you expect to not have as much, you come to realize that things that were once in your control aren't anymore. And the gift of giving is that you no longer believe you're owed anything, but when you receive, it's something that you really appreciate.

You don't have to have kids to live a life of serving by the way, this is way bigger than that. This is about everything you do, pouring yourself into others, putting them in front of yourself.

So as Heather and I sat together watching the Reds win (they're 2-0 on games that I've been to this year....I'm just saying), there was an overwhelming sense that we are so blessed. It was a liberating feeling, to feel blessed about something that you've experienced so many times. Maybe the greatest gift isn't what you have, it's in what you give.