It doesn't take more than about 30 seconds as a parent to realize that those new thrills and chills you feel up and down your spine are as related to fear and terror for your wee baby's safety as they are to love. And it takes less than 3 minutes watching and/or listening to the news to clutch your kids tighter, and lock your doors, which I suppose is part of the point.
So the fact that Sharon Randall is stating that the first job of good parents is keeping watch, is both overly simplistic and elegantly accurate.
"Watching children is not a job for the faint of heart. It requires
constant vigilance. If you blink, they run in the street. If you
answer the phone, they juggle knives." She ends her reflections about her son with "I wonder what the boy will do next" and you know? If that's not the crux of parenting, I don't know what is. We stand by, watch over, wait and wonder what they'll do next. And we are lucky and blessed to be so appointed.
