Planting Seeds

In the summer when I went to an old friend’s house and met the father of one of Lindsay’s former classmates from first grade, I remember him talking to me about how he influences his daughter in the decision-making process. “I plant the seed. And then, eventually, she comes around and sees my point of view and does exactly what I want her to do. But I never tell her outright. I just plant the seed.” That’s what he told me. Then his wife reiterated it not five minutes later. At the engagement party I had a nice long conversation with Scott’s mom about Lindsay and Scott, of course. And then, like deja vu, I heard it again. “I plant a seed. That’s all I do,” she said. “And eventually, my kids make good decisions.”

Is there something I missed along the road of parenting? I have never planted seeds. I just repeat over and over again like a broken record, I think you should do such and such or One day, you’ll thank me for giving you this advice because I have experienced it and I know what’s best for you. Subtlety is not my strong suit. I shoot straight from the hip. Besides, I don’t have the patience for planting seeds. I wouldn’t know the first thing about how to do it. Even when I plant for the summer season, I walk right past the seed packet aisle, which would cost me a fraction of what I end up spending, and straight to the already grown flowers.

I was talking to my best friend, Meryl, yesterday and we had this conversation about the seed planting parents and we both agreed, we are not part of that group. As a matter of fact, I blamed Meryl for being my role model in parenting and she graciously accepted her responsibility. I also realized that my own mother was a seed-planter. She never told me what to do. She did make suggestions and then told me I would figure out what I should do because I was smart enough to do that. Aha! I never gave my kids credit for being smart enough to figure out what to do because I thought and said I had all the answers. It’s a control thing, I think. No, I know. It is a control thing. I am a controlling, manipulative, overbearing mother. I just can’t stop myself. But I need to. The first step is admitting it and I have. I wish I just knew the next step. So, Meryl, my mentor parent, and I tried to figure it out. First, I said to her, “I have to take myself out of the picture. For example, what if I was dead? My kids would survive. They would have to make decisions all by themselves. After all, there are plenty of successful people out there who had no mother, or a mother who wasn’t always around- Barack Obama became president, after all, and it didn’t seem like his mother was ever-present. Maybe she was even a seed-planting parent.” Then Meryl told me a story about these two boys who lost their mother and then a couple of years later, their father, while they were teenagers. And- no one took them in. They had to get a teacher to live with them to act as guardian. “They’re both doing really well,” Meryl told me.

Okay, I thought, out loud, it can be done; your children can survive without your guidance. But I know the “dying” part is a bit extreme. Then we made a pact. We are going to join the Seed Planters. We are going to begin with never ever, ever saying “should”. The word “should” is forever banned and is a weed in the garden of growing children. The fertilizers are the words “could” or “can” or just being a good listener, even when you’re stomach is tied up in knots while you’re doing this. It will be difficult, but it sure beats dying to prove your kids will endure. And then when you are alive to see that the seed planting took root and grew into a good decision, you get to say, “I planted a seed.” I wish us luck.