Father's Day: OF DREAMS, DARED & DASHED, AND DEATH

#blog #vlog #opinion #fathersday #avgeek #aviation

An essay...

BUT FIRST, A VID TO CELEBRATE PILOT DADDYS!

DIRECT LINK:

http://youtu.be/-0hjuehotoM

Note:  The following is an opinion article submitted to the Wall Street Journal on 16 May, 2013.*

OF DREAMS, DARED AND DASHED, AND DEATH

Southern California.  Inspired by his airline pilot uncle, a young 19 year old man plots with excitement his first solo cross country in an airplane.

Boston, Massachusets.  Inspired by his radical Muslim big brother, a young man plots with excitement to bomb the Boston Marathon.

Two young, impressionable men.  Barely adults.  Both with role models.  And both on wildly different paths.

How does this happen?  Where did we go wrong?  And how do we fix it?

As a father of three, grandfather of two, and an airline pilot who blogs about his adventures, I have unwittingly found myself in another roll—that of role model.  I do not take lightly this newfound position.  As they say in Spiderman, “With great power comes great responsibility.”  As we all know.

Or do we?

Long before Charles Barkley declared, "I am not a role model," impressionable youth have idolized others, for myriad reasons.  Some reasons are reasonable, others ridiculously random.  Some role models are deserving, others . . . deplorable.

Eighteen is the most dangerous age.  Fully adult, we suddenly have absolute power over our lives.  But we are armed with scant experience to help us make sound decisions that will shape our future.  Indeed, we are barely conscious of the enormity these little decisions have.

 I have encountered first hand this ironic dichotomy in our youth.  A large demographic of my readers are young men and women about to embark on a career that they hope will lead them to the cockpit of an airliner.  They are from all walks of life, from all financial, regional, family and cultural backgrounds and challenges.  But they all share one thing:  a dream.

This dream shapes their every action.  They study hard in school, work hard at jobs, and typically have a positive, supportive relationship with their parents.  They are singularly focused, and driven.  These are the traits that will help them “make it” in the world, regardless of whether they ultimately achieve their goal.

The unfocused youth is still driven.  But they are the vulnerable youth, for they are searching for one thing:  acceptance.  And they will find it, whether it be at the hangar or the hangout.  The soccer team or the street gang.  The coffee shop or the meth lab.  And through this acceptance, they will shape their future.  And ours as well.

Who’s at fault?  We are.

The realities of our mobile society are accelerating.  In moving from the farm family to the nuclear to mixed, America has severed its roots from the wisdom that older cultures have known for centuries—the bond of family.  We pay lip service to the phrase, “It takes a village,” but in reality we have cast family aside as an inconvenient truth.  We have abandoned the traditional family* and gone our own way.  And we are reaping what we have sewn.

The family unit of old served to provide, among others, three fundamental needs:  stability, peace, and identity.  In short, love.  And with that, the drive of youth is not wasted in searching for acceptance; they already have it.  They are now free to search for themselves.  To find and pursue their dreams.

We in the States cherish freedom above all—as well we should.  But have forgotten that, with great freedom comes great responsibility.  In our drive to remain “free,” we have abandoned our youth to make their own way.

In our drive to “get ahead,” we often make the same mistake.  Mom and dad both working is equivalent to a single parent household: for a large part of each day, Junior has been abandoned.  

The key, again, is love.  Only when our society as a whole begins to reflect on the failures of the fractured family, only when we each of us come to realize that most basic truth—the love of a child trumps all—will the arc of our societal ills begin to mend. 

A single parent is admirable, and deserves our great respect.  But, perhaps, rather than taking that second job to make ends meet, the single parent—and the dual parent household alike—should consider instead spending more time at home.

God knows it will pay vastly more dividends.

*In reference to the May 16, 2013 WSJ article, Boston Suspect Left Note in Boat (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323582904578486861916415232.html)
*“Traditional family” here means two parents, one or more children, along with grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.  An entire support team network.  The “gay marriage debate" is outside the scope and point of this essay.

This post is dedicated to the memory of my loving father, Richard.

A proud boy and his daddy.  With my big brothers, circa 1965, at the Grand Opening of Daddy's Firestone store.

Dad, you always took time out every day to play with me and my pals,
and always supported me in everything I ever did.

Thank you!  I love and miss you!!!

RELATED POSTS

• "Mother's Day Special: Flyin Mommas!" —http://capnaux.blogspot.com/2013/05/mothers-day-special-blog-n-vid-flyin.html
• A Plea to our Muslim Brothers and Sisters —http://capnaux.blogspot.com/2012/09/a-plea-to-our-muslim-brothers-and.html

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Posting June 26 @ 11:00 PHX

"Around the World in 80 Jumpseats"

A Pilot's Eye View of the World from the Cockpit Jumpseat!

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