My husband sat in a kid-sized chair staring at a bulletin board resplendent with construction paper space ships headed for different planets in the solar system. Some rockets had already reached Pluto. “Mr. Noonan,” our son’s fourth grade teacher said in a somber tone, “every time a rockets reaches a planet, it represents a book that your child has read.” He pointed to the bottom of the chart. “Notice that your son is still on the launching pad.”
And so went my son’s fourth grade parent/teacher conference. He didn’t like to read. I could add this incident to my “I failed as a mother” list. Why didn’t I make him read a book for homework? I didn’t even know he was supposed to be reading a book. He hadn’t shared that vital piece of information.
What’s a mother to do? My husband and I had visions of him drifting through school and just getting by. I had a knot in the pit of my stomach and already had him enrolled in tech school in my head. This kid was never going to be an intellectual. To him, school was a necessary evil.
But all that changed in high school when he began working part-time in the produce department of our local supermarket. The thought of prepping and packaging vegetables for the rest of his life motivated him to study in college. At the end of his first semester as a freshman he had a 4.0. He told us, “Hey, guess what? All I have to do is study and I get good grades!” What an epiphany.
So a mother’s fears bit the dust. It just goes to show you how myopic my vision of his future was. If only I could have had the perspective that God had and seen his life unfold in one panoramic picture. I needed to lift my vision higher.
After college my son taught English as a foreign language at a university in China for two years. He learned the language and now teaches Chinese to high school students. And, oh yes, he is an avid reader.
Bad performances don’t have to be game changers. They can be stepping stones. God has positive plans for each one of us. “‘For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord, “They are plans for good and not disaster, to give you a future and a hope.'” Jeremiah 29:11.