I wrote about the comic strip “Pearls Before Swine” the other day, and it struck me again that the character who is perhaps the one who is mostly there for comic relief has become one the the most poignant ones in the strip.
The recent strip was about Larry the Croc walking his kid to school and praying that he would return home safely at the end of the day. But there’s more to parenting than just fearing for your children’s safety. There’s the active side of the job.
I’m not sure I’ve seen a more poignant strip that doesn’t involve actual tragedy. Larry and his wife are the only regular characters in the strip who have children, and they love their on very much.
There’s a real irony if you look at our country these days. Think of all the political figures on both sides of the aisle and then name the one who shows the most open love for one of his children.
Two come to mind, albeit for very different reasons,
The one person who seems to love his son the most unreservedly is President Biden. Hunter Biden has had a difficult life when you figure his mother, is older brother and one of his sisters all died before their time. Nothing seems to infuriate Trumpanzees more than he hear the president say how much he loves his son.
I suppose that’s because Trump never says nice things about his sons Uday and Qusay, er, Don Junior and Eric.In fact, when his late first wife — the one he buried on his golf course — had proposed the name for his first born, Trump said, “What if he turns out to be a loser?”
Of course Trump is the other one who has shown open love for one of his children. The sad part is that it’s his older daughter and the kind of love he feels is the kind dads go to prison for.
It appalls me that the so-called Christians who consider Trump a holy man don’t write him off just for this, and that’s probably all I should say about Trump in this context.
When I look back at the comic strip at the beginning, I remember my dad saying to me, “You just talk to hear yourself talk.”
I don’t know what I felt when I heard that, but I know I have never said that to either of my children.
Something I never realized until my wife told me about it after something I said once to our kids is that it is so easy to kill a child’s spirit.
Remember, we only have them for so long.
And when they’re out in the world, we will always miss them.