“Grandpa, What Keeps You Up at Night?”

Now in my 50s, I can say the things that “Keep Me Up at Night” have morphed over time.

Pre-Teens: The shadows under my bed and in my closet.

Teens: The girls I liked, trying to be popular, an occasional test.

20s: The wide-open possibilities of the world, girls that are now women, college, marriage.

Mid-20s: Providing for my family and attending college, putting food on the table, my schedule.

Late-20s: Starting my career, spending time with my wife and kids, my kids and entering school, bills.

Early-30s: Much the same as Late-20s, add my older kids turning into teenagers, working toward promotions, bills, moving into a better neighborhood for my kids and wife.

Late-30s: Wash, rinse, repeat Early-30s.

40s: My career, spending time with family, bills, kids leaving the nest, kids making adult choices/decisions, the introduction into grandparenthood, retirement.

Early-50s: Grandkids, retirement, self-awareness, purpose, kids, the country (USA), friends.

Do you need a nap now after reading this? It’s okay if you do. No, really, go ahead and take a nap, I’ll just wait for you over here…<zzz>.

Do you see any trends in the list? Do you see any comparisons to your own life in this list? The first thing that I see is the fact that I’ve been unfairly blessed. May *unfairly* is the wrong word here. I just feel that I’ve been blessed beyond my spiritual earnings. I’ve definitely overdrawn my blessing account (luckily my wife has a great overdraft account she lets me use).

Looking over my list, there is a definite trend to the outward versus the inward person. Don’t get me wrong, I am very aware that I wrote “self-awareness” in my 50s, but I feel that this is due more to being able to adjust my thoughts from Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs to becoming more service oriented in my day-to-day life. This is definitely something that is more prevalent in my latter-years as the strains of bills become secondary and trivial to a degree (again, recognizing that I’m very fortunate).

Getting back to my original question, “What Keeps You Up at Night?” The most prevalent things from my list are my grandkids and the country. These two things are very intertwined to me. One does not necessarily rely on the other, but if both are in order their results are much more favorable.

Do my grandkids need the country to be running perfectly to make good decisions and succeed? Not necessarily.

Does the country need my grandkids to make good decisions and contribute positively to society in order to succeed? Absolutely.

The common denominator here is that I worry for my grandkids and the decisions that they are faced with in life. I do have confidence in their parents, which is truly a natural shot of Ambien for my nighttime needs. But what can I do as a grandparent to contribute? What’s my part in benefitting my grandkids and complimenting my kids in their goals for their own children?

Looking at the list I created, there are items that are not present in my early years that are manifested a little later in life. There is some understanding that I truly have now that were not basic, everyday needs earlier on (food/shelter). I’m able to look a little beyond these things as my own kids are chasing those needs for their families.

Again, what do I have to offer? I have the fortune of being able to slow down, to listen to them when they say, “Grandpa, you know what,” and then let them share critical parts of their life with me (in their eyes), to read a book with them, to spoil them at times, to have them and their cousins come over in the summer for several days of “cousin camp” so that they can make strong connections to family, to have an open-door policy for Sunday dinner every week so that they can see how important family is, to know that they are loved and surrounded by a large group that cares about them, and always know that they have a safe place from the world. If they eventually understand and agree with these observations, then my work here is done (for now).

I may have rattled on a little in this post. But hey, I’m a grandpa, it tends to happen, just ask my kids and grandkids. If you find yourself in a different place that grandparenthood on the age chart, hang in there, it gets even better!