You were always a little different. Always going in your own direction. One of my favorite memories of you as a toddler is of watching you paint alongside your 7 year-old sister and 4 year-old brother. They had each started in the center of their blank pages, using just the tips of their brushes to craft bulbous, two-dimensional animals— perfectly age appropriate representations, perfectly expected results when kids put on their artist hats. But not you. At two, you had sat and chewed your lip for a moment, considering. And then, when the idea had come into your head (apparently fully formed) you began. Fat lines, thin ones, colors mixing, all corners of the paper splattered and streaked and alive. For forty minutes, you focused and worked on that one, single sheet.
You were so proud. So, so proud. And later that night, when your siblings told Daddy about the horses and dinosaurs and cows and birds they had made on reams of paper, you held your one still-drying masterpiece, heavy with globs of acrylic, and said, “Is evryfing.”
Everything.
That’s been you. From the moment we met. Everything. Everything loud and fast and full and dynamic. Everything colorful and daring and wide open.
You discovered airplanes when you were a baby. A chubby red plastic jet oversized for the grip of little hands was your constant companion. You chewed on it, spun its hard plastic wheels, smashed it into the dog’s face over and over. Your first plane ride was when you were 18 months old. At the airport, you stood at the huge window overlooking the runways, motionless, your legs panted firmly apart and your forehead pressed into the glass. When we walked through the passenger boarding bridge and onto the plane itself, your eyes were wide, drinking it all in. Years later it was you making pass after pass at the Missionary Aviation Fellowship booth at a homeschool conference, then it was you touring Paul Allen’s Flying Heritage Museum, then it was your first flight via Young Eagles.
It wasn’t our thing, wasn’t something that came naturally or easy in a family full of readers and writers. But we learned about planes and flying because we loved you, and you loved them. It was your direction. So of course we followed, and we shared in your joy no matter how out of our comfort zone. After all, the differences in family are the thing that make us strongest, that bind our hearts the most, should we allow it.
This week, you turn 17. And yes, you are still everything. You are the tallest, the strongest, the most raucous. You like food and friends and being challenged beyond what you think you can reasonably handle. You’re not gonna be happy unless you’re going Mach 2 with your hair on fire, to quote one of your favorite movies. And you live it.
True to your history of blazing your own trail in the family, you’ve decided that your calling is a military life. I admit it’s hard to follow you there— another role I never saw myself in— but I am, as always, 100% Team Jack. Your grades and test scores and extra curriculars and volunteerism have made you a desirable package for colleges. You figure ROTC and an eventual commission as an officer is the way to go, but maybe you’ll end up joining the Air National Guard through college and transfer to full-time active duty after you graduate. When you, the kid who could literally do anything and do it well, talk about parajumpers and security forces and acronyms that stand for things I don’t even understand…. well, your eyes tell me this is what your everything is now. And I’m happy for you. So very happy.
The next year is going to be tough. Your primary goal is The Citadel, but the finances are in God’s hands. As always, He is speaking to you, guiding you, and making clear your path. I have no doubt it’s going to be beautiful, and challenging, and different, and you. It will be messy and hard and enough to make most young men throw their hands in the air and surrender. But you won’t. I know you. You will keep going. You will focus. You will work. You won’t turn to the right or the left. And it will be everything.