LET’S GET MARRIED!

Let’s get married, and have a family!
How many times have you heard that said?
They go together like ‘bread and butter’.
What good is butter, without the bread?
 
Being married and having a family..
Is that what life is all about?
Well, maybe it’s not for some of us,
It was for ME, I hope to shout!
 
I laid in bed at night and thought,
I wonder what our first child will be called.
Would he be born in the prime of my life?
Or when I’m older, and slightly bald?
 
Well, I had a pretty good head of hair
When our first one came along.
I was the typical ‘proud father’,
Well, really more like King Kong!
 
I felt like beating on my chest,
And yelling out to the world, in my joy:
“Look here world, look what we’ve done..
We’ve got us a baby, and it’s a BOY!”
 
Yes, he was special, no doubt about that!
There’s something about that ‘number ONE’.
But equally special, were the TWO that followed:
A beautiful daughter, and another son!
 
They began growing up, as children will do,
And their appetites grew along with them!
I wondered, at times, when paying the grocery bill,
Who ate MORE, three kids or three MEN!?
 
You tell yourself they’re growing children,
That they need all that ‘grow-em-up’ chow;
But you protect their ears, when the money runs short
And you exclaim, “What will we do NOW?”
 
But somehow you make it, you struggle-on through.
You learn to live, well...just day by day,
You adjust yourself to the fact that your bills
Will run just slightly higher than your pay!
 
One needs shoes, the other a dress
For that program their teacher dreamed-up.
There’s no way now, you can turn them down;
That sleek camera you wanted?..give it up!
 
But that’s alright, you don’t really mind,
You’re happy to provide for them, as you do.
There’ll be plenty of time, later on in life
To think about what to buy YOU!
 
It gives you something to look forward to,
After all those ‘child-raising’ years.
When you took care of all their necessities,
And soothed-away those childhood tears.
 
You finally begin to give some thought
To spending on YOU, .. it’s been a while!
Forget it brother!  You’de rather spend it
On that beautiful, FIRST grandchild!
 
Let’s get married, and have a family!
Not a bad idea, that somebody had;
But it took me nearly a lifetime
To understand the laments of my Dad!
 
                         jac 1-11-85