I wish hindsight was 2020, but even that is pretty rare.

In thinking of my life I started to wonder why I’m always watching my back trail to figure out why I thought the way I did last year or did the things I did. Hindsight is 2020 they say, but then I had a funny thought:

“Who cares how well you can see the past? It’s 2020 that I need to see in 2020 vision!”

Of course we suspect that the patterns of the past repeat themselves in the future, but I think there’s another reason why we spend so much time trying to figure the past out:

We can’t control the future, but I can almost control how I remember the past? 

When I look back, my tendency is to put everything in a nice neat little box and check it off so I don’t have to worry about it anymore. Also it gives me much more of a sense of control thinking about it now versus the complete lack of control I had when actually in the middle of those scenarios.

Most of the time we’d trade control for joy, but there’s much of love that is risk and sacrifice with no guarantees at all, but that’s what makes it the more beautiful.

I had no idea my daughters would be smarter than I am when I had them, but that’s why it’s so funny now. Granted, in raising them with sarcasm they have also learned how to be witty and (gasp) occasionally score points off of me in silly verbal exchanges, but when the moment of realization that they just soundly defeated dad hits them, they all start laughing at my facial expression, high five each other and dance around.

The high fiving actually started with me. If I’m monkeying around and trying to get someone to agree with something ridiculous I want to do sometimes I’ll run three or four conversations at once with my sleeper cell buried in there. Then I randomly hold up my hand for a high five with an expectant look on my face, which is just weird for an adult to do anyways, but if they go for it I say “You high fived! You agree with _____!”.

I think of it like the signing of a contract they didn’t read properly that gives me what I want, or makes me the winner of an argument.

Advantage Corey!

Sadly my girls and even Erin are doing it to me now, which is betrayal at its worst when you think of all the things I do for them, which I assume is quite a lot.

Now my older girls have started boring me with details at the beginning of a conversation about something I don’t care about (just the word “details” is boring), and then when my eyes glaze over and I start looking at the work they interrupted for something they could decide for themselves one of them will toss in a “and that’s why I should probably stay home from school Friday?” and hold up their hand for a high five!

Now I’m torn between having to actually listen to the whole conversation again to make an educated decision, or letting the high five stand and having to decide my two pronged defence when Erin discovers I technically high fived somebody “not going to school Friday because dad said so”.

There are only two options available then: I look like an idiot because I agreed to something I shouldn’t have, or look like an idiot when I pull the “I’m the man of the house and surely can decide if my daughters can take Friday off for something that seemed reasonable in the moment Erin!” card.

Hindsight is definitely NOT 2020 because I’ll do it all again in a month. I have the worst attention span in the world.

I think maybe the best thing for 2020 is not figuring everything out perfectly, but rather making sure the right people are on the bus and the bus is going in the right direction. By that I mean maybe our closest friends shouldn’t be great at navel gazing (staring at their own lives constantly), but actually looking down the road to adopt the best practices and attitudes for the future.

No one can fully predict the circumstances, but your resilience and ability to learn and grow is often a direct result from the people you hang out with the most.

And there’s one other thing we need that I love about my family and closest friends: Movement.

All the best destinations in the world don’t matter if the bus isn’t actually moving forward.

So here’s to a 2020 of high fives!