It Just Takes a Bit of Time...

A friend dug up a hydrangea from his property in the Drakensburg and gave it to me. I planted it here in Pretoria, not knowing how it would do in the iron-rich soil. One year later, it bloomed for the first time.

 

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...And Here He Is!

Here's the beautiful weaver bird that shares the tree in our back garden, and the nest he just built (notice how the entrance to the nest is on the bottom):

 

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Thoughts on Weaver Birds and Perseverance

This spring, a weaver bird moved into my back garden and built a nest in my tree. A few days later he tore it down and built a completely new nest. A few days later, he tore that one down and built a completely new nest. This has gone on for over a month now, and I think he's on his seventh or eighth nest. Here's his latest piece of art:

Why does the weaver bird do this? Apparently, the male builds a nest and tries to attract a female bird. The female comes along, and if she approves of the nest, she'll move in and start a family with him. If she doesn't approve, the male will tear it down and build a new nest. Sometimes a weaver bird will make a dozen nests before he finds an approving female!

What I love most about the weaver bird in my back garden is his perseverance. He hasn't given up yet, though I haven't seen a female move into any of his nests. He also has one other obstacle stacked against him - he is building his nests in a tree that isn't normally inhabited by weaver birds. Pioneering and tenacious... you have to admire that!

When a human is pioneering and tenacious, he is sometimes labelled as stubborn, a fool, or even stupid. If he succeeds, he is lauded as a courageous hero. Maybe I'm wrong, but I kind of think he was even more of a hero when the world was against him yet he refused to give up.

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At Last, An Accurate Street Sign!

On the way to Swaziland, we saw this sign:

Sure enough, just a few kilometres up the road we encountered:

They may have changed half of the street and city names in South Africa, but the animal signs, thankfully, are still accurate.

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My Snails are Bigger Than Yours

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Thoughts on Being a Leader

"A leader is a dealer in hope". - Napoleon Bonaparte

I find this quote interesting, given that so many leaders govern from a position of power and/or fear. Yet if you stop and think, the truly inspiring people - the ones that motivate you to "go out there and make a difference" - are the ones doling out hope as though there's an endless supply, the ones cheering you on and boosting your confidence, the ones who see your potential before you do and nurture it into being, and the ones who see the positive side of change and fan the flames of your imagination into seeing it as well.

I never really wanted to be a leader, but sharing hope and encouraging people to reach their potential... that I can do!

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The Hard Part of Parenting

As a parent, I want to teach my children, raise them well, and protect them from failing or making bad choices. But I can't. If I could, I would be controlling them completely and they would be mere puppets in my hand.

At some point, my children will make bad choices. Fail. Do really dumb things (and let's be honest, haven't we all?). What we in modern days have sometimes forgotten is that many of life's teachable moments come from our failures. In shielding kids from all that's bad and distasteful in life, we do them a great disservice - we are preventing them from learning how to handle suffering, consequences, how to rise from the ashes and recover from mistakes.

This past week, two of my kids made some huge mistakes. I was angry. I was disappointed. I wanted to lecture, admonish, and mete out punishment like a Supreme Court Judge. But then it dawned on me... maybe the best thing I can do is to love them at their "worst" and teach them how to learn from failure and move on. If they have to be perfect - if they live in fear of failure - then I will have missed my opportunity as a parent to teach my kids that some of the best life lessons come from our darkest hours.

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