STEVE SMITH -- Family Time

* EDITOR’S NOTE: Does Father really know best? Or maybe that was Mom.

Either way, the trials and tribulations of parents and children can often

make for good stories to tell. The media today have many different

specialties -- business, sports, entertainment -- but what about the

family? Who speaks for them or tells their tales? Today, we begin a new

column, Family Time, designed to do just that.

Written by a familiar face, our regular Saturday columnist, Steve

Smith, a married father of two, will now devote his columns to parenting

and family matters, giving advice on what to tell your kids in times of

trouble, how to handle tough problems and how to just be a good parent or

maybe a good child.

As a contributor to parenting publications, Steve has much experience

in this realm and we’re happy to have his expertise. So gather ‘round,

turn on the reading lamp and listen to what he has to say.

We hope you will like it.

Most moms and dads measure their parenthood in milestones -- the

birthdays, first teeth, first days of school and other special events

that form the peaks of our lives from which we leap, point to point. Ask

a mom or dad about a past year and you’re likely to get a list of major

holidays, celebrations or bad events that form the condensed version.

“That was the year Bobby had his tonsils out” or “Pat’s soccer team won

their division that year” are typical replies.

But as parents move from grand moment to grander moment, we miss the

real joy of parenting, the small things that reinforce our decision to

have children in the first place. In between the birthdays, first dates

and soccer championships are the times we should treasure more than any

other: the times when we are just being a family.

Most parents could easily tell you their children’s birth dates or the

year they started kindergarten. But how many dads remember the first

football they threw to their little boys? How many moms remember the date

they taught their little girls how to make eggs? I certainly can’t give

an honest answer to the first question.

Most parents are just too busy, too content, to do anything more than

get through the day without a catastrophe. So, we focus on the final

score of the game instead of the practices that taught our kids teamwork

and sportsmanship. We focus on Thanksgiving dinner instead of the

planning and preparation for the last Thursday in November. And

Christmas, as you know, is all about gifts on Dec. 25 and has little to

do with celebrating the birth of Christ or the warm feeling we all have

in the days prior. We focus on the big day, not realizing that all the

little days are more important.

The little days, the in-between days, are the times that shape our

children. They are the days when they see us returning change to the

cashier who has given us too much. They are the days when they see us

pick up someone else’s trash off the ground just because we want to make

our world look better. They are the days when they see us turn off the

big game so we can help them with their homework or play catch outside.

Kids remember the in-between days more than they do the big days. For

all of the vacations my family took, camping all over California, I still

remember and most appreciate driving in the family station wagon on the

way to my mother’s latest campground selection. I remember those drives,

not the final destinations.

In 1964, we took a camping trip to a place called Chilao Flats, our

first as a family. I remember arriving at the Chilao Flats campground and

trying to assemble the brand new umbrella tent we bought at the old Star

Sporting Goods on Highland Avenue in Hollywood. We struggled with it for

a while, then my dad drove my mom to a phone so she could call the store

to ask for instructions. We still didn’t get it right and spent the next

three days under strict orders not to touch the pole in the middle. But

Chilao Flats? I couldn’t tell you what the place looked like if my life

depended on it.

I remember looking out the car window for hours, or reading or

harmonizing with my brother on some Beach Boys tunes as we drove to

Yosemite or Sequoia National Park. I remember my father, the family’s

only driver, with his left arm out the open window as we sped down the

freeway. That arm was always tan and the window was often open so my

father could smoke his cigar without choking the rest of us. To this day,

the simple smell of a cigar brings back more memories of my dad than any

event, holiday or trip.

I remember watching my mother read the Los Angeles Times cover to

cover each morning, something I now do each morning. I remember my dad

always smoking a cigar without chomping on it or obsessing over it. My

dad just smoked it. I remember playing football in the street in front of

my house with my friend Fred sending me on a pass pattern that took me

behind Mrs. Spira’s Chevy for a big gain.

But these days we are lost. We have become so busy worrying about the

wrong things that we have forgotten how to enjoy the in-between moments.

We’re still looking at the scoreboard and missing the game.

Now we are days away from another holiday season. We’re making plans

for Thanksgiving day, Christmas day and New Year’s Eve, but forgetting

that we have so much time in between to make the real memories.

And when the year is over and the new gifts have become old hat, most

kids will cherish the things parents don’t have time to remember.

* STEVE SMITH is a Costa Mesa resident and freelance writer. Readers

may leave a message for him on the Daily Pilot hotline at (949) 642-6086.