I Am Thankful for “But, if You Were Going to… What Would You Do Next?”

Sometimes my husband is pretty smart.  Perhaps, I do not always give him credit when it is due.  Today he gets a lot of credit for getting one kid out of the comfort zone.

Yesterday I wrote about a mother who put up a “stop sign” for her child because he said, “I can’t…”  Now, I have to admit that I went into the house to do a few chores after that.  But, when I came back outside the mother had gone home and the child was doing exactly what he had said he could not do.

How did that happen?  How did the child learn to complete the task?  Well, that’s where my husband came into play.  Today I am thankful for his wisdom and his patience.  Of course, my husband has overcome some of the greatest challenges life can put out there.  As a quadriplegic he graduated from university, attended law school, and practiced law for many years… and he drove himself to his office and to court everyday.

So, today I am most thankful that he taught the little boy how to overcome “I can’t….”

The child was frustrated.  He wasn’t thinking.  He was reacting to a new task — one he had never attempted.  All the child was looking at was the end result.  And, the end result looked very daunting to the young one.

The conversation between the child and my husband went something like this:

“I can’t….”

“But, if you could what would you do first?”

“I can’t….”

“Okay, so you can’t.  But, if you could… and we know you can’t…. but if you could, what would you do next?”

The child looked around, watching other children as they began to build or paint simple birdhouses.  “I don’t know how…”

“Of course, you don’t know how, but, if you did know how, what would you do next?”

This little exchange apparently went on for some time.  The child protested before each step he took.  And, my husband agreed that he didn’t know how before asking “if you could….” or “if you knew how….” 

Three hours later the little boy ran over to me yelling, “Miss Maya, look what I did.  I made a birdhouse!”

I have to admit that tears came to my eyes.  Okay, so I am an old softy.  But, I can remember going with my husband to buy a truck once upon a time.  The salesman asked me to sit in the driver’s seat, to take the truck for a test drive, and to select a color.  He was literally speechless when I told him that it was my husband who was his potential buyer.  The salesman didn’t know what to do.  He had hit his stop sign!

My husband asked the salesman to park the truck at the far end of the parking lot and to leave it unlocked.  The skeptical salesman did as asked.  I took a seat in the showroom.  My husband rolled himself down to the truck.  He stayed with the truck for almost 45 minutes. 

The nervous salesman stared from the showroom as my husband’s head could be seen through the truck’s rear window.  I’m not sure if he was worried or fascinated.  But, I don’t think he ever even blinked.

My husband returned to the showroom.  “I’ll take it.”

As my husband left with the paperwork the salesman asked, “What is he going to do with a truck?”

“Drive it, I guess.”

Well, you see, the truck was an impossibility as far as the salesman could tell.  But, left alone with the truck for almost an hour, my husband asked himself, “But, if I could get in the truck by myself, what would I do first?”  Forty-five minutes later he knew how to get into the truck and how to pull the wheelchair in behind himself.  (It was a three door truck.)

Today, I am thankful for “but, if you were going to… what would you do next?”

A friend, Niels from Norway, wrote a wonderful “can do” comment that I would encourage everyone to read.