What It Takes

I don't know where my son is going, exactly, but I know that he'll be fine once he gets there.
I say this because he managed a couple of things: Completed his undergraduate degree in less time than either one of his parents. He replaced the engine in his car. When it comes to getting your hands dirty, he's the man. The motto of Cal Poly San Luis Obispo is "learn by doing," and if it were just the past five years that taught him that, all that tuition was well spent.
But I know that he showed up to those hallowed halls with great chunks of that ethos already in place. There is the story from his formative years, when his mother was rushing him away from sand castle construction on the beach and he begged for just a little more time. When he was done, he exclaimed, "See? Give a kid an extra fifteen minutes and he'll create a masterpiece." Probably the most impressive thing about that assertion was his own confidence in what he had accomplished. A masterpiece. By his own reckoning.
It was during these days that he was linked almost inexorably with his childhood home. It was a rare occurrence that took him far from his mom and dad, and the place where all his stuff was. He was most comfortable with the people, places and things that he knew. His parents didn't do much to keep this from being the case. We were happy to go everywhere together. When it came time to go to college. He was ready. I confess that I wasn't sure how this was going to work. Four hours away? I steeled myself for the phone call that would come, begging for rescue.
It never came. We got some calls, but not that one. A speeding ticket. Some requests for additional funds. He was doing his thing. He was ready. When things got tough, and the grades weren't there, he did the things he needed to do to push on through. I would be lying if I said that he didn't want to give up a couple of times.
He didn't.
He took all the things he had learned and put them to great use. He learned more, and he put those things to still more use. He terrified his parents by announcing that he was going to replace his own brakes. Not the part of the car that made it stop. That could work out so horribly. But it didn't. Then he announced that he was going to put a V8 in his Toyota Supra. The one he named Hobbes. He was sure he could do it. Over the course of weeks that drifted into months and into completing his degree and a global pandemic, he kept working. He learned by doing. I remember the phone call we got on the day that he finally got the engine to seat properly in his beloved car. He told us he was bouncing around the house. We didn't need to see it. We could hear it in his voice. I confess that I was a little jealous. All those extra fifteen minutes, he had created a masterpiece.
And he knew it.
I'm not worried about my son. He's ready for whatever this wacky world into which he is wandering out into. He has what it takes.