They come from the same pa­rents but are so dif­fe­rent, I think.

I am te­ac­hing my ol­dest child to drive and ask how she feels about it. There is a si­len­ce, then a sigh:

– I just hate the clutch!

She li­kes to do eve­ryt­hing at her own slow pace. She wants to drive on pri­va­te ro­ads long enough to feel con­fi­dent about en­te­ring pub­lic traf­fic. She tends to avoid roun­da­bouts and pre­fers qui­et gra­vel ro­ads. But wha­te­ver she has le­arnt she will re­mem­ber. There will be no big surp­ri­ses for her in how to hand­le the car.

My se­cond ol­dest is dif­fe­rent. Both the te­ac­her and the stu­dent are close to lo­sing their tem­pers. We are too si­mi­lar. His thoughts are not where they should be. When he is en­te­ring a roun­da­bout, I need to slam on the bra­kes to avoid col­li­si­on. He says there was no car. I point at the car that had right of way and ask:

– Hey, what’s that? Not a car?

We both blow up. Then we have car ser­vi­ces and pre­ach for­gi­ve­ness to each ot­her. He gets his li­cen­se in due time.

My third ol­dest has an ex­cel­lent start. I mar­vel at her con­fi­den­ce be­hind the wheel. But there are ti­mes when so­ci­al pres­su­re builds up.

– Help, that guy is tail­ga­ting me! I’m sure he’s an­no­yed be­cau­se of the stu­dent dri­ver sign.

I try to calm her down and tell her that the same traf­fic ru­les ap­p­ly to all pe­op­le, and that eve­ry­bo­dy is en­tit­led to his or her own place on the road.

The of­fi­ci­al dri­ver’s test is ter­rib­le. She fails more than on­ce be­cau­se she is so ner­vous.

– You know, that guy looks at me in such a fun­ny way. Should I wear dif­fe­rent clot­hes, so I would look ol­der?

When she can fi­nal­ly do the test with a dif­fe­rent per­son, she feels less ner­vous and gets her li­cen­se.

For me, the ti­mes I have spent te­ac­hing my kids to drive have been les­sons in life. I have seen the uni­qu­e­ness of God’s cre­a­ti­on. I have found that some child­ren are more com­for­tab­le with cri­ti­cal feed­back than some ot­hers. One is a re­a­list, anot­her a dre­a­mer. They all have their ta­lents and short­co­mings, just as I do.

My task is to love them as the kind of per­sons they are, to sup­port and gui­de them in my own small way. I am hap­py about the love we feel for each ot­her and the know­led­ge that we are he­a­ding to­ward the same des­ti­na­ti­on in he­a­ven. There are mo­ments when I have flas­hes of un­ders­tan­ding that our mu­tu­al love is not me­re­ly love bet­ween fa­mi­ly mem­bers. It is love from he­a­ven.

Text: Har­ri Vä­hä­jylk­kä

Trans­la­ti­on: Sirk­ka-Lii­sa Lei­no­nen

You will find the ori­gi­nal Fin­nish blog post here.