In a country were it seems we work to work some more and home is just a way station on the way to work I think Family life, the home is being neglected. Families on average are said to get only 8 hours together per week given modern demands on our time.
One of the many reasons we homeschool is help our children build healthy home lives to support the lives they will go on to lead outside of the home someday. We wonder sometimes, is the high divorce rate and family dysfunction some experience in pare due to their lack of bonding time? Or maybe family time and the home life was just never treasured as important. Maybe not enough wonder and marvel was shared over the ordinary life like William Martin mentions in his poem found in the book The Parent’s Tao Te Ching.
Part of our goals, even if our children go off to public school in the future will always be to treasure the ordinary. The extraordinary will in fact take care of itself. I can’t say we have all the answers, we don’t. But our teenager isn’t pregnant, none of the kids steal, and no one is doing drugs, or abusive, or cheating. I love our life. It isn’t easy being a military family, but as a family we are very blessed to have one another and the peaceful home life we have created.
In an often too hard word it is nice that we have a soft place to call home. One where each member of the family is loved and respected and cherished. One where judgement isn’t used as a weapon but as a tool for betterment. A place that is safe and comforting and always there. We are a military family that moves often, like others, we have grown to know that we must learn to grow where ever we are planted. Home is not the building we sleep in but the people there waiting for us with open arms. All the money in the world, all the extraordinary adventures, they would be lacking without a home to come back to, to share the stories, to support loved ones. We want our children to do amazing things but we know that giving them a solid foundation is the most important thing. We homeschool because we feel like we can do this better than the public school system and it gives us more hours in a day to share this wonderful life and belief with them.
