The day Bánh Mì went to school

This past May, there were days when my wife and I sat in our home feeling as though everything had come to a standstill.

Con Ơi was not yet running smoothly. The pressure of making ends meet was always there, unspoken but present every day. If I worked far from home, there would be no one to help my wife look after Bánh Mì. If she stayed home with our child, she could not take on any more classes.

The two of us kept turning from work to our child to all the expenses we had to cover, and back again.

We were a happy family, but we were also struggling to hold on to that ordinary happiness.

Then we thought about sending Bánh Mì to preschool.

A decision that seemed so simple.

But it turned out not to be easy at all.

Most preschools near our home only accepted children aged twenty-seven months and up. Bánh Mì was still much younger than that.

And so a father in a wheelchair, with the streets of Phú Nhuận ahead of him and a child who could barely say a few sentences behind him, set out in search of a door that might open for his child.

One school would not take Bánh Mì.

The next could not yet, either.

The wheelchair kept rolling.

But hope kept dwindling.

Perhaps those days taught me something more about life: sometimes what wears us down is not the long road, but going on and on without knowing which door will open.

Three days later, I took Bánh Mì to another school near our home.

The sisters came out.

They sat and listened as I told them about our family's difficulties.

Without rushing.

Without judging.

Then one sister said:

“For now, let's have your little one try three days. If there isn't too much fussing or crying, we'll take Bánh Mì.”

Just a few softly spoken words.

But that day, to me, they carried more weight than so much else anyone could have said.

I could not hold back my tears.

They simply rolled down my cheeks in silence.

Perhaps those tears held gratitude, and all those days and months of struggling to find a way, and a father's fear, and a little hope that had just been placed back in my hands.

Three trial days.

Bánh Mì was so good.

My child could not say much yet, only a few babbled words, but listened so well to the sisters and teachers. And somewhere along the way, the people in the nursery class grew fond of Bánh Mì, too.

Three days passed.

Bánh Mì was accepted.

In July, my child started summer school.

In August, school continued.

And now it is September.

Tomorrow, Bánh Mì officially begins the school year in the nursery class.

Tomorrow morning, I will wake up as I do every day.

I will pack my child's little schoolbag as always.

Two cartons of milk.

Two diapers.

A change of clothes.

Tiny things tucked neatly into a tiny bag.

And a very great joy.

My wife will stand at the door.

I will take Bánh Mì to school.

The wheelchair will roll along the morning road again.

Perhaps that road will be no different from the days before.

But I know Bánh Mì is different now.

Twenty-one months ago, my child lay in Mother's arms, still pink from birth.

Twenty-one months later, my child sits behind me on my wheelchair, a little schoolbag on those small shoulders, on the way to school.

My child can call for Daddy now.

And Mommy.

Can say fuller sentences.

Can sing a few lines of The Wheels on the Bus.

And has begun taking those first steps into life.

I watch my child grow day by day.

Then sometimes I look at my own parents and suddenly realize: as my child grows a little older, so do they.

Time is a strange thing.

It never stands still.

It adds to a child's childhood, while quietly taking away a little of the youth of those who love that child.

Perhaps that is why tomorrow, when I take Bánh Mì to school, I will not say:

“You're growing up too fast.”

I do not want to hold my child back.

Nor do I want my child to grow more slowly.

I only hope I have enough strength, enough patience, enough love to fulfill my responsibility as a father.

So my child can grow.

Can go to school.

Can have friends.

Can run and play, sing and laugh.

Can step out into this wide world on those very own feet.

As for Daddy...

I will keep following behind.

Today, perhaps, it is a wheelchair.

Tomorrow, it may be a pair of little feet running ahead of me.

Then one day, perhaps I will no longer be able to keep up with you.

But that is all right.

Perhaps being a father is a journey of learning to walk behind someone you love, and finding joy in seeing them go farther and farther from you.

In May, we thought our life had become stuck.

Stuck in work.

In money troubles.

In worries.

In having a child still too young for school.

But then a door opened.

Bánh Mì went in.

And life carried on.

I find myself thinking of a lotus.

A lotus does not choose the mud.

But still it grows from the mud.

Perhaps human happiness is like that, too.

We often wish life would give us nothing but smooth days.

But sometimes it is those rough days that teach us how precious an ordinary morning can be.

A little schoolbag.

Two cartons of milk.

Two diapers.

A change of clothes.

A mother standing at the door.

A father in a wheelchair.

A child sitting behind him, singing softly:

The wheels on the bus go round and round...

And the wheelchair rolls on.

Tomorrow, Bánh Mì goes to school.

And Mommy and Daddy...

will learn another lesson in how to love a child who is growing up.