The most important thing you can give your child

is your time. It can't be sold, it doesn't impress the neighbors, you can't hang it on the wall or put it in the bank, but is the single most valuable thing you can every give to a child.

Time is what we want most, but what we use worst.William Penn

I have read, watched and listened to so many different people lamenting the loss of this, that or the other thing and blaming said loss on the degradation of our society. "We took religion out...", it's video games, it's movies, it's everything but the parent. What it is, or what it isn't, is the amount of time we spend with our children. Time actually spent with the child. Driving them to practice, or a game or school, that doesn't count. "Yes, but I sat in the stands and watched" isn't good enough. Children need parents. Involved, interested, responsive parents who dedicate time to being a parent. How often do you see parents truly engaged with their child? Look around. I see kids playing with mommies phone or tablet while mom is busy doing something else. I see children running rampant around the store because the parent is engrossed in what they are doing and completely oblivious to their child. The neighborhood I live in is filled with kids, yet I rarely see a parent. Apparently they're too busy doing other things. And then we wonder why the children do the things they do.

Sometimes I feel that life is passing me by, not slowly either, but with ropes of steam and spark-spattered wheels and a hoarse roar of power or terror. It's passing, yet I'm the one who's doing all the moving. 

~Martin Amis

And life, it does pass us by. Some faster than others. So many spend their time working, worrying about buying the next big thing. Trying to keep up with what society tells them they must have. All the while forgetting the one thing they should be focused on, their child. People will stand in line for days to get a new phone, or tickets to some show but often can't be bothered to spend 10 minutes with the child they chose to create. People seem to equate spending money on a child with being a parent to the child. When you buy them a new xbox, that's not parenting, that's giving them something to fill the time with. If their room is full of toys and electronics but never sees a parent, that's not parenting. That's not being a part of your child's life. 

Adults seem convinced that children need things. They don't. They need parents. Things are fun, sure, but not if they come at the expense of a parent. If you're buying your child things perhaps you should ask yourself why. Is it out of guilt, because you're always at work? Why are you always at work? Is it worth it? Is the overtime to pay for the new car worth it in the end? When you watch your child grow up through other peoples photographs and video, is it worth  this just to have that shiny car parked in the driveway? I don't think so. We make the choice to have children. Man or woman, or both, we make that choice. Once you make that choice to bring a child into this world it is your responsibility to raise that child into a decent person. And no, I don't mean it's your responsibility to financially support the mother, or the state. It's much much more than that. Yes, a child need basics to survive. Clothes, food, a place to live. But those are of little use if they never have a parent. An involved, loving, nurturing parent who makes the child their number one priority. 

If you're working 70 hours a week so that you can save up for that big vacation, so you can spend "quality time" with kids, you're doing it wrong. No, really. If you're working 14 hours a day "for the kids", you're doing it wrong. Kids need parents. Parents that have time to be parents. If you show up to watch the play but have no idea what the play is about because you've been ignoring your child's request to help practice lines because you have "work" to do then showing up isn't going to fix that. 

But what minutes! Count them by sensation, and not by calendars, and each moment is a day. ~Benjamin Disraeli

Here's something to think about. If you died tomorrow, while working overtime because your boss has some deadline, is that boss going to care next week? Is that boss going to care in a month when your position has been filled by someone who does it faster for less money? Nope. Are you beer drinking buddies going to care? Probably not much, not really. Is your child going to care? Is your child going to care in a year? In 10? The car you're working so hard to pay for, it doesn't care if you live or die. Neither does the house, or the boat or any of the other meaningless things we obsess about. Your child, your child will care. Your child will watch, and learn and eventually decide that the new motorcycle is more important to you than they are. And they will act accordingly. 

There is one kind of robber whom the law does not strike at, and who steals what is most precious to men: time.

 ~Napoleon I, Maxims, 1815

At the end of your life, you will never regret not having passed one more test, not winning one more verdict or not closing one more deal. You will regret time not spent with a husband, a friend, a child, or a parent.

~Barbara Bush