When the Rational Answer is Not the Right Answer

I did something today that I’m still not entirely settled about.

I took our Playstation2 and all it’s associated paraphernalia, and I sold it.

For much less than it cost us.

So that we can buy a different game system for Christmas.

 

When the child first broached this idea I told him that it was never going to happen.  Russ was even more opposed.

He’s been persistent, though.  And hasn’t wanted anything else for Christmas.  He even figured out how much money we would get for selling the game system we already had to go towards helping buy the new system.

I still said no way.

An odd thing happened that evening when I knelt to say my prayers.  I can’t even remember what I was praying about, but I had the distince impression:

sell the playstation.

I was baffled.  Selling the playstation made no sense financially.  It neither prudent nor logical, and I am generally both prudent and logical.  But I could not escape the thought.

Sell the playstation.

So I did.

 

In the end, I realized that this is really just like letting your son shave his head bald for Halloween.  This is about telling this son that we have heard him.  That we care about what he thinks and what he wants.  That he is sometimes more important than financial logic. 

And in the end, in the years to come, hopefully he’ll look back at this moment.  And he’ll realize what a crazy thing to do this was.  And then he’ll say,

My mom and dad must really love me.

Which is certainly more important than either prudence or logic.