Parenthood is quite a responsibility and people are often not ready to play such an important role. However, delicately precious moments like the birth of one’s child can change their perspective. In a fleeting moment, the pressurizing thought of being a parent turns into a blessing! Late Steven Irwin, the Australian zookeeper and father to TV personality Bindi Irwin and Robert Irwin, had similar thoughts on being a father. In an interview in 2003, he reflected on how he thought it was an impossible task till his oldest, Bindi Irwin came along, per Australian Story.
Image Source: Steve Irwin poses with a three-foot-long alligator at the San Francisco Zoo on June 26, 2002, in San Francisco, California. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
Sharing glimpses of the time his wife, Terri Irwin, was pregnant with Bindi, Steve mentioned how he wasn’t keen on the idea of fatherhood. “I never wanted to be a father, I couldn't give a rip. Now I'm the proudest father, I gotta tell ya." Everything changed for Steve the moment his daughter came into the world. From not wanting to be a father, his heart skipped a beat when he saw the little miracle he helped create. “I can’t dwell on her for too long or I’ll start bawling my eyes out,” he said. Even in his interview, the mere thought of his little girl brought tears to his eyes.
Image Source: Steve Irwin poses with his family at Australia Zoo June 19, 2006 in Beerwah, Australia. (Photo by Australia Zoo via Getty Images
Steve poignantly recalled carrying a picture of his daughter with him every time he went out into the field. “I would sit there and just start crying,” he remarked. “Who would have thought that someone as ugly as me could bring into the world such a beautiful treasure,” the dad said. To Steve, being a dad to Bindi was nothing short of a miracle. Steve pointed out that people constantly asked him for tips on how to get parenthood right, but he followed only one simple tactic. “All I do is treat her the way I would want to be treated,” he exclaimed. Sharing an adorable example, he said, “She wants to have chocolate? Mum’s not looking, here, have the whole block.”
Image Source: Steve Irwin poses with his daughter Bindi Irwin October 2, 2006 in Uluru, Australia. (Photo by Australia Zoo via Getty Images)
Steve continued the conversation by sharing how he tried to keep her childhood normal by letting her spend as much time as possible with other kids. He always wanted to be a part of her life and vice-versa. The heartwarming relationship between the father-daughter duo is built on a simple but firm foundation of love. There are no great parenting techniques, no big books, just pure love and parenting led straight from the heart. Steve passed away in 2006 but Bindi has kept his legacy strong through the zoo and herself. Just as he was a proud father, she stands today as a proud daughter.
Image Source: Steve Irwin poses with his son Bob at Australia Zoo August 2, 2006 in Beerwah, Australia. (Photo by Australia Zoo via Getty Images)
Bindi reposted the interview from 2003 sometime back on her social media with her heartfelt reaction. “Every time I watch this clip my heart overflows with emotion. The people we love are always with us. Love lives on no matter what. I think that is the most beautiful thing about our existence. Thank you, Dad, this moment captured on camera made my whole life,” she wrote.
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Will your current friends still be with you after seven years?
Professor shares how many years a friendship must last before it'll become lifelong
Think of your best friend. How long have you known them? Growing up, children make friends and say they’ll be best friends forever. That’s where “BFF” came from, for crying out loud. But is the concept of the lifelong friend real? If so, how many years of friendship will have to bloom before a friendship goes the distance? Well, a Dutch study may have the answer to that last question.
Sociologist Gerald Mollenhorst and his team in the Netherlands did extensive research on friendships and made some interesting findings in his surveys and studies. Mollenhorst found that over half of your friendships will “shed” within seven years. However, the relationships that go past the seven-year mark tend to last. This led to the prevailing theory that most friendships lasting more than seven years would endure throughout a person’s lifetime.
In Mollenhorst’s findings, lifelong friendships seem to come down to one thing: reciprocal effort. The primary reason so many friendships form and fade within seven-year cycles has much to do with a person’s ages and life stages. A lot of people lose touch with elementary and high school friends because so many leave home to attend college. Work friends change when someone gets promoted or finds a better job in a different state. Some friends get married and have children, reducing one-on-one time together, and thus a friendship fades. It’s easy to lose friends, but naturally harder to keep them when you’re no longer in proximity.
Some people on Reddit even wonder if lifelong friendships are actually real or just a romanticized thought nowadays. However, older commenters showed that lifelong friendship is still possible:
“I met my friend on the first day of kindergarten. Maybe not the very first day, but within the first week. We were texting each other stupid memes just yesterday. This year we’ll both celebrate our 58th birthdays.”
“My oldest friend and I met when she was just 5 and I was 9. Next-door neighbors. We're now both over 60 and still talk weekly and visit at least twice a year.”
“I’m 55. I’ve just spent a weekend with friends I met 24 and 32 years ago respectively. I’m also still in touch with my penpal in the States. I was 15 when we started writing to each other.”
“My friends (3 of them) go back to my college days in my 20’s that I still talk to a minimum of once a week. I'm in my early 60s now.”
“We ebb and flow. Sometimes many years will pass as we go through different things and phases. Nobody gets buttsore if we aren’t in touch all the time. In our 50s we don’t try and argue or be petty like we did before. But I love them. I don’t need a weekly lunch to know that. I could make a call right now if I needed something. Same with them.”
Maintaining a friendship for life is never guaranteed, but there are ways, psychotherapists say, that can make a friendship last. It’s not easy, but for a friendship to last, both participants need to make room for patience and place greater weight on their similarities than on the differences that may develop over time. Along with that, it’s helpful to be tolerant of large distances and gaps of time between visits, too. It’s not easy, and it requires both people involved to be equally invested to keep the friendship alive and from becoming stagnant.
As tough as it sounds, it is still possible. You may be a fortunate person who can name several friends you’ve kept for over seven years or over seventy years. But if you’re not, every new friendship you make has the same chance and potential of being lifelong.