In re my 83 & 96: I promise. I’ll just drop this train of thought in this venue. Apparently either I lack proper voice and/or words, or I’m just totally off base. I won’t repeat.

Thanks for all your work and applying your considerable talents to the problems faced by this “modern” world. – A.

That’s really fascinating. I’ll have to read more about this.

I’ve always told people who ask how I raised such thoughtful, conscientous children that it helped being broke. I simply could not do for them what a lot of their friends’ parents could. What they wanted, they had to work for. Before they could get “real” jobs, they had paper routes, mowed lawns, shoveled walks, babysat, etc. And there was no allowance. “Mom doesn’t get paid for doing chores, and neither do you.”

I made their education their main job, made a decision early on that they would only participate in one sport/activity per season (mostly because I couldn’t afford the fees for multiples!) and got rid of the cable when it hit $50/mo. At the same time, I raised them with my Democratic beliefs in equality, fair play, and empathy for others.

Christy: As a parent, you’re given only a few moments when you absolutely know that your child/children have turned out well or are on the right road. We get caught in the day-to-day, and then something happens that shines a light on how all our efforts thus far have paid off. Like Peanut extending a welcome to a new friend. I’m sure the glow from that is still with you.

Then again, we haven’t hit the teen years yet, have we?

The teen years are…interesting. It is fascinating to watch the person your child is becoming. Scary, everything out there they are dealing with.

I’m trying to spend as much time as I can every day just hanging out with my son. Doing whatever he likes to do. If he invites me to play a video game, or watch some goofy show, I stifle the “no I’m starting dinner” or whatever springs to my lips, and appreciate how wonderful the invitation is.

I’m also giving him more freedom to make choices and spend time with his friends, biking around on adventures. Used to be he loved doing things with me, now not so much. I’m determined not to take this personally, but it’s bittersweet.

Still, every day, I give thanks for such a wonderful kid, and the great luxury of watching him grow up.

But when I got to school, one of her teachers pulled me aside to let me know that a new child had joined the class and The Peanut had walked right up to the kid, introduced herself, reached out her hand and held the other child’s and said, “Being new is hard. I’ll be your friend.”

Awww…what a sweetie. Nice job, Mom (and Dad).

As for these kids:
Many studies have shown positive trends among American teenagers in recent

decades regarding problems like teen suicide, pregnancy, substance use and violence. Yet upper middle class kids appear to be floundering, outpacing their peers in rates of cigarette smoking, depression, alcohol and drug abuse, anxiety, rule-breaking, and psychosomatic disorders like headaches and stomach problems,

On the one hand, they’re whooping it up, but on the other, they know in their hearts and their guts that the way they live is empty, meaningless, and wrong. It is a sickness, consumerism, that permeates our whole culture, and it has sucked dry the soul of our society.

However, alcohol and substance abuse surely took their toll on that family. But the Kennedy’s showed no fear of working hard and certainly had to solve many family problems. I don’t think they had an “easy life”. I think the substance abuse was more likely fueled by “trauma” for them than “affluenza”.

I don’t know what the cure to this is. I’m raising two kids right now, and we are reasonably affluent but very self conscious about purchases and yet the stuff-the things–just kept winging through the window when they were young. Stuff was so cheap that people who knew us only a little but who wanted to signal their joy and happiness at our new children would give us stuff. In a previous generation only close family gave you things, and then only on significant holidays. Now every event, every non event, days that end in “y”, is a sign that gifts and tokens and things should pour into the house. We cleared out all the teeny tiny giftie stuffed animals and dolls a few years ago but still they come in to the house. It prevents kids from forming significant attachments to things, or from grasping that playign with the thing is its goal not just having it.

We try to put our time and effort into doing stuff that is worth doing artistically and socially, in a non competitive way. They both dance and perform. And they go to a progressive school which preaches and teaches the value of community, committment, work, and sharing. We try to “do” stuff rather than “have” stuff but it puts them waaaay out of sync with other people’s kids. And I don’t mean with the kids of the rich, but with the kids of, say, their brazilian babysitter who they have played with since they were newborns.

aimai