My wife is telling me that the parents of one of our son’s high school friends are moving back to their home country of Japan. She doesn’t understand how parents could move so far away from their children. Their two kids, both in their 20s, are staying here in California. “Well,” I say, “other people’s kids are often a little disappointing, in my opinion,” and she starts knocking on something that I’m pretty sure is not even made of wood. Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Parents
ADHD in the Making
My family and I are enjoying a meal at a Japanese restaurant. In the booth behind me are a husband and wife and five kids, the oldest of whom looks to be about 12. One of the kids, a boy of about 5, is standing up and running a toy car back and forth along the divider between his booth and our booth. He gets bored with that after a while and starts drumming on the divider with a pair of chopsticks. The boy’s activities don’t bother me much . . . what bothers me is that it takes 15 minutes for one of the parents to tell him to stop it and sit down. He doesn’t do either and nothing else is said or done about the matter. In the near future, this boy’s inability to sit still and follow directions will get him “diagnosed” by a schoolteacher as… Read more →
We’re Still Smarter Than You Are
Teens from Asian nations dominated a global exam given to 15-year-olds, while U.S. students showed little improvement and failed to reach the top 20 in math, science or reading, according to test results released Tuesday. — Why Asian teens do better on tests than US teens – CSMonitor.com Why am I not shocked by that? Because Americans on the whole are dumb and lazy. We have lots of dumb, lazy parents raising dumb, lazy kids. The average American kid doesn’t compare well academically to the average kid in an Asian country where academics and hard work are valued, or to the average kid from a small, homogenous European country where it’s easier to get everyone pulling in the same educational direction. The U.S. is a big, diverse country and the average academic results are pulled down by a lot of dummkopfs. But still, the smartest people in the world are… Read more →
The Twenty-Six Malignant Gates
“Do not ride your bicycle around the corner,” the mother had told the daughter when she was seven. “Why not!” protested the girl. “Because then I cannot see you and you will fall down and cry and I will not hear you.” “How do you know I’ll fall?” whined the girl. “It is in a book, The Twenty-Six Malignant Gates, all the bad things that can happen to you outside the protection of this house.” “I don’t believe you. Let me see the book.” “It is written in Chinese. You cannot understand it. That is why you must listen to me.” “What are they, then?” the girl demanded. “Tell me the twenty-six bad things.” But the mother sat knitting in silence. “What twenty-six!” shouted the girl. The mother still did not answer her. “You can’t tell me anything because you don’t know! You don’t know anything!” And the girl ran… Read more →
Heredity
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and neither does the nut. Read more →
And So it Goes
Joe Bell, 48, was walking cross-country from Oregon to New York to memorialize his gay son, who killed himself after being bullied. Bell’s journey began April 20 and ended this week on a two-lane road in eastern Colorado, where he was struck and killed by a tractor-trailer whose driver had apparently fallen asleep. Read more →
The School of Dysfunctional Parenting
Specializing in ineffective and destructive ways of relating, a vicious spiral in which the faults of the parents are passed on to the children . . . Read more →
If You Quote Poetry at My Death, I Will Haunt You
If you know me, and you outlive me, and you want to say something on the occasion of my demise, please do not quote a snippet of poetry or other literary material, e.g., “He did not go gently into that good night.” Or: “I think Wordsworth said it best . . .” Bullshit . . . Wordsworth did not say it best. Wordsworth didn’t know me. You knew me. Go ahead and say something from the heart if you have something. Keep it real. He was not a good person. He had the most appalling social skills, which is why he had no close friends. After his son moved out, he just unraveled like an old sock. I remember at Jackie O’s funeral, her kids — was it just one kid, or both? I think both — read a poem. A poem! That’s when you really know that your life… Read more →
A Tradeoff
If female employment rates matched male rates in the U.S., the GDP would rise by 5%. This stat & more: http://t.co/XsBVJW1xtE — Harvard Biz Review (@HarvardBiz) August 25, 2013 Okay . . . but who would be raising our kids? Or is that not important? Read more →
EppsNet at the Movies: Mother
We rented Mother from Netflix. As I explained to my family before screening it, the movie’s about a crazy Asian woman and her devotion to her mentally challenged son. “You can see why it resonated with me,” I said. “It’s like someone made a movie about our lives!” “You are not a nice person,” my wife said. “Our boy is not crazy.” “No, you’re crazy,” the boy corrected her. “I’m mentally challenged.” That said, I enjoyed the movie, although it contains a lot of profanity, which I don’t like. Director: Cast: IMDb rating: ( votes) Read more →
Opting Out
Best-educated moms are also more likely to ‘opt out,’ research finds — Life Inc. Opt out of what? It turns out “opt out” means opt out of the workforce. How is a mom staying home and raising her kids considered “opting out”? Read more →
Intellectual Giftedness is Not Necessarily Hereditary
I get an email from the UCI-Gifted-Students mailing list. Shortly thereafter, a parent clicks Reply All to send out this response: Please remove my name from your mailing list. Wait, there’s more. A second parent then responds to the first parent, also via Reply All: I’m one of receipents [sic] of the UCI-Gifted-Students emails, therefore not responsible and able to remove you. I wish I knew who to direct you to. Good luck. Read more →
Our Children Can Drink Water From Broken Bowls
We must make do with today’s Happenings, and stoop and somehow glue together The silly little shards of our lives, so that Our children can drink water from broken bowls, Not from cupped hands — Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, “Aubade” Read more →
Kobe Bryant, 1978-2013
One never knows when the blow may fall, Mamba Mentality notwithstanding. He wakes up this morning and a few hours later he dies at the age of 41. It sounds like they may have been flying through fog and hit a hillside rather than hitting the ground. Is there enough time to grab your daughter’s hand and say “I love you” or is it all over too fast? Which would be better or worse? RIP Kobe Bryant, Gianna and all the other passengers Read more →
Please Look After Mom by Kyung-Sook Shin
This book should be read by everyone — especially anyone with grown children and/or older parents. Read more →
Why Kyrie Irving is a Better Basketball Player Than Anyone in My Family
My son (age 19) and I are driving to Staples Center to see the Lakers take on the Cleveland Cavaliers, listening to the pre-game show on the radio. Because the Cavs are basically a one-man roster, and that one man is Kyrie Irving, there’s a lot of talk about Irving on the pre-game. One of the analysts offers up his opinion that Irving is as good as he is at such a young age (he’s 20) because Irving’s dad was hard on him as a kid and pushed him and didn’t let him take breaks. As always, when the topic of someone’s dad bullying him to greatness comes up, the boy gives me a melancholy look to say that my lack of abusiveness as a parent is the reason he’s not a professional athlete. “You let me take breaks,” he says. “You know,” I say, “I think for every guy… Read more →
More People I’m Sick Unto Death Of
Parents who let their kids grow up stupid and blame the schools People who yawn or sneeze a LOT louder than necessary People who use the expression “we tip our hat [or cap] to those guys,” especially if they’re wearing a hat and they don’t physically tip it Read more →
I Have Kids Older Than NBA Players
My boy, a college sophomore, and I are watching the Lakers play the Charlotte Bobcats on the TV . . . “Did you know,” he says, “that I’m a full two months older than [Bobcats forward] Michael Kidd-Gilchrist?” “Hmmm . . . really?” “He grew more than me.” Kidd-Gilchrist is 6’7″, 232 lbs. He turned 19 in September. Read more →
Grown-Up Kids
It used to puzzle me how parents could stand to live at a distance from their adult children. Now I think it’s because it’s a bit embarrassing to have your kids see how absurdly vacant your life has become now that your parenting days are over. A lot of species, once they get too old to have and raise offspring, they just die. They don’t hang around forever and make everyone uncomfortable. Maybe a little distance isn’t such a bad thing. Read more →
Berkeley Voters Leave Something to be Desired as Parents
According to a new survey, just over 10 percent of Berkeley High ninth and 11th graders reported carrying a weapon onto school property, while about 35 percent of 11th graders reported attending class drunk or high. If I had a kid at Berkeley High, I’d be moving out of town yesterday, but I’m reading in the Daily Californian that this news has been “met with surprise and joy from administrators,” the reason being that a similar survey two years ago reported about 17 percent of ninth graders and 16 percent of 11th graders carrying weapons onto campus, and 48 percent of 11th graders attending class drunk or high. Progress! “We’re very pleased with the survey results all around,” said Director of Student Services Susan Craig, “and at the same time we’re not at all complacent.” If by “pleased” she means “horrified,” I couldn’t agree more. In other news, Barack Obama… Read more →