“The Myth of Quality Time: How We’re Cheating Our Kids” accused the headline to Newsweek magazine in zillion point font. Kids and parents lined up like hands on a clock. But it differed from most of the parenting articles I read in a key way – it was more than 20 years old.
“I’m going to tweet that!” I proclaimed after my older son did something so very kid-funny.
“No. Don’t tweet that,” my five year old son replied, frowning.
“Oh,” I hesitated. “I guess I won’t then.”
“Mommy would never post anything you don’t want her to,” my husband chimed in.
I almost said, “Well, I didn’t say that.” Instead, I nodded.
“Noooooo!” my older son yells at the screen as a giant seal almost swallows the penguin protagonist of Happy Feet.
“I know it’s scary!” I affirm. “But do you really think they’ll kill off the main character in this type of movie?”
“No,” he admits.
“Trust me. Trust the characters that they’ll get out okay,” I assure him. He sits back down to watch the movie.
I get his fear because I’ve experienced it myself. Like him, I get deeply immersed in fictional worlds, caring about the characters as if they’re people I know.
Beyond stories, I also know that fear of not being able to trust that everything will be okay. How often have I had his “noooo!” in my head, albeit internally? How often have I not trusted the people who surround me to pull off some form of a happy ending for everyone?
36 isn’t what I expected it would be.
When I was 10, I knew I’d have a book published before I was 20. In fact, I expected to be a famous author in the winter and a marine biologist in the summer. I would be so famous that I’d use my maiden name for my writing so I wouldn’t get mobbed when I traveled.
“I’m not going to be here for dinner tomorrow,” I told my kids. “I’m going to tell the people in charge of the city that I support our neighbors from other countries.” I was going to speak at our city council meeting about a proposed Sanctuary Cities policy. They nodded, then went back to eating dinner. While their interest in local government is pretty low at two and five years old, I hope that I can help get them more involved as they get older.
That’s because local government at the heart of a lot of policies that underlie unjust systems. It’s also a place you can see personal impact. While calling your Congressperson or national representative is important, you can rarely see the same level of individual response and even change that you can on the local level. From climate change to racist policing, getting involved in local government is one of the biggest ways you can teach kids to make a difference.
Here are some ways you can get your kids involved:
Valentine’s Day as a parent is…
– Watching your kindergartener with pride as he fills out his Valentines by himself
– Buying drugstore candy because you don’t have time to get anything else and know your spouse will like it better than the fancy stuff anyway
– Arguing with a two-year-old in the middle of the night about changing his mysteriously wet pajamas
“They shouldn’t have given you a time estimate,” the customer service representative said. My eyes narrowed and I resisted the urge to throw the phone across the room. It was 10:30 PM at night. We hadn’t had natural gas service to our house for more than 24 hours. And now this person was telling me that they didn’t have a clue when we would get our heat and hot water back.
This whole thing started two nights earlier, on Super Bowl Sunday. I walked outside to empty the compost when a neighbor walked past me, then doubled-back. Stopping for just a moment, he said, “You know, I smell natural gas on your block.” Sniffing the air, I caught a faint scent of rotten eggs.
“Thoughts and prayers for me as I face one of the biggest challenges of parenting (and yes, I’m very lucky I’ve never done it before) – having the kids for the weekend by myself,” I posted on Facebook two weeks ago. For the first time, I had the kids to myself for more than a day.
In the past, my husband Chris, has always been back by dinner. While I’ve gone on several work trips over the years, he’s never gone on a trip on his own. But two weeks ago, he was headed off to Las Vegas to visit his sister and her new baby.
He deserved it. I owed it to him.
I was also scared shitless.
“An 12, huh,” I muttered to myself, looking at my computer screen. I had just taken the “Are You a Sensation Seeker?” self-assessment on the Highly Sensitive Child website. I finally had a word to put to something I’ve known for a long time about myself. And more importantly, I also had a word for something I realized much more recently about my older son.
“Back in my day, kids roamed the neighborhood without supervision and nobody had these fancy birthday parties,” says yet another article about how childhood was different “back then.” While the world has changed for the good and the bad, I feel like my children’s experience isn’t all that different in some ways than mine or even my mom’s. Looking forward, it’s different in so many good ways as well.