Category: Parenting

Pretty much everybody needs a little help deconstructing texts. It could be argued that the point of college is to learn how to read and understand Chaucer, Milton, Pope, and Shakespeare. Of course non-English majors learn how to understand different authors and ideas–Machiavelli for economics majors, Watson and Crick for

Why don’t your children listen? Here’s one possible answer: Maybe your kids are bad. Why not? It’s possible. Maybe deep down, they are just plain and simple, intrinsically B-A-D, bad, budding little rotten to the core psychopaths who, left to their own devices, would deliberately with malice of forethought, just

There’s a story about Abraham Lincoln growing up dirt poor–wanting to study but not having enough money to buy candles which would allow him to read after the sun went down. Gas lamps were also out of the budget and Mr. Edison’s electric lights were a generation away. So instead

Here’s an expression that I hear frequently. You may have even said the following words yourself recently. “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.” Yeah? Bring it. You think you’ve got Stupid? Compared to what’s been going on with me this week, you haven’t ever even met Stupid. Stupid doesn’t

“You’re sending me away to boarding school,” intones ninth grader, Melissa. “I’ll never speak to you again.” “But, Honey, you know the schools here locally are terrible,” Mom responds. “You yourself said that you’re not learning anything, that your teachers are uncaring and borderline abusive, that your classmates can barely

Toward the end of the Second World War, one of my dad’s buddies got an infection. He had a high fever and was in the infirmary. His arm swelled up to three times its normal size. There was no doubt but that this young serviceman would die. Except that a

As a rising seventh grader in the summer of 1967 I was invited to lunch at the home of my band teacher. Mr. Abrams lived walking distance from the junior high where he taught and where I would soon attend. The meal was served by his wife, the mother of

Forty year-old, Juan is a two-pack a day smoker, with a sedentary life style and a tire around his tummy that makes the Michelin man look svelte by comparison. Juan can, and frequently does, suck down a six pack of Bud on a Sunday afternoon while watching his beloved Marlins.