PARENTING #101

I'm guessing that most parents, most days think they are doing a great job of parenting. I come from a generation where parents didn't really think about parenting. There were no self-help books, no Love & Logic classes, no media inundating our parents about the right and wrong ways to potty train, spank or not spank, allowance or no allowance, time-outs blah blah blah. Our parents and the parents before them just did the best they knew how.

I'm one of those parents that is constantly trying to raise the bar within my own parenting. I'm not reading the books or taking the classes, I'm gauging my children, seeing what works and what doesn't. Most days I think I'm doing a pretty shitty job and my kids are going to grow up and be in 20 years of psychoanalytic therapy.

Instead of spending his day off packing for Italy, Bubby got two of the boys up before the crack of dawn and traveled a little over an hour to an Air Force Base. You see, since the age of four, Christian has been obsessed with growing up and serving in the Armed Forces. He dreams about being a tank driver that finds bombs and detonates them, a sniper in the special forces or a pilot. Christian asks us weekly if we can send him to a all-boys Military School. So Bubby took the boys to see the Blue Angels. Now Bubby and I are about as liberal as you can get. Bubby would rather stay home and pull out his toenails one by one than to be around a bunch of gun-toting, right-wing, Bush-loving, God-fearing militia types. Bubby does this out of love for Christian......and that is the ultimate in being a good Dad in my opinion.

I guess if there was one thing that I KNOW in my heart we are doing right is setting the example for our children that you can be anything you want to be.......even if it's not our choice. We in no way want to create little Bubby & Tallulah clones. We want our children to grow up thinking for themselves and questioning themselves.......not being stifled by our political ideals. Even though Bubby is an Athiest, he is quite comfortable with the children wanting to attend a home Bible study group in the neighborhood of Way Down In Mayberry. Right now they are learning that if they aren't good neighbors and if they steal and lie, they will go to Hell. Whether it's fire and brimstone (Christian views) or Hell is Prison (our view), it's all the same. We are teaching our children good morals. Treat others respectfully, don't lie, steal or cheat, love all creatures and the Earth etc.

Maybe if I'm blogging twenty years from now, I'll give you an update on how they all turned out. In the meantime, I'll worry and fret some days that I'm not doing the right thing. Other days I'll relax and repeat the mantra, "they'll be just fine."