HW # 57 Parenting 101

I have not given much thought to how kids should be parented. In fact, I don’t think I have given any thought to this. Is parented a word? Off the top of my head I think having a sense of humor is a great thing. Little kids are funny. You have to enjoy them as a parent. Otherwise, what is the point? If you have a strange kid, it can be a challenge I guess. Our next door neighbors have three kids. They are half-Chinese. One of them is unusual. He is terrified of my dad, who likes all kids. This kid is afraid of dark skin. His parents are embarrassed about it. He also memorized all the subway train lines and what stops they make when he was about three. He would tell on other kids in his preschool. He had not one friend there. His mother told my mother that she has no idea where he came from. I have no idea about what I would do with a kid like that.


The best part about how my parents raised me was to let me try to keep up with my brother who is six years older. I was allowed to get roller blades and go ice skating before I was three. We would go to Battery City Park and go really fast on roller blades and up and over all the marble steps and benches. There was a great playground there with trampolines. There was also the best ice cream shop. I always had mango-lemon sorbet. Those were the days. I don’t think I was that much trouble. If I wasn’t racing around, I was passed out in my stroller. Maybe the key to great parenting is to exhaust kids. You have to let them get all their energy out.


First I will write abut the Doctor Ferber article. I should first say that my mother hated the whole idea of Ferberization, which was very popular apparently when I was a baby. My mother said that she would let y brother and me cry for approximately half a second before she would come pick us up in our crib. Now, back to our neighbors. Two years ago in the summer their 3rd child seemed to be constantly shrieking night after night. One night three of the neighbors called the police. When the police arrived, about ten of them, our neighbor Vivien (the baby’s mom) said, “We are just trying to Ferberize her.” The weird thing is these neighbors have a powerful spotlight on their garden all night long because they say this child is so afraid of the dark. It seems like such a waste of electricity and it’s annoying for the neighbors (us). I wonder if Doctor Ferber has a plan for this type of problem.

I like the article about the backfiring of giving little kids choices. It's funny because it all seems true. Little kids say what they really think and they learn how to drive their parents crazy and have a little control at a very early age. And when you think about it what's wrong with that? When you're little you are always being told what to do and especially what not to do. It's a good thing to try to get your way from time to time. Otherwise you would be a complete wimp. The good thing about this mother is that she wrote a funny article about her kids. You just have to enjoy them. I think that's the trick.