On Parenting

I have been thinking about children and parents, maybe because so many of my cousins and friends have recently given birth, some for their first time, others for their second, third, or fourth. Maybe because I'm 28 years old and gay and not in a relationship but am nonetheless receiving visions of a blond-haired, blue-eyed boy named Benjamin whom I know is my son. It could be, too, that I am stuck on dispiriting conversations from past relationships, discussions with potential lifemates who had ideas about raising children that did not sit right with me or who told me that they didn't believe we would be good parents together or that I would be a good mother. Maybe I've been thinking about my own mother. Or my students, who all seem to be parents, and I'm wondering if my parenting will grow completely out of responses to what I have seen and heard and whether parenting by response is the way or if intuition would be wiser.

In any case, I have begun developing a mental list, a plan, a doctrine for how I will raise my son. Here are its beginnings.

1) I will not allow the medical establishment to circumcise my son. However, if he wants to opt to cut off a piece of his body when he is at an age where he can make such a decision, I will not stand in his way.

2) I will enroll him in many different kinds of activities and allow him to make decisions about how he would like to spend his time and energy. I do not remember being part of a sports team when I was a young kid, and I wasn't enrolled in dance classes or art classes or music lessons or anything of the sort, though I remember picking up a violin in maybe second or third grade and feeling a pull, and I remember asking for a guitar and eventually receiving one but never being enrolled in lessons so that the guitar sat in its case gathering dust, and I felt I was a failure. I would like my child to try many different activities, and if he expresses interest in any of them, I will support him in his passions.

3) I will cheer my kid's successes, and I will count successes on his terms. A few years ago, I was in graduate school and had gotten a poem published. Excited, I called my mother to tell her. I should have known better, but I was still yearning for the mother I never had, the one I'd seen on T.V. and read about in books. Instead of congratulating me, she said, "When are you going to publish a story or a novel? Why are you wasting your time on poetry?" She said it with such disgust, like not only was I wasting my time writing poems, but I'd wasted her time by calling to tell her about the publication. She couldn't see my success because it wasn't a success in her eyes. It was always this way. None of my pictures were ever good enough. My good behavior was never good enough. My good grades, not good enough. I was an exceptional child, but I never felt worthy of praise because the one person who should have loved me more than anything didn't show me love when I needed it most.

4) I will teach my child manners. There are so many people walking around who seem to have been raised in barns because their parents treated them like kings and queens. These people do not have manners, or when they do, they use them not out of a sense of love and appreciation but to manipulate. They say please, but it's a demand. They say thank you, but it's a sneer. Or they don't say anything because they expect. Some of them even go so far as to expect YOU to say Please and Thank You when you are the one giving, as if your very giving was an offense. Manners remind one to be humble; they engender goodwill and love and community. They remind us to slow down, to be aware, to take care of each other. They are not just a simple formality. I would like my children to remember themselves, to remember that they are part of the world, but are not the center of it.

5) Piggybacking on the manners bit, I will set and maintain healthy boundaries with my kids. They will feel secure because of these boundaries. They will be healthier, happier adults. They will be better adjusted than the kids I see today because they will know the meaning of a time-out, a spanking, a grounding. They will know that "no" means "no," and they will come to understand that their actions have repercussions. In this way, they will also begin to understand that they are part of the web of life, and that they have great responsibility to themselves and to others.

6) I will foster my children's curiosity, intuition, creativity, and imagination. I will not squash their innocence with my ignorance, with the world's knowledge and teachings. My children will still learn science, math, history, and all the facts textbooks and teachers have to offer, but they will go beyond the intellect; they will be intelligent because I will not stifle their right brain.

7) I will let my kids be who they are. Someone once asked me what I would do if I had a kid who didn't like to read. I can't remember what I said, but I remember what I felt--a great wall rising up in me, a sort of horror and indignation. Such a thing could not be possible! But I suppose it could be, even though I think reading is a skill that, if taught and fostered, is agreeable to all children. In any case, if I have a child who prefers not to read, I will love him anyway. I will hope that he is finding the magic that I find in books in his other interests/endeavors. His path is not mine to command.

8) I will teach my children about value and money (they are two different things with some overlap). I've noticed that many people do not know how to manage their money; they do not spend it responsibly when they have it, buying far too much and/or buying things they do not need or will not use. Some people even spend money as a way to fill the void inside, as a way to convince themselves that they have power, that they are productive human beings, that they are free, that the sacrifices they've made --the tradeoff: happiness, soul, joy--are worth it. And then when there is an emergency or when they have a real need or a real desire, they do not have the financial means to gain the solution. I am not talking about people who do not earn enough because our system is broken; I am talking about those of us who earn more than enough to keep a roof over our heads, food on our tables, and clothes on our back but who still fail to have any savings because we've opted to spend the money impulsively, without any thought of the future.

The moment I started earning an allowance--and I earned it, unlike most kids today who "earn" an allowance for merely existing--I started saving. I had a goal. I wanted a Super Nintendo game system. I made my bed, took out the trash, washed my dishes, fed the dog, did my homework, took in the mail. I did whatever chores were asked of me, knowing every month with the growing dollars in my piggy bank that I was that much closer to my reward. And after a year of diligent, committed work, I bought an SNES and was finally able to meet Mario and Luigi. My brother and sister were so jealous; it was almost like they were mad at me, like I'd gotten something from Santa and they hadn't! But they'd blown all their money every month on candy and jewelry, and I'd suffered a bit every month when they were able to buy three or four times as many candy bars, but I'd stuck it out, knowing a controller in my hand would be worth more than a Snickers in my mouth.

Okay, so that was a long, roundabout way of saying that I am responsible with my money and have found that it generally pays off and that I'd like my kids to learn this lesson. Other examples of how this works: I bought my first car with cash, so I didn't have to pay interest. In fact, I've NEVER paid interest on anything but student loans. My credit card bills? I pay them off before the interest is tacked on, and in that way, I earn miles/points without having to pay 18 or 20% interest on whatever I spent on groceries and gas.

It helps that I am so frugal and stubborn. In college, I wanted to be sure I had enough money to keep a roof over my head and food in my stomach while still having enough bus money and cash for textbooks and course materials, so I resorted to measures that most people perhaps wouldn't. I had a 1 bedroom apartment, and it was expensive, so I asked a friend to move in and share the rent. She took the huge living room as her bedroom, which was fine with me as I never had reason to go in there, and I wound up saving 350 or so dollars per month.

Oh, and instead of buying a car on credit to get me around to all of my jobs, I took the bus for many months, saving my money until I could buy a car without having to pay interest (this was not my first car but another one I got after that car died). When it came time, I cut a check for something like $5200. I would no longer have to be a slave to Rhode Island's public transit system.

Okay, I've used an excess of examples, which I'll probably pull out again when I'm explaining these concepts to my kids. It's just that I want my kids to understand how money works so that they can make their lives work a little more smoothly.

I also want them to understand value. Buying something because it's cheap is not always the best idea. In fact, it's rarely a good idea. I remember how many cheap PC's we blew through at my house when I was growing up. My mom refused to buy a quality computer, and consequently, we were constantly at war with the PC. It seemed like the computer would break every time I had a really important project due. Our computers got every virus that was every created (it probably did't help that we were all, I presume, secretly looking at porn sites filled with trojan horses). My mom was always having to buy anti-virus software or bring the computer in for hardware repairs. In the end, I'm sure she paid far more money buying new computers and trying to maintain them than she would have had she bought something of higher quality, like a Mac. ;) This, too, will be a lesson I teach my kids.

9) I want my kids to learn the value of being present. It bothers me to see so many kids with their faces glued to a screen. How many of them have played Kick the Can? Or have climbed a tree? Or built a blanket fort in the living room? Or made up their own game? I remember with great fondness spending hours on my bedroom floor, inventing board games with my brother. I never felt closer to him than when we were creating something together. And I had profound moments in nature--discovering tadpoles and deer and the way the moon looks rising over a lake. I remember sitting on couches listening to my elders, to their stories, watching the way their mouths moved, how their cheeks lit up, how their eyes softened when they were remembering something sad, how their voices changed, how they gave themselves away. I was much more of a wizard then, but at least I had those first 8 years, relatively free from screens, to live in a world of real magic. I'd like my kids to have the opportunity to be wizards, to live IN the world, to experience it through their senses and intuition rather than through someone else's interpretation of it. I will be limiting screen time, for sure!

10) I want my kids to feel safe to express their emotions. When I was growing up, I was laughed at more times than I can count. Not just by the bullies on the playground, but by my parents. I was not listened to, and my emotions were not validated. I would say I was scared, and someone would say, "There's nothing to be scared of," which is not the same thing as saying, "I understand you are scared. Sit with that for a minute; feel it all the way through. And then when you are ready, move through it. I'm here for you." And when I was vulnerable, when I shared something that I feared would make me look "bad" or that might make me look foolish, instead of being received with love, I received exactly what I feared--condescension, laughter. And when I cried, I was either ignored or spanked or laughed at. So I hardened, and I became a very angry, sullen child. It took me years to open again, to let myself be soft and trusting, to stop resorting to walls and anger as a first defense. And so, I will give my children the gift of respect for their feelings.

Well, there are many other gifts I'd like to give my children, but I will cap the list here for now.