To all parents.

Olymom
Sat, 06 Feb 2010 17:48:23 +0000

Kipling wrote that a man needed to be able to “walk with kings” but “keep the common touch.” What he didn’t write was how dangerous a man (or woman) is who thinks they can do these things when he/she can’t. We parents think we are in touch with our children and our children’s lives. To us, college years were just an eyeblink ago and we think we are experts.

In truth, the world changes – sometimes rapidly so. We don’t even know how clueless we are. So we have the ignorant-but-certain leading the confident-but-immature (sorry, but at 17 to 19 people are going to be immature in one category or another. It just is so). Results are . . . varied but predictable.

How is life as a parent? Like sailing. Sometime exhilarating, sometimes tedious, sometimes terrifying and always expensive.