We're Not Okay, Okay

Recently, I was speaking to one of my successful friends about the generation which preceded us. Because we are both parents, we’ve each heard one of the staple sayings from our parents on a regular basis, “you turned out okay.” The sad and unfortunate truth is that our parents say this because they don’t really know us. Most parents know the educational and professional accomplishments of their children but they know nothing about their bouts of depression, feelings of inadequacy or struggles with loneliness. Theirs is a generation where fatherhood means providing and motherhood means nurturing and, in some cases, disciplining until “daddy gets home.” However, those deep and meaningful conversations were never broached. As a matter of fact, most of us never even had a "sex talk” and while I may not agree with the content of mine; I did receive one from each of my parents and my grandmother. My father’s mother, a preacher’s daughter, turned to me and asked me in a drugstore one day if I was on “the pill.” I was in Junior High School. I was abhorred. Unbeknownst to her, I was a late bloomer who was still very active in the Girl Scouts and whose main interest at the time was tennis and doll collecting. But at least someone said something to me. Most men I know were given a stack of condoms, usually on prom night, and told “don’t get anyone pregnant.” I only know of a few that were actually told how to use them (which kind of left the “don’t get anyone pregnant” request up to chance). Most women I know never received a talk at all, leaving their knowledge of sex up to a friend who was usually one of those fast girls you absolutely didn’t want your child to learn from. And then there are those who got the “sex is for marriage” speech but no real, useful information about how celibacy could actually be achieved. These scant tidbits of information, of course, are far more than what our parents received from their parents. However, it is one of the reasons why many women, even in my age group, confuse sex with love. This was not a problem back in the days when people were getting married at 17 and staying married no matter what. We simply can’t afford to raise our children the same way. Further, while some of us might have “dodged the bullet” in the area of sex by not getting pregnant or, for men, getting someone pregnant, it doesn’t mean the lack of information we received was a successful way to parent. We suffer from other ailments such as emotional scarring and an inability to connect with people with whom we’ve been intimate. I know countless men who suffer from this—countless successful, "degreed", intelligent, married, single, etc. men. And guess what, their parents have no idea. My theory is that for many of us, our parents are like a fan club. It’s actually quite endearing. We’ve been able to accomplish things professionally that, in some cases, they weren’t able to accomplish. Perhaps we’ve travelled to places they haven’t or perhaps we’ve just simply made more money than they did (adjusting for inflation). Some of us have bigger houses, more degrees, more properties or, quite simply, more interesting lives. They admire us the way a kid looks up to a super hero. But they don’t know us. Our conversations are relegated to those comfortable subjects of weather and world problems. No one sits at the dinner table and asks, “Are you feeling isolated in your marriage, dear?” or “How are you dealing with your spouse’s philandering?” Instead our parents ask, “How’s work?” And they sit there and wait for some juicy story of our latest promotion or accolade from our boss. They then go on to enlist others in our fan club such as neighbors and family members. All the while, you face your imminent divorce, your feelings of failure and your insecurities on your own, without so much as a suspicion from the people who raised you. If you do dare to share these feelings, they are often discouraged with words of “it’s time you got over that” or “we all have problems.” Because, at the end of the day, for the most part, they don’t really want to know us. Really knowing your children means facing mistakes you might have made. It means realizing that you failed in some areas and that, perhaps, your offspring weren’t prepared to enter adulthood just because a driver’s license deemed it so. For parents, saying, “you turned out okay” means they were good parents. They did their jobs. Game over. But in our generation, where self-introspection is part of the daily ritual and where parenting involves, well, let’s face it, much more “involvement,” we are going to be doing things a little differently. Unfortunately, due to the world our children will face, we don’t have much of a choice. With all of our imperfections and flaws, our fears and insecurities, we have to go deeper with our children. And we will. Because despite the things we weren’t taught, we were given the insight to know what we lack. So, in the grand scheme of things, we are not okay but we’re going to be alright.

Taylor Is 7 Months Old

Friday our son turned 7 months old. Already, his face is beginning to change again and he is determined to get out of his crib on his own. So far, he’s only managed to lift himself to a standing position by holding onto the slats or poking his long, muscular, legs through the front but his resolve is unshakable. He will do this one day. He knows it and I know it and I will not be ready. I finally understand the syndrome in which parents continue to treat their children like babies years after the capable and self-sufficient offspring have moved out, purchased homes and started families of their own. The baby stage is so very short. I remember laying our son on the couch and walking away, knowing he’d be there upon my return. Now, I can’t get him to sit still through a bottle feeding. He wants to talk through it, grab things through it, play with the tray through it … Sometimes I just sit and stare at him, which does nothing for my writing career. And on Friday, he reached a new milestone when he began chanting “dadadada …” throughout the day. He was so excited, for a long time he couldn’t stop. I concluded at the time that, in fact, our child was a genius!

Though it drizzled that morning, I thought we needed to do something to celebrate his life on earth for seven full months. I happened upon a children’s gym surfing the Internet which was open to children 0 – 5 years old. I thought this would be a wonderful experience because he loves scooting after the older ones. I had the entire day planned out but, of course, as traffic in LA would have it, nothing fit within the strict time parameters I intended. After running a mile at the gym, soaking in the sauna and relaxing in the steam room, I went to the gym’s childcare room so I could scoop my “kid” up and rush to the kid’s gym on the other side of town. He was sitting up in the Calvin Klein jeans and t-shirt my aunt purchased him weeks prior. There were no other children in the room. He was under the close supervision of a babysitter, playing a keyboard. He sang and hit the keys with extreme pleasure—the kind that adults rarely experience. I thought to myself, he doesn’t need a gym. He’s about as happy as he would be with a room full of children running around. That’s just his personality—plays well alone. It’s a blessing all parents don’t get to experience. So I stand and bask in it, realizing how rich I am.

ASSETS VS. LIABILITIES

I thought of this subject because on more than one occasion I have heard someone mention the charitable work that is needed here verses in other countries. Many Americans believe that we give too much to others while not servicing those at home. I believe this is because most people don’t have the full picture. Collectively, third world countries are almost 2 trillion dollars in debt. During many of the disasters when we go in to help, these countries are given loans with exorbitant interest rates that they will never be able to pay off. Thus, part of Tony Blair’s plan of calling for a 100 percent cancellation of multilateral debt owed by 62 developing nations.

Most of my friends who have travelled to third world countries (I’ve even seen this in resort areas when we’ve ventured off to where the indigenous people really live) tell about the whole other level of poverty experienced in other parts of the world. One friend describes how appreciative a young boy was in South Africa who was given a mere pair of tennis shoes. Personally, I have been involved with public service in America since age 5. A few years ago, I worked with homeless children through an organization called Stand Up For Kids. I was in charge of arranging their monthly dinner parties at the beach and I walked “the beat” a few times handing out information. I am not kidding when I tell you those homeless kids were very particular about everything from food to clothing. They could be extremely demanding and at times not even thankful. It was a job you did because you hoped it might make a difference but there was no immediate reward. In fact, it was a little draining because you knew you’d be leaving them every night to fend for themselves. Los Angeles county only has one shelter that accepts kids without their parents. Unappreciative or not, they deserved a safe place to sleep. Most of them ran away from abusive homes. Still, it was easy for us to get excessive amounts of food and clothes on a regular basis. We even had to get a bigger storage bin because of all the items we received. America has plenty of ASSETS. But we also have plenty of LIABILITIES.

Webster’s dictionary describes a liability as “the quality of being something that holds you back.” Our biggest liability just happens to be our bureaucratic government. A grand example of this is California. We have not been able to raise national test scores in schools from near bottom in over a decade. The fifth largest economy in the world is only doing slightly better than poor states (and even given the culturally diverse student make-up, this is still unacceptable). I personally know how inept our leaders are because I helped organize a day of lobbying for my sorority chapter. It was on that day that I heard a representative tell us we had approximately 20 or so gang prevention programs (I can’t remember the exact figure) that had been active for several years. However, their organizers were never able to communicate effectively. So, we hired Civil Rights Attorney Connie Rice to evaluate them and give suggestions to get them to work together. Are you kidding me? No one ever thought about this before? Rice wrote up a massive roadmap for overhauling L.A.'s strategy but this is several years and billions of dollars AFTER the problem has escalated to the point where we've had a 44% increase of gang related crimes since last year in the San Fernando Valley alone. Some of these crimes have been committed against the vulnerable homeless kids who have no where to go at night. This is because, though most runaways travel to California (and Los Angeles county specifically) there have been very few steps toward figuring out away to protect these children. However, Santa Monica did pass a law preventing us from feeding them.

California is very much a reflection of America in general. Collectively, we have plenty of Assets. In this state particularly, we pay amongst the highest property tax in the country and our sales tax is nothing to sneeze at. But we, like much of the rest of the country, have an Asset Allocation problem due to our Liabilities—our leadership. We don’t need more money. We need more competence. And we need it NOW.

To Spank Or Not To Spank ...

To Spank or not to Spank, that is the question. For most people the answer may seem pretty obvious—they received spankings, they turned out “fine.” End of story. However, for one of my close friends it was not that simple. Though she was disciplined through corporal punishment as a child, she and her husband decided that is not the route they wanted to take with their children. This involved informing both sides of the family and neither wanted to comply. When you decide to make different decisions for your children than the previous generation, you sometimes run the risk of backlash. They feel like you are criticizing them. But there is another way to look at it. If those parents raised competent, intelligent children, shouldn’t they be trusted to raise their own children? Shouldn’t any parent who is a sane, capable, loving parent be able to make those sorts of decisions for his or her own family? If, in fact, our parents have done a great job and we “turned out fine” then shouldn’t they trust us to rear children who will turn out “fine” as well?

Personally, I was not beaten regularly as a child and by most accounts I turned out “fine.” I received one spanking at age 11 (I stayed out too late), the same age at which I was employed by a local hairdresser to work on the weekends and six years before I would shoot my first documentary and raise so much money for the Muscular Dystrophy Association, through my charity event, I'd be asked to present a check to them on television. On the other hand, many of my friends were hit habitually and have decided there is a different way to discipline their children. Of course that is great in theory. But what do you do when you have a screaming two year-old who refuses to listen to you? Amazingly, these same friends have very well-behaved children who have tested gifted, excelled in extra-curricular activities and who have even taken to activism. The sort of parenting they practice takes more patience and parental discipline. It requires that a parent be extremely in tune with his or her child. This is not only because appropriate punishments must be selected but an awareness of the child’s feelings is required. Is he or she depressed or angry or having trouble with someone at school? Most people I know didn’t grow up in an environment where they could express their feelings with their parents. They may have faced bullies at school, had questions about sex or any number of things. Most of my female friends never even received a sex talk from their very own parents. And, yes, they turned out “fine” because their parents don’t know about the trips to Planned Parenthood or the attempted suicides. Frankly, that is not the type of relationship I want with my children. I don’t want them to fear or be intimidated by me. I want them to respect me. How this is accomplished is a choice up to myself and the father of my children.

Recently I read that many kids who are considered to have learning disabilities, hyperactivity or problems with paying attention are actually suffering from food or environmental allergies, which can cause abnormal learning patterns and symptoms. A great number of these children are spanked or drugged because of their unmanageable behavior. Parents believe they have no other choice and it’s an acceptable response to an “unruly” child in our country. But I would venture to say if our parents knew that they might be able to calm some of us down by simply eliminating Cow’s milk, wheat, corn, soy, eggs, citrus and/or peanuts or any of the environmental causes of disruptive behavior such as molds, dust, cleaning chemicals, perfumes or pesticides, they would have laid down their straps and given us some organic veggies instead.

Time To Step Up My Game

I just walked/ran ½ mile with my baby and boy was it a struggle. No, that is not a typo. Not 1 mile. Not 2 miles. One half mile with a stroller! Though I've been working out consistently for about two months now, 2-3 times per week, I have realized it is time to take it up a notch. Age is not an excuse when you have a father 24 years older than you with better abs. My dad recently beat a 22 year-old in a tennis tournament! I doubt at this point if I could get through one match. I, on the other hand, recently attempted to play volleyball at a family barbecue where my lack of hand-eye coordination showed no sign of past athleticism. Those of you who played sports as children, remember what it was like to have your coach push you. You would run or do the required exercise until you thought you would DIE. There was an achy pain in your joints that made you feel like you couldn’t go on. But you did. And you lived. Your drive and determination was unshakable. As a nearly 40 year-old, I sit in my Pilates class and watch each of the women in the room with me, at varying times during the workout, simply stop and take a rest. Can you imagine telling your coach you needed to take a rest? That would mean more laps or more push-ups or more of whatever torturous activity they could devise on the spot. I have fond memories of literally laying on the tennis court after having a rigorous workout. Yet, last week I smugly retorted to my not so young herself Pilates instructor after she asked me why I wasn’t moving, I lack the upper body strength to do that particular move. She demonstrated it with ease and smiled at me. She sat there grinning in front of us with her perky breasts and legs so flexible she effortlessly wrapped them in strange configurations right before our very eyes, while we dreamt of laying on the couch watching Oprah and drinking Chai Lattes from Starbucks. Today, however, I realized I have to change. Running (or attempting to run) with my son made me see how important it is for me to get in shape and just how little stamina I possess. I want to have the same energy level my parents had when we were growing up. I’d like to enjoy playing tennis and running up flights of stairs with him like my dad did with us. Further, I want to live long enough to watch him graduate from high-school, college and, eventually, Harvard law school (wink, wink). This means more cardio, more discipline, more consistency. Perhaps being a parent is just motivation enough for me to step up my game.