Day: March 17, 2013

1045. How to Be a Disappointment to Your Kids pt. 1

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You ought to start by yelling at them. That’s where I began. I noticed it from time to time, noticed the voice rising and the anger filling my lungs. It became clear when my eldest turned to his siblings and said, “Come on guys, lets play upstairs because Daddy is angry with us.” My heart broke. I was caught between feeling like crap and struggling to find the words to explain what they’d done to make me so angry. They didn’t understand, and they hardly ever do. To 3, 5, and 8 year old boys, their actions and world is about having fun. The behaviors that get them in trouble are normal things they’d do like running and fighting and kicking balls over walls. These are energetic things that could be properly directed if I was a good enough father to understand how, and more importantly when to do so. However, I don’t know these things, because I wasn’t shown them as a kid. I didn’t have a role model for positive parenting, so now I’m in yet another role that I don’t believe I have the goods to fill.

This isn’t a pity party on my birthday (though it is my birthday). I’m not crying over the key board wondering why my mother sucked so bad as a parent and why my step dad was taken from me way too early. The fact is I’ve probably romanticized my step dad way too much. I don’t remember him ever being the Justicar, but I do remember getting into a whole lot of trouble while he was alive. This post is more about recognizing the negative behaviors, so I can take the appropriate steps to change them. It is also about sharing my wrongdoings, so anyone who reads this can take a moment to think before they do the same stuff I do.

The worst thing I do is compound time.

I write a lot. I also have a terrible burden at my job and often come home so laden with the stresses of the day that all I want to do is kick my feet up and play a video game. There are days that I come home and the kids are the last thing on my mind. However, they are the first thing to greet me when I hit the doorstep. That does not jive. Even if it means finding a way to spend more hours at the office, when you are home with your kids they need to be the absolute center of your universe. If they are not, if there is something else you would rather be doing, they will know and they will challenge you to be there for them and not it. That battle is what grays the hair. You can’t win. Even if you manage to focus on the other thing you are losing, because you are fostering animosity within the household.  Kids know when you don’t want them around and it really really hurts them.

Today is my birthday. I had expectations of spending the day alone working. That is an insane plan that cannot work. I need to be here with my kids all day. I need to give them the time they need from me, and perhaps for a few hours I can get the time I need for me. This is the truth and difficulty of parenting. It is the scheduling nightmare that causes marriages to collapse. Everybody needs personal time, but both parents getting it is often impossible to do–especially if you can’t turn your working mind off and find yourself slaved to the cellphone or laptop trying to get one last moment in before the horde descends upon you.

1044. The Following: How Fandom and Serial Murder Collide

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I’ve been watching The Following on FOX. The show depicts the battle between  a serial killer’s cult and a team of FBI agents bent on stopping the killings. The more I watch the show with a critical eye, the more I notice the connections these writers are making between the average person and serial killers. See, the people following the killer and carrying out his will are lost. They seek the guidance of someone with a moral compass; and with a plan and purpose. In truth they are a lot like church folk in need of Jesus.

The parallels are compelling and the sole difference is the size of the population that follows the religious compass vs. that of a serial killer. One prays to God and acts His will. The other preys on the living and acts their shared dark morality. They both want to be a part of something–anything larger than themselves.

I would argue that our recent national fascination with serial killer shows and ongoing fascination with salacious sexual and explicitly violent content reflects a gradual decline of the baseline moral code. So many web authors point to the parallels between Rome in decline and today’s America, but it feels like we aren’t quite there yet. Still that fracturing moral code was part of the upswing of the Roman era. It ended badly. I suspect the land of us may too struggle if we fail to understand the connective tissues between the baseline moral compass and the prevalence of outliers to that compass. In short, the more the compass erodes, the more likely we are to enter into a space where extremists on both ends of the spectrum prosper. On one end you’ll have the ultra-cons looking to send us back to the formality of the 1800’s and on the other there will be many who treat human life as they would any other infestation and take equal pleasure in snuffing it out–so long as they are recognized for their good deeds.