|
|
Here's a modest proposal, without all that tedious baby-eating: No more parents.
Honestly. The word "parents" need only be a technical term with simple biological connotations, rather than the heady, bothersome, sociological and emotional trappings with which it is presently burdened. I realize this sounds ungrateful — and I assure you that it is — but I believe that parents are both a luxury and a curse in the information age. They're always messing with the program — instilling fears, shaping false values, wearing sandals with socks. In the words of the fabulously quotable Fresh Prince, "Parents just don't understand." It seems to me that flying blind through development would almost be a more refreshing option, with the number of unqualified parents out there. Then, once and for all, children might enjoy their freedom to "get jiggy wid it." (Oh, that inimitable Prince and his wonderful bon mots!) Because dysfunction is not necessarily the product of absentee parents; it is more often the sad product of existing parents doing their jobs incorrectly or without patience (except in the case of my cousin Freddie, whose dysfunction was the product of too many Amaretto/furniture-polish sours).
Take a second, as I did, and catalog everything you've gained directly and exclusively from a parent-filled existence (not counting cash rewards or inheritance). Here's what I came up with:
- An incriminating assortment of Sears portrait studio photographs
- 6,590 servings of zucchini bread (my mother's single greatest passion, next to interrupting teen-age coitus in her refurbished basement)
- Compassion for those less fortunate than myself, and an appreciation of my own gifts coupled with an unshakable desire and will to provide others, wherever possible, with the same happiness and quality of life I have always been afforded
- A genetic proclivity to male pattern baldness
Aside from the whole compassion hoo-hah, where do the benefits really shake out? Sure, parents aren't wholly impractical after conception and childbirth. They're great for breastfeeding, for taking telephone messages, and for bailing you out of Mexican jails every now and again. But really, doesn't a mother with bursitis in her left shoulder and occasional weeping fits associated with a middle-aged menopausal meltdown take up quite a bit of space? Particularly when viewed next to a sleek, compact AT&T; 1715 Digital answering machine with remote messaging? (And living in New York, I need the space. Granted, my parents don't live with me, but still...)
Shelf-space aside, with the convenience and abundance of information channels in our daily existence, "media tutors" are quite capable of helping you figure out on your own 99 percent of the things your parents warned you about — more, if you pay close attention to Mudfoot's sage advice on The Fat Albert Show.
Researchers, sociologists, and TV pop psychologists all claim that good parenting is the lock and key to a well-adjusted adult life, but so often they neglect to mention that actual, physical parents who stick around are a distracting, unnecessary middle agent to good parenting. I often think about what I could have been without parents — a world-champion indoor hand-scissors relay racer, the Speaker of the House, Little Orphan Annie — and I cry. I cry like a baby that's about to be devoured by an overweight British satirist. And I think: What if I were raised with knowledge from experienced, reasoning minds like Mahatma Gandhi and Immanuel "TV's Webster" Kant, instead of the confusing maxims of an overworked Dad (offering frustrating puzzlers like "Because I said so" and "By the power of Grayskull, go to your room right now, young man")? Who knows what kind of person I would be today...
The ever-jiggy Todd Levin writes a monthly column for Smug, and occasionally inhabits tremble.com.
|
