Angels and Sugared Windows Pt. 2
Sep. 20th, 2004 04:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
talktoolooseI went with my father to the cemetary on Sunday afternoon to visit his parents' graves. I've accompanied him before, but this time I felt the weight of that visit, as my father moves towards his 80th birthday; his father died at 85. My father and I, who have been growing closer for the past 15 years, seem to have broken through yet more of the walls that separated us. There is an ease in our proximity now, a willingness to be caught off guard that wasn't there before. An intimacy that seems to be filled with the incense of mortality and an acceptance of human limitation that is as tragic as it is comforting.
Pointing to various graves of long-dead Jewish socialists, he told me about his childhood best friend who fulfilled his early aim of geting into the projectionists' union and about his crazy travelling salesman uncle who kept hundreds of dollars in his artificial leg. When they found his dead body in the hotel room, so family legend goes, the leg was gone!
My brother was supposed to accompany us to the cemetary but, as usual, he begged off at the last minute. His eleven year old son showed an interest in coming but his insane mother wouldn't allow it. Why? She is incredibly death-phobic. In the house she grew up in, you were never even supposed to say the word "death". Now, in fairness, both her parents are Holocaust survivors and must have seen enough death around them for a lifetime. But when she says that kids these days "grow up too fast" and "should be able to keep their innocence," she's talking a load of horse-apples.
Since when did childhood not include learning to cope with death, whether it's a puppy you love or an ant you just deliberately stepped on? Furthermore, we're talking a really bright 11 year old here AND one who watches CSI shows with his father when his mom's not around.
You know what, sweetie? I agree that children are being forced to grow up too fast. In fact, your son is forced to run from school to math enrichment, to music class, to sports lessons, to competitions, to computer camp and on and on. His life more resembles a Japanese salaryman than a kid. Kids need time to dream and walk through ravines and step on ants and discuss death with their friends and put on super capes and do dangerous pseudo-kung fu in the park.
Of course, she can't cork the genie no matter how hard she tries. They came across my nephew explaining all the gory details of reproduction to a captive audience of his cousins. My sister-in-law was again scandalized. "Why does he have to know that already? Why can't he just believe that parents put sugar on their windows and the children are attracted to the house?"
Ick! Like insects! Like cockroaches!
Pointing to various graves of long-dead Jewish socialists, he told me about his childhood best friend who fulfilled his early aim of geting into the projectionists' union and about his crazy travelling salesman uncle who kept hundreds of dollars in his artificial leg. When they found his dead body in the hotel room, so family legend goes, the leg was gone!
My brother was supposed to accompany us to the cemetary but, as usual, he begged off at the last minute. His eleven year old son showed an interest in coming but his insane mother wouldn't allow it. Why? She is incredibly death-phobic. In the house she grew up in, you were never even supposed to say the word "death". Now, in fairness, both her parents are Holocaust survivors and must have seen enough death around them for a lifetime. But when she says that kids these days "grow up too fast" and "should be able to keep their innocence," she's talking a load of horse-apples.
Since when did childhood not include learning to cope with death, whether it's a puppy you love or an ant you just deliberately stepped on? Furthermore, we're talking a really bright 11 year old here AND one who watches CSI shows with his father when his mom's not around.
You know what, sweetie? I agree that children are being forced to grow up too fast. In fact, your son is forced to run from school to math enrichment, to music class, to sports lessons, to competitions, to computer camp and on and on. His life more resembles a Japanese salaryman than a kid. Kids need time to dream and walk through ravines and step on ants and discuss death with their friends and put on super capes and do dangerous pseudo-kung fu in the park.
Of course, she can't cork the genie no matter how hard she tries. They came across my nephew explaining all the gory details of reproduction to a captive audience of his cousins. My sister-in-law was again scandalized. "Why does he have to know that already? Why can't he just believe that parents put sugar on their windows and the children are attracted to the house?"
Ick! Like insects! Like cockroaches!
