My Jenn-eration

So it seems that this blog has become the anti-blog, the place where I rally against other random points of view. The other day my target was Mayim Biyalik and her tirade against TV and today I am stuck on another fascinating piece that ran in The Atlantic a few days ago. The title: “The Ethical Implications of Parents Writing about Their Kids. [1] ” The author, Phoebe Maltz Bovy, argues that a new genre has arisen of women and men who over share about their children’s lives, subsequently humiliating them and violating their privacy at the same time. As you can imagine, the essay hit home with me. In more ways than one I suppose I am complicit in Bovy’s argument and at first I had a rather strong knee-jerk “this is crap!” type reaction to it. And then I thought more on it. And you know what? Her point really is crap and I’m going to tell you why. Folks like Erma Bombeck and Bill Keane and countless others have used their children and family as fodder for their work and columns a...

“WALK!” I yell, but my words fall on deaf ears as they literally seem to erupt out of the school doors. Did you tiny people never hear of Johnny Cash? Walk the Line! What, no toddler geometry today?! The shortest distance between two points is a straight line! My words are pointless. My children literally just seem incapable of doing this. The best way I can describe them is like two inebriated octopuses – a gaggle of arms and legs moving in every direction at all times, never at any one time moving in a straight line. This used to and often continues to frustrate me to no end. I mean, how long do you think it takes to get from the front door of a preschool to your parking spot? One minute, maybe two? Let’s say five if you are really taking your time. Now, let’s put on your Dylan and Ruby world-view goggles. As you exit there is a relatively innocuous storage box that I swear no other human ever notices or touches but that Ruby feels compelled to climb up on so that she can take...