OleopteneA blog for Mara Collins

And then this month’s Brain, Child arrived.

A quick digression: I love this
magazine. It’s a parenting magazine, but, well, different. Within six months
of looking at regular parenting magazines, maybe more if you’re a bit
sleep-deprived and hormonally imbalanced, a bit less if you’ve previously
overdosed on regular slick women’s or teen’s magazines, you figure out there’s a
formula: a sleep or eating issue because that’s what we all worry about the
most, some “hidden hazards: how well have you baby-proofed” article. An
article promoting this season’s cool toys, or toys to build your baby’s brain
because it’s never too early to worry about admission to Harvard. An article on
exercises to lose that extra weight you’ve been carrying since the baby was born
– something trendy that a celebrity used to get back to her size negative four
pre-baby figure three hours after the baby was born. Something about your
marriage and how to maintain the spark after having children. Discipline
strategies telling you it is not appropriate to lock your child in a closet with
only bread and water when they melt down in the grocery check-out aisle over
only being allowed to choose one candy bar. I may exaggerate a small bit, but
one gift subscription given to me when Aod‡n was born only expired this
summer, and there was a certain predictability to the whole
production.

Brain, Child is not
like that. They publish essays by mothers of children with disabilities,
survivors of miscarriage, and lesbian mothers. You will find in the magazine
musings on the real significance of Barbie, articles on parents who believe any
disciplining of your children is an abuse of power (that manage to look at their
claims seriously) and an editorial pondering whether different subsets of
mothers can connect when their experiences are vastly different One of the most
memorable articles I’ve read was titled “Why I Hate Dr. Sears”. And I love the
cartoons, including one of my all-time favorites, a little girl, hands on her
waist, looking up at her mother, with the caption “What part of no don’t you
mean?” Every month there is a debate taken on by two parents “Are today’s
children overpraised?” “Do toy guns make children more violent?” “Is spanking
always wrong?” and so on. I always finish the magazine as quickly as I can so I
can pass it on to Jenny and Gail and we can talk about it because there is
always something worth talking
about.

This month’s Brain, Child
arrived at my house with the debate about whether parents should be friends to
their kids. And both sides were so well taken, I found myself in deep agreement
with each: the qualities that make a good friend are essential to parenting
well, having empathy and listening and understanding. But it’s confusing to a
kid to try to take on a role of equal with a parent and parents should be
unambiguously in charge. I think of course, about my experience with my
parents, and I have to say that some of my best memories are one-on-one
experiences of doing friend-like things with my parents, hiking with my dad or
going to see a chick flick with my mom. And as adults there are few couples
with whom my husband and I can spend as relaxed and laughter-filled an evening
as our parents. I still turn to my parents for advice and enjoy just talking to
them whenever I get the chance. I look forward to having something similar with
my adult sons. And yet, this is the adult perspective. When I was growing up,
boundaries and roles were clear. And in adolescence there was something
cringe-worthy about adults who tried too hard to be a friend. There are certain
boundaries that just keep everyone more comfortable: kids may cuss around each
other, adults may cuss around each other, but kids older than, say, three, know
not to cuss in front of adults and adults should know better than to cuss in
front of adults. It’s not dishonesty, just boundaries and roles. This is
brilliantly discussed on This American
Life , episode 267, titled Propriety, broadcast 6/11/04, with Dr.
Timothy Jay, author of Cursing
in America and Why
We Curse . I thinkcursing stands in for lots of behaviors that define
relationships between peers and non-peers — nobody wants their parents to
discuss their sex-lives with them.

I am
not sure when I stopped playing with Aod‡n and Xander. We still play board
games and card games and they tried one night to teach me a video game which
made all of us miserable, but I don’t go up and build legos with them anymore
like I used (and still do with S¿ren). They can give each other a sort of
company I can’t provide. In fact, aside from keeping the old baby monitor on
their upstairs playroom just loud enough to hear if trouble should aris. After
they come home from school and finish their homework, they disappear until it is
time to set the table and it feels a little strange — like I’m trying to
balance respecting their need for a space of their own to play and remaining
connected and interested. I don’t think there’s a formula for the correct
balance, multiplying age by hours in the week divided by grade in school and
then subtracting time spent reading. I do wish I had more hours in the day to
make sure everyone got my undivided attention at least an hour a day, but I’ve
found that sometimes we talk best walking to and from school or cooking or
unloading the dishwasher together, that I can still manage to read to everyone
each night, even if I’m nursing while doing so. And hopefully this is laying
the foundation for a lifetime of our being able to talk to each other and
understand each other. The thing is, you may have countless friends in your
life, but you only have one set of parents.