Lies Parents Tell

Lies Parents Tell Today I was walking across City Hall Plaza in Downtown Boston. A family -- mom, dad, and little girl -- came toward me, the girl dancing around and trying to scramble up a brick structure. As I passed them I heard the dad telling the little girl that no, he wouldn’t boost her on to the top because ‘The cops’ll come and arrest you.’ This comment transported me. To my childhood, to my parenthood, to all the times I’ve heard authority figures make dire predictions to get the behavior they want. As a child, cautions like, ‘Don’t sit on that wall, you’ll fall down and break open your head and your brains will spill out’ never moved me. The classic -- ‘Don’t cross your eyes or they’ll get stuck’ -- didn’t stick, so to speak. When I hear parents making stuff up to manage their kids I cringe. I fast-forward to a young adult debilitated with irrational fears of police and brains falling out on the pavement, or the other extreme -- a family where the parents have no credibility. I suppose most outcomes fall somewhere in-between. Maybe I’m falling prey to my own criticism of dire predictions. But apart from what really happens later on for these unfortunates, it just isn’t right. I know as well as anyone how difficult parenting can be. We all fall back on imperfect ways under stress. But just plain lying can’t be the answer. Was that guy so stressed about his kid walking around on the platform that he had to resort to invoking the cops? I suppose he may have believed it. Or, he may be a hapless second or third-generation phobic passing on the family neurosis. Or he was just an idiot. Is there a sensible line to be drawn between the fable of the Easter Bunny and the yarn about cops arresting 4 year olds? This could be the crux of confusion for many parents. The world we construct for our children is full of white lies and spin -- ‘Did the tooth fairy leave you anything last night?’; ‘Daddy and I are not fighting, we’re discussing’ ; ‘Your grandfather loves all his grandchildren the same’; ‘Your teammates don’t hate you for striking out’ -- that adding a few manipulations in our favor can’t be all that bad -right? Or is this just another manifestation of the parenting void that has spawned reality shows like ‘The Nanny?’ I haven’t yet lowered myself to watching, but from what I’ve read about these shows, in exchange for lessons in common sense, struggling parents prostrate themselves before millions of strangers. I read recently that a new profession is taking root called ‘parent coaching.’ Parents engage a coach and call for advice when they have a sticky situation. At least with a coach the parenting role is intact. The kids don’t know there’s string-puller behind the curtain. Then again, I wonder if people who hire coaches find themselves resorting to, ‘Do it because my coach said so!’ It’s the parents who abdicate responsibility, invoking the police and predicting physical harm to set limits, that bug me. As a fifth grader, like everyone of my vintage, I spent hours in science class drawing electrons in concentric rings to visualize the elements at an atomic level. Later we learned that this busy-work was based on provisional truth. Atoms were in fact threeStan Dolberg 617-283-6250 [email protected]

dimensional, with electrons madly racing around the nucleus in elliptical orbits at all angles. Apparently educators believed we weren’t mature enough for the truth. This revelation undermined much of what was later offered as the real deal. I wondered what would they tell us next year? 1+1 = 3? The electron scam became a metaphor for my generation. The anger and near-paranoid suspicion we bring to virtually every issue -from public policy to genetically modified food -- draws energy from that diabolical 5th grade science cover-up. We could have handled the truth. My sense of safety was formed in the crucible of the cold war. The threat of mass annihilation loomed over us, robbing sunny days of their warmth. I’m sure I wasn’t the only child of my generation to occasionally go to sleep terrified of being incinerated. Against this backdrop there probably weren’t too many cause-and-effect scenarios my parents could conjure that would shape my choices. To avoid complete loss of control, my mother intuitively found fertile ground -- fear of humiliation. She drilled us with the mantra ‘Be alert every waking moment.’ She would say it just like that. Sometimes she offered a fiercely enunciated ‘You must be alert every waking moment.’ In our house, being taken advantage of was like having your eyes get stuck. If it happened, it might become permanent -- you’d be a patsy. My mother won her battle, despite the cold war. My wife and I were fascinated with the writings of A.S. Neill, the creator of a school called Summerhill and an educational/child rearing philosophy that celebrated the innate goodness of children and the value of self-direction. He also discussed the harmful effects of parenting and schooling that were based on control and forced socialization. When we had children we were early in careers and found it challenging to incorporate these ideals into daily life. Despite our enlightened thinking, soon enough we were demanding conformance ‘Because I said so!’ These pains were in part self-inflicted, committed as we were to explaining everything to our children. We believed that if they understood ‘why’ that all discord would dissolve. As the battle of wills unfolded, even trivial plans spawned protracted negotiations. We all laugh about it now. They became fabulous people. We wish them every happiness. We also quietly await the day when they ask, in reference to their own children, ‘Were we like this when we were kids?’ Back on City Hall Plaza I see that the little girl, fearing incarceration, immediately stops trying to climb up on the bricks. Wow. The ruse totally worked. My kids at that age -- 10 minute conversation, easy. Hmm. Efficiency vs. truth. Truth vs. efficiency. We know where George Bush came out on that tradeoff. That makes it easy. Stick with the truth.

Stan Dolberg 617-283-6250 [email protected]