The Molding

It wouldn't be immodest to say that I have more parenting experience than most adults my age. This includes adults of the female variety, especially since the birth control pill liberated them from the shackles fashioned out of umbilical cords. Since that moment of perfect and complete social reflection, women have enjoyed a total freedom exactly equal to that of men, untroubled by expectation or pressure to fulfill traditional roles as child-raisers and caregivers while still pursuing their own dreams of creative and/or professional satisfaction. THIS IS THE UTOPIA WROUGHT BY SCIENCE.

But seriously, I did stay home with my kids for like 8, maybe 9 years, some shit like that. And since most men demand like three months of constant verbal recognition and tangible rewards of either an edible or sexual nature because they stayed home alone with their own child for like three hours on a weekend without killing it so mom could do something she really, really wanted to do like go to Target, I'm definitely suggesting that people like me should be lionized, probably ahead of service members, firefighters, police and definitely the president.

When I have advice for you, then, don't sit there and bitch about how it's "unsolicited" and "inherently judgmental" and "somehow vaguely racist." You sit there and you take it in, just like you did on that day that got you in this bullshit parenting mess in the first place.

There are books and websites and blogs and TV shows and any other kind of consumable media about child-rearing. Anything that causes humans anxiety you can bet is also a cottage industry for bullshit advice doled out by people probably less qualified than you to give it. I'm going to cut out all of my economic viability on the topic by reducing my own HIGHLY SUCCESSFUL philosophy for raising offspring down to three words. Are you ready? Be ready. Because here it comes: have mediocre children.

Don't get me wrong, high achievers can be great, but really only at events where they are not present. Because anything you could go to as an adult--parties, sporting events, trampoline parks, schools--is always ruined by the presence of children. If you're at one of these things with only other adults, your high achievers give you the chance to make other adults feel like feckless hobos with defective genes. This is the apex, the zenith, the pointy tippy top of the parenting mountain: making your peers feel like shit because of stuff you didn't even have to do yourself.

Other than that, though, high achievers are a problem. Stamp out your child's ambition as quickly as possible. Many promising academic careers have been ruined by an expertly timed passive-aggressive comment. And if their prowess lies in the sporting field, you may have to actually physically harm them.

But the stakes here are real. Look at me. I have a kid who made the freshman basketball team. Hooray, right? WRONG. Do you have any idea what time freshman basketball games start? No? I'll tell you: three o'clock in the fucking afternoon, that's when. On weekdays. Hey, want to also guess who does NOT get out of work in time to make it to a 3 pm basketball game? Fuck you, you know it's me. So now I'm trying to fit in make-up hours so I'm not burning the vacation time I wanted to use to take like two weeks off over the holidays. It's 11:53 pm on a Thursday as I'm writing this and my alarm is set to go off in less than 5 hours, all down to my kid being both coordinated and ambitious. I knew love and encouragement were going to come back to bite me in the ass.

Mediocre is specifically the goal though, let's be clear. Not children who struggle. You have to remember, they're minors. Their struggle is going to become your struggle. Overdo the parental correction of the high-achievement error and there's only one way that ends: you get stuck raising your grandkids. Sure, you love them as much as you can love anything with fetal alcohol syndrome, but two generations in, you know at that point the question of struggle/not struggle is out of your hands.

It's tough needle to thread, but I believe in you. As parents we all have biases toward our own experiences, but I think I have the scientific backing to say what you want is a kid exactly like me. Think of how much money you'd save on phone bills, condoms and prom tickets with a kid who can't talk to other humans. And all the free time you'll have never having to show up at one awards ceremony. And here I am, raising my own kids and my educational debt is still all my own. Mom really did it right. You can to.