What’s a Good Dad to Do? How About Set Some Limits?

Last February Dalton Conley wrote an article for TIME Magazine about the way social media are actually changing our children’s brains.  The 7 hours and 38 minutes a day that children ages 8 to 18 spend on entertainment media have altered the brains to “pay more attention to environmental stimuli at the expense of focus,” thereby damaging their young minds’ ability to perform high-level thinking.

Bummer. 

As a concerned parent–not to mention a member of a society that will one day have to take care of me–the article had my attention.

But then the author made a stunning revelation without even highlighting it as a problem. 

He writes in the first person (as all TIME columnists do these days–a very strange trend indeed):

But I am still concerned about the effect that 24/7 connectivity has on my kids-and on my 11-year-old son in particular...So what’s a good dad to do?  I’ve set some rules that are designed to aid his social and cognitive development: no Facebook during school, and no electronic devices after 9:30 p.m.

Did any of you catch his tacit admission (along with his really lame limits)?

Facebook policy clearly states:  If you are under age 13, please do not attempt to register for Facebook or provide any personal information about yourself to us. If we learn that we have collected personal information from a child under age 13, we will delete that information as quickly as possible.

Where’s the ambiguity here?  Facebook says, “don’t do it.”  The boy's father clearly allowed him to lie about his age to register on Facebook.  What else will his son lie about in the future, with or without his father’s expressed permission? 

As for the limits the father set for his son, they really aren’t limits at all.  No Facebook at school?  Kind of a no-brainer.  And no electronic devices after 9:30 p.m?  Isn’t an 11 year-old likely in bed by that time?  If not, why not, and can you lend me a couple ounces of your patience? 

Look.  I’m not a perfect father.  If any of you are therapists, my children may one day pad your wallets with stories of irrational outbursts, control, snide comments, moodiness, and a propensity to let a Packers loss ruin the day.

But please.  Let’s be grown-ups here.  We can set limits for our children.  Our 11 year-olds don’t need to lie and get onto Facebook.  They’ll be just fine if made to wait until age 13. 

As for 7 hours 38 minutes of entertainment media a day?  I don't even know how to respond to that, unless it's a Sunday NFL double-header.  Then I get it.

To Cable or Not to Cable - OR - Holy Crap! The Brewers are REALLY GOING to WIN their Division!

A little perspective:

In 1982, my friend John and I sat in the last row of the leftfield bleachers at Milwaukee County Stadium during Game 5 of the World Series between the Milwaukee Brewers and the St. Louis Cardinals.  We won.  I was 14.

Guess what?  Now I have two fourteen year-olds.  If someone had told me back in ’82 that the Brewers wouldn’t win another division until I had children as old as I was back then, I probably would have become a Yankees fan.  I mean, come on!

But here we are.  It’s 2011.  I have two Freshman in high school, and this is the first time my kids will actually have something to brag about pertaining to the Brewers.

Let’s face it: 2008 was a mess.  The Brewers lost  15 of their first 19 games in September that year, leading to the firing of Ned Yost.  Yes, they won 6 or their last 7, but their final victory of the season, a necessary one, came against a Cubs team that was resting several of its starters.  That and a Mets loss allowed us to get into the playoffs.  True, it gave us a chance, but no one was thinking we could go all the way, even with CC Sabathia. 

This year is different.  As I write this, the Crew is 10½ games ahead of the Cardinals, and though stranger things have happened in baseball, I am confident (and this is big for a guy who’s usually skeptical) that the Brewers will in fact win their first division title since I was a pimple-faced, cocky little punk in 9^th grade at Brookfield East High School.

It’s all so glorious.

But the question remains: do I now purchase a cable TV package?  After all, both the Division and the League series are to be aired on WTBS, NOT one of the 6 or 7 channels we get on our rabbit ears antennae.

You see, in 2000, my family moved back to the Midwest after a 6-year stint on the East Coast.  After the move, other priorities took hold, and my wife and I spent the first month in our new house not worrying about cable TV, and instead we rented a lot of movies and watched what little we could on our antennae. 

Turns out we didn’t miss cable even a little.

Here we are, over a decade later, and probably about $6000 richer than had we gotten cable.  True, my children are considered weird, and their friends discuss shows my kids have never seen before, but they’ve gotten used to it, and we try to rent what few cable shows are worth watching through Netflix.  My "cableless" children seem no worse for the wear.

But alas, this year is DIFFERENT.  We’re talking MLB playoffs, baby.  If my kids are as unlucky as I, we’ll still be talking about this baseball season TWENTY-NINE YEARS FROM NOW!!  I'll be 72!  Holy crap.

So really, can I honestly NOT get cable?  I think not.

But then I have visions of a three game sweep by Atlanta in the first round of the playoffs, and me stuck with 256 channels of crap for the next twelve months.

But a victory.  A National League Championship Series appearance, or even...gasp!...a World Series.  I would pay a monthly cable fee ten times for that experience.

I’ll be calling Comcast in the morning.

An O'Hare Pick-up Nightmare

It’s an evening in June.  My wife Alice is arriving at O’Hare from the East Coast, but it’s not going as planned; there are bad storms in the area.  The following is a transcription of a text conversation between my wife and me (and my daughters when I’m driving).  You be the judge as to whether texting helped or hindered this process. 

7:18 PM, Alice

I am going to be delayed.  Willing to pick me up?  I am American Flt 4193.

7:19 PM, Paul

No problem.

Things get delayed more, and Alice still hasn’t landed by the time I pick up my daughters from a late summer school class.  I take off straight from there around 10:30PM, assuming by that point that it’ll be a quick in and out at O’Hare.  We arrive at the cell-phone lot and wait for further instructions.

10:50 PM, Paul

We’ll be parked in cell phone lot until you let us know

We wait and we wait.  People are getting tired and edgy, but the girls don’t have summer school the next morning.  No big deal.

11:11 PM, Paul

Getting close?

11:12PM , Alice

Oh goodness.  There is no one here to move the jetway.  I will let you know when I am off and on my way.  3 minutes, hopefully.

11:13 PM, Paul

Ok.

11:19PM, Alice

They are holding us hostage.  Want to head home and I will grab a #*@# cab?

11:22 PM, Paul

Probably good idea.  294 was bumper to bumper going south.  Could b clear but maybe better take Manheim.  If things change for u soon let us know right away

We begin to exit the cell-phone lot and make our way toward Manheim Road.

11:23 PM, Alice

We are getting off!  Can you still come?!

My daughters’ take control of the cell-phone.

11:23 PM, one of my daughters

Yes!!!

11:24 PM, Alice

Yippee!

We begin to make our way toward the terminal pickup.

11:24 PM, one of my daughters

Bottom level

We approach the roadway to get to the bottom level, but it’s bumper to bumper.  Time to call an audible.

11:29 PM, one of my daughters

New instructions…Go upstairs…

Then again, the top level doesn’t look any better.  In fact, it’s horrendous!  Now there’s a certain degree of frustration setting in.  I circle around and make my way back to the parking lot.

11:33PM, one of my daughters

Just kidding…just to get out it would be an hour…We’re parking…We’ll meet you on lower level by baggage claim. 

Unfortunately, by this point Alice has already made her way outside and it waiting at the lower level.  The rising frustration level isn’t confined to the car.

11:34 PM, Alice

No.  I am standing here!

11:34 PM, one of my daughters

Yeah…but to get to u it’d be a long time

11:34 PM, Alice

Up or down?

11:35 PM, one of my daughters

Baggage claim!

11:35 PM, Alice

K.  By Starbucks.  Claim 9

11:35 PM, one of my daughters

Ok!

We park the car, Cubs level, get into the elevator, press down, and exit into the tunnels beneath the pickup area where we’d hoped to be ten minutes ago.  I now have control of the cell-phone, which makes me feel a little better.  Cuz I’m a guy.

11:37 PM, Paul

U can start walking down toward the lot

11:38 PM, Alice

There are 2 tunnels.

(I’m thinking, “Yes, I know there are 2 tunnels, but for gosh sakes, just get downstairs already!”) but I show great TEXTING RESTRAINT and edit myself, a skill I haven’t yet mastered while talking.

11:39 PM, Paul

Here now claim 9

Eureka!  We have visual confirmation!  Hugs are exchanged.  Bags are rolled.  We make it home by midnight (I decide to take Manheim) and tell my wife, “Next time, take a cab.”

Meeting the Stranger: a Packer fan on the East Coast

In his novel Cat’s Cradle, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. pokes fun at the superficial allegiances people make, particularly those based on geography (something Vonnegut calls a granfalloon).  But as I traveled last week in the Northeast, I concluded that meeting people – no matter what shallow reason might be behind the introductions – makes for a more blessed venture.

For about a third of my twelve day trip, I sported either a Milwaukee Brewers shirt or a Green Bay Packers shirt.  And on these days, my attire inevitably resulted in meeting people I would never have spoken with otherwise.

Sure, some of the conversations were actually one-line quips that ended as soon as they began:

• The man at the visitor center in Cape Cod who said, “We don’t generally give advice to Packer fans.”
• The woman in Boston, who in spite of jogging with labored breath over a bridge, nonetheless heaved out a “Go Pack” as she passed me.
• The older gentleman in New York sporting a Yankees’ hat who, after noticing my Robin Yount shirt, said “You’ll be lucky to get out of this town alive.”  (I reminded him that the Yankees swept the Brewers earlier this season).

But I also had two lengthier conversations on two different subway rides – one in Boston, the other in New York, both of them only two stops long – that I’ll always remember, and that gave my already enjoyable trip an extra lift that only human interaction can provide.

After a ballgame at Fenway, I met a woman who noticed my family’s Packer paraphernalia, and in the two stops we had together, I learned that she was a social worker from Neenah, that she considered moving to New York but decided on Boston, that she had a boyfriend in Connecticut, that the beaches we were considering visiting were nice but crowded, and that we should consider transferring to the blue line because the green line is notorious for mechanical problems (note: we ignored her advice, and three stops later our train broke down).

In New York, I met a man who congratulated me on the Packers’ Super Bowl championship, announced that he was headed to a Yankee game even though the score was already 12-0 in favor of New York, applauded my son’s and my decision to go to the Empire State Building instead of joining my wife and daughters at a Broadway show, and professed his allegiance to Brett Favre no matter what Packer Nation had to say about it.  After I shared with him the details of my family’s trip, he said to my son, “You are one lucky kid.”

Of course, I couldn’t wear my Packers and Brewers garb every day.  For much of the trip, I wore shirts with solid colors or stripes, and on those days I spoke with fewer people, started fewer conversations, and went to bed with terrific memories of sites to behold, but not with that extra something, that extra spark that awakens after sharing just a bit of my life with a stranger.

We meet people for silly reasons all the time: for the places we come from, the teams we support, the places we work, the religions we practice, the music we like, the pets we own, the politics we share or oppose and the authors we read.

And we are better for it.

The Anti-Social Network

In the July 10 issue of the Chicago Tribune, columnist Fred Mitchell writes about the recent trend of ballplayers spending more time in the locker room texting, checking Facebook, playing video games and watching TV than actually commiserating with their colleagues.  He writes:

Times have changed from the days of ballplayers playing cards in the middle of the locker room, leafing through fan mail in front of their lockers, reading the newspaper or playfully teasing each other.

This might be a rather nostalgic view of the past, but it’s one I happen to share.

The potentially negative consequences of recent technological changes came to my attention about three years ago, when I noticed that parents picking up and dropping off their children at my home were no longer poking their heads in for a hello.  In fact, some of the kids we’ve hosted through the years have parents I have yet to meet.  Don’t know their names.  Couldn’t pick them out in a lineup.  That’s not only a shame, it’s kind of scary.  One of our seemingly endless list of parental responsibilities is knowing the parents of our children’s friends.

In the short six months I’ve owned a cell-phone, I’ve resorted to the anti-social behavior of texting my kids to let them know I’m waiting outside to take them home, but this is a habit I intend to break, extreme weather notwithstanding.   Generally, there’s time to say hello to people, and in life, there’s almost always room for a few more acquaintances.  Sometimes these acquaintances make my day.

Last week, I spoke to a parent at the pool for a good twenty minutes, and the conversation was so animated, so full of gems I couldn’t make up in a million years, I wrote our dialogue down as soon as I returned home, hopeful that I’ll be able to use it in a piece of fiction.  What if, instead of chatting, we’d both opted to check our email?  A more efficient use of our time, perhaps, but a real loss in social interaction.

Of course, technology isn’t responsible for all anti-social behavior.  This morning, it took one of my daughters ten minutes to acknowledge my existence, but I believe that sort of conduct began long before the cell-phone, the TV or even electricity.  And I also believe that time will help buck that trend.  If not, perhaps my incessant nagging will.