ESSAY # 3 When mom went to work and dad hit the road

 When mom went to work and dad hit the road, where did all the children go?**

Thanks to whomever was responsible for marrying two of America’s passions, sports and technology, and despite the modest fortunes of my family, I was in the very first group of Americans, even before the pre-boomer generation wave, to literally grow up with front-row seats to everything.

Although I was born in1943 (making me a WW II baby) in many ways my life journey began on what had been a typical 1949 summer day in Redwood City, CA.  Contently hanging around in my front yard, mostly by myself, day-dreaming about nothing in particular. My fantasy world revolved around two poles: either “being” Black Bart, fighting off the bad guys and saving what-ever women folk (that being my mom, and my two sisters) consented to  being rescued; or “being” the key player (pitcher/batter) in a key moment of a crucial baseball game. My real world time horizon extended to day’s end when my Dad would return home.

All of these memories can be triggered by a single family photo: my Dad trying to keep his white gasoline service station man uniform clean while at the same time kneeling on the backyard patio trying to gently restrain a pair
of young puppies. His black hair shining, perfectly parted and combed with
just a strain of it falling across his forehead. His dark warm eyes matching his wide, white teeth showing smile. His gentleness on full display in the way he cups his loving hands around those pups who are so excited they are trickling  peep in unison onto the patio. How many times would I see and hear that same expression, saying “Okay but don’t get so excited that you hurt yourselves.” Safety was his constant concern. The constancy of this concern over his life-time would much later be seen in his chewed-up inner lips from his constant worrying about our safety.

This particular day in 1949 was not going to be in any way typical. It would actually turn our lives, all of our lives, in ways we could never of imagined.

My dad had allowed himself to be lured into a door-to-door salesman’s promise to bring a “live” baseball game into our front room; thus, did TV enter our lives. We had no need to call our friends; the whole neighborhood was a-buzz…I would hazard to say faster than the quickest of today’s
text messaging queens could accomplish. Kids we hardly spoke to at school (we Servelle kids, girl-boy-girl, were so close together in age that when separated by grade level at school we felt separation anxiety) now were coming around to our house after school. Re-united and safely at home, we kids were happy to welcome our new friends into our home. We didn’t know it, but we had acquire  a certain  “cache“ along with our TV.

Even with our own children to learn from, our knowledge and perception of children has come, in no small measure from, surprise, TV! A long line of “kid” shows have addressed themselves  primarily to children. Beginning in the early  fifties with the growing access to in-home TVs, popular kid shows featured “real” children.  A fore-runner of  the current rash of “Reality TV” shows, these shows would typically have a re-occurring group of kids chosen to represent real kids.

From Art Linkletter‘s, “kids who say the funniest (darnest?) things“,  to Mr. Rogers’ serene neighborhood; to learning with Big Bird & Barney; to having fun with Bill Cosby’s’  “hey, hey, hey.”, the notion of who and what it was like to be a kid emerged. No matter that these kids were chosen for their acting talent and were given clever lines to deliver. Thus, our idealized children were bright, happy, knowing, loving and virtuous. But what about the real reality. If the children you know are bright, happy, knowing, loving and virtuous, you bear witness to a  miracle that should be treated as such.

If you don’t know many kids that exhibit most of these positive traits, shouldn’t you wonder why. I believe that worry over what is wrong with our kids is truly the number one concern among most Americans. Certainly, there is no shortage of remedies in the market place. Take pills, eat healthy, exercise, live in a tree house, love your parents/hate your parents, go away to boarding school, be home schooled or get over it.

The child development experts, from Dr. Spock, to Dr. Brazelton and, now, Dr Phil have been more than  ready to say what a normal child could be, if only, they were “appropriately” nurtured. Thanks a lot Docs. Duh.

 A disconnect occurs when we try to reconcile this “model” child with all the real children that we know.  A source of the disconnect is how few of our children are “appropriately” nurtured.  While the details of “appropriately” would  undoubtedly  be debated, I believe a  consensus exists for the broad elements of such nurturing.

The elements would likely include: safety, consistency, respect, affection, positive reinforcement, caring inter-action, play, talking, reading and  holding.  The providers of this nurturing can be anyone who can “genuinely” offer such nurturing. The sad and troubling reality is that there are vastly fewer providers of “genuine” nurturing then there are children to be nurtured.

Little mention will be made of the obvious outcomes resulting so often from the absence of nurturing parenting. Head of house today is more likely to be a working single parent than a clone of the likes of Donna Reid, or Ozzie Nelson or Fred Murray’s Father Knows Best. Far too few in our society  ever develop an understanding of their own self -worth and therefore are unable to imbue others with it. Lacking a sense of something (anything) having value, it easily is concluded that all things (including lives) are value-less. And value-less things need no consideration, or compassion or other human emotion. Generations of single mom house-holds (where are the dads) have relied on whatever help they can find to deal with school drop-outs, bullies, and, in too many instances, non-feeling, loners that do monstrous deeds.
 
I raise  this question: “if parenting (or it’s absence) is so  powerful in determining who we become, why do we leave it to chance.?” One would expect that we would forget about everything else and concentrate our full attention on improving the chances (e.g. “increasing the odds”) that we end up with individuals who understand and respect the notion that all of our individual actions, good/and bad ones, come with some consequence attached to them like an unrelenting shadow. And, alas, that the individual gives a damn about that consequence.
 
** Bob Dylan
Now all the criminals in their coats and their ties
Are free to drink martinis and watch the sun rise
While Rubin sits like Buddha in a ten-foot cell
An innocent man in a living hell.
 
When I'm gone don't wonder where I be.
Just say that I trusted in God and that Christ was in me.
Say He defeated the devil, He was God's chosen Son
And that there ain't no man righteous, no not one.