Parents are more than skin deep
Parents can be such an embar
rassment. They always talk
about what it was like when
they were your age. They had to drive
their grandma’s Rambler to college
and they bagged groceries for ten hours
every night to pay tuition. Some pro
tested the war in Vietnam and a few
probably dropped acid, but you can’t
tell by looking at them.
Those cutting-edge hipsters of the
’60s now look like Wal-Mart catalog
people. Your dad sweats profusely
when he mows the yard on a riding
mower, and he parts his hair just
above his right ear because there’s
nothing to part farther up.
Your mom throws a fit when you
wear long-handles undercut-offs. She
called the Crisis Center when you
pierced your nose. She has a collection
ofbizarre exercise devices in the base
ment, including a Barbie-doll size
trampoline and a set of giant rubber
bands. She went through a seaweed
and- tofu phase, a yoga phase and an
exotic houseplant phase. When the
kids are finally out of the house, she’ll
join a rock-climbing group and start a
newsletter for menopausal women.
Parents seem to live in a shell. They
just don’t understand the way things
are now. People carry guns in high
school. Friends kill themselves. Ev
eryone knows where to go for an abor
tion. Only girls from poor families
have their babies. Life is gritty for
teenagers, and parents seem to live in
a la-la-land of mini-vans and frozen
yogurt.
If it’s hard for kids to believe that
parents were ever teenagers, it’s just
as hard for parents to believe their kids
are teenagers.
Although the duration of a lifetime
appears to be linear, time picks up
speed after one’s 30th birthday. This
unusual phenomenon manifests itself
in subtle ways. Suddenly, people have
to do an equation to remember their
age. A couple of beers will put them to
sleep. They can’t believe it’s already
Christmas again, and they fixate on
It happens to everyone. One
day you’re spending every dime
you earn on state-of-the-art
stereo equipment. The next day
you’re shopping for a mattress
that won’t hurt your back.
young people’s growth rate — my,
they can’t believe how much you’ve
grown.
The time-acceleration phenome
non is yet another joke of the universe,
a sub-group of the mysteries of the
universe. Jokes of the universe in
clude nostril hair, cellulite and ratio
nal communication between men and
women. Nothing makes time-acceler
ation more evident than kids leaving
for college. Parents may treat their
college-age kids like babies because
time-acceleration makes it seem like
only yesterday they were fishing jelly
beans out of a certain nose.
Actually, parents do understand
that life is gritty. Half of the marriages
they celebrated two decades ago end
ed in divorce, and others arc on shaky
ground. Their best friend from college
nas cancer. Lately, they’ve noticed a
lump beneath their arm that just won’t
go away. Property taxes are going up
again, the car needs new skins and
grandma may have to go to a nursing
home.
Life can get so gritty that people
find ways to ignore painful things. A
florified ranch house with a Ford
aurus in the garage represents mid
dle-class entrapment (as well as free
rent) to an in-your-face teenager. It
represents comfort and security to
people who have lived in two dozen
cheesy little apartments and need a
little respite from life’s accumulated
grit.
It happens to everyone. One day
you’re spending every dime you earn
on state-of-the-art stereo equipment.
The next day you’re shopping for a
mattress that won’t hurt your back.
Parents vacillate between telling
their kids, “you’ll find out one day, ’
and not wanting their kids to find out.
Consequently, it may be hard for par
ents to talk to their kids about depres
sion, sex, illness, drug abuse and abor
tion. They omit certain family secrets
from their oral history. They can’t
help it. They think they’re protecting
their kids.
Young people in high school and
college are confronted with a menu of
deadly issues including AIDS, eating
disorders, suicidal depression, alco
hol and drug abuse, violent relation
ships and peers with pistols.
These realities exist at UNL, and a
survey by the Bureau of Sociological
Research asked students to rate the
seriousness of campus problems. Stu
dents rated parking as the most seri
ous problem on this campus for five
years in a row.
Parking. Life does, indeed, get grit
tier.
The parents of those UNL students
who perceived parking as the most
serious problem on campus have done
a good job of protecting their kids.
Parents might want to consider
protecting their kids less and prepar
ing them more. If families don’ tleam
to talk about AIDS, eating disorders,
depression, violent relationships and
substance abuse, kids may long for the
days when parking was their biggest
problem.
Deb McAdams is Dally Nebraskan editor
and a Junior news-editorial major.
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