For those who don’t know, my wife Catherine doubles as “The Family Coach.” It’s sort of an Adam West-turns-to-Batman sorta thing. One moment she’s this mother, spouse, watcher of reality TV and baker of insanely tasty treats. The next moment she’s this wonder helping families cope with myriad problems. Hell, she’s even got a book.
Anyhow, the Family Coach keeps a blog. And while it’s always entertaining and interesting, today hit a new level. See, we’ve had a bunch of local youth suicides in the past month, and it just feels increasingly … engulfing. Almost contagious. So Catherine wrote this brilliant post, with this money section:
Catherine and I have a 14-year-old daughter and an 11-year-old son and I can say—with 100-percent sincerity—that we do not care where they attend college. Harvard or Westchester Community, Duke or Delaware State, Brown or Brooklyn … it does not matter. And if one of them wants to attend, oh, culinary school, or wants to become a sanitation worker, or wants to become a beat poet … he/she will have our support. Without fail.
I don’t know what it is about parents, or how this whole thing became so contagious. Do we view our kids’ colleges as etchings of our own worth? Do we need to brag to friends? Are we just hyper competitive? It’s weird, because there’s literally no correlation between happiness and collegiate status. Or, put different, I attended Delaware, my wife attended Bucknell. And we live very happy lives.
So back off.
Chill.
Relax.
Love your kids.
