Columns
By Karen Alea
Ten years ago my husband and I lived in Thailand. One day, we were driving in the countryside on a dirt road and passed a three-foot-wide stream dividing the road from shack houses. I spotted a little boy, probably no more than 2, tiny-legged with only a shirt on, running across a thin piece of wood, maybe 6 inches wide, that served as a bridge. Astonished, I watched his little toddler legs maneuver that rickety bridge with ease. My first impulse was to lunge from the moving vehicle and grab him by the tiny shoulders and yell at him, "You can't do that; you'll fall in the water and hurt yourself." But I didn't yell at him, for two reasons. He was already safely across, and the only Thai I knew at that point was "thank you" and "very delicious."
The experience taught me something few parents today seem to know: children live up to the expectations laid before them. Unfortunately, American children cross very few bridges. Our expectations for our children are decreasing faster than the ozone.
Consider this story about grading schoolchildren, first reported in the San Diego Union Tribune: "[R]ed ink is stressful and demoralizes students, while purple, the preferred color, has a more calming effect." I think I know some of these students. They are the ones yelling in the grocery store and drawing penises on the paper tablecloths at Macaroni Grill.
For someone who received a lot of red marks in her years, I can say this: I am still alive. In fact, those little red marks are the least of childhood that scarred me. Maybe for this reason, I want to bring my girls up solidly, without pressure but also without coddling. I want them to know the harsh realities of the world without becoming fearful of it. But now they may never see a test paper with red on it except on eBay. I picture my daughters' papers coming home with calming purple ink and a "better luck next time" sticker on the front: no, honey, 2 plus 2 does not equal 3, but we'll just wait and let the IRS teach you that when you grow up.
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Recently Bill Maher talked about the red marker conspiracy. He said he's not going to have any kids until he meets some kids who he wants his children to play with. I know what he's talking about. Kids today are too adult, too obnoxious, too forward and too brash. It's as if self-entitlement pellets have been ground and laced into rice cereal. I still remember the time some new neighbors popped over, and their 3-year-old asked his mom if he could play my husband's brand-new—and highly cherished—electric guitar. She didn't even look at us, the owners of the house. She told him, "Sure, honey. Just be careful." We moved.
How do I go about making my kids live up to great expectations without pressuring them? And where do I find parents who are doing the same? And why does my kid refuse to play with the few kids I find who are quiet and intelligent? Can't they see that children who lack motor skills or prefer to extricate their nostrils are preferable to those who build their own stink bombs and eat mud pies?
I have a plan. It's an old ritual taken from my group of friends in college—the mark of shame. If any one of us said something stupid, we received a black mark of shame on our arm. Obviously, studying would have been a better use of our time, but we were young, broke and we had a Sharpie. I received two black slashes for referring to a rough draft as a ruff raff. But I learned.
Now, I didn't go around crying because of these black marks, just as I didn't cry about the red marks from Mr. Trotsky, my high school English teacher, whose motto was "If in doubt, mark it out" when he couldn't decipher what you wrote on a test. Such marks just came with life, like going to sit in the principal's office, or writing "I will not..." a hundred times, or even corporal punishment.
I want to hand out red Sharpies to everyone—every teacher and parent and piano teacher. We will mark, mark, mark. But this time we will mark the parent. One mark for asking your child if you hurt his feelings when you spoke sharply at him for defacing public property. Two marks for not correcting him if he hits or pinches another child in public view. Three marks if you keep asking your child, "You hungry, sweet pea; you thirsty?" when she is over 3 years old. Four marks when you tell her to sit down and she doesn't, and you tell her again and she doesn't, and you finally forfeit the fight and give a weak smile. And five times if you have a child who is a known hellion but still owns a GameBoy.
The other day my husband took our youngest, 3, to McDonald's. There he found four children playing on the indoor playground. They were unruly—yelling, hitting, stepping on my sweet pea, I mean, my daughter. They were out of hand. When he asked where their parents were, one of them replied, "Grocery shopping."
My 7-year-old was taken with the story of the conveniently abandoned kids. Oddly, she enjoys hearing about other children who are misbehaving, fighting, spitting and screaming. But she already knows what I learned that day in Thailand: "It's not their fault they were acting that way, is it?" she asked. "That's the parents' fault, right?"
No red mark for her.
This time.