Parenthood

The 1989 movie Parenthood contains what I think is a great comment on parenthood. The character Tod, played by Keanu Reeves, describes having his dad flick lit cigarettes at his head and says, "...you need a license to buy a dog, to drive a car - hell, you even need a license to catch a fish. But they'll let any butt-reaming asshole be a father."

The movie never introduces us to Tod's father except through this one speech. The audience is left to fill in the details on their own. When I fill in those details, I see a parent to whom parenthood has happened. This is a man who has a son, but I can imagine that having a son is really just a consequence of his attempt to have something else that he wanted. I can imagine him being bitter about having to support a child that he did not really want. When he flicks a lit cigarette at Tod's head and tells him to go fetch him a beer, he's really just trying to get something for himself out this whole parenthood thing he's stuck with.

Few of us do anything with our lives as profound as create a new life. It would seem to be something that we should choose to do not something that happens to us. Once chosen, it would seem to be something that we should choose to do well.

Tina and I have decided we'd like to have children in the near future. That the human race has survived as long as it has seems to indicate that it is possible to raise a child with the instincts that we were born with, but I also suspect that a large amount of child rearing is cultural. So, I feel like it's our responsibility to figure out how to be the best parents we can be. Toward this goal, I've begun a survey of the child-rearing literature.

It would appear that today's baby care philosophies are polarized around two camps. On one hand, there's Dr. Spock, Dr. Ferber, and Gary Ezzo. On the other hand, there's Dr. James Sears and Martha Sears. Both camps have devoted followers and extreme critics. My life experience is that in most cases the truth lies somewhere in between.