renting can feel like an inescapable theme park of chaos. Truth is, you're not simply a parent, but a negotiator, a janitor, a superhero, and the prime suspect in the mysterious case of the missing sanity. It's a job as exhausting as it is exhilarating, as thankless as it is rewarding. Little kids are certainly a challenge. They think mud is a food group and possess the lung capacity of a blue whale. To a small child, a closed bathroom…
’re often presented with an image of parenting that is a bit too perfect. Like a Norman Rockwell scene preserved in a snowglobe. But all too often parents wake up to realize they were cast in a reality show without their permission. The kids cause more problems in 4 minutes than I could get into in 4 years. You wonder if your genetics have spawned an unholy chimera of you and you partner’s worst traits. It gets to a point…
Your living room looks like a highlight reel from “Mad Max: Fury Road.” The little ones are screaming the hits from “Frozen” and the teenagers are teenaging all over the place. The whole house needs an exorcism. Keeping things under control seems like an endless game of whac-a-mole when you already…
Living a good life means managing your time. Problem is, we don’t understand time at all. Go ahead, explain time to me; I’ll wait. (Eric hums to himself and drums fingers on the tabletop.) Don’t blame yourself. To be fair, the nature of time has been a matter of some debate…
2020. Yeesh. I was starting to wonder if the reason we’ve never had time travelers visit us from the future was because humans just aren’t around that much longer. In the mind-frying insanity of the pandemic, it might seem like the most relevant parenting book is Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road.” But, truth…
In prior centuries, life was simpler for young people. Not necessarily better, mind you, but definitely simpler. You knew where you were gonna live for the rest of your life, what you were gonna do and had a pretty good idea who you might marry. Meaning and purpose in life were…
Every parent wants their kid to do well in school. And it's simple to measure because GPAs and SATs have nice numbers that are easy to quantify and rank. On the other hand, we don’t have a universally accepted “emotional intelligence index” or a “decent human being metric” let alone a “this…
ou want your kids to grow up and be more than just... older. You want them to be successful and fulfilled. But it’s a daunting challenge for a parent. Never mind that the price of 4 years of college looks like a phone number these days. You also get a…
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