It's No Better To Be Safe Than Sorry

We all hate to be critiqued for how we parent. Until you have walked a mile in my shoes you/we/I should not judge. At the end of the day most of us will reap what we sow. (How many more idioms will appear in this post?) Therefore, we should sow wisely for good or for bad.

I recently was critiqued for my parenting. Rather than get defensive and hurt, I got defensive and went on the offense. There are certain things our children NEED to know. To send them into adolescence or adulthood not equipped with the tools to cope and survive would be like forgetting to wear shoes on a snowy day. I wouldn’t say I was outraged by the critique, but I would say I had a bit of righteous indignation that my parenting style was not being appreciated.

So here goes…I got in trouble last week by my 11 year old for making her stay up past her bedtime to watch 80s videos. It all started after an episode of The Goldbergs  (tell me you are watching this show?  You MUST be watching this show!) Somehow MTV came up and there was a blank stare. After 20 seconds of trying to explain I finally had to say…bear with me here, this is hard…the channel that My Super Sweet 16 is on. (barf) She doesn’t watch this show, but has heard of it and I WAS TRYING TO MAKE A PARENTING POINT! Sheesh! Anyhoo…I asked her if she knew what MTV stood for.  Blank stare. At this point I was realizing that when I was working on manners and personal accountability, I was neglecting her cultural upbringing.  MTV actually played music at one time.  Good music.  With videos.  And a good song became even better with a great video. There was no ON DEMAND, so we (80s kids unite!) would sit and wait for that favorite video. And then we would try to figure out the stupid VCR in time to record and pray to God that we weren’t recording over Days of Our Lives or the end of Family Ties. We would sit for hhoouurrss…and it was worth it. I learned patience, and character and love in those hours of waiting. I also learned how to hold my pee until commercial and run as fast as I could to make it back to the couch before Martha Quinn came back on….but I digress.

My child needed to know how life changing videos were.  Had I had more time I would have come up with a better strategy/order in which to teach her, but I panicked and started with Girls Just Want to Have Fun. Then I went to Borderline and Material Girl. (Don’t judge…I said I panicked.  At least I didn’t start with Debbie Gibson or Tiffany! And you are welcome for the links to some classics.) When she threatened to get up off the couch and leave the room I pulled out the big guns.  I told her what I was about to show her would change her life and that she could never fully appreciate it because as amazing as it still is in 2014 was freaking.mind.blowing in 1985. Y'all know where I'm going with this, don't you? I mean I still remember sitting on that scratchy brown burlap couch in our family room and not moving.

 

How did they do that? How could it be half real and half cartoon? How could that waitress just crumble up the comics so flippantly and not realized Morten was being chased by motorcycle cops? (I told you crazy thoughts run through this head) So back to my big guns…I did it.  I told her to sit her tushie right back down and to not roll her eyes at me. She did and let me just tell you….IT WORKED!!!!!!!!!   I mean she was still mad at me for making her stay up late and was still mad the next day.  She tried to get me to let her sleep in the next morning, but I wasn’t having that.  What is even better is that the next day I saw her sitting next to her sister on the couch and telling her she needed to show her something that would blow her mind. (exact words! )

Critiquing my parenting all you want, I put this one in the win column and can promise that my kid may eat will both elbows on the table still, but knows all the words to Take On Me. Next up 80s movies and John Hughes.  Maybe I will wait until she is 14 for that.

Note to self: When searching for pictures of a favorite childhood band, do the math and realize that pictures will show up of said band as middle aged men.  A-ha did not age well.

Follow up note: When looking for Tiffany videos on YouTube, you will be singing I Think We're Alone Now for the rest of the evening.