So many things going through my head this Friday night. We have had a nice rainstorm out here in the drought zone, which is a very good thing. The wetness all around us feels like a blessing from the Rain Gods.
But first, my kids. I continue to be concerned about my youngest child, particularly regarding her difficult adjustment to being a freshman in high school. Tonight, as I watched her joke with her brother who is a senior in a different high school, I suddenly realized how helpful the whole Mom's House/Dad's House model of parenting can be for children of divorced parents.
Her mom has never allowed TV. I always have. It's as if we represent the yin and yang of parenting.
As Julia and Dylan watch silly TV shows together tonight, they talk and laugh and share impressions about the powerful cultural influences that dominate the views of their peers. She tends to ask him questions and he tends to provide answers. In the process, they are of course playing out ancient gender roles, but every now and again she seems to have the answer to something that he is wondering about.
This is a subtle interplay, one I notice only because I am always hovering in the kitchen, cooking them dinner.
I think it is in these secondary moments, where she knows what he does not, that the both advance and grow as people. And indeed, if we are ever as a species to become better, women's voices have to matter every much as much as men's.
What we really need to learn to do is to listen to each other.
-30-
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