Scatter Shooting...

Scatter shooting while thinking about parenting.

Families are a lot different today, a lot of married couples wait until later in life to have children and then they only have a few kids. In the old days, couples married at a younger age and had more children. Fathers often worked two jobs to support their families. There wasn’t a lot of time to consider “innovative” parenting techniques… a belt/switch was quicker and required less thought.

When my uncle Alton was 12 or 13 he came home from school with a homemade tattoo. My grandfather sat him down and removed it with a pocket knife. I’m sure he didn’t anticipate that when he was getting the thing.

When Walker was a kid I worked two out of three Saturdays. So the Saturday I was off I always had some plan to get something done around the house. Often times I was foiled by Walker having some friend over to spend the night. I made a rule that if a friend was coming over he had to work too. The friends always seemed to enjoy it.

When kids knock on the door selling something I always try to buy it, no matter how worthless it is, because it takes a lot of courage for a kid to knock on a stranger’s door and make a sales pitch. They say that positive reinforcement is a much stronger teaching tool than negative reinforcement.

Parents are supposed to teach children to be good workers. It seems to me that nowadays we’re teaching them to be good beggars. As a business owner we’re always being hit up for “sponsorships” for little league teams or camps or whatever. Frequently it’s not even the kid making the request… it’s the parents. My office manager said the other day, “what’s up with giving money to cheer leaders… don’t they know how to wash cars anymore?”

When my uncle CB was 8 or 9, my grandmother took him to see the Navy dentist for a bad tooth. They waited in line for a long time and when they finally got in to see the dentist CB threw a big fit and grandma told the dentist never mind and took him home. When she got him home she sat on him and pulled out his tooth with a pair of pliers. Never underestimate the power of a Navy wife.

Some kids knocked on my door one day selling candy bars for some school function. I didn’t really need any more candy bars so I told them I would pay them $20 if they weeded my flower bed. Their mom gave them permission and we both received something of value. Selling candy bars is the first cousin of begging.

Every semester I would ask Walker if he wanted to go to school. He would answer in the affirmative and I would pay for it. He never made very many passing grades. So one semester I asked him if he wanted to go to school. He said yes and I told him about the new plan; he would pay for school and I would reimburse him for every passing grade. I don’t think I was out very much money that semester. After he got married he graduated Magna Cum Laude. His wife swung a bigger hammer than I did.

My business partner had three brothers and was one of 9 kids. When his dad would send them to the barber shop in Kingsville, Texas they were always very careful to tell the barber how they wanted their hair cut but they always received the exact same haircut. They found out later that their dad would call the barber ahead of time and say “I don’t care what those boys say, this is how I want you to cut their hair…”

When I was in the fourth grade I had a friend who lived across the street who always picked on me. After several complaints to my mother she finally told me, “I want you to fight that kid and if you don’t I’m going to give you a whipping”. I still remember the fight. Somehow we continued to be friends. Years later I asked the 6.0 version of my mother and she said, “well… that kid was a bully”.

Our dad had rules for me and my two brothers about how to hit each other. We couldn’t hit each other in the face, belly or back. Dad said we could hit each other in the shoulder area. Dad didn’t encourage us to hit each other he just knew the realities of raising three boys and tried to manage it.

Mom and Dad didn’t care too much about grades when we were growing up. As long as we passed we were OK. My report cards were heavy on “C’s” and light on “A’s”. Somehow we did OK; I’m a Veterinarian, Scott is a Dentist and Greg is a Mechanical Engineer. Still, I always pushed my kids to make good grades. I guess the acorn fell off the tree and rolled into a river on that one.

My kids still laugh about Saturday mornings at out house. Sometimes I would line them up and with buckets in one hand and shovels in the other we would scour one acre for grass bur plants. I’m glad I could create such pleasant memories.