When I was your age

Deeply ingrained in every parent's heart is the desire to see their kids become adults with an adequate set of life skills. A child's life is fraught with clear and present danger. Perhaps the adult feels that if they can just save one child from the traumas they themselves suffered, their own life lessons will have been worth it - there will be some gain from the pain, so to speak.

However, these lessons adults have learned along the way are in constant danger of becoming swallowed up by the more pressing life lessons that their own kids are learning. Also, the world is changing at such a rate, that the language an adult uses in trying to instill these lessons is barely understood by the young ears. These days, you just can't say to your kids "I played a video game called PONG when I was a teenager" or use words like fuddy duddy without the dinner table life-lesson completely collapsing under the children's laughter.

All the same, adults are infused with a need to pass on information to their kids - if only for posterity. They remain expectant that by so doing, the kids will avoid a few potholes along the road of maturity. Invariably, this takes place at what is determined to be a 'teachable' moment.

These 'teachable moments' are seized upon when the child is held captive. For instance, they happen to be in the same vehicle as the parent, or they are waiting in the doctor's office, or they have to stay behind to do the dishes.

The child will make a little comment about treatment at schoool by their peers, and the floodgates of reminescence open.

The adult begins to expostulate about the old days, The 'old days', in this case, are when the adult was a child. "When I was your age", they say, and the lecture begins. And the eye rolling. And the urge to visit the bathroom, or to finally get that root canal. ANYTHING! to escape the historicity of the parent's recollection.

"Not the /Soil project Story /When you broke your leg Story/When you shouldn't have let that jock muscle you out of the way when you were practicing your high jumping skills Story/" the child groans audibly.

It is always a shock to the parent that the child has heard their life-lesson stories before. "You mean I've told you that one already?" they ask incredulously, while in the back of their mind they are thinking "I'm sure I only told your brother that one".

"Yes Mom", is the patient reply "and the teacher didn't give you a decent mark even though you worked really hard on it, but you aren't bitter/ I shouldn't slide down banisters because that's how you broke your leg/ I should just work hard at my sport and not let others define who I am as an athlete."

At this point, the parent is a trifle baffled. To whom will they pass on their wisdom now since this child has obviously not only heard the stories before, but understood them, and taken in the life lessons?

It is then that a very scary proposition crosses the parent's mind. It must be time to have another baby!