...on the one hand

funny, we are a 'so on the one hand but on the other hand' kindda generation of parents...we like to see all sides and choose our religion as we see fit...we are non committal and non confrontational while sticking to our guns, which we don't want our kids to play with (read on)......an old friend of mine who is both a rabbi and a ball player turned spiritualist once told me not to be afraid of  not going to temple as every person is their own rabbi... thus i was empowered to rule myself...so self i said "what do i believe in today???" although  i am still trying to answer that on a practical level, on a macro level i feel well advised by my self....but it is on the micro level that i find fascinating both my decisions and those of my fellow suburbanites regarding ourselves and our children....

like many decisions in my kid's lives they were a bit pre-destined due to a rich tradition of doing, going and belong...one of these things was sleep away camp...although i despised sleep away camp...i know, you must be shocked...you should never put that many girls together in a non-military like structured environment if you are expecting anything more than petty behavior with mascara running down sad faces and enough hairspray to attract all the bugs north of Portland Maine!

....none-the-less my kids headed off to an all boys (thankfully) summer camp in the north east...during the spring prior to leaving for the summer i was sitting on the side of a ball field (the site of 75% of poorly behaved parenting outbursts, myself included, especially when another parent yells at my kid who did not make a tag out at home...oh i digress and i am sure that's in another post)...when discussing summer camp with a group of parents...(a suburban parents hot button topic as most believe their child's camp is the preeminent...although i like my kid's camp, and more importantly they love it, i do believe that camps like nursery schools are all within 5 degrees of each other or they would not be in existence for 100+ years)...one mom preceded to get on her soap box about how she would never even consider visiting the camp my boys go to because they have riflery....really, riflery, her decision came down to riflery...amazing since her kid's behavior is feared by 90% of the kids in town and goes unchecked as her little cherub faced angel barrels over other children with verbal bullets, she did not want to send her kid to a camp with riflery...on the one hand lets condemn a camp because of an age old activity that can't hurt anyone without intention while on the other hand let us justify verbal bullets with a patented tag line of  oh you can't control what a 12 year old says

in the world of condemnation, i find it interesting  that on the one had we sit around as parents condemning underage kids who drink, yes alcohol not juice boxes...but we let our kids have Facebook pages where they display images of themselves with alcohol type paraphernalia...we get our bee in a bonnet when our kid is not invited to a party in the fall  but on the other hand we are able to justify the hell out of why another kid did not need to be included at a party in the spring...we bash one parent's choice to let their almost 17 year old drive after nine one year and the next year blatantly let our almost 17 year old routinely drive after nine.

...my friends we are all our own rabbi in the big bad world of parenting...on the one hand lets be honest with ourselves and on the other hand lets be respectful of how our decisions will affect others...and let us not forget the most important rule at hand...you should love, or at least respect your neighbor as yourself...