Friday, March 14, 2008

In response to the barrage...

kbpm's ranting on parental anxiety (among other things) made me recollect Peter Drucker sooth-saying (in 2000)about this century's revolution in human affairs.
"....In few hundred years, when the history of our time will be written from a long-term perspective, it is likely that the most important event historians will see is not technology, not the Internet, not e-commerce. It is an unprecedented change in the human condition. For the first time, literally, substantial and rapidly growing numbers of people have choice...."
Isn't that quite amazing and so true? Our generation can actually can feel the effects....to make your work relevant or irrelvant to your education, to work (outside of home) full time, part time or no time, to raise children in any crazy way we think fit, locational and vocational choices across geography, to see eye-to-eye or fist-to fist with parents, in-laws, neighbours, the whole lot..the list goes on.

I confess I get stressed out thinking what will happen to seven year olds who have GREAT diffculty with spellings and letter sounds (one reason why I adamantly refuse to watch TZP), but I believe they will very shortly be mature enough to understand their shortcomings and find something off beat that they will excel and also be passionate about.

4 comments:

Preeti Aghalayam aka kbpm said...

yeah i do stress myself out at times, my fears are about four-year olds who have no inclination to eat by themselves, who seem to be able to go for days being cranky but not realising its just hunger. i am sort of ranting at parents of older children, you know, the 18+ year olds, who should essentially not be called children.
maybe we should sign a pact (in blood), and say that when the time comes and our 19 year olds tell us that crazy thing they want to do with their lives, we will *not* freak out, but help them weigh pros and cons and support them... you game?

Airspy said...

Absolutely game.....but if they say the following things at 19 years i will surely freak out:

(a) they want to retire at 19.5 years!
(b) they want to marry and settle down!

:-)

Preeti Aghalayam aka kbpm said...

so be it, right. I mean I refuse to monetarily support her beyond a point (don't see why its required), but other than that, it should be fine, right? she wants to marry young. fine. have two kids (she has already decided this, time is tick-tocking :-)). fine. she wants to be a lesbian. fine. she wants to study in Harvard, fine (hope I dont have to pay the damn fees). she wants to go to Xaviers. fine.

point is, we have to let go. i dont think its our decision either way, although we could do our best to help them think through things without indulging in excess of emotional drama type stuff.

but yeah, we should call each other up when they come up with these things at 18 (or whenever) and have a good laugh. Thank god you are ahead of me. I can take notes & tips... :-)

Choxbox said...

can i also call you guys up?