#327

I feel lucky, as a parent, to have texting. Especially with divorce. Joint custody reduces direct contact (but so does work, travel, and general busyness for the undivorced). If your kids are amenable, or you enforce it somehow, you can chitchat to your heart's content from afar. Even if brief and infrequent, it's there. How was your test? How was the mile run you dreaded, etcetera etcetera. And sometimes: Where the hell are you, Michael?! I've spooled out a little freedom to Michael. They have apps to locate and track phones, but I haven't conjured this magic yet. How will they get away with the shit I pulled? Lying and misdirection — I'm at Greg's house (not Lisa's) — and so on. I'm not that naive; they'll figure out a way. And I'll figure out the truth. I'm sure my parents always knew the score, even if they didn't let on. Some rules were law and some were bendable. A little give and take is okay. I saw it soften rebellion. In college, it was evident that a few kids were stifled and stunted socially at home. This didn't serve them well when suddenly things were totally unsupervised.

I mentioned the election. I was frustrated more with the media than the candidates. And that's saying something. Everyone who covered the election earned a big, fat, clown nose. Big, fat, and red. Ha, an electoral map pun. Everything was so dripping with bias it was absurd. One huge outlet rarely referred to Clinton as anything other than 'felon,' and another — leaning the other way obviously — wouldn't portray Trump as a serious candidate, even though his candidacy resonated with voters; clearly it did because he won. These were the big-names and acronyms we count on for 'news.' News will always have bias. The choice of what to share as news is itself a bias. But no one even attempts to be unslanted or positive. Imagine my surprise today when I read that in the UK, media anchors / presenters are governmentally mandated to be impartial. I don't know how that's judged, but it's an interesting concept.

Megan's basketball team won a tournament in Huntley last weekend. Years ago, a friend said that coaching kids is twice as exciting as playing. Yep. I don't put undue pressure on the girls, it's just that pushing them, and wanting them to improve and achieve, and then watching it happen... it's the best.