Meet the Parents…
I think I would like to introduce you to my family little by little because I think there is a lot of material to blog about there. Much of it humorous, much of it frustrating.
My husband called my father-in-law like he always does approximately every other week or so. It is amazing how much he has no idea who my husband is. My husband’s parents divorced-well seperated while my husband was very small. Neither one was forced to take responsibilty for their child because whenever it became inconvenient to have a son, they were able to send him off to the other parent or a relative-which happened often. Neither of my husband’s parents see anything wrong with this philosophy of child rearing.
So here we are, 29 years later,my husband a practicing “traditional Catholic” if you will, pro-life, pro-family, pro-morals etc. His parents are dumbfounded why he has not embraced the values they tried so hard to instill him with in between their partying breaks-being pro-abortion, pro-cohabitating and most importantly making sure that everyone you will happen to meet knows you are Puerto Rican.
So, my husband calls up my father-in-law to shoot the breeze and afterwards leaves my husband with a sick feeling. To make up for time lost not being a father (or at least that is my best guess), my father-in-law tries to step in while my husband is grown to tell him what he is doing wrong in his life:
- “You should work more hours,”-my husband works 53 a week
- “You shouldn’t give the kids steroids for their asthma,”-from a man who smokes
- “Are you sure you know what you are doing with homeschooling?”
- “Why don’t your kids speak Spanish yet?”
It is so frustrating because he just shoots off critiques without ever asking “why did you choose to do that?”
How many of us Gen X Reverts have people from that Baby Boomer generation in our families that it is impossible to communicate with?