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[Strangeness Growing Up] or How Everyone's Parents are Loony
JebusUD
Adventure!Candy IslandRegistered User regular
Adventure!Candy IslandRegistered User regular
I think it is safe to say we have all been there. Growing up, we had restrictions placed on us that seemingly made no sense. Maybe, as my father now says, there is no manual on parenting. Or my alternate theory, that there are too many manuals on parenting. A million different people, and websites, and magazines, all telling people the one weird trick to making great children.
Examples:
I basically had to put the dishes in the dishwasher twice. My mother was convinced that if we found the right configuration they would come out clean. So I'd put them in, she would check, and say that it wouldn't work because of... whatever. Then I would adjust it as instructed. Well, as an adult with a nice dishwasher, I know looking back that it didn't matter how the dishes were put into that cheap ass piece of garbage, they never would have come out clean.
Or
My parents wouldn't let me watch Popeye. Somehow Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and GI Joe were fine. But Popeye was a bridge to a lifetime as a violent criminal.
Share your zaniest parent tales here.
Examples:
I basically had to put the dishes in the dishwasher twice. My mother was convinced that if we found the right configuration they would come out clean. So I'd put them in, she would check, and say that it wouldn't work because of... whatever. Then I would adjust it as instructed. Well, as an adult with a nice dishwasher, I know looking back that it didn't matter how the dishes were put into that cheap ass piece of garbage, they never would have come out clean.
Or
My parents wouldn't let me watch Popeye. Somehow Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and GI Joe were fine. But Popeye was a bridge to a lifetime as a violent criminal.
Share your zaniest parent tales here.
and I wonder about my neighbors even though I don't have them
but they're listening to every word I say
but they're listening to every word I say
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You dodged a bullet there.
Not like that good clean GI Joe. That's family friendly violence everyone can love!
but they're listening to every word I say
YO JOE!
Alright. I have some more then.
A couple friends of mine had pretty bible thumping parents. Our school team was the "Magic". Which admittedly sucked. They had replaced their previous racist mascot with that.
Anyhow. One of the parents tried to get them to change it because magic was a tool of satan.
The other guy, his parents wouldn't let him read Harry Potter because witchcraft was, once again, a tool of Satan.
but they're listening to every word I say
Heh, mine picks on my (adult) sister like an 8-year-old would. It's the best.
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
I wouldn't go that far, I'm just having a time thinking up an interesting example.
Best one I can think of right now is my parents instilled in me a great fear of fiberglass insulation. They were remodeling the upper floors and wanted me to not touch it, so they told me if I touched it I would itch forever.
It worked, as it kept me clear of that area so they could actually get work done, but long after that I didn't want to be near the stuff.
They sound old fashioned. They must stick with magazines.
This reminds me of another story that is totally first world problems, but I'm going to tell it anyway.
So we went to Disneyland when I was 10ish. Coincidentally this family vacation took place over the day of my brithday. So my parents were sort of cheapasses, as evidenced in my previous dishwasher tale. So they told me that the trip was my birthday present, which even 10 year old me knew was made up to save cash. Later that day we went to a restaurant, and the waiter did what good waiters do, suggest some upsells. So I ordered a smoothie and got my burger with the bacon. Happy birthday to me, or so I thought.
20 years later and I'm still paying for it, in that my father will tell basically everyone within hearing range, anytime we go to a restaurant, about that one time that I ordered bacon and a smoothie.
Waiter: would you like anything else.
Dad: yeah can you add bacon and a smoothie to that! Haha!
Me: groan!
but they're listening to every word I say
Good work, dad.
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They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.
But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.
Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself."
My Maternal Grandmother was a Breast Cancer survivor and had had a mastectomy so she had a few false breasts that she could wear if she went out.
One of the first times I met my him I insisted I show it to him, (I was like 4) and he laughed so much.
Eventually my grandma gave him the older one that I had showed to him and he used to talk about mounting it on the wall.
The entire premise or...?
To be fair it does make you itch like crazy until you wash it off.
I thought that is why you had kids. So you could torture them too! Guess you shouldn't have chosen to be a child!
Nah, really though it's good to laugh about it. Cathartic. All you can do is try and be mindful and better to your children. I think that is more than a bunch of people do.
This is a great story!
but they're listening to every word I say
Thing is, though. Whatever the cable guy did during his blocking somehow enabled free HBO and Cinemax on that TV. And the allure of free movies appealed to my parents too much to have it reversed.
So to sum it up, as a teenager I got banned from watching Beavis and Butthead and pretty much all music videos in the house. And as a teenager, I got free reign of R-rated movies and Skinemax.
My parents had strange priorities.
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I really found it odd back when I was a child that I liked watching PBS and cartoons {we did not have cable} but when I would talk to other children they watched channels or movies I could not because they had cable and thought PBS was boring
What it is going to be, is a bit of a rambling diatribe about parents not making adequate time for themselves and not planning for the future very well.
Now, for most of my life my Mum has worked at least a part-time job as well as raising the kids while my Dad worked full-time. Situations and circumstances have changed over the years, but once my eldest sister was old enough to look after my other sister and me after school until Mum got home, they both worked pretty much full-time. Now, I know kids are expensive and it's important for parents to try to indulge in their own hobbies and leisure activities as much as they feasibly can, but ideally a parenting couple needs to make some guidelines and boundaries, and set some upper limits for things.
My Mum has loved horses ever since she was a little girl, and once the opportunity arose, she went and bought a beautiful chestnut Arabian named Geneva. She rode her reasonably often for a few years, but Geneva started developing soreness in her spine due to slight abnormalities so Mum rode her very little after that diagnosis and became more interested in carriage driving. As for my Dad's hobbies, he was always tired from commuting and work during the week so he would spend a bit of time on the weekend reading and maybe building a small model kit here and there. Mum ended up buying another horse (well actually a "grey" [actually stark white] Welsh Mountain Pony named Tiffany) and a pipe cart ( a cheap beginners version of a sulky) and Dad built a 7 foot high corrugated iron fence around half the property to prevent people driving past from seeing that there was a pony at our house now (the council wouldn't have been too keen. As for the Arabian, that had always lived down the road in agistment).
After that property was fully paid off, Mum decided that she wanted to move somewhere with enough land for both horses to live on it (agistment fees were about $100/week) so we sold that property and moved from the small semi-rural town we were in to a small rural town further out in the country. That wasn't so bad, except now there was a 45 minute bus ride to an inferior high school instead of a 10 minute ride, and Dad had to start driving to work because public transport services were (and still are!) abysmal. Over the next few years Geneva died, and was replaced with another pony, then Tiffany died and was replaced with another pony, then another pony was bought. There were also two sulkies bought (one for each pony) and a third restored by my Dad for a total of three. One pony was sold and replaced, then bred and gave birth to a foal. The breeder was moved to Albany to live with a friend and one of the other ponies was sold.
During this time my Dad saved up separately and bought himself a cheap Chinese-made lathe (he's both a fitter and turner AND a diesel technician by trade) to start building model steam engines for a hobby.
Then my sister bought a horse and a sulky, then another (broken down) sulky to restore, and built her own pipe cart (I'm super proud of her for that, she taught herself how to weld). So there are three horses on the property, one 600 kilometres away, enough carriage vehicles on the property to start having Ben Hur-style deathraces around the property, and just a few years ago, almost all of my parents life savings (after having eventually paid off the newer property) was spent on building a nice block of stables for the horses.
Now, with Mum's advancing age she hasn't driven any of the horses in years, and to be honest is not very likely to ever do so again so they're basically just very expensive, high-maintenance pets. Melanie (the horsey sister, not the eldest) still drives her horse regularly, she's involved with Driving for the Disabled, which is literally just the RDA but with carriages, and Dad hasn't had time to finish his first model steam engine. Nor has he had the time or money to fix up a nice car (what he's always wanted, since before he was married). And now that he's had a debilitating stroke, he never will. It's extremely unlikely he'll ever even drive again.
Now, my point here isn't to try and paint anyone as good or bad, because I love all of my family very much, and they are all wonderful people who would never intentionally hurt anyone. What I am trying to indicate is that there needs to be give and take from all sides so that one or more people do not end up missing out. Mum would have been just fine with only one horse, but the thing with horsey people is that there is no such thing as one. What Dad needed to do was stick up for himself more, and have more constructive discussions about what would be more fair for everyone. He's ALWAYS been the kind of guy that would sacrifice to make someone else happy though, it's just in his nature. He does seem to harbour a lot of regret though, when I go see my parents he seems to have changed a bit as he has come to the realisation that things are never going to go back to the way they were pre-stroke. He doesn't watch car shows on t.v. anymore, he's trying to give me all his old books and paraphernalia to do with cars, he doesn't go near the shed (where his little workshop is) whereas he used to spend as much free time in there as possible. And Mum seems to be realising what is going on, and feeling pretty guilty about it.
So I guess my point is, it's important to try to look at your situation and your place in a long-term relationship from an outside perspective as best you can every once in a while, and try to talk with your partner as much as you can about whether you both are getting to do the things you really want to do with your life, in case something entirely out of your control happens and your options suddenly get taken away from you. And it's important to consider whether your pursuit of happiness may be unintentionally impeding someone else's.
Mom liked to completely destroy everything in the house if she decided it wasn't clean enough.
Hilarity!
Twitter: @LittleWren42
I loved eating vegetables sadly I am the only one of my family who does so I have to beg when my brother makes dinner to at least include some.
My dad picked up a weird "12 days of Christmas" tradition somewhere, where we had to spread out opening our Christmas presents so they lasted until the 12th day, which would usually be the socks or whatever didn't sound exciting when shaken.
My dad also resisted the corrupting influence of cordless phones for a long time, sticking with spiral-corded honest-to-god-rotary-dial phones into the late 90s. To this day, they only have a single non-smart cell phone between the two of them (although they do have an iPad, and my dad had one of the earliest Apple Powerbooks).
This even happened two days ago when he and Mom brought some of the family antique furniture to my house.
Early cordless phones kinda sucked.
We had a little radio when I was a kid that could pick up the neighbors conversations on theirs if I tuned it to 99.9 and pointed the antenna towards their house.
I think it's an engineer thing. My dad does it as well, only not quite to such ridiculous extent.
"Sandra has a good solid anti-murderer vibe. My skin felt very secure and sufficiently attached to my body when I met her. Also my organs." HAIL SATAN
But the much more interesting ones are the ones my dad tells about himself, because it is shocking that he lived long enough for me to start existing
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Not sure how old you are, but I'm guessing that spanned the years the show was worth watching.
I mean I reorganize a little bit if I want to fit something else in there
But this is like a total reorganization of whatever the initial loader has done
It is some next-level "I know you did this job but the way I do it is the way it must be done" optimal-efficiency stuff.
"Sandra has a good solid anti-murderer vibe. My skin felt very secure and sufficiently attached to my body when I met her. Also my organs." HAIL SATAN
That was from like '96-'01
she used to beat me with kitchen utensils and sacks of potatoes until i got big enough to fight back
she was super fundy right wing christian and refused to let me even watch wholesome cartoons (ren and stimpy was 'satanic')
PS my mothers death affected my dad so deeply that he, 27 years later, refuses to show even basic emotion
something switched off inside him
Like, I wasn't allowed to read Harry Potter
I spent a lot of my childhood trying to make sense of it, since it couldn't have been the magic aspect of it, since literally every other thing with wizards and witches were okay
And then when I started playing D&D in high school they whipped out the 80s era hysteria and tried to keep me from playing it
Eventually I did read Harry Potter, and told my parents there was nothing to worry about, to which my dad replied "Yeah, I'm still not sure about that"
But he's a Deadhead.
My best friend growing up had family ties to Phil Lesh, the bass player for the Grateful Dead. So when his mom(also a deadhead) somehow got tickets to the 1995 Soldier Field show - what would be the last show before Jerry Garcia died - and invited my dad, he was ecstatic. For more reasons than one.
I was in bed by the time he got back, because I was 9 or so. At some point in the early morning, my door bursts open. My dad runs into my room like Homer did in the Cape Fear sendup Simpsons episode. I remember this, because I watched it earlier that day.
"Bud! Bud! I've got somethin' I need to show you!"
"...what?"
"Check out this fucking sweet earring I got at the show, man!"
He bends over to show me, and I get a strong whiff of an odor I would become quite familiar with later.
"...That's cool. Hey Dad, I have school tomorrow."
"Oh shit fuck, sorry bud. Go to sleep."
The next day he looked like the walking dead. Strangely enough, I never got more of a talking to in the future about the perils of drugs aside from "Don't be an idiot."
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Watch me struggle to learn streaming! Point and laugh!
This was my parents. They chastised me though for doing it wrong. But I'd bet if I had made a chart of every way I had filled it I had found every possible permutation. I'd still have been told I did it wrong, and "how many times have I told you..."
I'm sorry dude. I feel that a bit. I mean my childhood wasn't all bad. Bit I got smacked around and shouted at quite a bit too. So I feel you there.
Sorry to hear that. This one goes out to you.
My mother was a housewife, but she really should have gotten a job, I think the boredom drove her crazy as we got older. She would rearrange all the furniture on a weekly basis, and we had one of those weird museum fake living rooms in which you weren't really allowed to be in. The chairs, couches, and everything sat perfect and empty forever. Even stranger since few people came to visit.
My parents also used to like to enlist my friends into projects whenever they were over. We wouldn't really hang out for more than a half hour usually before they would put us to work putting in a fence or something. No warning, just surprise you are doing this now! So mostly my friends didn't like to come over.
I feel you too on the idea that people end up putting themselves in these situations where they are stuck and less happy. (Didn't want to quote the very large post ). My parents have continually moved further and further outside town to get a larger house and yard, that sort of thing. But I think it has only isolated them and made them lonelier.
On a happy note, so this isn't all a bummer post, my dad traveled internationally all the time, so we would always have interesting things brought back from wherever he went. I still have a Bayern Munich scarf and a love of kinder chocolate because of it. And a great curiosity to try new things.
but they're listening to every word I say
my dad's prison guard stories are fucking crazy.