Grandparenting

A magazine article caught my eye: Mother Knows Best.The gist was to create an opportunity bring grandparents back from the from the 'good ol' days' to modern times where things are often done differently. It promoted an attempt to bridge the gap since “raising children today is a lot more complicated than it was” cites a medical grandfather. And who would argue with that?

Maybe a lot of people. If you think you had it tough, you should have been born fifty years ago. Or, You whipper snappers think you have all the answers. And on and on. Back to the article. Mothers Know Best suggests that grandparents be sent to obedience school. That actually caused me to read the article.

The idea of a school for bringing up grandparents in a grandparenting class no doubt was not intended for all mothers of mothers with little ones but those who are meddlesome, overbearing, out-of-touch, bossy, know-it-all grannies. That there are those is evident because of the “long, often passive-aggressive history of generational conflict over child rearing . . . .”

The rise of grandparenting classes represents a marked shift among parents from attempting to lecture to their forbears to hiring expects to do the lecturing for them. The article continued discussing one situation where a medical institution increased the frequency of its three-hour grandparenting classes from every other month to twice a month as part of its $275 Welcome Baby package among other topics.

Somehow, I missed out on those classes unless they were initiated long after my time. However, there apparently is a need for improving conversations between a couple of generations trying to raise another's children. I suppose classes might help, sobriety also might help, the ability to keep and maintain silence could bridge the gap somewhat.

It is true that we old timers drove our vehicles without seat belts, no specialized baby seats nor air bags. We never heard of disposable diapers and learned to make safety pins slide better by lubricating them between our fingers. We ate our meals together, not on an installment plan, and never worried about competition from cell phones, Blackberries, iPods, iPads, or TV which always remained in the den or living room with their b/w 12 channels.

But times change. We walked to grade school, high school and there was no such thing as a student parking lot. We had no idea what Driver's Ed was and learned mostly with a stick shift in a vacant lot tutored by a rather impatient parent or worse, an older sibling. Yes, times change. So frankly, perhaps there is a need for grandparenting classes. But maybe, just a thought; should there also be classes for some young parents to better understand their parents?