For families everywhere the arrival of September means “welcome back to reality” time. School starts this week for most American teenagers, and summer is rapidly vanishing in the rear view mirror. If your summer was like mine, it won’t make for an enthralling Holiday letter come December – which is why when it comes to retelling the highlights of your summer vacation, if you weren’t able to afford an exotic, envy-inducing summer vacation, then at least make sure you have an exotic, envy-inducing story about your summer vacation.

When it comes to summer breaks, our family’s summers are consistently quite lame. Take this past summer, for instance. It consisted mainly of listening to our girls whine “there’s nothing to do” and “I’m boooooooooored” – God knows, life is boring when you live in the scenic Pacific Northwest with all its mountains and lakes. Heaven forbid your kids actually go outdoors, ride a bike, swim in the lake or clean their room.

As any loving parent would do, in an effort to insulate ourselves from their constant whining and badgering to “take me to the mall” or otherwise entertain them, we loaded up our kids’ summer with a series of week-long summer leadership / character-building camps and a couple of obligatory annual pilgrimages to visit elderly relatives. That’ll teach ‘em to whine about being bored.

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That’s my sister, Betsy Jones – on a good day. She’s 52 years old, but on most days acts 24: carefree, fun-loving.  But on a bad day, stay away from her because she is cursed with absolutely the worst luck of anybody I know. Take a good close look at this photo. You may think she’s on the verge of snapping – about to lose it and leap over the wall, with a one-way ticket to Crazy Town. And you would be correct.

You see, Betsy has had, well, a rather challenging life, to put it mildly. Imagine Winnie the Pooh going on an “explore”.  He comes upon a sign that says “This way to ‘Honey, Goodness, and Nice People’, that way to ‘Hell’s Burning Dungeons of Despair.’” Of course Pooh follows the sign toward ‘Honey’. Problem is, by the time Betsy gets there, the wind blew the signs around. Uh oh. That’s the story of Betsy’s life – “Blown by the wind.”

You know how some people lead a charmed life? Well, I think Betsy was put on this planet to balance out the scales – singlehandedly. It’s like Betsy has a sign on her back that reads “Go ahead, kick me again – but could you kindly do it before I get back up? – it will save me another trip down.”

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Finally a youth sports league has realized that when it comes to our kids, winning isn’t everything. (More on that below.) For too long, we parents have been pushing our kids way too hard, telling them they need to get passing grades in school if they want to get into a top flight college, or nagging them to do their chores now rather than waiting till, say, never, or harping on them relentlessly to practice their piano longer than fourteen minutes a week if they want to do well in their recital next week.

We are constantly pushing our kids way too hard to achieve, try harder, and be nicer to their younger sister, to the point that we are forgetting one fundamental point – that no matter how much of a snot-nosed brat they are when we ask them to help put away the dishes for the third time, no matter how much they whine that “Angela’s parents let her have Internet on her cell phone – why can’t I?”, our kids are all winners in this game called life.

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I think it’s wonderful that so many dads and moms are realizing the wonderful learning experience that is “Bring your child to work day.” One of the great joys in life is bringing your child to work to learn what it is you do each day while they’re usually at school ignoring their teachers and texting the their BFF (Best Friend Forever) in the row behind them.  

So I was thrilled when I learned about the caring dad last week who, as an air traffic controller at JFK International Airport (the 5^th busiest in the nation), invited his elementary school-age son to take over the controls to guide planes during their take-off and landing procedures (I can’t make this stuff up). What a swell dad. And by all accounts, other than the near crash landing of a minor non-commercial twin engine plane, which overran the runway, the lad’s instructions were almost flawless. Hey, how do you learn unless you make a few mistakes?  

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As most of you know by now, I’m considered a foremost international authority on all things love.  Perhaps it’s because I’m half-German. Or perhaps because I got an A- in French in high school – the language of love. I don’t actually have any formalized training in this arena (not that this has ever stopped me from giving advice about anything, mind you). And I still don’t understand position #27 in the Kama Sutra.

My love advice credentials stem from a series of devastating, star-crossed romances in my formative youth, all of which ended catastrophically and from which I am for the most part healed. And it has given me the ability to counsel thousands of lost, lovelorn, lonely hearts (how ‘bout that for alliteration) on how to successfully attract their one true soul mate. Fortunately, very few of you have actually followed any of my suggestions. Still that does not seem to stop people from seeking my advice on matters of the heart.  

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This week, I dug deep into the Dr. Tim advice column mailbag and came up with the following very informative letter:

Dear Dr. Tim:

My 16-year old daughter now has a boyfriend. Should I kill myself?

Signed, Terrified in Tacoma.

Thank you for your very detailed and well-constructed letter, Terrified. Can I call you “Terri?” Read More…

Are all teenage daughters evil? It’s a question I have been wondering about a lot lately. A research study recently reported that people with teenagers in the house are, statistically speaking, the least happy demographic group of all* (I am not making this up). Interestingly, disgruntled postal workers and prisoners in solitary confinement rank higher in their daily happiness quotient than the average parents of teenagers. Sadly, Melvin Zemmecki, a postal worker from Newark, New Jersey, serving time in prison in solitary confinement and father of four teenage girls, has the dubious distinction of being rated the unhappiest man in the entire USA.**  

Not to toot my own horn, but I consider myself an expert in understanding the impact of parenting mistakes and communication failures (based on years of intense field research – mostly in the family room). As a parent of two darling teenage daughters, ages 14 and 15, I find myself discovering the miracle of witnessing in stereo hormonally-induced multiple personality disorder on a daily basis. There are all sorts of theories as to why teenage girls tend to be so moody, angry, irritable, thoughtless, self-absorbed, lazy, disrespectful, emotionally distant, narcissistic, a giant pain in the ass, never EVER cleaning their damn rooms, would it kill you to clean it up just once, I tell you??!!!??…. But I digress. 
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In my previous post, I posited the theory that at one time or another all teenage girls become evil – not permanently, mind you (at least, I sure hope not). Thanks for the hundreds of emails and letters people never got around to sending me in staunch support of my theory.

In fact, based on further limited but rigorous field research I did (comprised mostly of renting the movie Mean Girls) I have concluded there appear to be several actual city ordinances which require girls in some affluent suburban neighborhoods to turn evil (or at least seriously bitchy) by the time they reach puberty. This ordinance clearly is in effect in Beverly Hills, Orange County, Palm Beach, Florida, the Hamptons, Greenwich, CT, and oddly enough, Omaha, Nebraska*. (I know, that last one surprised me too.)
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