Leave That Sleeping Teen Alone!!!!!
I posted part of this a couple of years ago, but it’s the weekend and I think it bears posting again because when I think of all those exhausted teens being dragged from their beds because some adult thinks that because he’s up, everyone should be up, I get really angry on behalf of the teens.
Mamacita says: I remember being so tired it wasn’t humanly possible to turn OVER, let alone get up. But I got up anyway, because I had responsibilities. I sleep-walked across campus many times, to take a test. I took tests with migraines so severe there were sparks shooting out of my head and I could barely read the questions. I took tests that I’d pulled two or three all-nighters in a row to prepare for, and I really believed I was prepared! I have fallen asleep with my head resting on my completed test. I never once cut class on a test day, even though there were plenty of times when I wanted to. (Are you listening, students dear?) (Because midterms aren’t all that far away, you know.)
I think a great way of telling whether a person is an adult or still a kid is watching him/her to see if he/she is, on a regular basis, dragging the ol’ carcass out of bed to do something because he/she signed up to do it, promised people he/she would be there to do it, paid money to do it or is being paid money to do it, and by golly he/she is just SUPPOSED to be there to do it. No excuses. If it’s an obligation that requires a timeline with an established start and finish point, get up.
That being said:
Unless there is a legitimate reason for a teen to get up on a Saturday or any vacation day, the kid should be allowed to stay in bed all DAY if that’s what he/she wants. Item: the possible fact that Mom and/or Dad are up is NOT a legitimate reason to make others get up.
Teenagers really do need far more sleep than even a baby, and they seldom get it. Many adults don’t understand this, and they insist that a teen GET UP on a Saturday morning or a vacation, because YOU’RE WASTING HALF THE DAY! COME ON, GET UP, THERE ARE CHORES TO BE DONE, ETC ETC ETC and these things can’t be done at nighttime, apparently. . . . Plus, there’s the absolutely ridiculous early-morning start of high school, which most experts agree is detrimental to most teens’ body clock and yet school systems insist on it, mostly for the convenience of the bus drivers and families who rely on their older kids to babysit the younger kids after school.
Doesn’t anybody care about our sleepy teens? An average teenager’s body requires ten to fourteen hours of sleep sometimes! Why won’t some parents let the kid sleep? Just, you know, leave the kid alone and let him SLEEP? Wasting the day? Some people are night owls, plain and simple, and sleeping when they’re the most tired is just logical. Not everybody loves the early morning. I don’t. I hate it, in fact. “Are you ever going to get out of that bed? Do you intend to sleep your life away? Jane, you’re wasting half of your Saturday!” No, I wasn’t. My Saturday was divided differently than certain other people, that’s all. And at nine or ten p.m., when those people were curled up in bed, I was just beginning to be at my mental-alertness peak. I’m still that way.
Teens are wasting good daylight hours when they could be DOING something? No, they’re not. Teenagers desperately need that sleep, so leave them alone on their days off and let them sleep. It doesn’t do any good to insist that a kid go to bed earlier, either. Most of the time, a kid just isn’t sleepy enough to go to bed earlier. Mother Nature is a wily old thing and wired us all differently, sleep-needs-wise.
So who’s right and who’s wrong? Nobody and everybody, of course. But far too many adults can’t fathom a kid who wants to sleep so much. Nay, a kid who MUST sleep so much. I understand it completely. I sympathize. I’m all for leaving the kid alone and letting him sleep. He needs that sleep. He needs hours and hours and hours of blissful uninterrupted sleep, far more than adults need. Leave the kid alone and let him sleep!
Unless, of course, the kid, of his own free will, signed up for a job, or a degree, in which case, the kid needs to be there, #2 pencil in hand, or spiffy uniform donned and ready to fry, right smack when he/she contracted to be there, or else. Part of becoming an adult is forcing oneself to do things one really doesn’t want to do, simply because it’s the right thing to do. Many forty-year-olds still haven’t learned this.
HOWEVER, if that’s the case, these kids should have signed up for the midafternoon or evening class, not the morning class. And since they did sign up for it, they need to honor their commitment. Most of my students have jobs. That’s good. All teens should pay for their own car insurance, dates, and fast food with the pals. But if a kid can get up for fast food with the pals, the kid can get up for class.
Parents, please leave your teens alone on vacation mornings. Do you really think he/she would have set the iPod and cell phone down and turned his/her back on them unless there was a very, very, very good reason? Your kids are genuinely tired. They desperately NEED that sleep. It’s not laziness. It’s biology.
Just be grateful it’s the kind of in-bed biology that you don’t have to lose your own sleep over.
So, old people, get up at the asscrack break of dawn if you are wired that way (bizarre) but leave other people alone. It’s a funny thing, but early-rising people always seem to love that time of day so much, they can’t conceive of anyone not being grateful to be awakened to share it.
News flash, morning people: If you don’t get out of here right now and leave me alone, I’m going to have to hurt you. I’m not kidding. The only good sunrise is the one you watch before you hit the sheets.
And I was even worse as a teen.
Sincerely,
–Dracula’s daughter
P.S. If the teen has a real commitment, such as a job or a class, he/she needs a good LOUD alarm clock and some serious consequences falling on his/her head – not from you but from the college or employer – if there’s a question about whether or not to get up to meet that obligation. If you just want the car washed, you can bloody well wait until late afternoon. Sheesh. Go watch the sun rise and eat “breakfast” if it’s that important to you. Leave everybody else alone. LEAVE THEM ALONE. You are not like them, and they are not like you. They’re normal, and you’re a bloody freak.
Well, I feel better now.
Why Are We Allowing Schools to Punish the VICTIMS of Bullying, and Not the Bullies?
Mamacita says: There is nothing on the planet as important as our kids, and we really need to keep aware of what’s going on in their world. Even when we don’t like to admit that these things are happening.
Oftimes, those things that are the hardest to believe, are the very things that are really happening.
Look out: I’m going to rant about bullies here. Theme: Bullies suck.
As parents, we sometimes hide behind the “not MY kid” philosophy. I’m sorry, but that one doesn’t work all of the time. It IS your kid, and it’s MY kid, and it’s HER kid, and it’s HIS kid. It’s all of our kids. And even if your kid isn’t actually (insert popular but inappropriate activity here), your kid is being exposed to other kids who ARE.
There has always been peer pressure. It’s worse now than it’s ever been. There have always been bullying, and name-calling, etc. In the old days, such vile little creeps were kicked out of school and sometimes even hauled down to the station and sent to “reform school.” Now, bullies and harassers have “problems,” and need “guidance and understanding,” and should be “coddled” so their “anger issues” can be kept under control. Well, I suppose that’s easier than telling the little shithead to control himself OR ELSE. And then making sure the “or else” is some kind of memorable deprivation.
I wonder why it is, that the parents of the worst and most dangerous kids, are almost always the ones who stand the tallest to fight for their ‘rights?’ Don’t sweet well-behaved kids have any rights? Why are most of the rewards given to kids who terrorize and sneer? Two days of bringing a pencil to class should NOT be grounds for a limo ride. Where is the limo ride for the decent kids who brought pencils to class every single day because that’s what decent kids are SUPPOSED to do? Positive reinforcement is one thing, and barking idiocy is quite another. Oh, it’s for ‘self-esteem?’ Don’t even get me started. Besides, I’ve already ranted about THAT one.
I have a real problem with bullies. I think a school’s focus should be to refer them to some outside source for help, get them the hell OUT of the building so they can’t hurt anyone else, and to concentrate on the feelings of the victims. Why do the bad kids get all the attention? It’s not fair. A school should be a safe haven for all kids. Why has it turned into a safe haven mainly for rotten kids? When did school become the best place to bully and torment and tease? Why don’t we put a firm and heavy foot down on these nasty little terrorists? Oh, right. Their parents. Sorry. I forgot there for a minute. Oh, and they have rights. More rights than nice kids have. “Anger management problems.” Right.
Money talks, doesn’t it. Loudness is heard over fairness. Excuses make more sense than doing what’s right. It’s too hard to be well-behaved; don’t punish a kid for being a kid.
Guess what. Normal kids don’t terrorize, beat up, taunt, attack, and blackmail other kids. Even games penalize for unnecessary roughness; why doesn’t real life? Because schools are afraid of terrorist bullying parents, that’s why. Or even weeping, whiny parents who ‘don’t know how to handle him” but who will take you before the board if you don’t coddle him in every possible way. One irate parent’s opinion is usually enough to cave in an entire school board. Above all things, they fear loss of money and adverse publicity.
Oh sure, I know that LIFE isn’t fair. But shouldn’t it be? And wouldn’t it be, if we all worked harder to make it so?
Bottom line: We need to stop enabling bullies, punishing their victims, and finding excuses for the bullying behaviors. We then need to focus on the decent, well-behaved, creative, kind, artistic, musical, literate, in-OR-out-0f-the-box students, and give them what a school was meant to be: a place where those who wish to learn and advance, may do so without being slowed down or stopped completely by, well, anything or anyone.
Quotation Saturday: Gumption!
Mamacita says: Well, well, well, another Saturday has sneaked up on us!
“Gumption” is an old-fashioned word, but gumption itself is a quality that seems to be old-fashioned, too. Schoolkids aren’t given time to prove they’ve got gumption or not, because before they can even comprehend that they can’t comprehend something, an adult is right there showing them how, thus keeping the child from figuring things out himself. When kids want to play, they no longer have to scout around the neighborhood, looking for an empty field, etc, and they no longer have to teach each other the rules, or look out for each other in case bullies, dogs, bees, poison ivy, or any other unmentionable shows up, because most kids these days have never even navigated their own neighborhood since they’ve never in all their lives EVER been out of their mother’s sight, and she’s always right there with the kids in their fenced-in back yard to save them from Nature or mean kids or the trouble of making their own amusement. Any games a modern kid plays are set up, regulated, and supervised by adults. Modern kids would have no idea how to play without a grownup right there to tell them how. Sigh.
People have no gumption these days. Plain and simple. Those who have it are not encouraged to use it lest some other person’s self esteem be damaged, or he/she might fall down and break an arm, or – heaven forbid – he/she might even develop a love of learning and adventure and that would really rock the boat for school systems, administrations, and parents who’ve turned hovering into an art form. Of course, if a child DOES fall down on the playground, the parents can always sue and get a lot of money. I mean, falling down on a playground? Why, it’s UNNATURAL. Some adult wasn’t taking good enough care of the poor kid. LAWSUIT.
Those who DO have gumption and who have the gumption to stand up and USE that gumption, deserve to rule the world.
1. Anyone who has gumption knows what it is, and anyone who hasn’t can never know what it is. So there is no need of defining it. — Lucy Maud Montgomery
2. It is very easy to forgive others their mistakes; it takes more grit and gumption to forgive them for having witnessed your own. — Jessamyn West
3. Boredom means you’re off the quality track, you’re not seeing things freshly, you’ve lost your “beginners mind”…boredom means your gumption supply is low and must be replenished before anything else is done. — Robert M. Pirsig
4. I like the word “gumption” because it’s so homely and so forlorn and so out of style it looks as if it needs a friend and isn’t likely to reject anyone who comes along. I like it also because it describes exactly what happens to someone who connects with Quality. He gets filled with gumption.
A person filled with gumption doesn’t sit around dissipating and stewing about things. He’s at the front of the train of his own awareness, watching to see what’s up the track and meeting it when it comes. That’s gumption.
If you’re going to repair a motorcycle, an adequate supply of gumption is the first and most important tool. If you haven’t got that you might as well gather up all the other tools and put them away, because they won’t do you any good. — Robert Pirsig
5. When I was a kid, people who got divorced were people who had no gumption. — Phil Donahue
6. Thus my modest recommendation, requiring no change in laws or regulations, just a little more gumption. Let us start talking about group differences openly. — Charles Alan Murray
7. One of the final challenges for human beings is to get old with as much verve and gumption as
possible. — Alison Judson Ryerson
8. There are times when each of us has to have some gumption to take a stand as to what we wish to preserve or change in order to maintain our self-respect and not be as “a reed shaken with the wind” (Matt. 11:7) . . . . We lose much credibility and strength, and we risk being weighed on an uneven balance, when, Don Quixote-like, we go around “tilting windmills”. — James E. Faust
9. Margaret Mitchell ran into a fancy New York publisher when she was still writing Gone With The Wind.
“So, Little Lady, what’s your Civil War book about?” the publisher said.
Mitchell looked him in the eye: “It’s about people who have gumption and people who don’t.” –Unknown
10. When the worms are scarce, what does a hen do? Does she stop scratching? She does not. She scratches all the harder. A lot of businessmen have been showing less sense than a hen since orders became scarce. They have laid off salesmen; they have stopped or reduced their advertising; they have simply resigned themselves to inaction and, of course, to pessimism. If a hen knows enough to scratch all the harder when the worms are scarce, surely businessmen … ought to have gumption enough to scratch all the harder for business. — B.C. Forbes
11. To all the usual reasons why small companies have an advantage, from nimbleness to risk-taking, add these new ones: The rise of cloud computing means that young firms no longer have to buy their own IT equipment, which helps them avoid having to raise money or take on debt. Likewise, the webification of the supply chain in many industries, from electronics to apparel, means that even the tiniest companies can now order globally, just like the giants. In the same way a musician with just a laptop and some gumption can accomplish most of what a record label does, an ambitious engineer can invent and produce a gadget with little more than that same laptop. — Wired Magazine, The New New Economy
12. My personal feeling is that this is how any further improvement of the world will be done: by individuals making Quality decisions and that’s all. God, I don’t want to have any more enthusiasm for big programs full of social planning for big masses of people that leave individual Quality out. These can be left alone for a while. There’s a place for them but they’ve got to be built on a foundation of Quality within the individuals involved. We’ve had that individual Quality in the past, exploited it as a natural resource without knowing it, and now it’s just about depleted. Everyone’s just about out of gumption. And I think it’s about time to return to the rebuilding of this American resource — individual worth. — Robert Pirsig
I definitely need to re-read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.
People who have no gumption: I just don’t understand it. Far too many people would rather sit at home and complain about having no job, than get up, walk out the door, and work at something “menial” while waiting for something better to come ’round.
Ten-year-old kids are being dressed from head to foot by Mommy. They don’t even know how to put on their shoes, or button a shirt. We used to make fun of Mary Lennox for standing like a statue, expecting Martha to dress her like a doll. Because she DESERVED to be mocked.
Parents have no gumption about their children’s school. Somehow, they’ve permitted our schools to become holding tanks for the lowest common denominator. A school should be a place where those who wish to learn, might learn. No person should be permitted to befoul our children’s schools with disruption, disrespect, or violence. A school is intended for students: people with a desire to learn and advance. Many administrators have no gumption and have taken the easy way out: cater to the population that lives to withhold education from those who want education. I can think of no viable reason for a school to endure any person of any age who doesn’t want to learn and doesn’t intend to allow anybody else to do so, either.
Buck up, people. Show some spunk. Illegitimi non carborundum est.
Darn skippy.
