As the father of four, one of whom is going to be old enough for college in six years, I find the things I read about the so-called “hook-up” culture extremely troubling. The Philosopher Mom has some stuff to say about it.
The View from the Foothills
A tiny principality in the Commonwealth of Letters
The View from the Foothills 
Yes, I always did too. Happily, once my children got to that age I was relieved and pleased to find that they had somewhere along the way picked up morals and good common sense and a sense of discernment as to what influences to avoid. Whew! Clearly kids do make mistakes and our society seems to cheer them on in some of the worst of them. However, having a good solid family influence is something that helps offset all that. At least so far, so good, fingers crossed and prayers going to God’s ear.
What helped me most of all in worrying about such things was when someone told me, “God doesn’t have grandchildren.” It never had occurred to me to think about Him being just as involved with them as He was with me. I’m so silly! 🙂
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I’m surely hoping and praying that it works out that way. The troubling part is, on the one hand a college education is more or less a necessity; and yet I hate to send my kids into *that*. It was certainly possible to get into all kinds of trouble on campus when I was in school, back in the mid-80’s, but things seem to have gotten much worse.
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But not worse than when I was in school (ahem) in the late 1970’s. Anything went and authorities generally winked at drugs of most kinds. Free love was … well, free. And yet, most of us were very normal, nice kids.
Things have a somewhat “meaner” feel these days I think. But people are people. Rose has found some extremely normal people in downtown Chicago going to her fine arts school (in the film department) … like, practically all of them. Except for the ones who want to be different. You can tell them from the “posing.” So, again, very normal.
So far, so good. And I remind myself that all the worrying in the world doesn’t change things. Tom and I have done our ground work and it is now up to them. These are their baby-steps into adulthood. We can rescue a daughter from checkbook problems and overdrafts once and then wait on the sidelines ready to let her crash and burn. Because they have to make mistakes … college is still the place where they are still somewhat protected while they do it.
On the high school front, it may make you feel a tiny bit better to know that a friend of mine was forced by finances several years ago to take a job an give up homeschooling her five children. They have flourished and the oldest daughter wound up becoming the prize pupil of her high school … which was the very worst one in Dallas. Because of her, they began several new programs for talented and gifted students within the school. So even in a very frightening circumstance, it all worked out fine.
I realize that not every story does, but I think that the media loves to focus on the negative without ever telling how many more times simple normalcy is the case.
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Thanks for the reality check.
I suppose that if the world weren’t insipid and dark, there’d be no need to be salt and light.
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