MOMMA'S. DON'T LET YOUR BIKERS GROW UP TO BE BABIES.

First things first. This particular post was inspired by Kimberly At: Got Blog?
 But don't blame her if you don't like where I have taken this...

Today's children have become and sorry bunch. Well it didn't just happen, like some magic spell cast upon the youth of America. Nor was it an accident or a vast conspiracy. But it started back in the generation that I came from. And it has culminated in the children of today. What do you give your children as a gift? Computers? Cell-phones? Nintendos? IPods? XBox 360? Play Station PSP? Art Supplies? Even if you go out on a limb and give a really dangerous gift like a skateboard or a bicycle, you have to include a helmet and elbow pads. And it has gotten so bad it's against the law in most states to ride a bike without a helmet. And give a kid a car ride without a five point restraint system and they post pictures of you in the Daily News and brand you a BAD MOTHER. In my day BAD MOTHER had a completely different meaning. When I was 5 my father used to let me stand on his lap and steer the car. Try that today and you'll be prosecuted for Child Endangerment. Mel Gibson was chastised for showing Children with guns in his movie "The Patriot." I have owned guns since I was 6. But today I can't give my daughter a gun for any reason until some MOTHER in The Government Approves first. There's a lot of MOTHERS out there minding your business. And they have turned your children into a mass of Namby Pamby, Skillet licking, pablum gagging,  computer literate, weenies. And try to convince me that you first reaction if you saw a child untethered in the back of a car, that your first reaction isn't to be a MOTHER and call the cops to report  a rogue citizen raising a free spirit.
Think back to your childhood. Did you have a car-seat with at least a 3 point restraint system? NO! Did your mom's car have Air-bags (Besides the one she married)? NO! Did she suit you up in crash gear before you rode a Bicycle? NO! Did she only give you crayons with a warning not to eat them? NO? Did anything have a warning label on it? NO! Did she love you? YES!

Let me tell you some of the Toys I got from my mom and grand-mom as a child.  A BB Gun. A .22 rifle. A Junior Scientist Chemistry set. A Microscope with glass slides and dissection tools and dye stains. A 300 watt wood-burning tool. An Erector Set. An Electric Slot car and race track. A set of Lawn Darts.
I played Little League Baseball and I wore a helmet. But we kept score. There were winners and losers at every game. And we learned the agony of defeat and the thrill of victory. Your children watch Sesame Street and Barney The Dinosaur! We watched The Three Stooges and Bullwinkle! We had Barbie and G.I. Joe. Your kids have Teddy Ruxpin and Cabbage Patch Dolls. We had BB guns. Your kids have NERF guns. We had steel Horseshoes. Your kids have plastic Horseshoes.
In school I wrote essays of Haunted Houses and Headless Zombies. I got A's in English. I doodled pictures of sword fights and Airplanes shooting other Airplanes and guns with tongues of fire coming from the muzzle. No one cared. If a child draws a gun today, he gets expelled and sent for a psych eval! I had a psych eval. But not until I was grown and was being considered for a position on a Nuclear Weapons Security Team. I never heard what the results of the Evaluation were. But I sat at the Launch Control Panel for 21 years. So I must have passed.

I said earlier that Moms started being MOTHERS back in my generation. While I was eight and watching The Stooges, my mom told me the paper had a story of a boy who had hit his brother on the head with a hammer. And when the parents asked "Why?" He told them he had seen it on the The Three Stooges. My mom asked what I thought about that? I told her "That kid must be a retard!" Right now MOTHERS all over the world just clutched their chest because I used the "R" word. OH! How Insensitive! Well what else would you call a kid who thought it was OK to hit someone in the head with a hammer? RETARD pretty much fits. But in actuality the story belonged to the new genre of BS known now as URBAN LEGENDS.

Nosy MOTHERS Are still spreading these Tales of woe. A few years ago a MOTHER told how her 5 year old son burned down the house after watching BEAVIS AND BUTTHEAD. My fist thought was Why in the wide world of sports was a 5year old watching Beavis and Butthead? I was almost there. I was turning into a real MOTHER. But I found the truth a couple days later when CNN reported that the homeless MOTHER had lied. She didn't even have a cable connection, so her home was incapable of seeing anything on MTV. Her kid was a PYRO. But someone else must be to blame.

I have a niece who has four beautiful children ranging in age from 1-9. Her husband and she are both successful college educated Corporate Lawyers. And their children are quiet, well mannered and dressed neatly and clean. Yet whenever she goes out with the youngsters in tow, NOSY MOTHERS ask questions like: "Are you Catholic?" "Are you Mormons?" "Can't you figure out what causes them?" None of those things are true, and She finds it quite distressing. I suggested she get matching Tee Shirts that say: "My parents are married and not on welfare. So mind your own business." Or "Call MY UNCLE KURT! HE"LL EXPLAIN IT TO YOU."
So while I have, and continue to tell you Teach Your Children Well. Be their MOM. Or be a MOTHER. But don't try to MOTHER everyone else's children. Hillary Clinton is wrong. It does not take a village to raise a child. I could be wrong. What do you think? Do you think?