The Smiths and Joneses (28 page)

              Wolf almost runs towards the house.

              Sean, Carol and Bob watch him dash off and chuckled at his predicament.

Chapter 16

              Sean opens the latest episode, “Carol, Bob, thank you for having us back. It’s an honor to be your guests again. We realize this must have turned your lives upside down.”

              Carol smiles saying, “Sean, you have no idea. Our family has become local stars. Just yesterday I was shopping when two strangers approached me, asking for my autograph. They wanted to take ‘selfies’ with me. I couldn’t believe it. Beth is loving it; she’s the star of her first-grade class. Even her teacher spoils her now. She’s asked to tell the class what happens on a TV show. Everyone in the school wants to be her friend. She’s in heaven. We’re trying to guide her, so it doesn’t go to her head and make her a spoiled brat. We don’t want her fame to go to her head. Tomorrow I’m going to address the class as is one of the other parents who is a local weatherman on our local CBX channel. We’re going to try to explain that everyday people can be on TV and it doesn’t mean anything. We’re not stars in the sense of Hollywood.”

              Wolf asks, “Carol, have you noticed a change in Beth or Leon?”

              “Beth started to get a bigger ego. However, I think we caught it before it turned her into something else. As far as Leon, well, he’s using his notoriety to get dates. His calendar is filled for the next two months. We’ve tried to coach him, so it doesn’t go to his head. We’re afraid we’ve failed. His attitude has changed; Bob talks with him every day.”

              Sean responds, “Carol, we’re sorry for any issues we have caused your family. To be very honest, we didn’t expect the program to be such a hit. If we thought it would have gathered the ratings it did, we would have left the children out of the program.”

              Carol smiles saying, “Sean, even if you wanted to leave the children out of the program, they would have found a way to walk in front of the cameras. You know how kids are. They’re not going to give up a chance for fame. We’re trying to explain to them fame isn’t all what the tabloids make it out to be. We want our children to be grounded. It’s much harder to ground them than we thought it would be.”

              Wolf asks, “Carol, don’t you think this is a perfect reason the LSA’s policy of the town and state helping raise children is better? Bringing up children is a full-time job, we all know how hard it is. It's a job that’s usually more than one set of parents can handle.” 

             
Bob looks at Wolf with a forced smile on his face, “Wolf, being a parent is a difficult job. It’s a job a husband and wife should make sure they’re ready for before they have children. How can a town or state bring up my children? They don’t know my values or how I want my children brought up. They will turn children into little robots; all raised to be the same. Children should experience being children. They should have fun and use the fun to learn how to get up when they fall. Falling and getting hurt, simple cuts and scratches are part of growing up. Failing is part of life. Under your system, you isolate the children from failure or failing. You teach them they can be anything they want to be. They are all perfect little angels. They all make the team, they all win a prize. What you’re really teaching them is that they don’t have to push themselves, they don’t have to learn anything new. They don’t have to improve their skills because they’re going to get the trophy no matter how they perform. In reality, each child has their own special gift. They’re not all the same. They never will be. Under your system, when the children grow up and hit the wall for the first time, they’re shocked, they don’t know what to do, and they’ve never learned how to think on their own. They don’t know how to think on their feet. They never learned how to face failure. Failure is a very important facet of life. We learn more from how we handle failure and what we learn from failures than we do from winning.”

              Wolf responds, “Bob, I disagree with you. Why should children be forced to suffer? Why should they be in pain from getting cut or scratched? Why shouldn’t they all be taught they can be all they want to be? It’s true they can all grow up to be anything they want to be. They shouldn’t feel they don’t have any friends. Being without friends or playmates is a cause of child suicide that we have a very low amount of. Can you say the same? We don’t accept bullying. Can you say the same? Our children can use our social media without worrying someone is going to bully them online. You can’t say the same. How many USA kids have killed themselves because they were bullied online?”

              Carol jumps into the discussion, “Wolf, how many of your children are on some type of medication? How many are classified as ADHD? You medicate your children, so they fit into what you consider normal. Our percentage of children on ADHD drugs has decreased by 70%. We’ve decided to allow our kids to be kids. You have bullies, among children there are always bullies. You can’t change human nature.”

              Wolf gets very serious replying, “Bob, Carol, children are society’s future. Their education and upbringing are too important to leave to untrained parents. We believe we can, and we have changed human nature. It’s all in the education system and what you may call conditioning.”

              Carol’s face turns red, “What do you mean untrained? There’s no classes or college degree for being a parent. I learned how to parent from my parents. When you say conditioning, what you’re really saying is programmed and controlled.”

              “Carol, there are college courses for parenting, we’ve started an entire new class of study, parenting, graduates receive a BS degree.”

              “Huh? When did this start? Who came up with the course study? A BS? You consider parenting a science?”

              “Carol, we engaged the top child Psychologists in the LSA to design the college curriculum.  It’s been working well for us. Carol, parenting is more a science than it is an art.”

              “Wolf, how do you know its working?”

              “Because our children are happy, they’re growing up to be well-adjusted teenagers and young adults.”

              Carol responds, “Wolf how are you judging this?”

              “We use the statistics from the previous years.”

              “Wolf, what percentage of your children are taking any type of ADHD medications?”

              “Carol, I don’t have those numbers at my finger tips, nor do I think they’re meaningful to our discussion.”

              “Wolf, sure they are. If you medicate an entire generation, of course, you’re going to have nice well behaved children. You’re raising a generation of ‘Stepford Wives.’”

              “I disagree with you. You’ve never been to the LSA to see with your own eyes how our children act. I’m very proud of our children and what they’re going to be when they become adults. Come visit come see for yourself.”

              Sean jumps in saying, “I think we’ve beaten this horse as much as we can. Let’s change the subject. Bob, Carol, are you concerned about your family’s personal safety and security?”

              Bob responds, “Sean, not really. If you notice, we don’t have bars on our windows. We don’t even have a home alarm system. We don’t need one. We’ve gone to bed and forgotten to lock the front door; we woke the next morning with nothing missing. We’ve said we have a neighborhood watch program. Each family looks after each other. We don’t worry about our kids going outside to play. If you’d like, we can introduce you to the neighborhood watch chairperson.”

              Wolf says, “I would like that, thank you. Why don’t you worry about your children going outside to play?”

              Bob asks, “Wolf why should we be afraid?”

              “There might be many criminals out there waiting for the children to go outside to play so they can adduct them.”

              “Wolf, we really don’t have that many abductions, in fact, I don’t remember when we’ve had a single local abduction.”

              “But it could happen at any time.”

              Carol, clearly irritated, responds, “It’s also possible to be hit by lightning from a clear sky. However, it’s not likely. Is this a problem in the LSA that you think is also one in the USA? We don’t have many of these problems. We allow our children to go outside to play with their friends. We allow Leon to ride his bike to school and see his friends that are ten blocks away.”

              “Ten blocks? Why doesn’t he ride the school bus?”

              “What school bus? Any children that live within a mile don’t have a bus. It’s a way for us to keep our costs down and also enable our kids to get exercise.”

              “What about when it rains?”

              Carol laughs, “Wolf, its water. They have rain coats. They’re not going to melt.”

              Wolf responds, “Carol, they could catch a cold!”

              “So? They bring home enough colds and flus from school that gets passed around from child to child. That’s normal. Getting a cold from walking in the rain is an old wives tale.”

              “Carol, you know many of those old wives’ tales were true.”

              “Not this one. You’re a reporter, didn’t you ever cover a story in the rain?”

              “Of course I did.”

              “Did you get sick?”

              “I don’t remember.”

              “Next subject?”

              Sean laughs, saying, “What are your thoughts on gun control?”

              Bob laughs responding, “Sean, we believe in gun control.”

              Wolf smiles, he asks, “You do? Could you explain a little more about your thoughts?”

              Bob smiles back at Wolf, “Sure, we both believe in controlling our guns when we shoot them. We believe in the proper holding of a gun to limit the recoil so follow on shots are on target.” 

             
Wolf looks shocked, “WHAT that’s not the type of gun control I’m talking about!”

              Bob asks, “What are you asking?”

              “You know what I was talking about. Laws are controlling who can own firearms.”

              Bob responds, “We have a master law, it’s called the US Constitution. Of course, Congress has passed some gun control laws, such as we can’t own a new machine gun, we can’t own a working tank or mortar; we can’t own a canon. I don’t think we can own a battleship, not sure about us owning a fighter or bomber either, I’ll have to check. Oh yea, we can’t own personal nuclear weapons.”

              Wolf’s face turns red, “You know darn well, that wasn’t what I was asking. You tried to set me up.”

              Carol responds, “No we didn’t. You already know that gun ownership is not just allowed in the USA, it’s encouraged. It’s a way to ensure we, as citizens, can help defend our homes. Robert Heinlein wrote, ‘An armed society is a polite society.’ It turns out he was correct. We have a very low number of home break-ins. Criminals don’t know if they’ll find a gun behind the closed door. Many have. Let us tell you, nothing cuts down on crime more than stories about criminals getting their butts shot off trying to break in someone’s home.”

              Wolf asks, “Defend your homes from whom?”

              “The LSA for one.”

              “That’s crazy; the LSA would never invade the USA. We don’t even have a military. We’re the most peaceful nation on the planet.”

              “Wolf, President Bloomberg would be happy to take over the USA if he thought he could get away with it. He is like most politicians who are power hungry.”

              “How can you say that?”

              “Just look at the number of laws you’ve passed to control every aspect of your people’s lives.”

              Getting angry, Wolf responds, “We don’t control them, we help them. We pass laws to provide and protect our people.”

              Carol responds, “Wolf, if censoring everything a citizen writes or says, if watching every citizen and controlling what they eat is your idea of protection, I’ll be happy to accept some risk.” Bob nods his agreement. With that, Leon, riding his bike, comes up the driveway, he jogs into the living room saying, “I’m sorry I’m late. I kind of got held up at a friend’s house.”

             
Bob looks at his son, he says, “Leon, next time I suggest you wash your face. You have lipstick all over it.”

              Leon turns bright red and dashes off to the bathroom. When he returns he says, “Sorry about that, all better now. Girls, I’m not going steady or anything so check out my FB page.”

              Carol frowns saying, “Leon, we’ve discussed this. This program isn’t for you to use to locate new girlfriends.”

              “Mom, I was just reminding everyone that I quickly accept friend requests, nothing else.”

              Bob responds to his son, “Leon, enough. I don’t want to find out you’re using your FB page for hook ups.”

              “Dad…”

              “Leon, just drop it. We’ll discuss it later.”