Rice Daddies
Posts on fatherhood that were also cross-posted to the Rice Daddies blog.
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Before I was a parent I used to joke: “That’s how Chinese people show love.” I made that joke every time my friend complained about how critical her mother was of her. We were in our 20s then. It is curious just how much impact “mother” has on a person. I am just over 40…
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I was a little too young for the Lassie movies. I was more the generation of Run Joe Run on Saturday mornings. While Pumpkin was not accused of a crime, he loves to play and he did run away. Despite his age, he still has a lot of puppy in him. All you need is…
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I know this is an Al Jolson song. I chose it because it’s poignant in so many ways. When I look at my boys, I see great things. I see everything I couldn’t achieve because of circumstance or simply a lack of imagination. I see dreams and aspirations that shame my own lack of ambition.…
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Easily the most unpleasant chore for me as a parent has been writing my will. It should have been easy enough as a single 20something – even 30something! Having no worldly possessions or “legacies” to speak of should have made them easy to address via a “last will and testament.” They were not. Even the…
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I hated school as a teenager and maybe even before that. The institutionalization of my intellect. The fascist policing of my imagination. The “marginalization” of my individuality. The co-opting of my identity. I cringe when I read writers like Victor Davis Hanson denounce public education. In his article, “Back to School Blues,” he condemns the…
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Click J-Pop singers, Yuimino, for more 2008 NYAF pictures. I geeked out last weekend and took the boys to the 2008 New York Anime Festival at the Javits Center. The challenge of conventions like this is determining the “age appropriateness” of its events. By “age appropriateness,” I don’t mean the form enhancing costumes that some…
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Simultaneously posted at Rice Daddies. It rained heavily the night before the Tuesday the planes hit the World Trade Center towers. My wife and I got into a huge argument. I don’t remember exactly what we argued about. Only that we had argued about it before and that the absurdity of the argument was that…
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*Simultaneously posted at Rice Daddies. Forty-something years old and my mother still knows which buttons to push to upset me. At best, I tolerate my parents. My relationships with each has its own conditions. I say this not because I do not love and respect my parents. I love and respect my parents very much.…
Vincent Young 