Physical Limitations

This blog entry is part of a short series dealing with my gripes. You can read the introduction here.

My wife is beautiful. Her body is a feast for the eyes.

My wife also has a physical disability. Before I write anymore about it, I want to state clearly here that I am well aware that no matter how inconvenient it is for me, my wife's disability is something she deals with day and day out, and has for a long time now – long before I came along, and that I should count my blessings that I don't have a similar disability. I did know she had the disability before we married, but I didn't expect it would impact our life the way it has. That could be my fault for not being more observant or engaging my wife in activities that would have revealed more. Or, perhaps in putting her best foot forward, she wasn’t as forthcoming as she should have been.

With that being said...

It didn't prevent her from working long hours on her feet, often with children. It didn't prevent her from walking hand in hand with me on our dates when we did a lot of walking. She doesn't collect disability payments from the government.

The disability is bad enough, though, that she insisted on having a house with no stairs, and it is also why she doesn't take the kids to the park (they may outrun her, or someone else may take them and outrun her), why she saves errands for my days off, and why she usually has me pushing her in a wheelchair as I walk around the very places she and I used to walk hand in hand - before we got married. When you throw in a kid or two in a stroller, we're limited in what we can do without another responsible person along to help.

The thing is - she never used the wheelchair before we married (she doesn't use it around the house, shopping, or most places). She didn’t even own one.

She seemed capable of doing just about anything before we got married. I imagined that one of the benefits of having her be a SAHM was that she could take care of more of the errands and getting the kids out and about while I was at work. I didn't understand how things would actually turn out, and perhaps there is a way I could have gotten a better idea ahead of time, so I could have planned better; like taking a kid somewhere with us for the better part of a day. Unfortunately, we didn’t have nieces or nephews that fit that age range at the time. If I understood more about her disability or how she thinks about it before we married (and her family situation), I would have insisted more forcefully that we live closer to my family, so that they could assist us.

There have been some get-togethers with other mothers and their kids, and sometimes she'll take the kids over to her parents' during the day, so it isn't like they never get out while I'm at work. Just not often enough.

In this aspect of the marriage, I really didn't know what I was getting myself into. Sure, you can marry an Olympic athlete and an accident or disease can leave them disabled... but that's not what happened here.

Since there was a little time between when some of her physical limitations started to change things (immediately after marrying) and when we started to actively try to have children, I did raise some concerns with her about taking care of the children. She insisted that she could handle taking care of them, and perhaps she finds everything hunky dory the way it is now. Whenever I bring up that the older kid needs to get out more, she gets defensive and doubts her ability to offer proper physical supervision. So that's why I try to take the kid out when I get home. On the one hand, I think I may have gotten a better understanding of the limitations if we had waited longer to marry. However, the year following our wedding, due to external factors, was very difficult, and going through that without being married to each other would have been so much harder. I can't do anything about that now anyway. I need to look for solutions.

I do try to be sensitive to her limitations. I probably overdo it in being protective of her, with her usually assuring me, "It's okay, I can do it." Getting the children out and about more is the one area where she is the one quicker to say she can't do it. The difference, probably, is that she is willing to take risks with her own comfort, but is overly cautious about the safety of her children.

A few members of my family could help. They'd love to either go along on errands to help keep an eye on the kids, or babysit the kids while she gets out. Ah, but we don’t live close to them. We live close to her family members, most of whom are eliminated from consideration as babysitters due to substance abuse. That's for next time.

At least we get to use handicapped parking.

By the way, I'm not demanding when it comes to things like how the house looks, or what we have for dinner. It's not like I expect her to keep the kids entertained AND keep the house spotless AND make a gourmet dinner AND run all of the errands – all with a disability. A "messy" house does not bother me, as long as it is sanitary. Laundry piles here, toys there... that doesn't bother me. And I'd be fine with peanut butter and jelly for dinner, though my wife often cooks up a nice dinner, and yes, she does the laundry - bless her.

My Commute

This blog entry is part of a short series dealing with my gripes. You can read the introduction here, along with the first gripe, which explains why I live where I do.

My commute and the traffic is almost always slow. Rarely is my drive "straight home" any less than 45 minutes. If there is an accident along the way, it will easily be over and hour. The going-to-work commute is usually shorter. But I don't mind the commute itself. Really. It is my alone time for the day. (My wife also knew from the start that I am a person who enjoyed my alone time, and she enjoyed hers.) I can think without interruption, I can listen to what I want to listen to, without considering what my wife would like to hear, or what I don't want my children to hear. For example, my diverse taste in music includes harder classic rock, whereas my wife isn't fond of that style.

The problem comes in that when I combine my long working day with this long commute. I always have a long working day because I have a short workweek. Sometimes, I need to work later than "normal", which makes the working day even longer.

This means that when I do get home from work, there isn't a lot of time to spend with the wife and kids or do anything else before I should be getting to bed. This means I almost never get a full night's rest during my workweek, and often it becomes more like an extended nap.

Hey, no problem, right? I have a short workweek, so I've got plenty of time for the wife and kids and relaxation on my days off, right? Well, sometimes. Usually my wife saves the errands for my days off, so that I can do them while she is watching the kids at home, or vice versa, or so that we can do them as a family. So my days off are often filled with running errands I thought my wife would be handling when we married as well as the typical honey-dos that any husband should expect.

If my commute was shorter, perhaps I'd have more time to spend with my family, more time to spend with the guys (that's practically nonexistent right now, as it has been for most of the marriage), or more time alone with more freedom to do what I want during my alone time instead of being limited to "thinking" or listening to talk radio/music as I try to avoid getting hit by other drivers.

Perhaps I will find employment closer to home. It's highly unlikely my current employer will be moving any closer to our house.

These days, I get home and try to get my "older" kid out to the local park for fun and exercise, and I can right now, but as the days grow shorter that won't be the case.

So why doesn't my wife do that earlier in the day? Well, it has to do with the same reason she didn't want a house with any stairs, and why she saves most of the errands for my days off.

I'll get into that in my next installment.

(Writing out these gripes reveals that I have very little to gripe about in the overall scheme of things. I have a job, I have a working vechicle, and most importantly I have a great wife and children. Still, I want to make things better, if I can.)

Every Rose Has Its Thorn

Although I've talked a lot about my past mistakes, things I didn't like about past relationships, and male/female relationships in general, and I am blogging somewhat anonymously... I try to avoid using this forum to complain about my wife or our marriage.

Yes, I'm happily married. My wife is an amazing woman and I'm deeply in love with her. She keeps herself in shape, she keeps her hair long, she feeds me (yes, these are important things), she's generally a great mother, she's very good about our money, she understands that even if she isn't in the mood that I still need some, she tells me how much she appreciates me. I could go on and on about what a great wife she is.

But I am not blind to problems in our relationship. I do have some gripes (and I know she does, too, but this is my blog). Everything is not perfect. But that’s an elusive goal in this life anyway.

I also admit that whatever complaints I have are partially my responsibility, because I chose this woman to be my bride and I do have some power improve things in the marriage.

I don't want to complain to others who actually know us, and perhaps by sitting down to write about these things I will find some sort of solution, even it is comes down to a simple attitude adjustment on my part. If you have any suggestions, I’m open to considering them.

So let me get to my first gripe.

Where We Live

This plays a role is most of my other gripes.

I had a spoiled childhood in terms of where I grew up. Oh, I didn't grow up in the lap of luxury. By regional standards, it was middle class. But the neighborhood was special. I know a lot of people think their hometown is special. But this place really was and still is. I can tell because news media types and authors who do stories involving the city say so. I can almost guarantee you have seen this place, even if you've never been to my state. A lot of my classmates who left town upon high school graduation have moved back, especially after having kids or their kids reach school age - not to live with family, but because of the town and schools. The public schools are some of the better ones you'll find anywhere, and kids who really lived in different districts would lie about where they lived in order to get in to them.

I had moved out of this town for college. A few years after graduating, I moved back to this town to be close to my job. Our state has traditionally been full of movers. Everybody came from somewhere else, and they don't stay in one place very long. But in my hometown, once a family moves in, they seem to stay for generations. So there is a small town feel, even though it is part of a sprawling megalopolis, surrounded by a continuous sea other cities on each side. People speak English, even if some form of Chinese was their first language. The signs are in English. I don't want to get more specific than that.

I grew up on a tree-shaded street with single family homes and seemed like most of the houses were homes to families who had children somewhere close in age to me or my siblings.

My wife grew up in a different part of southern California, and although she has fond memories of her childhood home, she has no desire to live in that neighborhood today.

When we were discussing marriage, the plan was to move close where I would be working as soon as it made sense. Upon marriage, I moved in to her place (a condo) because she was paying a mortgage and I was paying rent for an apartment, and so living in her place made more financial sense while we made plans to find a house. This meant pretty much exactly the commute I had moved from my "college" apartment to avoid. But it was temporary, right? Ah, but things have a way of changing after marriage.

When we were finally able to upgrade into a single family home, my wife did most of the looking. My work location had been moved by my employer, but the commute was still about the same. Although I had always wanted a single family home with yards and the whole bit, two things had caused me to be open to the possibility of instead upgrading to a larger condo or townhome in a better neighborhood than her condo: 1) It was clear that neither of us was prone to spend much time in the tiny backyard we already had, nor keep the weeds from growing – how were we going to handle having larger yards of our own? 2) Housing in our region is expensive, and we could be in a nicer neighborhood with more security if we went with a condo instead of a single family house.

My wife would not consider the possibility at all. She actually cited as a reason that the only person she knew living in a condo when she was growing up (wealthier than I) was a single mother. And this was supposed to be a reason not to settle in a condo. Plenty of axe murders have lived in single family homes, but so what? Once me wife gets an idea in her head, it is nearly impossible to change it.

Another restriction: No stairs. I’ll get into why later. But it never occurred to me that stairs would ever be a problem for her. It never came up while we were dating. A house with no stairs - that severely reduced our options. Of course, we had to be able to afford the place, too - no crazy no-money-down ARMs for us.

When push comes to shove, she wanted to live close to her family, and they lived close to our condo. I have wondered why she just couldn't have been honest about this before we got married, so I knew what to expect. She insists that she wasn't counting on me to pick up a job with an employer closer to the condo, so that makes it seem to me like she always felt this way. On the other hand, it is possible that she was influenced somewhat by things that happened after we got married. Moving closer to my job would bring us closer to my family - and although she praises my mother as a great MIL and grandmother, she has been bothered by some things about my family since we married, including that she thinks I am too close with one of my sisters.

Now, I think she may be projecting a bit of her family on my family here, because she has a sister and brother who have moved out of her parents' place together, moved back in, and have moved out together again. They "party" together, frequently sit in the hot tub together, and I think they have even messed around with the same woman (though the sister dates men). My siblings and I don't have a history of even hanging out together sober, much less partying and stealing make-out buddies from each other. Mostly, I keep in contact regularly on the phone with one sister, and we talk about our parents and siblings. That's about it. Mainly, my sister wants to know about my kids.

So, we ended up with a house in what I'm sure used to be a great neighborhood in an overall city that I really do like. But most of the residents in our neighborhood don't speak English as their first language if at all, graffiti is an issue, a woman comes by every evening yelling in Spanish in hopes that someone will come out to her on the sidewalk and buy tamales from her, and I kid you not - the other day I saw a rooster walking around (no, there isn’t a farm nearby). Police helicopters circle overhead most nights. The elementary school sucks, but "we're planning" to homeschool, so what does that matter? (Except I fear that may change, too, like planning to settle near work.)

I wasn't expecting to be able to afford to live in the neighborhood of my youth. But I did think it would be possible to live close to it, and we'd be closer to my work and family.

My wife repeatedly tells me she loves our house, so I'm glad for that. To be fair, in addition to wanting to be close to her family (that's something I will get to later), she probably fell in love with the interior of the house. I'm also happy that I do have my own man cave in the house. Unfortunately, we had to install a whole HVAC system when we moved in – using the duct spaces originally in place for the old heater, plus adding some - and the living room/dining room was an addition with a beautiful ceiling, but it doesn't have insulation. While the rest of the windows in the house are new, the windows in this room are older. So it isn't the most energy efficient, and the AC has to be run hard in the summer. And, of course, work as is far away as ever.

So this brings me to my commute, which I will discuss in the second installment in this series.

What Ever Happened to Surprising Someone?

What do you think about requests for certain gifts? What about wish lists? SOLICITED IN ARIZONA wrote into Dear Abby:

My mother-in-law has a terrible habit. She tells us what she wants for gifts in the form of e-mails with Web links to things she wants.

While that is getting out of line, my wife and I have found letting people know about our Amazon.com wish lists is a good thing. I know that if I buy her something from that list, she will not be disappointed. But letting someone know about your wish list should be as aggressive as you get.

One year, she bought a pair of $700 earrings and told her fiance that he bought them for her birthday. He actually had to reimburse her.

No, he didn't. He could have kicked her to the curb, and he should have. Does he want a lifetime of that?

I have a problem with someone telling me what she wants when I haven't asked. I also don't like being told how much to spend.

It is important to have a variety on the wish lists that includes low-cost items.

My husband is used to it. He doesn't know how to say no to her.

Lucky you.

My wife gets a little bent out of shape when someone ignores her wish list. My attitude is that any gift to me is welcome, whether it is off of my list or not. Nor do I even expect a gift at all. Why? Gifts are supposed to be voluntary. That is what makes them gifts. I value home-made gifts from my wife most of all.

EHarmony Is Not a Christian Dating Website

It is a matchmaking and relationship enhancement business.

Yes, it was founded by and based on the research of a Christian, but so what? It is no more of a "Christian" business than Harvard or Yale are Christian universities. Even less so, as Harvard and Yale were originally founded to train Christian ministers, while EHarmony was founded with the goal of reducing the divorce rate.

The website was originally marketed through Christian outlets.

But over the years, the website has expanded its outreach.

I frequently see blog or forum postings claiming that EHarmony rejects atheists or any non-Christian.

As far as I can tell, the service does reject some atheists or other non-Christians, but it also rejects some Christians. The service does not reject people based on their religious or philosophical beliefs per se, and plenty of non-Christians have been accepted by the service and have used it. So no, the service doesn’t reject atheists because they are atheists. However, if someone indicates they are an atheist, they want another atheist, they feel very strongly about this, and they are very serious about finding someone very close in location to them... perhaps nobody who meets those parameters and is compatible with the applicants' personality and other conditions is in the EHarmony system. In that case, the service tells you they can't find matches for you at that time. I think it also does this if other limitations you have placed result in too few matches. Instead of taking your money, they reject your application. What's wrong with that?

Now, EHarmony.com doesn't do same-sex matching. But apparently a lot of people looking for this and thus complaining about EHarmony are unaware of their sister service, Compatible Partners, created to settle a lawsuit... or the many other online matchmaking services for gays and lesbians.

If you're going to criticize something, do so on the basis of reality.

Note that EHarmony also rejects applicants based on age, being legally married, having "too many" past marriages, depression, instability, or some other factors your personality test results indicate would keep you from being marriage material right now.

Dr. Laura Schlessinger is Not a Christian

I've seen several instances online of people referring to Dr. Laura, in a less-than-approving-way, as an evangelical or fundamentalist Christian.

These people are apparently incapable of doing even the bare minimum of research online, or are deliberate liars, or simply don't care enough to get their facts straight.

Dr. Laura is not a Christian. She doesn't claim to be. She doesn't proclaim Jesus Christ her Lord and Savior. (I'd love to hear her do that, though!)

Her background, as far as I can tell from reading her stuff and listening to her, is this:

She grew up in what she describes as an "interfaithless" home, meaning one parent was Jewish by birth and the other some form of nominal Christian, and she was not raised in any standard religious tradition or consistent religious practice.

Prompted by some questions from her son about being Jewish (as she considered herself and her son), she started a spiritual search that eventually led her to Orthodox Judaism.

She practiced that for a while, and then stopped practicing Orthodox Judaism, but still considers herself Jewish as far as religious affiliation.

Over and over again on her show, she places family cohesion in a single religion over a spouse's newfound desire to pursue a different religious path. An "evangelical Christian" would likely encourage everyone become an evangelical Christian. Dr. Laura doesn't do that.

As long as I'm on the subject of Dr. Laura, I wanted to call attention to some of the stuff I recently came across on her website.

First up is this pretty good listener letter written by an older woman to a younger (college student) woman about sex outside of marriage, and why it should be avoided. What the letter never discusses is that the girl being addressed probably got some enjoyment out of having sex with her boyfriends. This approach assumes that the younger woman's feelings of guilt and regret will outweigh her hormones and hedonistic inclinations, and they may actually do so at the time she is reading the letter, after a recent break-up. But it could be a very different story when she is alone with the next boyfriend. Ignoring this reality, and why one behavior is ultimately better in the long run than an immediately enjoyable behavior, is what prevents these kinds of essays from being more effective... especially coming from an older woman with a lower libido and access to regular marital sex.

Too often, the situation is presented as some guy "taking advantage" of a woman or that she has "nothing to show" for having had sex. Like he was supposed to give her two mules and a herd of goats. What does he have to show for having had sex with her?

In this blog entry, Dr. Laura discusses a group of mistresses and a wife who conspired to break the law to get revenge on a guy they all seemed to find irresistible.

Of the people who commented on a recent news story in which several so-called "mistresses" and a wife blindfolded and bound a man and then Krazy Glued his penis to his stomach, 68% of them LAUGHED. They actually LAUGHED at this story.

They wouldn't have laughed if it were the other way around, i.e., if several men glued a woman's genitals closed.

Bingo. No, then it would have been hate crime and evidence of a "culturally ingrained violence against women".

Finally, there's this blog entry, where she takes to task a female professor who says that men who do more domestic chores are better husbands.

When women call me complaining about such things (usually women who are at home), I ask them if they drive their husband’s route in traffic every day, or if they deal with difficult bosses or co-workers, or if they aren’t able to take breaks whenever they choose or take care of all the car and house repair issues. They say "no," but expect him to do housework in addition to all his other responsibilities.

In those situations where both husband and wife have full-time jobs, and there's a "war" about who’s going to take care of household chores, I say they should budget and pay for part-time housecleaning help, or one of them ought to reassess their life and decide if having no one at home to make a nest is worth the money they both make.

There are biological and psychological imperatives in females for nesting/child care, and in males for conquering/protecting. When these are turned inside out, there is usually (but not always) a reaction in the female to feel less respectful and
sexual toward her mate.

The whole blog entry is worth a read. She goes on to say...

A better study would be to find out what household situations make MEN happiest, because those are the ones which, overall, are going to attract the men who make the best husbands. Happy husbands spend more time with their families, and would swim through shark-infested waters for them.

Thank God for Dr. Laura.

Marriage Delay

Over at Biblical Manhood, you can find a substantial argument by Anakin Niceguy that men are not primarily to blame for delaying marriage - or not getting married at all. The rising average age that couples marry worries some advocates of early marriage and "marriage mandaters".

As I commented on the blog entry, I think the delay also has to do with how the workplace climate/job market has changed in recent decades.

Regardless of the faults of women or men, one reason for a delay in marriage is that it generally takes longer now for a man to become established to the point where he can financially provide for a family. These Early Marriage Mandaters think it is unrealistic that men will maintain purity if they marry later (and just who is interacting with men in these cases, hmmmmmm?) or not at all, but they don't think it is unrealistic for a man to marry, be a good husband and father (meaning, to them, always doing all of the things his wife wants him to do, cleaning up around the house, playing with the kids and changing their diapers, being there for breakfast and dinner) while AT THE SAME TIME completing his education... while already working in a job that earns enough income to provide for his family AND being active in church activities... and climb up the professional ladder while not "disrespecting his wife" by networking with female professionals.

Sorry... most of us do not live on isolated family farms anymore. Unlike our fathers and grandfathers, we are competing with women for seats in university/grad school classes and job openings and for payroll dollars. Getting professionally established often involves evening events or working late, working weekends, business trips, and relocations. It is also taking men (and probably women, too) longer to figure out who they are and what they want in life, especially with more choices than ever.

But getting back to what AN wrote...

I'm really hard pressed to argue to any childless guy who has been able to live well on his own or shacking up, has no desire to be a father, and has no qualm about sex outside of marriage (or, a low sex drive) why he should get married at all - and that seems to be a growing number of men.

As for men who are followers of Christ, I would still advise them (if they were to ask me) to be single and celibate and only marry only if a set of narrow circumstances are persistent. Those would include, among another things:

1) a desire on his part (not his family’s or anyone else's) that he be a husband
2) that he be in good standing to be a husband
3) he has found a woman he strongly desires with whom he is compatible and who likewise has a desire to be his wife and is in good standing to be a wife.

... but it seems like a confluence of those conditions seems to be more and more rare.

Yes, our grandparents were happily married for life starting at early ages, but grandma wasn't conditioned from an early age to disrespect and disparage men and normal masculinity. She didn't expect her husband to be just like one of her girlfriends, only with the ability to lift heavy objects, scare off some would-be predators, and open jars. She wasn't conditioned to expect she would have it all. She wasn't bed hopping. She didn't have old crushes and new smooth-talkers contacting her via online communications. She didn't have "no fault" divorce and all of the other family law elements that encourage nasty divorces and the spouse earning less income to file for divorce. Our grandparents usually didn't start out their adult lives facing many more years of school and massive debts. Grandpa could earn enough to support a family, even without college.

Our culture has changed, and marriage is not immune to those changes. An old-fashioned guy and an old-fashioned girl can get married young and have a happy and lasting marriage, but it is more difficult than ever for that to be the case.

I suppose men can be blamed for letting things get this way, because supposedly we once controlled everything with an iron-fist patriarchy, and if that is the case our fathers must have consented to these cultural shifts, presumably by letting their libidos overcome other internal influences and listening too much to the wrong women. Because now, the system definitely favors women in general, and when it comes to men, in general, it seems to reward the hedonist jerks and and punish the marriage-and-family-minded nice guys.

So if you are happily married to a godly wife or a godly man, thank God you have beaten the odds. That's the way I feel.

That's Business

The Dr. Laura Show is leaving KFI, its flagship radio station in Los Angeles, where her show was before her national syndication and has been during her national syndication up to this moment. She'll subsequently be on a much less powerful and popular station - KFWB AM 980. I have no doubt that she'll raise their ratings, but it will be nearly impossible for her to get the same ratings (or reach) that she did on KFI. There's always satellite radio and StreamLink, should KFWB or another radio station carrying her in the area not reach a listener's house, car, or office.

It is interesting to see CBS-owned KFWB, which used to be headline news 24/7, taking on talk, when earlier this year CBS-owned KLSX FM flipped from talk to Top 40, thereby depriving us of Adam Carolla, Tom Leykis, and others.

I especially miss Leykis, even though we disagree and some very basic things about life. I also still miss Howard Stern, who had been on KLSX before leaving for satellite radio, to be replaced by Carolla.

I learned as a kid not to get too attached to radio personalities or station formats (thanks to KMET 94.7 and KIQQ 100.3) Glad I learned that lesson early.

Frankly Speaking

Frank Pastore is a retired MLB pitcher who went from atheism to devout (and educated) Christianity. He has an afternoon drive talk show on local Christian radio station KKLA 99.5 FM. He calls it "the intersection of faith and reason". I generally like him, how he does his show, and what he says on his show about theology and politics.

But I do have a quibble.

He posts "run sheets" about what happened on his show, with links to websites of the guests or the material he discusses.

According to his run sheet, on Wednesday, July 22, from 6:28pm to 6:38pm, he discussed this:

Single moms, how can we as the church help you? Men's groups, shame on us for allowing their need to go unanswered!

Before I really get going, I want to at least commend Pastore for actually using the word "shame" instead of just the tactic, as is so common in today's culture, including the church, when it comes to men. Also, I did not hear the segment, but I have heard other segments of his show lately on issues of gender. With that said...

Excuse me? Why is it the responsibility of the "men's groups" at a church to take care of single mothers? Yes, I strongly believe it is the role of the church to care for those in need, including showing those in need ethical, moral, and legal ways to get out of being needy so that they, in turn, can help others. I certainly think it is better that people in need get their help from the church instead of the state.

But it is the role of the whole church. Not just the men, not the "men's groups", to take care of those in need. In the instance of single mothers, it should first and foremost be other women in the church who are ministering to their needs. It certainly isn't the role of men's groups to provide single mothers with companionship and attention.

I like that Dr. Laura makes a distinction when it comes to single mothers. When someone identifies themselves as a single mother (or father), she asks if they are "divorced, widowed, or never married". There is a difference. Most single mothers picked the wrong man with whom to make babies, or they made babies with a generally good man but treated him badly and/or divorced him and took custody of the children. These days, there are a few who deliberately used official or de facto (intentional one night stand or casual fling) sperm donation – intentionally depriving their child of a father. There are widows whose husbands were killed by some fluke or unpreventable terminal illness or negligence on the part of others, or in the line of duty, and they have my sympathies. There are also widows who picked a guy prone to violent or self-destructive behavior, which lead to his premature death.

These things are relevant because the church needs to approach these different women differently. A mother whose husband was killed serving his country or community doesn't have the same issues as a mother who keeps getting pregnant outside of marriage with different men.

Just as there should be roles in the home, it does make sense for there to be roles in the church. Men's groups can be tasked with things like security, doing auto repair and handyman and moving for any members of the church in need, or the church itself. Likewise, women's groups can be tasked with baking, shopping, babysitting, etc. When our first child was freshly born, different couples would bring us home cooked meals. In reality, the wives were doing the cooking. (And God bless them for doing it.)

But men's groups should not be tasked with most of the needs of single mothers. It isn't appropriate. If the father of those children is in the church, then the men's groups can lead him in in the direction of being a good father to his children, and possibly towards reconciliation/marriage to the mother of his children. The men's groups can help in the same way they would help any other person in the church. We shouldn't expect, say, a member of the church who is a plumber who gives a discount to other members of the church to do free work for a single mother simply because she is a single mother.

Otherwise, it should be well-grounded women in the church who are meeting the needs of single mothers.

I will not hold my breath waiting for Pastore, or other people in Christian media, to say "Women's groups, shame on you for allowing the needs of single fathers to go unanswered!"

In general, the church should not be asking men to take care of the needs of women without also asking women to take care of the needs of men. Most of all, the church should be teaching people how to rely on God and how to address their own needs (if God has left it to them) before seeking help from others.

Mom Wants Adult Daughter to Clean Up

Moving out does not mean the end of hearing "clean your room" from your mother. WORRIED MOM IN OREGON wrote in to Dear Abby:

My 35-year-old daughter, "Rhonda," is intelligent and creative, but her house is a disaster.

Why would someone expect someone's house to be clean and orderly because they are intelligent and creative? If anything, creative people are more likely to have a mess.

There are clothes, books, magazines, etc. piled on every surface. Dishes are stacked on her bed; socks and paper litter the floor.

While unmarried, and thus, living alone, I had my clothes, books, magazines, papers, and more piled everywhere, and my laundry in a pile. However, I never kept dirty dishes around, because I didn't want to attract bugs. Now that I'm married, I have my own room (with a closed door) dedicated to my disorganized stuff. The rest of our house is less cluttered but rarely ready to appear as a good example in a magazine. We have young'uns.

How can she feel good living like this?

Maybe she doesn't. It isn't really a problem unless there is a fire hazard or an actual health hazard - or if she is in dispair. Not everyone likes to entertain others in their home, and they don't mind living in clutter or disorganization.

Rhonda is caring and attractive, but she rarely dates.

Maybe she does "date" and you just don't know because she goes on booty calls and doesn't feel like telling you. Maybe she doesn't want to date. If she does want to date, maybe this is one way of keeping herself from bringing someone home, though from what I hear, a very messy place doesn't always stop someone from bringing their dates home.

Could her mess be a symptom of something more serious?

Sure. But so could pristine order and cleanliness.

Abby, I'm worried about my daughter's chances for future happiness, but I have no idea how to help her.

You have not indicated she is unhappy, and I'm sure you would have cited other evidence of her being unhappy if you had it. Maybe she has more important things to do than pick up everything and organize it, especially if she is the only person living there.

Dear Abby responded:

If you're the kind of mother who always picked up after her children, then this is only more of the same. If your daughter's disorderliness is something new, then it might be a symptom of depression or some other emotional problem.

All true.

When you say you are concerned about Rhonda's chances for future happiness, do you mean you're worried that she's 35 and still single? Not every woman needs a man to complete her.

Also very true. Well, as a follower of Christ I would say every woman AND man needs Christ, and He's a man, but that's not what we're talking about here.

Have a heart-to-heart talk with your daughter and explain your concerns. You won't find out what's going on in her head until you do.

If she expresses a desire for things to be different, you can try hiring a professional organizer and then a maid to come in once every week or two. However, at 35, old habits die hard, and things will likely get disorganized again, even if the place is "clean". And that is also something for any potential husband to keep in mind. This woman can't be relied on to keep a clean, orderly house. Marrying her means either cleaning up yourself, or paying for someone else to do it - or living like that.

Sixteen Will Get You Twenty?

That's an old saying about the risks of going after "jailbait" when it comes to sex. But take a look at this:

A high school athletic trainer was placed on three years probation and ordered to perform 240 hours of community service today for having an unlawful sexual relationship with a high school student.

Harold Adam Johnson, 24, San Juan Capistrano, pleaded guilty earlier this month to six counts involving sexual contact with a minor.

He admitted he engaged in a consensual affair – including sex acts in his San Juan Capistrano home and in his car – with a student he met while working as an athletic trainer at Tustin High School in 2008.

Johnson worked at the school for about a year and worked with several athletes in different sports until he resigned in November 2008 while he was under investigation.

Superior Court Judge Gregory W. Jones accepted Johnson's guilty pleas and reduced all felony counts to misdemeanors over the objections of Deputy District Attorney Nikki Buracchio.

Buracchio contended that Johnson should sustain felony convictions, arguing that Johnson took advantage of his position of trust and engaged in a continuous course of unlawful conduct over a lengthy period of time.

Jones, however, said misdemeanor convictions were appropriate because the sexual contact was consensual, the student was 16 and 17 during the course of conduct and was a willing participant who had engaged in some deception to maintain the relationship.

The judge noted that Johnson is a college graduate on his way to a productive life and is not likely to re-offend.

Jones also said that the age of consent in most states for sexual activity is 16.

Wow. Outrageous. A slap on the wrist.

But guess what? I changed the story a little bit. I changed the perp's name and references to the perp's gender, and I removed references to the student's gender. The perp in this case was actually Hope Ashley Jacoby and the victim was a boy. Does that change anything? What if I told you that people tend to find Jacoby attractive? The paper won't even name the boy, which is strange considering the actions and words of hte judge.

I want to look at a few quotes from Larry Welborn's Orange County Register article.

She admitted she engaged in a consensual affair - including sex acts in her San Juan Capistrano home and in her car - with a male student she met while working as an athletic trainer at Tustin High School in 2008.

So can minors consent to sex with adults many years older, or not? Sure, they can consent to abortion without so much as parental notification, but haven't we always heard that minors can't consent to sex?

Jones, however, said misdemeanor convictions were appropriate because the sexual contact was consensual, the male student was 16 and 17 during the course of conduct and was a willing participant who had engaged in some deception to maintain the relationship.

I see. I would be very interested if this judge would apply the same statements if he deals with a similar case where the sexes are reversed.

The judge noted that Jacoby is a college graduate on her way to a productive life and is not likely to re-offend.

Huh? I wonder on what that is based? And plenty of college grads on their way to a productive life do things that warrant prison time.

Jones also said that the age of consent in most states for sexual activity is 16.

So what? California has medical marijuana laws, and other states don't. Different states have different laws. For example, if my wife were to divorce me after ten years, California law would give her alimony for life. I couldn't appeal to the laws of another state to avoid this. This was in California, and is subject to California laws.

Manny of the people commenting on the article on the website are livid, rightfully pointing out that there is a double standard. This woman abused her position of authority. While it is tempting for some to say "lucky boy!", the law must be applied equally, right? Sure, I just wrote about my consensual relationship with an older woman, but I was 19 when that started – it was all legal.

This kid was not old enough to deal with the possibilities of STDs, pregnancy, child support, and the emotional issues.

It looks to me like there was a vagina and/or beauty discount here as far as her punishment and what her record will be. Even if you think this was no big deal and shouldn't be a crime - do you also say that about guys who have sex with underage girls?

My First MILF

Two disclaimers on this one.

1. I do not encourage sex with anyone other than one's spouse. You can read some of my reasons in a previous entry. You can read some other points worth considering here.

2. Yes, I'm writing about sex again. If this is a problem for you, skip this entry.

This is about my first real girlfriend – I wrote some about this relationship in this message, mostly talking about what was wrong with the situation. This entry, however, is more about why I was in that situation and what I got out of it.

If I had encountered her causally in my routine life, such as at the supermarket, simply having her walk by wouldn't have caused me to do a double-take and drool. She wasn't ugly by any means, and she did have a nice pair, but she was older and carrying some extra weight. The idea that an older woman would get involved with a 19-year-old guy was the stuff of the rare fictional TV show, like an episode of Soap I caught being rerun.

Not that I was a model. I was rather nerdish in my appearance, though I got of lot of aerobic exercise.

But between the e-mails, the phone calls, and the visits, I fell in love. She was a flirt and gave off this aura of sexuality.

I had a history of befriending people significantly older than me, including a female (with whom I have never and will never have that kind of relationship). A lot of it had to do with a shared hobby and that I was not the partying sort, and so I was not out partying with people my age.

So there I was with this flirty woman as a pen pal of mine, talking and writing back and forth, and me as a horny 19 year old who was thinking I was way behind when it came to my interaction with the opposite sex, and very shy when it came to those matters.

She started showing up in my fantasies. Eventually, I found an opening in our phone conversation and I told her I'd been having thoughts about her. In the context of our conversation, it was clear that they were sexual in nature.

There it was... on the table.

There was a pause on the other end of the phone.

That pause was killing me. I think I most expected dismissive laughter and a statement along the lines of "Me? Ha, that's funny. Cute. Say, did you see that fire on the news tonight?" Some form of rejection was coming – I was almost certain of that.

Instead she said, "I've been having thoughts about you, too."

WHAT?!? A dozen different substances must have flooded into my bloodstream at that moment. What did this mean? Would she dismiss the idea as a silly mutual crush that could never mean anything? At least she had some feelings for me.

Then she said "This means it is inevitable."

It was a lie, of course. I could have backed out. She could have backed out. Or, we could have met in public for a stroll and a serious talk about the issues we faced. Instead, she made plans to come to my place two nights later. Due to circumstances I won't bore you with, she ended up coming over the very next night instead – which was just as well, as one day of total distraction was more than enough.

And so it began, with me about as nervous as I could be.

I had had no idea this woman was attracted to me, and had been since the first time she'd caught a glimpse of me in person. In retrospect, one could ask how blind I could have been to miss the signs, including the time we were hanging out somewhere and she wanted to see where I lived. But I had very low self esteem when it came to women, and that evening when she wanted to see my place, we were with a couple of other people, one of whom sounded like she would come along - and my place looked like a disaster anyway. So I deferred to another time. There had been at least two occasions in the past – meaning my teens - when I was sure some girl was interested, but she wasn't. In one of those situations, I ended up getting punched in the side of my head by a dude I didn't realize was the boyfriend. (In retrospect, he was suffering more than me, being in a relationship with a girl who would flirt so much with other guys right in front of him.) So, I was overly cautious.

The feelings had been bubbling up. Just before the turning point, I had stayed over at her place, on the couch. I had thoughts about something happening, but with her daughter also in the apartment, I didn't dare try anything. She told me after everything started that she, too, had considered approaching me in the middle of that night.

On that one fateful night she came to my place. Her daughter, knowing her mother much better than I, questioned where she had been when she returned home later in the evening. When she told her daughter she had been at my place, her daughter, who had a boyfriend mere weeks younger than I, asked, "Were you good?" Her mother's expression gave her away. So her daughter was first to know.

I went to her place the next night, where her daughter was not happy to see me but was being taken out by her boyfriend... and it was constant after that.

At the time, I was a full-time student and I was working mostly Fridays through Sundays, holidays, and some short evening shifts. So I would usually go to her place Friday nights after my shift, leave from there for my shift the next day (or sometimes return home for a few hours), return to her place Saturday night, repeat the cycle, and then return home Sunday night – unless there was a Monday holiday.

I would also go over one night during the week, because the weekends were just too far apart.

She would often be out driving from client to client, and so there were times she would stop by my place during the school day, when I would be home between classes. Those were always pleasant surprises.

It didn't take me long to realize a few things about her:

1. She loved performing oral sex; she wanted me to ejaculate into her mouth and she enjoyed swallowing. Either that, or she was really good at faking it. I figured this out before I could even suggest or hint at it, let alone outright ask for oral sex. She went there on her own without any prompting on my part, and stayed there, persisting. I remarked, in a tone that was half asking and half surprise, that she wanted me to finish there, and she affirmed.

2. She truly liked sex. A lot. Love or no love. She didn't just like it as a way of bonding, or taking a relationship somewhere, or for use as a bargaining chip. She liked sex for sex. In fact, she said the often-used saying that "men use love to get sex and women use sex to get love didn't" apply to her – she would have a tough time having to choose between love and sex if there was such a dilemma.

However, she did, according to what she told me, go without sex for the previous five years, save for a single clumsy encounter months before we started up with a drunken guy I happened to know. From some of the other stuff she told me that she didn't have to, I have no reason to believe she was lying about her five years of celibacy, which roughly would have been from the period her daughter was 11. As her daughter was having sex by 15 or 16, this woman probably reasoned that setting a good example wasn't doing any good.

3. She was multi-orgasmic. This probably has something to do with point 2.

4. She had no hesitation about tasting herself anywhere on me.

As a result, it was common for me to enjoy the pleasure of cunnilingus until she had at least one orgasm, then engaging in intercourse and more kissing, and then finishing the session with her performing fellatio on me.

It was a good sex life – getting it at least three times a week, often more, even if it meant sacrificing an hour of sleep when I wasn't going to get nearly enough sleep as it was; the regular, enthusiastic fellatio with her swallowing at the end like it was the best thing she'd ever tasted; the things she would say.

Oh, the things she would say. Did she ever know how to lie to a man. Things like:

1. "You're so big."
2. "It is perfect; it's beautiful - I just want to stare at it."
3. "You're reaching me in just the right spot – we fit together so well."
4. "You are the best lover in the world."

That last one was definitely a lie. Even I wasn't naïve enough to believe that one. She was my first, after all, and by her own accounts, she had been with many guys. I'm sure she must have had a lot of better sex.

Still, all of this does wonders for a young guy's ego. He feels like he is a higher achiever of some sort, because he is able to keep the interest of an older, more experienced woman. In reality, it is usually a sign that something is wrong with the woman.

Her ex-husband and father of her child, who was totally out of the picture as far as I could tell, had been many years younger than her when they got pregnant and married – something like her in her later twenties and he maybe 19 or 20. She said they intentionally got pregnant first, because there was some question about his fertilization ability.

What was the deal with her and younger men? She linked it to her past.

She claimed to have been abused by her father, including sexually, though for years she had suppressed the memories. If it was true, it would certainly help explain some of her tendencies. She was actually married briefly as a teenager to get out of the house because her father almost killed her. She wasn't attracted to men who reminded her of her father – which, by that age, was men her age.

She called Dr. Laura to discuss the situation. I think Dr. Laura's show was still local back then, and the nature of the calls were somewhat different than they are now. I didn't hear the call, but she reported back that Dr. Laura told her that she was doing much the same thing to me that her father had done to her.

I can remember dismissing that with pointing out that I was a willing participant and I sure didn't feel like I was being abused.

I honestly thought it was about more than just sex. After all, we'd started out as friends. We struggled with the future. I was still of the mistaken belief that relationships like this were supposed to last as long as you didn't feel like murdering each other. I think she had originally figured she'd take my virginity, give me a makeover, have a short fling, and move on. But I (or the regular sex, or both) grew on her. That's why it lasted for a year and a half.

Not that the only alternative was doing the same thing with someone my own age, perhaps with a classmate, but I think I was better off going through this with some woman old enough to be my mother instead of some nice young college girl. It is for the best that I didn't knock up some girl who "accidentally" forgot to take the pill or poked holes in condoms, or take her virginity, or marry her because she was the first woman interested in me, or to lose her to some older guy who could legally buy alcohol or shower her with money. That was another good thing about the relationship – yeah, we bought gifts for each other, but she didn't expect me to otherwise spend money on her – which was good, because I didn't have any. She was practical in that regard.

Thankfully, although there were upsetting moments where it looked like we were going to break up, in the end I didn't experience a devastating break up with this relationship. It just kind of faded away when being grandma became her priority. We were still in contact daily, but she wasn't inviting me over, or coming to see me. When I finally moved on, and she figured it out, she was upset, but we hadn't seen each other in so long and we didn't have any actual commitment. I was surprised she was upset. A few months later, she called to apologize for her reaction and we were on friendly terms after that.

Some things I learned (and perhaps could have learned another way, or didn't need to know to have a good life):

I was not made of woman-repellant.
I was capable of sexually satisfying a woman.
A lot of women show attraction to a man if he is already seeing someone.
Some women do enjoy fellatio and swallowing.
I didn't have to spend loads of money to have a girlfriend.
Breakups aren't the end of the world.
Age differences seem to disappear in the playful throes of passion.
Dating older women can be a lot of fun.
Dating mothers means dealing with their child(ren), which can be a pain.

Speaking of dating mothers – although I subsequently dated some other older women over the years, only one was a mother. It was a brief fling and I didn't deal with her kids at all.

So now you may understand a little more about where I am coming from.

Although I had a lot of fun, my best advice now would be: Don't try this at home – or anywhere for that matter.

The Bachelor and Bachelorette Franchise is Not About Matchmaking

And so passes another finale for a season of "The Bachelorette". My wife watches.

If you don't want the show spoiled for you, come back to this blog entry later.

Natalie Finn has this story for E! Online, corporate sibling to ABC. This is the one quote I picked out:

Here's a lesson to remember, girls - as nice as one man's 8-pack may be, go with the guy who thinks you're a genius.

Just as men looking for a wife need to see past the well-placed molecules to evaluate character traits of women, women need to do the same when it comes to men. If she looks well enough, she just might be able to find the guy with the 8-pack who also thinks she is a genius.

Back to the show.

So both (or three) dudes were ready to propose to her, and one actually did, and she accepted.

Are they still together? Will they be in another six months? This franchise has a terrible track record, as do most imitators/variations. I wrote about this previously. Everything I wrote still applies. How much time are these people really spending with each other, and over the course of how many weeks?

I understand that as a straight married male, this show isn't targeted towards me. But c'mon, ladies, do you watch thinking there's a good chance that these people are going to find lasting love with each other?

Girl Power That I Can Cheer

Kudos to an 11-year old heroine! (I did spell that right, didn't I?) Denisee Salazar of the Orange County Register brings us a story from Anaheim with an almost-perfect ending.

The incident occurred at 10:30 a.m. Monday at the park in the 2100 block of South Haster Street while the [three year old] boy was at the playground playing with his 11-year-old sister and 12-year-old cousin. Their mothers were watching over them, said Anaheim police Sgt. Rick Martinez.

Great - getting the kids away from the TV and out where they can play and exercise - and not putting them in some day orphanage. So far, so good.

The boy was sliding down a slide when a man grabbed him and then ran northbound through the park carrying him, Martinez said.

Scary stuff. What kind of horrors were awaiting this child? Ah, but this is where the story gets good...

The child's sister caught up to the man, kicked him in the leg, and threw dirt in his face.

YES!!! Now there's a sister who deserves some respect from her siblings.

The man dropped the boy and ran northbound across Orangewood Avenue, then westbound and across Haster Street, Martinez said. Another man, possibly an accomplice, ran behind him.

The man was nearly hit by a truck as he ran across Orangewood, Martinez said.

Ah - darn it. If only that driver had sped up a little, the cops wouldn't still be looking for this creep.

Going Intergenerational and Blending Families

Let’s check in on relationship problems via an advice column, shall we? "Non-Cougar in Calif." wrote in to Dear Margo:

I am 29. My love is 55.

Okay.

We were friends first, and then it turned into a real relationship.

Let me guess... you are an "old soul"? Of course you were friends first, but only because you were attracted to him and he was to you. If you hadn't been attracted to him in the first place, he would have ended up in the "only a friend" zone, never to get out.

When we met, it was supposed to be "Friends with Benefits," but as the years went by we developed feelings for each other, which led to a relationship.

Funny how that happens. See - "friends first" - right.

I have a 5-year-old and he has a 16-year-old.

Oh heck no. Wrong! You should both be focusing on raising your children.

I've said that maybe I want more children, and he has said he’s open to it.

As "guy" as my first language, let me translate what he means: "I don't want more children, but I want to keep fornicating with you, so I will not give you a definite 'no' because this way, you'll keep fornicating with me."

But with our huge age difference, I am questioning it. What are your thoughts?

Raise your child. You'll be 42 when you child is raised. If you want to adopt then, find a man closer to your age who always wanted to adopt, marry him, and adopt. It is a bad idea to get pregnant by a 55-year-old guy who has a 16-year-old and doesn't want more kids. When you also consider that you already have your own child to raise... forget it.

I speak from some experience when dealing with age differences and prior kids in dating, although in my case she was the only one with a kid (who was, like this case, 16), and was the older one in the relationship. Throughout my rebellious time, I had relationships and flings with a few older women. One of those pairings had the same age spread as the letter-writer's, though I was 19 and she was 45. It is even more problematic at those ages, and with the male being the younger partner.

Mind you, I didn't know this woman was 45 at first.

In the days before most people had their pictures online, there were these dial-up electronic bulletin board services – some of them for a hobby or interest, and others for socializing. This one was for socializing in my metropolitan area, and you'd see someone's first name, their age, their gender, and their sexual orientation. I started talking with, among other people and usually in a "group setting”, a woman I thought was 29. It was never dirty, mind you, even when it got flirty. Just joking around and talking about whatever. When I took a serious look at her stats again, she was listed as 39, and I wondered why I had started chatting up someone so much older than me, not remembering that the stat previously said 29. Why all of this happened this way and how I eventually found out she was 45 is rather a boring story and not important to this post. The two important things to remember is that when I got heavily involved with her, I thought she was 39, and she later told me she was 45 after some math didn't make sense to me.

Originally, she had thought maybe I would be good for her daughter. But her daughter was a troubled brat. And shewasn't interested in me anyway. So, the elder woman of the house began to flirt with me big time. Dysfunction much?

Me, I was wrong. Wrong wrong wrong. Wrong for getting involved with a much older woman, wrong for getting involved with a mother with a minor child, and wrong for fornicating. Not to excuse my sins, but rather explain a little bit... I was almost completely inexperienced with dating, naïve, felt affection-deprived, and had an inferiority complex. I was ill-equipped to resist the flirtations of a (very) experienced, available older woman, even if this was before the whole "MILF" thing made it to pop culture. I was also living on my own, away from my family, by myself. That makes messin' around really easy.

We carried on for a year and a half. We didn't keep it a secret. Our friends and family and even a lot of our coworkers at our respective workplaces knew. We struggled from time to time with the age difference and the morality of the whole thing. It fell apart after her daughter gave birth. Grandma did't want to deal with the drama of her new-mother daughter fighting with her, and ditching me gave them one less thing to fight about. About 7 or 8 months later, I stumbled cluelessly into another relationship with a woman who was only two years older than me. Grandma later found some new 18 or 19-year-old guy for a while, and we were on friendly but distant terms until we lost contact after moves.

It wasn't all bad. We didn't really fight with each other, as we were too busy defending our relationship to others. She fed me well – meaning home cooked meals that helped me to lose weight. Between those and the – ahem – regular exercise (minimum three times a week, every week), I didn't even have to try to lose weight – it just happened. I slimmed down to an ideal weight. She showed how to behave with more confidence, and she gave me a makeover so I wouldn't look so much like the nerd I am. I was certainly not as bad off as I would have been if I had "fallen in love" with her daughter instead.

But out of all the things wrong about that relationship, at least we didn't marry, as that would have been a mockery, and I didn't get her pregnant. That would have been horrible for the child. Also, I didn't have a child to expose to a situation that was really all about having sex without marriage or a realistic hope of getting married and having it work.

Thank God for His mercy and forgiveness.

What is Wrong With This Picture?

It's another bright and sunny day in Santa Ana, California. Denisse Salazar of the Orange County Register has this article of interest.

Susie Young Kim, 37, was shot and killed just after 1 a.m. April 10 at 17th Street and Grand Avenue near a Food 4 Less supermarket in Santa Ana after a 30-minute [high speed] pursuit through Buena Park, Anaheim, Fullerton and Santa Ana.

That saved us the expense of having her go through the court and correctional systems, right? Well, keep reading.

Kim's 13-month-old daughter, who was in a car seat in the back seat of the black Toyota sedan she was driving, was unharmed. She was taken to Orangewood Children's Home and then placed under the care of her grandparents and father.

Thank God. How evil of her to put her child in that situation.

But guess what? Susie Young Kim's parents have filed a claim against the city!

The claim was filed June 24 by attorney Dale K. Galipo on behalf of Kim's parents, Yung Kim and Nancy Kim, and on behalf of her daughter, Angelica Kim Contreras, and the estate of Susie Young Kim.

That's what we call nerve. Audacity.

The claim asks for $20 million in damages, including for funeral expenses, legal costs, severe emotional distress, survival and punitive damages.

And what about Susie Young Kim's responsibility in all of this?

The claim alleges that the Santa Ana Police Department's officers involved in the incident "used excessive deadly force, which resulted in the death of Susie Young Kim."

Why have the officers never used excessive force against me? Oh, that's right. Because I don't put myself in that position. I don't drive like a maniac and refuse to pull over.

It goes on to say that the officers involved also "knowingly endangered the passenger child by using unnecessary deadly force and negligently handling the vehicle pursuit."

Susie Young Kim endangered the child, if the newspaper has it right.

Galipo said that based on his independent investigation to date, the officer fired from the side and there were no bullet holes to the front of the windshield.

Which might have been what spared the child.

After the incident, Buena Park police Sgt. Bill Kohanek said officers saw a car seat in the back seat and broadcast that over police radio, but he also said it's not uncommon for officers to miss transmissions.

I've driven many times with a car seat that didn't have a child in it. Especially at 1am.

Santa Ana has 45 days to respond to the claim. After that, a lawsuit can be filed. Galipo said they intend to file a lawsuit unless the city wants to reach a settlement.

Ka-ching!!! Blood money.

Galipo said it's unclear why Kim did not immediately stop when a Buena Park police officer tried to pull her over.

Oh, of course it is. I'm sure she had a perfectly good reason not to stop. Everyone does that with a 13-month-old in the car. At 1am.

I'm so sick of people who commit crimes (or the people who raised them) getting seven figure paydays at taxpayer expense.

Hey Yung Kim and Nancy Kim – how about a formal public apology for the actions of your daughter? You know, some day, that child is going to find out what her mother did. Poor thing... that child is the real victim in all of this, and her mother is mostly to blame, if the newspaper's report has it right.

Another Example of a Serial Killer in Training

...or two serial killers. Brought to you by the Associated Press.

A New York City teenager has admitted that she failed to let a kitten out of an oven after a friend put the animal inside and left it to roast to death.

Fluffy is now Crispy.

Authorities say Cherry and a 14-year-old friend ransacked a Bronx apartment before putting the cat in the oven, where it cried and scratched before dying.

And yet there are guys out there whould be stupid enough to intentionally not only marry these gals, but impregnate them.

In-Law Situation - What Is Your Take?

Someone (a wife and mother of more than one child) who shall remain anonymous left me this comment:

Let me get your opinion here: My husband's sister got knocked up and gave the baby up about 2.5 years ago. Six months later, she got married to a fellow (not the baby daddy) and is now pregnant again.

These in-laws would like to [move] to my state to be close to my husband and I so that they can "utilize" me as daycare while they finish their degrees and work beyond full time. I was very clear that I think a child should be raised by its parents. My husband, however, stepped in to say "we" (which is to say ME) would do whatever we could to help them out.

Sure sometimes there are extenuating circumstances, but, I gave up college and worked around my husbands college and work when we had our first.

It's not like either one is close to graduation, we're taking years. My husband and I are thinking about having one more child ourselves.

...I'm not wrong here, am I? You put your wife and kids and their needs before others, even relatives, don't you? You encourage people to make the necessary sacrifices, you don't make it easy to abandon their kids, right? Or am I just being stingy and persnickety? I've been changing diapers for about 7 years straight now - I can barely muster up the love to wipe my own kids bums ... and I'm pretty sure I'll be expected to be cheap if not free labor. My time isn't valued. I feel whiny. Sorry...they haven't moved yet and probably can't afford to (unless they were to move in with us for a while), so it's all hypothetical.

What do you think?

I wrote back privately, but I'll share some of my thoughts here...

Ultimately I defer to how these things are settled in your family. I'll give you MY opinion though, even though my opinion should mean squat within the walls of your home.

These in-laws would like to my state to be close to my husband and I so that they can "utilize" me as daycare while they finish their degrees and work beyond full time.

This MIGHT be okay... IF... you had the time (reading your blog, I think you have enough on your plate) AND they would PAY you for it. So, essentially, it would be a home-based business.

I was very clear that I think a child should be raised by its parents. My husband, however, stepped in to say "we" (which is to say ME) would do whatever we could to help them out.

Sounds to me that he is putting his sister and his charitable feelings - as well as intentioned as they may be - over the needs of his family. "Leave and cleave". His wife and kids should take the higher priority.

Sure sometimes there are extenuating circumstances, but, I gave up college and worked around my husbands college and work when we had our first.

EXACTLY. You have made good choices and should be further burdened by the choices of others. Now, of course family helps each other out and in cases like this family babysits from time to time, but not regularly.

I'm not wrong here, am I?

No, you are not.

You put your wife and kids and their needs before others, even relatives, don't you? You encourage people to make the necessary sacrifices, you don't make it easy to abandon their kids, right?

Yes. Yes. Have I mentioned before that my MIL keeps pressuring my wife to leave our child with her overnight? Have I mentioned my wife has refused to cater to her mother's wishes, even to let her babysit for a few hours during the day, because MIL is an active alcoholic? MIL would stop bitching if my wife simply said, "okay!" But we just can't take the risk.

Tell your husband that you feel for them, but you need to put taking care of him and your children over making it easier for his sister. They have made their choices... and you two have made yours. Aren't there grandparents who could get involved? Childless relatives/friends who would like to have the fun of looking after kids without the ultimate responsibility?

The bottom line for your husband should be that you are his wife. You are the one in his bed. Tell him that you were hoping to have more time and energy to focus on practicing the art of lovemaking, and it will be difficult to do that if you have to take on this unecessary burden.

Family should step in when something unplanned happens... some sort of accident or illness or something that someone did not bring upon themselves. Your SIL's situation in entirely her own doing.

She wrote back, explaining that the other options (other relatives) I mentioned are a no-go and why.

You know how I feel about this. Any more advice???

Parenthood by Proxy

I attended a baby shower over the weekend. These things should NOT be co-ed, but I might have had to go anyway, because it was for my sister-in-law and her husband as they anticipate the arrival of their first child. One couple in attendance brought their two-month-old adorable child. Absolutely precious.

What made me even happier to see this child was that her parents tried so hard for so long to get pregnant this time around, and that was AFTER trying hard to get pregnant, carrying a child to term, and then discovering upon birth that the child had a problem that prevented the baby from living more than a couple of weeks. Very sad.

So seeing them with this healthy baby was great.

Then my heart sank as the mother explained to my MIL that she's going back to work very soon and has found a day orphanage for her two-month-old.

Her husband is a good earner. I'm sure they could make it with her staying at home. Or with him staying at home.

Why try so hard to make a kid and carry that child around for nine moths so that you can see the child essentially only weekends? Grade school will come soon enough. Why not enjoy your child during the infant and toddler years?

I feel like I am missing out when I am away from my child. I'm thankful my wife gets to spend as much time with her as she does, and thankful my wife was willing to have this arrangement.

Why do people allow themselves to believe that hired help is better for their child than they are? Clearly, some new parents choose daycare when they have other realistic options. And most everyone else using daycare who "must" choose it "must" choose it becausae a series of previous choices in which they could have chosen differently.

To all you SAHMs and SAMDs - GOOD FOR YOU!!!

For the Sake of the Kids

Divorce and out-of-wedlock parenting have become so commonplace that it is now shocking heresy to take the position I'm taking. "WENDY" IN WASHINGTON wrote in to Dear Abby:

If someone is in an "unhappy" marriage with kids, is it a good idea or bad thing to wait until the kids are adults before considering divorce?

I tend to agree with Dr. Laura on this – put the kids first. Stick together and behave as though you love the person. Model a peaceful, cooperative home for your children. Don't take any bait to engage in fighting. Who is to say things will not work out in the mean time? Plus, this gives you more power to protect your children and control what kind of home they'll continue to have than if you divorced. You don't want your kids exposed to different honeys your spouse would have in the place if you weren't living together.

The exception, which I shouldn't even need to point out, is when danger is involved. In that case, take the kids and go – preferably to your parents so they kids will have both a male and female role model.

One of the risks in these cases is that the higher earner (in most cases, the husband) will be ensuring that he will be financially obligated to his wife for life. In California, ten years of marriage can obligate a man to pay alimony for life. The "guy solidarity" side of me wonders if it would be possible to legally separate but still live in the home in such situations. I know there are such things as post-nuptial agreements. This is another reason to have a pre-nup in the first place, though I think it is possible for a court to ignore it.

Ultimately for me, the needs of the children take priority, even if that means a guy will have to be paying money to life to some harlot shrew who was nothing but trouble to him for most of their time together. I would like to see the divorce laws changed - but whether they are changed or not, kids still need their parents.

Dear Abby replied:

I have heard from children of dysfunctional couples saying that although their parents didn't fight openly, they could feel the tension between their parents and would have grown up emotionally healthier if their parents had separated.

How do those children know that? It is easy to imagine that your parents wouldn't be fighting with each other and therefore things would be better (not to mention two sets of gifts received for each occasion), but I'm thinking these children didn't think about the possible (and likely) negatives of divorce. Their parents could still be fighting for years after a divorce, using the children as pawns, and exposing their children to unsavory dates.

It would be nice if everyone could by happy and have their ideal marriage. Dealing with a difficult person is not fun, especially when it is day in and day out in your own home. I know. I was once engaged to a woman who had a key to my place and I realized I needed to end it when I would approach my door, realize that she was inside, and be disappointed that she was. But once you choose to become a parent, you have obligations that take precedence over your wants.
Yet another reason to choose your spouse wisely and treat your spouse kindly.