Stephen, one thing about a bit of angst is that it builds character and gives us insights we would have never had otherwise. I have been listening to A Beautiful Boy and wondered as I listened if maybe his parents tried to hide the hurt from him and didn’t make him tough enough mentally.
The first thing I realized is the boys father broke the rules. He cheated on Nick’s mother and the marriage ended in divorce. Then the father got a girlfriend who then cheated on him. She broke the rules. Does this make it more likely that Nick would break the rules.
Nick finds himself torn between two families because his father didn’t obey the rules. Your mother and I may have had our disagreements, but in many ways, we did obey the rules. We didn’t cheat on one another. We generally treated each other with respect. We tried to live the values we taught you.
The father often refers to Nick as that skinny kid. It made me wonder what the dad did to make the kid feel good about himself. We went backpacking and skiing. You surfed like Nick. Nick did a lot of fun things with his son. But did he do character building things with him? You lacked confidence, but deep down inside you didn’t. There was something deep within you that Nick didn’t have. I think that’s the difference. It’s true of Jennifer too.
The other thought that came to mind was that religion was so liberal in Nick’s family. They acted like they were doing him a favor by being so open minded. I disagree. Kids need grounding and need to know their parents believe in something. I don’t think the parents provided this in Nick’s life.
Nick’s dad looks at all the things he did with Nick and how his life was so normal, well at least as normal as most kids, but I think that the Dad breaking the rules led to Nick breaking the rules to fill the empty spot his parents left by not grounding him in some real belief. It’s like I told Jennifer when she was younger. Being smart is OK, but having common sense is more important.
Your mother and I discussed whether we wanted to bring you and Jennifer up brilliant by enriching your environment beyond normal, which is sound like Nick’s parents did. Or raise you as normal kids. We decided on the latter. Yes, there have been problems along the way and you and Jennifer have had drama in your lives, but then we all do. And the real secret to life is learning to live with the drama and learning to cope with what lives gives us.
There are not real solutions in the end because life is not static. A solution that solves a problem today may not solve the same problem a year later.
Lastly, raising children requires eternal vigilance. Parents can’t just assume everything is OK with their kids because it never is. It’s because life isn’t static. I haven’t gotten into the book far enough to know what the parents did when Nick first showed signs of drug use, and of course will have more to write about that later.
Anyway, Seattle is a wonderful city and it’s surprising that none of us live there. I thought when I was young I’d make my home there, but it never happened.
