Tom Scocca's NY Times op-ed/true confession of his kid's strollercentric city life is pretty great.
It made me think of two things, though. OK, three:
1) Duh. That just means he's right.
2) When the kid was a few weeks old, I had my first preschool admissions conversation with a friend whose kids were 3yo. He told of attending a parents informational session where there were audible, nervous gasps when the director said he didn't want kids who just get pushed around all day in a stroller, and that he wants kids who can play and climb a flight of stairs.
3) As good as Scocca's writing is, the best line in his piece does not belong to him, but to family psychologist/cranky old man John Rosemond, who once wrote about how toddlers on leashes were not demeaning:
Here's what's demeaning: Wheeling a four-plus year-old child through a public place in a stroller as he's drinking from a sippy-cup. Those kids have no idea how demeaned they are, not to mention how absolutely ridiculous that looks.You have no idea how demeaned you are. I'm totally going to use that from now on.
Why Walk When You Can Stroll? [nyt]
Should kids be on leashes? And what about strollers? [seattletimes]
I thought this line was the real winner:
"There’s a fallacy among childless people that there are simple ways for parents to make their children less annoying, and the parents just choose not to do them."
Yes, that's a good line. Makes me think of the man in front of me on the airplane who said I should just tell my 21 month old that he should stop putting the tray table down (resulting in me having to keep putting it back up and therefore annoying the man). Yeah, that'll stop him.