*blend

Show the geek in your life that you really do understand them…

They even come on double-sided tape so you can place your gift where you can be absolutely certian your geek-love will find it…on the keyboard of course!

For the most part, living in a small rural town is great. Less crime, quiet neighborhoods, the freedom to allow your children to roam the streets safely. It took me a year to get used to the fact that the selection in the grocery store is limited. We had to drive 90 miles if we wanted to go to the theater. But I did get used to it, and wouldn’t have traded my small town life for anything. But after over 8 years here, we have watched our small town change dramatically.

Traffic on the main street has grown. We have 5 traffic lights, all on this street. And this street is where every teen with the keys to mommy’s car cruises for hours after school and on weekends. I can live with this, I suppose I wold rather them cruise the street in plain sight rather than hiding out on the back roads of the ranches drinking. With the added traffic, the safety of the streets has diminished. Many of the cruisers whip around on the residential streets ignoring stop signs, and probably never seeing the younger teens walking. I have 4 younger teens who live to walk these streets just like the older ones can’t wait to cruise. But now I do worry when they are out. I remind them each time to watch the traffic, stay off the main drag, and stay together. Sometimes I just don’t let them go at all. No one has gotten run over in our community, but I don’t want to take the chance that one my children will be the first. My younger two are only allowed to go one block down the street to the park, and never without one of the older girls with them. I recognized the actions in myself that I exhibited while living in much larger towns: mistrust of others in my community, worrying about what could happen to the kids in plain daylight, locking our doors and setting the car alarms. It happened slowly, so slowly that I didn’t realize it until many months later. I miss the small town I first moved to.

I blame over half of the problems we experience now on one thing that will probably get me told off by many parents: most of these teens and young adults have NO DISCIPLINE. They are used to getting they want, doing what they want, and have no idea of consequences.

One day, while standing in line at Wal-Mart, I watched a 15 or 16 year old girl verbally abuse her mother because she wouldn’t buy the jeans the kid wanted. She used every foul word she could, and was doing it loudly. And this mother, while being called a bitch by her own child, just stood there and took it! I know none of my 6 daughters would ever do this. Why? First, they have been taught since birth that you don’t act like this, and second, they KNOW there will be consequences if they did. My kids aren’t perfect by any means, they do stupid things, and say stupid things, but they suffer the consequences of doing so. They are children…they will push their boundaries and push my buttons, but in the end, I think they do know where that line is that you just don’t cross…ever. You don’t touch other people’s property. You show respect for adults, and for your peers, and especially for yourselves.

I know that in some instances, the aggression exhibited by these kids is no fault of the parent. Moms and Dads can do everything right, and will still probably have to deal with a rebellious disrespectful teen at some point. But these parents will also ensure that the kid understands the laws of cause and effect in doing so. What about that mother in Wal-Mart? Will she go home and ground the kid? I doubt it, because their relationship was obvious. The mother will do nothing, the kid will forget about the jeans, and life will go on.

Another area in which the lack of discipline rears it’s ugly head is the workforce. The level of service at our restaurants and stores sucks. No other way to say it. It’s not because the owners of the establishments don’t care what goes on, but because there is a serious lack of available bodies to work. One of our local restaurants had to stop opening on Sundays because no one wants to work. Another had to cut their 24-hour schedule, because no one wants to work. And while we have many fine, polite, and skilled individuals in the service industry, we also have a high number of teens and young adults who feel they are owed a paycheck just because they showed up. Their time at work is spent talking about:

• their weekend
• the jerk who didn’t call them back
• what so’n’so did with so’n’so last night when their boyfriend wasn’t looking
• the severity of the cramps they were feeling because they were on the rag
• what he did with his best friend’s girlfriend
• how he took the car keys when his father told him no, and told the a-hole to go eff himself
• how hot the chick at the next table was and what she’d like to do to her

These are snippets of actual conversations around me while checking out at the grocery store or placing an order in a restaurant. The checker talking with the bagger. Two waitresses not bothering to end their conversation and both came to the table to take our order. The busboy who went to the table next to us and sat down while his buddy took our order. These people apparently have no idea where that line is! And if they do, they don’t care. Before you blame the store manager or restaurant owner, remember what I said earlier: at least these brats showed up. I was able to buy my groceries, and eat my dinner, because bad service is better than no service at all.

All of this leads me to the real point of my rant. If these kids knew boundaries, could have fun without hurting others, if they had been taught from an early age where that line is, what happened yesterday probably wouldn’t have happened. Kids will always egg cars, and toilet paper houses, but this is just pathetic:

My husband came home from the rig to take me to lunch. He got in at about 11:30, and we left for lunch at about noon. It was quiet on the streets, Saturday afternoon, most of our neighbors were home but inside because it was a little foggy. We left my truck parked in front of one my husband’s work trucks on the street in front of the house and drove off happily in the other truck. The neighbor next to us got home about 1:30, and said all was fine when he had pulled in. When we pulled in at 2, we found the rear window to my truck shattered. Not just broken, but completely shattered and knocked to the ground. It was apparent they had broken the glass, then pulled the shards out. This wasn’t an attempted robbery, because you can see that the truck had nothing it just by glancing through a side window. Not even a penny in the cup holder. It was pure mean vandalism.

To top it off, the police are more concerned with whether I had made someone mad instead of the fact that in broad daylight, some brats looking for some kicks shattered the window of my truck! The cops leave, and I know I won’t hear from them again. I’ll have to go the station and beg for a police report so I can file it on my insurance.

Why so negative about my local PD, you ask? Because when we had to report an act of vandalism early last year, the officer that showed up told us to quit wasting his time. Quit wasting his time! The attitudes of the people in charge of protecting us are just as bad as that of the mother in Wal-Mart: it will pass, and life will go on.

And I ask myself: do I want my life to go on in this community, or is it time to find a new small town?

1. Grab the book closest to you.
2. Open to page 123, look down to the 5th sentence.
3. Post the text of the next 3 sentences on your blog.
4. Include the title and the author’s name.

“Beside him, Alice began to cry. It was the sort of out-of-breath weeping a tired child might make. One who is used to punishment.”

from the paperback edition of Cell by Stephen King.

Meme from Book Through Thursday