A Letter to Generation Q

Dear Quinn,

As much as I look for the angle from which the glass appears half-full, I still have twinges of freaky weird luck. Not necessarily bad luck, but as your Auntie Stacy will tell you, I have been known to have some of the most bizarre things happen, and that's not counting the use of my head as target practice by birds up above.

In light of this freaky phenomena, it's best I don't assume I will have all my marbles, any idea where I put my marbles, or the teeth to sound out certain words by the time you might find a fraction of what I mumble to be noteworthy. For that reason, I'm going to start jotting down a few flecks of "wisdom"... all for you to ultimately discard anyway -- as we all do with hand-me-downs of horse sense from our parents.

Here's a start...

1. Never ask Grandpa what's in the stew he made, whether it's fishheads, or watermelon rind really doesn't matter and no one should be privy to such a vile recipe. Just hold your breath, drink it, feign a smile then down a pack of mentos. If those are ancient and don't deaden your taste buds, (as some things in your grandparents' home tend to be a wee bit stale), then find a jar of Ben Gay and eat that because that stuff never goes bad.

2. On the topic of eating, follow the advice of moderation from my childhood neighbor Mrs. Sullivan: Never eat more than two cookies in a day. (I managed to forget the time interval and discovered along with a need for fat pants it wasn't "Never eat more than two cookies in a two second period without lots of chocolate milk to wash it down.")

3. Get a sense for the very few times in life that it is really worth "fitting in," and learn colorful language for the other occasions. (Just don't tell anyone your Mom taught you such words.)

4. If in the fourth grade you dare a friend to eat the glue in art class in exchange for $10, and then he actually, stupidly eats it... Do the right thing and pay the poor kid. His bum will be paying for the dare a lot longer than it took you to earn that much money from your penny-pinching parents.

5. Your eyes really could freeze in that position if you keep making that ridiculous face behind my back.

6. Skip the kool-aid. You might look like the odd one out, but whether it be hairdos, clothes, music, piercings, political thought, or a particular religion. . . Find what truly suits you so that later in life you don't have to make excuses for how you got sucked into such nonsense, and then have no pictures of your childhood because you had to torch all of 'em.

7. Just say "no" when someone says "Oh my god, that's awful! Smell that!!!" Nothing good ever comes of that.

8. Don't get nervous sleeping over at a friend's house. Your Dad and I will still be there in the morning; we won't have moved or abandoned you. Well, if by chance we did move overnight, we'd definitely leave a forwarding address.

9. Find a guy (or girl, we'd rather you be happy than try to shock us) that works hard, but plays hard; has more toys than you, and shares all of them with you.

10. Surprise people with your strength, but then expect to carry all the heavy stuff.

That's it for now. Until next time, I will hunt in a place better than my own backend for more nuggets of wisdom.

Love,
Mommy