Novice

Yesterday I was glancing through something I cannot now remember, and recall seeing the phrase "novice parent". It made me start thinking: Aren't we all novice parents? Did anyone get the manual that goes with each of these children when she suddenly became yours? Is it possible to advance from being a novice?

Wouldn't that kind of manual be great though? I'd love to peruse the chapter headings:

3--Feeding your child

7--When they no longer like the choices you present for them to wear

11--How to choose their friends

13--Helping them help themselves

17--Food aversions need not be life long

19--Interpreting their teen aged silences, or translating eye rolling

I'd read those chapters. In fact, I'd probably read them with a highlighter in my hand and a red pen stuck behind my ear. Then I would quote them prolifically here on the blog so you could also gain that sort of insight.

Sadly, without such a manual, I remain a parenting novice. A status that will undoubtedly stay with me the remainder of my life.

The second child wasn't any easier to parent than the first--as everything I thought I had figured out with The Girl, had no bearings on The Boy. Typical.

And after that no-longer-mortal point, these children revert to their Heavenly Parents again, right? And those parents are absolutely perfect. Great. I am hosed.