Sharing Doesn't Work; How about Fratricide?

My family and I were invited to eat at a friend's house tonight. You may ask, why would such a mundane occurrence as a dinner invite merit a blog post? Well, for most families, surely it wouldn't. But for ours, this is quite a rare occasion. You see, I believe our reputation precedes us. With four of the silliest boys on this hemisphere we seldom receive an invite and with good reason too. My wife and I remarked that the host family must surely be so new to Doha that they haven't heard of our tempestuous boys.

Well, after tonight they definitely heard them. If it wasn't Hector screaming frantically for milk, it was the other three fighting relentlessly to dominate their young host's toy car collection. As I listened, or rather attempted not to listen, to Cinci's high-pitched wail as Sherman repeatedly "stealed" his toy from him, I could hear my wife with a veneer of calm and understanding encouraging Sherman to share with his brother. After two hours of our children's shreiking cacaphony, I'm certain our departure relieved our hosts.

Driving home with a few moments to contemplate as my wife dozed and my children, perhaps exhausted from two hours of incessant yelling, settled into a pristine silence, I wondered why my children can't share. " With four boys you'd think they could learn how to share, " I had heard my wife complain to our gracious hosts. Well, maybe sharing just isn't what boys do. The dynastic troubles of monarchies of old are replayed in the microcosm of my family. It seems that boys have always wanted everything within reach.

It's no marvel to me that the first recorded homicide in Western history was fratricide, Cain's killing of Abel. As man developed, it seems, boys had a tendency to quarrel over their share of an inheritance. As families began to acquire wealth, they realized that such capital, rather than being dispersed equally between heirs, should be concentrated under one patriarch in order to preserve the family's wealth. But to whom should go the greatest share? In the West the law of primogeniture entailed the majority of an estate to the oldest male heir, thus solving the internecine feuds that often ensued the death of a powerful patriarch. The Ottoman Turks had a different way of dealing with a boy's inherent desire to obtain his share, they codified the law of fratricide. With the death of the sultan civil war inevitably ensued as brother would contend with brother as each struggled to ascend the throne. Finally, the victor, he who had killed all of his brothers, claimed the spoils, and thus the empire, rather than being entailed away to the various offspring inhabiting the Ottoman harem, was consolidated in the hands of one man.

Unfortunately, neither primogeniture nor institutionalized fraticide appear to be suitable antidotes to the civil strife in my domain. Should we choose to impose primogeniture upon our family, Atticus, I'm sure, would be elated but his brothers would be loathe to acquiesce in his predominance. Although from the high-pitched shrills emanating from our walls the neighbors may conclude that fratricide is the law in our family, I'm afraid my wife doesn't have the stomach for it. So, it would seem that the search for a Pax McColluma will remain elusive in our lands.

The Last Paperboy

My wife and I, when we have a few moments of uninterrupted conversation, often attempt to predict the future of our children. Of course, this is a fruitless endeavor: we cannot draw upon our own formative experiences to foresee our children's future. The world has changed and, more precisely, parenting has changed to such a dgree that our children will spend their formative years in a social and economic environment radically divergent from our own. So much of our lives as children passed in absence of the constant attendance of adults. Like the characters of a Charlie Brown holiday special, we enjoyed near total autonomy with the occational appearance of an incomprehensible adult.

But all that has changed. Today's children must be constantly and rigorously invigilated lest some harm or malfeasance happen upon them in the blink of eye. From our current perspective, perverts, pedophiles, and predators abound lurking in all quarters. Drug dealers and drunk drivers prowl the streets awaiting the opportune moment to slaughter adolescent innocence. Did these dangers not exist when we were children? Has the world changed or is it just our awareness? Are these the dangers to be feared by parents or is it our own stifling of childhood independence that presents the real threat?

A friend recounted to me the other day a story of Utah woman who recently received a child endangerment misdemeanor for allowing her seven-year-old to ride to school alone on her bike. Heck, the moment I learned to ride a bike I was off. By the time I was seven the majority of my friends and I rode well over a mile to school and back each day. These days, however, we would all be stopped by the police and our parents arrested for doing such!

My wife and I lament these changes and wonder with nostalgia, "where have all the paperboys gone?" We have come to the conclusion that we are the last generation of paperboys. Partially from economic necessity and partially due to the new parental control of youth, the adolescent paperboy has become extinct. At the age of nine, I experienced for the first time true economic independence when I collected the first ten dollars from one of my customers. With my brother I then promptly rode to a mall across many busy intersections to enjoy the fruits of my labor at the Galactican Arcade. I doubt my children will ever experience such independence before they become a legal adult.