Mennos Drink Espressos

You know those people that you see in public places with three or more children who just seem to have it together?  They're dressed nicer than your are, their kids are dressed nicer than you are, they're not screaming, they're intermittently laughing with each other.  The dad stops to pick up a leaf to show his 3 year old daughter and effectively explains photosynthesis in three sentences.  Meanwhile, the two year old son is doing cartwheels while reciting the nation capitals of Africa in alphabetical order.  You think to yourself, "Wow! Those people really have it together.  They must be great parents."

How do you get there?

Otto.  Staying out of trouble.

You would think that rearing children is in my blood.  You see, my last name is Klassen.  My mom was a Friesen.  That makes me extremely mennonite. Thorough bred.

If you don't know what a mennonite is, that's fine, but for the purposes of this post you should know that mennonites are pretty well known for having A LOT of poorly coordinated, extremely sober, cheap-skate children.

While I didn't have an overly large family, both of my parents did.  My mom has 9 brothers and sisters and my dad has 4.  I know, it's not quite TLC-syndication worthy, but it's still a lot of people to fit into one place for a Christmas party.  Fact is both sides of my family now have family gatherings in churches and community halls because there's just too many people.  Especially now that the cousins are mostly married and many have kid's of their own.

My step-grandma called me this morning to say congratulations about Otto.  It was very nice.  It's impressive that she can be personable with any of us grandkids given the following facts:

When she married my grandpa, he already had ten kids, most of them married and with kids of their own. Several years after he past away, she re-married a nice man who had 12 kids, all of whom were married and had kids of their own.  She told me today that Otto is her 52nd great grandchild!  And that's JUST my mom's side.

And none of us are psychopaths.  Nobody in that enormous mass of human beings has ever turned into a serial killer or a cult leader or a politician.

How is that possible?

I've been trying to think back to my upbringing.  How can I raise Otto to be as straight laced and well behaved as my sister and I?  Here are some unofficial tips I think my parents used pretty effectively:

1. Learn a language your child doesn't understand.  My parents both speak a strange, hybrid language called low german, which seems to be part dutch, part yiddish and part martian.  It was perfect for sheltering us from dirty jokes, "adult" conversations and Christmas present discussions.   I believe that somehow this kept my sister and I naive to most things until our early twenties.

2. Buy your kid's first gun early.  Of course, I'm not serious.  Working in emergency, I'm not a big fan of guns.  In fact, I endorse gun registration whole heartedly (sorry dad).  Perhaps the heading should be: Spend time with your kids when they're young.  I got my first .22 rifle when I was about 11 (I think) and I would spend a lot of time hunting or target shooting.  It was great bonding time with my dad and, ironically, kept me out of a lot of trouble, I'm sure.  As a teenager, many of the guns in our house were stored IN MY ROOM (sans ammunition of course).  By the time I was an adolescent, guns held no mysticism anymore, and were for the most part, kind of boring.  But again, not serious.  Please don't buy your kids guns.

3. Move to the middle of nowhere.  I grew up in a village called Roseisle.  You should really satellite google it, it's quite remarkable.  Two or so streets.  About 45 people.  I never learned to do anything bad, because there was nothing bad to do.  The town does have three churches, though, which may also have something to do with my innocent upbringing.

4. Be more fun and interesting than your kid's friends.  I never really had enough energy to keep up with my dad.  Fishing, water-skiing, camping, snowmobiling, road trips, go-carts.  When I was about 8, my dad built a three wheeler.  He BUILT it.  When I was a teenager we built a life sized, remote control robot.  Are you kidding me?  He was like MacGyver with a beard.

"What's that, mister delinquent, teenager, high-school friend?  You want to smoke drugs with me?  Sorry, I'm busy.  My dad and I are going to build a rocket ship that can go back in time, but maybe later?"

If anything, I'm sorry I didn't spend more time with my dad.

My awesome dad with Otto and Otto's cousin, Teagan.

5. Just let your kid be a little bit weird.  My parents were very supportive of me...and very patient.  They never gave me a hard time about listening to hard-core heavy metal, or being in a hard-core metal band, or about dying my hair.  They encourage me to draw comic books and program computers and do all sorts of socially abnormal things.  I think my parents had pretty good insight into letting me do things as long as they weren't dangerous or evil, and because of all that support, I never really felt like I needed to rebel.  Thanks, mom and dad.

Anyways.  That's what I've got so far.

If you're wondering about the title of this Post, Nils Vik (a la Parlour Coffee.  See earlier posts) informed me today that espressos are the cheapest way to get the most caffeine into your body and referred to them as a good Menno drink.  Never thought of espresso as a Mennonite thing, but it makes sense.

And because I will squeeze every bit of attention I can get out of this six year old triumph, here's the shining moments of my med school career in all their lo-fi, underproduced glory, Menno in Med School: