Evening star., 1940-01-29
Youngsters
Lives Not
Outlined
Parents Only. Invite
Suffering When
They Try 1t
BY ANGELO PATRI.

Fathers and mothers suffer for
the mistakes of their children out
of all proportion to their share of
the responsibility. The daughter
upon whom they lavished loving
care, for whom they sacrificed per-
sonal pleasure, for whom they
saved money that they could have
used for family necessities, leaves
college and marries the boy leader
of the dance band. Father and
mother are heartbroken, ashamed,
grieved to the depths.
There seems no way of comfort
ing parents in such circumstances.
They feel that in some way they
failed the child. Even while they
scold and cry they blame them
selves. If only they had done this
or that, this bitterness might not
have entered their lives. Yet what
could they do that they left un-
done?
The truth must be faced. There
are children who do not fit into
the scheme of living that seems
good for them, in their parents
minds. Usually the girl who leaves
college to marry the young band
master should never have been in
college at all. She should have
been preparing for marriage by
learning how to do houseWork,
how to care for husband and chill
dren. under her mothers direction.
Father and mother thought a col
lege education a wonderful thing
for the girl. 1t is good for her only
if she is able to take it. If not,
it is about as wasteful and cruel
a way of using a child's youth as
can be found in lifetime. When
child runs away he runs from some
thing he does not like toward some
thing that promises him freedom
from it's Furnishing pressure. That
holds true whether the runaway
Is boy or girl.
One of the hardest facts a parent
has to admit is the one that de-
clares his child an ordinary mortal
child with ordinary gifts, ordinary
hungers, ordinary ambitions. Every
parent hopes, wishes, even DEGREES,
that his child is an extraordinary
child, gifted beyond all others. If
he could bring himself to see that
his child is the usual human child,
happiest when doing the ordinary
things that ordinary people like to
do, with no special gifts to set him
apart from the group, he would get
on much better. He would not plan
ambitious schemes for the child to
the child's undoing. He would not
find himself weeping some day be-
cause the child cracked under the
strain and ran away, as he was
bound to do.
Even so, there are children who,
cared for, trained and taught ever
SO intelligently, break away and
dash headlong into trouble-marry
the wrong person, break law and
land in the courts, play truant from
work of from school, run away from
home, to the grief of their people.
When this happens the only thing
parents can do is-hope. Youth is
the time for trial and experiment
and some errors are sure to rise.
Help the wrongdoer. Spare all
anger and try to see way out
for the erring one. Never mind the
neighbors. If they have children
they know their turn is coming,
or has come No family ever grows
I'D without making trouble some
where, sometime. Our great COM
fort is in the knowledge that all
children, all humanity, tends
toward rightness. Right wins in
the end. We can only do our best
and keep hoping.
Mr.. Patri will give personal at
tention to inquiries from parents
and school teachers on the care
and development of children.
Write him in care of The Evening
Star.