Warp & Woof
Books in the fabric of everyday life

Raising a Mensch

Every parent's worst nightmare comes true during the young teen years: Your child turns into a storybook monster, feigning the attributes of a normal, rational human being, but transforming unpredictably and sometimes instantaneously into a devil's demon, breathing fire and vitriol. Walking through this nightmare, you persevere with a forced optimism, hoping that your positive actions will save the day, but fearing deep inside that your child is going to be lost no matter what you do.
      Well, my wife and I have survived. And we've been blessed with a daughter who just graduated from college -- early -- and landed a great job -- in just a week. She's a self-assured, self-confident, good and whole individual. Mostly because of dumb luck, we've been graced with a child who's turned out to be a mensch.
      Raising Your Child to be a Mensch (Atheneum, 1987), by Neil Kurshan, is a book that sticks in the mind long after it's read. When I read it years ago -- during the "torment" period -- I came to believe that perhaps the greatest achievement one can ever hope for in life is to raise the type of healthy, mature, self-assured individual Kurshan describes.
      A useful guide to the pre-teen years of childraising was Haim Ginott's classic, Between Parent and Child (Macmillan, 1965). As the title implies, Ginott's schtick is realistic communication with the child, based on a principle that should be obvious but usually lies just outside our brains: children are incredibly simple -- they aren't little adults -- and you have to meet them on their own level.
      Similarly, How to Parent (Signet paperpack, 1971), by Fitzhugh Dodson (not to be confused with Charles Dobson), is effective at describing the world of 3-year-olds, 4-year-olds, etc. as they see it -- sort of like cultural anthropology in your own living room. Dodson uses this understanding to unambiguously guide the parent in the challenges of raising that little bundle of will, known as the preschooler.