Subscription
Enter your e-mail address to receive this newspaper column each weekday.
My strict privacy policy will keep your email address 100% safe and secure.
-
Love
-
A WEEK after the wedding she shut me off!
13 Dec 2011 by Rod Smith / No Comments
“My son got married recently. It was a lovely wedding and all was well with my new daughter-in-law. One week after the wedding she shut me off. I have reared boys and have never had sulking people. I have never had to pamper a fragile little girl or an entitled person who has always had her own way. I do not want to do anything that I will have to do for the rest of my life to go out of my way to keep her happy or else she will sulk.” (Edited)
You are wonderfully equipped to handle this unfortunate event in your now-extended family.
-
Marrying, with children?
06 Dec 2011 by Rod Smith / No Comments
The power of a second marriage, following a divorce or a death of a spouse, should not be underestimated in its power to dislodge or upset children. Even when the children appear to be in full agreement of what is happening, even if they have been thoroughly informed about the intentions and the events to come, the adults will be wise to appreciate that adjustments do not come easy.
Living between two biological parents (in the instance of a divorce) can be more difficult than living in two homes. Having two bedrooms in two different places can be unseating, while trying to
-
In my situation mothering will not end…….
30 Aug 2011 by Rod Smith / No Comments
“You wrote that successful mothering does end. I feel that I am doing a great job with my 15 year old son. I adore my son, however, I am beginning to ‘let go.’ I am excited about his future and the role that I play in his becoming an independent young man who will leave us to spread his wings. However, I also have a younger son with severe autism. I also feel that I am doing a great job with him but this young man will not be spreading his wings. I am worried about his future and I am not sure that my mothering will end. We don’t have the facilities in South Africa to accommodate my son I really don’t think it is going to be possible to work myself out of this job. Do you have any advice for me?”
-
You won’t find a good man while you rescue leeches…….
17 Aug 2011 by Rod Smith / No Comments
“I divorced but my ex-husband continued to live me. I fell a man who stated texting me. He was living with his ex wife. I got him a place and did everything for him. He cheated and was also sleeping with his ex. I walked away but still wonder why this happened to me. My ex made my life hell and then this man was worse.
-
Does your life get in the way when you are listening to others?
27 Jul 2011 by Rod Smith / No Comments
I try to really listen to others.
Over the years, and just like you probably do, I have learned to listen for what is not being said, what’s intentionally omitted.
I know that what people don’t tell me is usually more powerful than what they do choose tell me.
-
-
-
Get Rod on FaceBook and/or Twitter
-
Verbal log-jam
When I was a boy I’d endlessly practice the fluent delivery of my name but it seldom flowed easily from my lips. As if it was new news to me, adults pointed out my stutter. Perhaps they thought I was beginning, at that precise moment, for the first time in my life to spit from the mouth, twist at the neck, jig my head back and forth trying to expel some inane statement log-jammed between my gut and my throat.
-
Life in our beloved 122
If the inside of a house (outside, too, I suppose) is a metaphor of the lives of the people who live in it – which is something I once read somewhere – gosh, are we in trouble. Our house is a mess.
I consistently clean it room by room, thinking often of the legend that the Golden Gate Bridge that says there’s some guy constantly painting it. I feel for him. While I am sure the view is wonderful I must believe that the poor guy whose doing it daily from one end to the other must find the wind and the weather quite a challenge.
-
Being a white South African can come with complications
Being a white South African reared under Apartheid is no simple matter. It permeated everything for me. While I do not pretend to have been a political activist, I was always cognizant that my privileges, simply a result of being born white, were unmerited, and most unfair especially when enjoyed at the expense of others who were not. I think this unsettling truth (for I took advantage of my station in life) was somewhat of a companion to me from the age of about six or seven.
-
Location, location – remembering winter in August
We live very close to our school and church, so close we can hear the school bell from our kitchen and the church bells in my bedroom.
Sometimes we walk to both and we don’t see the car for days.
I like it. I like not having to get in and out of the car. I like not having to negotiate traffic, something as synonymous with life in the USA as Disney, Fast Food, and the Fourth of July.
-
Ready to adopt?
If you wait until you are ready to adopt a child you never will because you will never be ready. The baby, and only the baby, will make you ready. Reading the right books will be helpful, but “ready” magically comes upon you when a real baby is sleeping in your arms or crying in the middle of the night. If you are not ready to change diapers – and I always am amused at the big deal about this non-issue – being unprepared will last only as long as a clean diaper.
Life inside the Smith household
-