Being a child of the 1970's, you got to see some really cool TV as a kid. In addition to The Carol Burnett Show, one of my other favorite comedy shows was Laugh In because it had strong women who created characters that could hold their own with the men. Dan Rowan and Dick Martin were more than happy to entertain the weird characters that Ruth Buzzy, Joanne Whirley and Lily Tomlin brought to life. It affirmed for me once again as a nine year old girl who one day wanted to be a funny lady, that if you could dream it and write it, you could be it. Back then, comedy albums were huge. I remember listening to Bill Cosby's My Brother Russell with my brother's and sisters until the record literally wore out. Women were making comedy albums too and one of my favorite Laugh In alumni albums came from Lily Tomlin who played Edith Ann. Edith Ann was a childlike philosopher whose dry sense of humor really appealed to me. I loved the way she could size up a situation with a child's perspective (hey, I was a child myself) and get away with all sorts of things with her trusty dog Buster. Unlike a lot of comedians who would pretend to be kids and make them over the top obnoxious, you could tell that she respected children and the way they looked at the world. And That's the Truth was another comedy album that also got worn out. I heard it so many times that I could do most of the routines on the album. I'd perform some of the bits in school which helped me get over being shy. The other kids through it was funny. Edith Ann was always a big hit during recess. 
I also loved the cover of the album one of the things that I thought was the most interesting to me about Lily Tomlin was the way she wrote her name. I loved that the "T" in her signature, looked like a real T and not like the cursive capital Ts we had to make in grade school. It was definitive and had no apologies. It didn't try to be something that it wasn't - it was a simple understandable T dammit! Everyone could see that. So right then I decided to make my capital Ts that way when I wrote in cursive. I would use that T in the words "The" at the beginning of a sentence, or "This" or "That", okay you get the idea. I'd get marked down on my papers but I didn't care - I wanted to make my Ts like Lily Tomlin - she didn't conform so why did I? Even though it was the 1970's and the Equal Rights Movement was steaming on ahead - it didn't seem to apply to being pro-writing choice when it came to cursive. You needed to write the way everyone else did - and that forced conformity really pissed me off as a kid - even though on the outside I was this sweet, shy little girl who just wanted to make other people happy.
More than that, the cursive chart just never made sense to me. Looking at it now - few people really write like this and it's hard to understand how people were able to read cursive at all. I mean really, a cursive Q looks like a backwards 2, the F looks like a T with a stick in it's middle and the J and Z just look like they are trying too hard. No wonder my left handed brain just couldn't grasp it - the print letters made more sense even if the Q looks like an O with penis envy. Of course I had to rebel against this non-sensical way of writing - Lily Tomlin's Ts brought order to a really confusing cursive world. Unfortunately, my teachers didn't see it that way.
My parents would notice the marked down papers when I brought them home and would ask me why I didn't write the things the way everyone was supposed to. I told them because I liked that way and it made it different. My parents knew when to pick their battles and getting on my case about my handwriting was not worth the effort. Remember, this was the 70's and the world was changing at a quick pace. They had three teens in the house - two of which were extremely rebellious at the time, so if letting me have my Ts meant one less argument, then so be it. I always loved that about my parents - they let their kids be who they were and didn't try to project their own hopes and ambitions on to us - they would just try to guide. Of course being in the middle of a recession and just trying to keep your head above water also helped keep things in perspective. Here we are 40 years later and the song remains the same.
I appreciate that now as a parent whose own kids are rugged individuals. I love the way they see the world and what they see as right and what they see as injustices. My son knows what's happening in Syria which is surprising for an 11 year old. Hell, it wasn't until I started doing international health projects in my 40's that I really had an idea of how countries outside of the US really work. He has even created his own country Amosan which welcomes of gays, the form of government includes democracy and a constitutional monarchy, there is enough food for everyone and it's main exports are sugar cane, rice and iPhones. It's a very liberal place which is located in the Indian Ocean and has beautiful beaches. He's also written a book called Mystery Falls and wants to publish it on Amazon which is actually easy to do. Amber has a blog on FanFiction.net and writes about cartoon combinations like the Kids Next Door, Total Drama Island, The Regular Show and Stoked and she is the favorite author of quite a few people. She also loves to draw and would like to be a cartoonist one day. Many parents would tell their kids not to waste time on things like this - but my feeling is let them be who they are - as long as they are keeping up their grades I'm not going to try to make them into something they aren't.
I appreciate now particularly as I work with teens who are feeling the pressure to make good grades so that they can qualify for scholarships in college. Every weekend is filled with extracurricular activities so that they can get into the college of their or their parent's choice. There is zero down time and the stress is palatable. I remember putting that same pressure on myself as a teen (actually my parents really didn't push that much). I was working after school at Publix to save money for college and trying to maintain a 3.8 point grade average. I was super stressed and would have crying jags once I got home. I see that same sense of frustration on the faces of some of the kids that I teach Sunday school to - they are tired of school, they are tired of trying to maintain the facade of achievement, they are tired of their parents for not letting them do what they really want to do which is goof off and have fun with their friends for the entire weekend. They're just tired and that will lead to some serious issues once they get away from Mom and Dad in college or cause some serious burn-out once they get there. If the kid is pushing themselves hard on their own, I think we need to step in and allow them the chance to Part-T -to allow them to be themselves and not worry about a college application for once - they need the down time.
I remember talking to a group of women at work with a very opinionated consultant about how kids are doing on school. This one woman talked about how they didn't have weekends because every minute was spent taking her sons from football to baseball and doing that even if they were sick because the coaches expected them to play not matter what. Her kids were exhausted also trying to keep their grades up. I mentioned that sometimes it's okay to let a child fail because they learn to pick themselves up and how resilient they really are. This comment incurred gasps from the women in the group. I also mentioned that Dave Thomas of Wendy's was a C student and that sometimes business leaders who weren't A+ students had an easier time managing people because they can think outside the box. The consultant mentioned that those kids will not get into Harvard with a C average like she did. I didn't want to point out to this well heeled young woman that even after getting a four year degree from an Ivy League school - she was in her 30's and still working for her mother. My God that degree really took her far. Bill Gates dropped out of Harvard, failed at a business called Traf-O-Data and eventually founded Microsoft.
We live in a society that is so afraid of failing that it can lead you to muddle in a sea of conformity and mediocrity because being creative and taking chances is risky. But the reality is that you learn when you fail - the failure can drive you to innovate what you've been doing and come up with something better. Colonial Sander's secret recipe was rejected a 1,000 times before he founded KFC. Before Evan Williams founded Twitter, he had a podcast platform that he had to abandon when iTunes started running podcasts. Fred Smith received a D for submitting the idea that would eventually become the company that he founded - FedEx. Walt Disney was fired by an editor because, "he lacked imagination and had no original ideas."
So as another school year starts, let's take it easy on our kids and allow them to be who they need to be. My son has grown his hair down to the back of his neck and is wearing it in a pony tail. Do I worry about him being teased? Hell, yeah, but he has to figure out how to handle things on his own. I will tell him that he has to maintain a certain grade point average and that he has to apply himself for sure, but he doesn't have to be a straight A student like I was because that's just not who he is. I'd rather that he's happy than losing sleep over a middle school science project he got a C on that isn't going to matter in 30 years anyway. We've got to give our children the right to be who they are - to Part-T because being an individual who is not afraid of failure is the best way to build tomorrow's leaders. Mark Cuban, the billionaire who sold his company to Yahoo once said, "I've learned that it doesn’t matter how many times you failed. You only have to be right once. I tried to sell powdered milk. I was an idiot lots of times, and I learned from them all.” So is letting your kids be comfortable in their own skin important? You bet your sweet bippy it is - and that's the truth!
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