Last week I discovered how to stop my youngest son from being late to school. At least it’s worked so far. You can say my youngest son, a high school freshman, has a chronic lateness problem. He hadn’t been on time for school since October. We talked to him about his lateness; The school sent home notes about his [...]

Am I being greedy for liking the prospect of saving $2,500 each year I have a kid in college? In my case that could add up to a total savings of $20,000. I have two sons who would be attending undergraduate school back to back – One will finish (I hope), just as the other [...]

In an early post on this blog, I talked about my family’s experience with dyslexia, specfically our first son’s reading troubles. Dyslexia is frustrating thing for child and parent, but we found an excellent tutor through a wonderful organization, the International Dyslexia Society. We saw the tutor every Saturday at her home and practiced specific [...]

A few weeks ago, before the economic meltdown set in, my youngest son greeted me with the announcement: “I’m a communist. And an atheist.” And good morning to you, too, son. For a kid who hadn’t turned 14 yet, that was a pretty big deal. He explained his reasoning:  The world would be better place without rich or poor. As for God, he just didn’t think [...]

A couple of weeks ago I drove my oldest son out to Stony Brook University for freshman orientation. I’m not sure which of us was more excited. It was a lot different from my college, the Brooklyn Center of Long Island University. That was a collection of buildings around a concerete yard, euphemistically described as “an urban campus.” This was in the early [...]

If you’re anything like me, it’s easy to slip into habits when it comes to holidays. Warm-weather holidays mean cookouts with classic rock in the background; cold-weather holidays mean big meals indoors, music optional. Now I’m all for celebrating with food and family, but at a certain point the holidays can seem interchangeable, so long [...]

With spring break approaching, April is prime time for college hunting. You’ve got juniors in high school checking out colleges for the first time and undecided seniors who want one last look before making the final decision. I know from experience. My oldest son is a high school senior and we visited colleges intermittently from January [...]

The opening days for New York’s new baseball parks are still a year off, but one thing is obvious when you get past the gorgeous renderings – the stadiums are too small. For the sake of all New York baseball fans, construction needs to stop and new plans drawn up for bigger stadiums. The people [...]

Toy guns are often a matter of controversy for parents. As a kid I had toy guns, but at some point my father decided that wasn’t a good idea. He didn’t want my youngest brother, 15 years my junior, to play with toy guns and banned them from the house. Of course my youngest brother [...]

Eliot Spitzer, and his apology for an activity he is yet to name, did not come up at my house last night.                  Now that could mean the kids didn’t know about it because the news broke too late in the school day to become gossip there. And [...]

My wife, oldest son and I visited Stony Brook University yesterday to check out the school that’s vaulted to first place on my son’s list of college choices. It’s a big school; lecture halls are routine for most classes he’s going to take his first year. Also since its an NCAA Division One school, chances are just about zero that he will play [...]

Yesterday I wrote about my elder son getting his first college-acceptance letter. He’s growing up and this post documents one of the more surprising examples. One workday a few months ago, I woke up to find my son ironing a dress shirt. Then he asked for help in knotting in his tie. This event  has repeated itself  on a weekly basis since then. Pretty shocking for [...]

An oversized envelope from SUNY Stony Brook arrived at my house this week. It’s appearance had been heralded by a phone call from the elder of my two sons who told me that he had something to show me when I got home from work. Stuffed with a colorful brochure touting the advantages of this state school, the envelope contained an acceptance letter. So now [...]

Yesterday was the deadline for many college applications. So my eldest son was at his school until 10 p.m. last night finishing his applications. I know that because at 8 p.m. he called to ask for an example of his stubborness, something he needed for his college essay. “An example of your stubborness? How about waiting until the last minute to finish you [...]

I don’t remember the last time I saw my oldest son cry. I didn’t actually see him cry yesterday when his high school basketball team lost by two points. After the small crowd had gone home and only the two teams and the score keepers remained, I looked across the court to see my son’s face buried in his hands. Then he [...]