Put an ACE bandage on it…you’re fine.

Not so long ago, not too far from here, kids fell down and cut their knees and bled and kept playing outside and made their brothers swear they wouldn’t tell mom and dad why they needed 17 stitches in their right knee because you were told by said brothers that jumping off the roof of the house with a garbage bag worked remarkably just like parachuting out of a plane, but with none of the risk or costs involved. 

 This would NEVER happen now.  And do you know why?  This doesn’t happen now because we are all namby pambys now.  There is a doc in the box on every street corner!  And bonus, when you take Little Johnny there to get his one stitch because you are a TERRIBLE mother and let him open his own birthday card and he sustained a life-threatening paper cut, if the PA stitching his tiny one little stitch into the tiny little wound that will certainly require a 14 day course of Amoxicillin hurts Little Johnny’s feelings and makes him cry…well great news!!  You can sue!! 

 But if you grew up in my house, and it literally wasn’t a life threatening injury, you wouldn’t be treated.  You put an ACE bandage on it and got on with your life.  And we had an in-house pediatrician in my house!  I’m not saying that my parents weren’t compassionate, loving people, but as my dad would say, “You’re fine.  Trust me, I’m a doctor”.  This would usually be followed by something like, “no you are not bleeding to death…How do I know? Because you’re not dead”.  And antibiotics…Forget about it! The motto in our house was, “most infections are self limiting, so you’ll be fine in 7 days regardless”.  Hell, my dad was even on public service announcements throughout the state warning against the over use of antibiotics…and that was before microbial resistance was cool. 

 Now, I’m not saying that kids don’t get sick and hurt these days, but COME ON!  In my day, you got the flu and you fucking sucked it up.  Some woman in your family would rub some metholatum on your chest, stuck your shirt to it and you and you woke up the next day just fine.  We also didn’t do things like wear bike helmets and knee pads.  And guess what? For the most part my generation is just fine. 

 Now, this is going to sound very old lady of me, but…it’s these young whipper snappers these days that are big fat wusses!!  WTH?  AND, the worst part is, it’s MY generation that is raising these fools!!  It’s ridiculous…stop it.  Stop it right now.  Were you SO mistreated as a kid playing with things like jump ropes and sticks that you can’t BEAR it if Little Johnny’s iPad battery goes below 54%.  Little Johnny should play some fucking Clue and read an actual book, you know, the kind with pages made out of paper.  Little Johnny should not get a trophy for showing up with the fucking team shirt on.  Little Johnny should be told about things like taxes and jobs and having to do what your boss tells you to.  Little Johnny’s mom should know that colds don’t need antibiotics and that Little Johnny is a loser.

 That’s right, Little Johnny is a loser…News flash, we ALL lose in life sometimes!!  As well we should.  Do you know what losing does?  It makes us fucking TRY!!!  What a novel concept.  Losing makes us dust ourselves off, get the fuck up and try again, but this time, we try differently expecting a different outcome.  And when we next succeed, we feel things like, a sense of pride and accomplishment.  As my dad would say, “It puts hair on your chest (thanks for the hairsute genes, btw-if I’m ever in a coma, by POA has to come with a pair of tweezers everyday). 

 So, please, let Little Johnny cut his finger and then just superglue it back together, he’ll be fine.  Chicks dig scars.  And tell Little Johnny that he sucked last night at soccer practice, and that tomorrow he needs to get his head in the game.  Let Little Johnny know that if he wants to do something great in life, he has to work his ass off for it, and he has to deserve it.  Chicks also dig men, and don’t you want him to be one, one day?