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> When you have children, you can have exactly one hobby. Anything else is an exercise in futility, self-deception, and ineffectiveness. Cooking healthy food is

by Dewie 13y ago

> When you have children, you can have exactly one hobby. Anything else is an exercise in futility, self-deception, and ineffectiveness. Cooking healthy food is a hobby. Exercising is a hobby. Maintaining a website is a hobby. Writing a blog is a hobby. Bringing work home is a hobby. You have time to do exactly one thing after your kids go to sleep, if you want to do it well. The pointless waste of time had to go. 21 century, the first world, and yet raising children is an almost insurmountable task. No wonder fertility rates in the West are so low.

reedlaw 13y ago
Maybe this is the case in the US, but it's not so for the West as a whole, viz.: the hands-off French approach: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204740904577196931457473816.html http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405297020474090457719...
- paganel 13y ago
  There's also something to be said about American suburbia and everything being so sparse. Until a kid is 16 and she can get a driver's license at least one of the parents has to be on call to drive her on/off to school, on/off to other kids' parties etc. That can consume a lot of time.
- Dewie 13y ago
  > Rest assured, I certainly don't suffer from a pro-France bias. Au contraire, I'm not even sure that I like living here. I certainly don't want my kids growing up to become sniffy Parisians. It's hilarious that she included a paragraph solely to excuse herself for complimenting a certain aspect of the French lifestyle, presumably in order to appease the (imaginary or not) anti-France streak in the American consciousness.
  - pm90 13y ago
    Off topic, but:I have seen this anti-French attitude a lot (in most cases, jokingly). What is the reason for the American dislike for the French? One Frenchman I talked to said that its because France does not always support US Foreign policy....is that really the case?
    - acheron 13y ago
      As you said, it's mostly a joke, usually exaggerated for comic effect. Even calling it "anti-French" may be too much; it's just playing off a stereotype of French people as snobby and overly "sophisticated" (in a slightly derogatory way). I don't want to link it to working class/upper class or rural/urban or whatever, since those aren't really right, but perhaps a vaguely similar impulse. Trying to tie it to "foreign policy" or something is thinking about it much too hard.
      - toyg 13y ago
        That stereotype exists because, right before US elites started formalizing their own cultural scenario (before F.S. Fitzgerald, to give a rough idea), French culture was one of their main models, if not THE model. On the other side, French elites invested a lot in the American Revolution and were quite disappointed with the outcomes (a society characterized by freedom but also rough and greedy, which eventually chose The Anglo Way in most matters and stole their thunder as Beacon of Civilization). Ever since, both sides were locked in a constant and intense debate in a way that very few other countries experienced. It's funng because both French and US mainstream cultures agree on very fundamental matters (the need for a secular State, the power of technological progress, the importance of cinema and popular culture, down to comicbooks) but express them in completely opposite ways in practice.
    - toyg 13y ago
      There's a very complicated history of mutual love and disappointment between France and the US, stretching all the way from before the American Revolution.
ak39 13y ago
I also liked that line. Being a father of three, I can attest to the profundity of that statement. It makes me smile though. Because there is hope yet. I have found that as time passes, two things happen: 1. Your children grow into creatures less demanding of your immediate attention (post nappy years, post "Daaaaad, I'm done!" on the toilet years ... etc). The real problem with keeping with other tasks while raising kids is not so much that you're unable to juggle many things at once, it's just that the sort of work we do (ideas, coding, design, you know the serious! stuff) requires longer chains of time for concentration and this is what suffers when kids (or for that matter anything else) constantly interrupts your thinking. You attempt to juggle at first, but pretty soon you realise the frustration of context switching from a more cerebral world to a banal one - and then back - takes its toll mentally. So you give up your art. (For the right reason of course. I love my time with the boys.) 2. You get better at juggling the cerebral and the banal at the same time. :-) ps. When I say banal, I don't intend to belittle the sheer fking honour of executing paternal obligations, no! But it cannot monopolise your time such that paternal obligations are all you commit to at the expense of your art. I ain't no John Lennon. :-)
- Dewie 13y ago
  > The real problem with keeping with other tasks while raising kids is not so much that you're unable to juggle many things at once, it's just that the sort of work we do (ideas, coding, design, you know the serious! stuff) requires longer chains of time for concentration and this is what suffers when kids (or for that matter anything else) constantly interrupts your thinking. The author also mentioned exercising and cooking healthy food, which for the most part does not demand long chains of deep concentration.
  - bkmartin 13y ago
    Do you have multiple small children under the age of 5? Both those activities typically take at least 30 minutes of continuity to be done right... a real challenge with a 4 and a 1 year old. After they go to bed, great. While they are awake? If you are ok with some TV time. then you might get lucky to have them sit still for half an hour.
epaga 13y ago
My wife and I have 4 kids 8 and under, and that paragraph is really making me think about my life - it resonates with my day-to-day experience and I wonder if it isn't time to scale way back on the various things I'm (perhaps ineffectively) trying to accomplish in my current life phase. Encouragingly, life phases always transition into something else at some point...so there is an end in sight. And it is so very worth it to not toss "spending time with my kids" out in place of a "hobby" like writing a blog.
Tichy 13y ago
Although I think you can't have that many more hobbies with children, either. I think jobs are a bigger problem than children (bigger time sink I mean).
CmonDev 13y ago
Children are also a hobby. You don't have to have them to survive, unlike Middle Ages. And it's not innovation as it has been done billions of time before. It's just a matter of picking the most favourite hobby: children, science, healthy you, social you etc.

by Dewie 13y ago

reedlaw 13y ago

Maybe this is the case in the US, but it's not so for the West as a whole, viz.: the hands-off French approach: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204740904577196931457473816.html http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405297020474090457719...

paganel 13y ago
There's also something to be said about American suburbia and everything being so sparse. Until a kid is 16 and she can get a driver's license at least one of the parents has to be on call to drive her on/off to school, on/off to other kids' parties etc. That can consume a lot of time.
Dewie 13y ago
> Rest assured, I certainly don't suffer from a pro-France bias. Au contraire, I'm not even sure that I like living here. I certainly don't want my kids growing up to become sniffy Parisians. It's hilarious that she included a paragraph solely to excuse herself for complimenting a certain aspect of the French lifestyle, presumably in order to appease the (imaginary or not) anti-France streak in the American consciousness.
- pm90 13y ago
  Off topic, but:I have seen this anti-French attitude a lot (in most cases, jokingly). What is the reason for the American dislike for the French? One Frenchman I talked to said that its because France does not always support US Foreign policy....is that really the case?
  - acheron 13y ago
    As you said, it's mostly a joke, usually exaggerated for comic effect. Even calling it "anti-French" may be too much; it's just playing off a stereotype of French people as snobby and overly "sophisticated" (in a slightly derogatory way). I don't want to link it to working class/upper class or rural/urban or whatever, since those aren't really right, but perhaps a vaguely similar impulse. Trying to tie it to "foreign policy" or something is thinking about it much too hard.
    - toyg 13y ago
      That stereotype exists because, right before US elites started formalizing their own cultural scenario (before F.S. Fitzgerald, to give a rough idea), French culture was one of their main models, if not THE model. On the other side, French elites invested a lot in the American Revolution and were quite disappointed with the outcomes (a society characterized by freedom but also rough and greedy, which eventually chose The Anglo Way in most matters and stole their thunder as Beacon of Civilization). Ever since, both sides were locked in a constant and intense debate in a way that very few other countries experienced. It's funng because both French and US mainstream cultures agree on very fundamental matters (the need for a secular State, the power of technological progress, the importance of cinema and popular culture, down to comicbooks) but express them in completely opposite ways in practice.
  - toyg 13y ago
    There's a very complicated history of mutual love and disappointment between France and the US, stretching all the way from before the American Revolution.

ak39 13y ago

I also liked that line. Being a father of three, I can attest to the profundity of that statement. It makes me smile though. Because there is hope yet. I have found that as time passes, two things happen: 1. Your children grow into creatures less demanding of your immediate attention (post nappy years, post "Daaaaad, I'm done!" on the toilet years ... etc). The real problem with keeping with other tasks while raising kids is not so much that you're unable to juggle many things at once, it's just that the sort of work we do (ideas, coding, design, you know the serious! stuff) requires longer chains of time for concentration and this is what suffers when kids (or for that matter anything else) constantly interrupts your thinking. You attempt to juggle at first, but pretty soon you realise the frustration of context switching from a more cerebral world to a banal one - and then back - takes its toll mentally. So you give up your art. (For the right reason of course. I love my time with the boys.) 2. You get better at juggling the cerebral and the banal at the same time. :-) ps. When I say banal, I don't intend to belittle the sheer fking honour of executing paternal obligations, no! But it cannot monopolise your time such that paternal obligations are all you commit to at the expense of your art. I ain't no John Lennon. :-)

Dewie 13y ago
> The real problem with keeping with other tasks while raising kids is not so much that you're unable to juggle many things at once, it's just that the sort of work we do (ideas, coding, design, you know the serious! stuff) requires longer chains of time for concentration and this is what suffers when kids (or for that matter anything else) constantly interrupts your thinking. The author also mentioned exercising and cooking healthy food, which for the most part does not demand long chains of deep concentration.
- bkmartin 13y ago
  Do you have multiple small children under the age of 5? Both those activities typically take at least 30 minutes of continuity to be done right... a real challenge with a 4 and a 1 year old. After they go to bed, great. While they are awake? If you are ok with some TV time. then you might get lucky to have them sit still for half an hour.

epaga 13y ago

My wife and I have 4 kids 8 and under, and that paragraph is really making me think about my life - it resonates with my day-to-day experience and I wonder if it isn't time to scale way back on the various things I'm (perhaps ineffectively) trying to accomplish in my current life phase. Encouragingly, life phases always transition into something else at some point...so there is an end in sight. And it is so very worth it to not toss "spending time with my kids" out in place of a "hobby" like writing a blog.

Tichy 13y ago

Although I think you can't have that many more hobbies with children, either. I think jobs are a bigger problem than children (bigger time sink I mean).

CmonDev 13y ago

Children are also a hobby. You don't have to have them to survive, unlike Middle Ages. And it's not innovation as it has been done billions of time before. It's just a matter of picking the most favourite hobby: children, science, healthy you, social you etc.