Monthly Archives: July 2014
Vacation time = family responsibilities
Summer is a tricky time for working parents. The added expense of caring for school-age kids during summer vacation is what led Debra Harrell, the now infamous South Carolina mom, to leave her child at a nearby park while she worked her minimum wage job at McDonald’s. She was arrested, and temporarily lost custody of […]
Train kids before leaving them alone
Stories about children left unsupervised have been springing up around the country. A 9-year-old was removed from her mother’s custody because she left the girl in the park while she worked her shift at McDonald’s. A mom is fighting criminal prosecution for leaving her 4-year-old son alone in the car for 5 minutes on a 50-degree […]
Early ACEs are anything but lucky
Who doesn’t have an ACE or two up their sleeve? Some of us have many more ACEs than others. And ACEs make all the difference in the life you lead, the way you feel – maybe even the manner of your demise. ACE means Adverse Childhood Experience. I recently sat in on a Vancouver Housing […]
People who need people
There’s nothing easier than going for a walk. Right? Sometimes. If you’re lucky. Lately I’ve really been struck by how lucky I am, just to be able to go get a move on, thoughtlessly and almost effortlessly. As that Very Clean Old Man urges Beatle Ringo in “A Hard Day’s Night” (which I enjoyed a […]
Pot stores prompt family talk about drugs
My 8-year-old son recently said a kid in his class told him that a certain convenience store sells drugs, launching a conversation that I hadn’t yet thought to have with him. I explained to him that the word “drugs” could refer to either illegal substances that he should never take or medicine that he would […]
Seven weeks until Labor Day and school: How will your family celebrate summer?
Has your family settled into a summer routine? What are you doing for inexpensive summer fun in Clark County beyond letting the kids run through the sprinkler and doling out Popsicles? I’m the education reporter at The Columbian. Unlike Erin and Scott, I’m the parent of young adult children who have graduated from Vancouver Public […]
CEO: You can’t have it all
The discussion hasn’t stopped since Anne-Marie Slaughter wrote “Why Women Still Can’t Have it All” in the Atlantic two years ago. We just can’t stop asking: Can women have successful careers and families at the same time? PepsiCo CEO Indra K. Nooyi’s answer cuts to the quick: “I don’t think women can have it all. I […]
Classic ’70s novel provides lessons for today
I’m reading my boys the Judy Blume classic, “Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing,” which I enjoyed as a kid. As I read it aloud, however, I’m realizing there’s a lot about the book I had forgotten. Early in the book, the 9-year-old protagonist, Peter Thatcher, describes walking across Central Park in his hometown of New […]
Bring or borrow a bike to hit the BBC Trail on July 12
Did you know that two of the most picturesque, varied, fun and doable (even for not-so-serious cyclists) paved bike paths in the Portland metropolitan area are right here in Clark County? The Salmon Creek trail is short (3 miles), flat and green. The Burnt Bridge Creek trail is longer (8 miles), more rolling and more […]