Modern Lives

There is a disturbing trend among parents that has been permeating popular culture for a couple of decades now: the objectification of young children. One need only witness the horrors that are toddler beauty pageants (and the reality TV shows, books, and movies that spawned from such) to know what I mean. Girls too young to even grasp basic arithmetic are gussied up, given dental veneers, bikinis, enough makeup to give Tammy Faye pause, hairstyles to rival the stature of any found in small-town Texas, and paraded around like tiny objectified dolls for the aesthetic enjoyment of the creepy old men and women who judge the degree to which these 4–6 year-old children successfully emulate adult sexiness. Increasingly, this behavior has become a mainstream oddity that most sensible Americans are morbidly fascinated by, but publicly dismiss with a tsk-tsk and solemn head shake while secretly DVRing the latest episode of "Toddlers and Tiaras." Every now and then, someone will take...

Wow. Has it really been over four years since I last posted to this thing? Does anyone ever actually read this? *tap-tap-tap* This thing on? A lot has happened since my last post. We lost Ezry almost exactly a year to the day after the last post. Shortly after publishing that post, she had gone back to her old ways and we had to exile her to the backyard again. Then, in the Spring of 2009, we remodeled the front living room and dining room with fresh paint, new furniture, and shiny new laminate floors. Having finally exorcised the ghost of little puppy peesalot, we allowed Ezry her place back in the house. All went extraordinarily well. We finally had our little girl back and she was happy to be allowed inside again. Ezry still went outside whenever she wanted, but usually came in before bedtime. One night early that summer, she didn't come back in. It wasn't the first time she had opted to stay out all night when the weather was nice, so we didn't think much of it....