What place?
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And more importantly why? Why would you subject yourself to that?
A very unhealthy sense of obligation to my boomer parents
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Phew!!! I nearly posted a sarcastic reply to your 1st post, cough cough wink wink…And glad I didn’t. 
Hope your parents are doing well bro 
There’s plenty good reason to stop at one, but the second is easier. I literally peeled grapes for the first one (figured it’s less of a choking hazard). We just let the second kid go ferile.
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Does “place like The Villages” just mean a 55+ housing development or does it imply a huge scale? My mom is in a place with like 600 units, so medium size. It has a clubhouse and a tiny golf course - par3 I guess if that. I have no idea about the politics here. My mom isn’t really involved in the community outside of sorta knowing some immediate neighbors.
Seems fine here to me.
My mother is in an assisted living community, and there seem to be all types. She mentions the deplorable types, but I also see flyers for movies and speakers of a Progressive bent. Plus the Dems organize and send representatives.
We waited almost six years between ours so not the typical experience, but definitely much more chill with the 2nd one, and really not as much juggling as you’d think.
From what folks with more have told me, it’s really that 3rd kid that ramps things up to hard mode, they say once you have three you’re honestly not far from the chaos of someone that has like ten.
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When you have a second they often entertain each other a lot (even if that’s by fighting) so it’s not nearly double the time managing them (outside of when the second is an infant). Having them 6 years apart makes that different - though maybe if the first kid is up for it you get semi-baby sitting.
I have two brothers and I don’t think it was chaos for my mom. There was the period of having to drive people around a lot for baseball games or whatever, but so much of the time we were just sent out to play and come home when it’s dark that I don’t think it was that chaotic. Most people don’t do that nowadays, but I actually let my kids go outside without hovering over them every second.
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As the 3rd of 3 boys, my mom was cooked by the time I came around. Couldn’t get me into school soon enough.
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My parents doctored my birth certificate to get me into school early.
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Man my mom is a fucking OG. Recently retired teacher / guidance counselor with 40 years in public education and a member of the teachers’ union. Grew up poor as dirt and has been a Democrat my whole life. Volunteers at the food bank (considered trying to get her to volunteer for Bernie, but this is deep, deep red Oklahoma) is kind to everyone and an all around good human being.
On the other hand, my father voted for Trump in 2016. Lifelong Democrat. Member of the pipefitters’ Union. Also grew up dirt poor, but the majority of his siblings are deplorables. I’m not sure what radicalized him before the last election (some kind of talk radio. Definitely not Fox News) but I can’t even talk politics with him anymore. I think the last time we even approached the subject he was asking me why I despise obscenely rich people so much (LOL). He’s been casually racist as long as I remember (he swears he’s not racist, didn’t even say anything when I brought a black girl home one Christmas) and his mother was super racist.
I’m debating calling him tomorrow and asking if he’s voting in the primary Tuesday. He’s still a registered Democrat AFAIK. I don’t even know what to say. He has some of that sweet Jman Union healthcare, so I’m not sure that’s the route. Thinks illegals are taking skilled labor construction jobs. Thinks the government is way too big and super corrupt. Thoughts?
Btw my parents are somehow still married. No idea how.
Too late to get anybody new?
You could try the vote for Bernie to make it easier for Trump approach
I’ve been using “my favorite deplorable” I know for a while. She is all all all fucking in on Trump.
Well today at tonight’s bridge game I overheard her saying
“I need surgery on my hand but I can’t afford it”
…
…
…
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And if you dared say anything about how it’s too bad there’s no free healthcare, you’d get the usual smarmy comment about “sure while I get put on a two-year waiting list while the government decides if I deserve to get the surgery!! No thanks” or whatever nonsense.
A few months ago, my nephew said, “My dad tells me it was the Native Americans fault for surrendering.” Well he’s getting older but he’s still a pre-teen, so I listen when he says these things, and I try not to feel so triggered that I jump to tell him the “right” way to think. Instead I just want to give him the space to think through this stuff. He’s starting from wherever he’s starting from, and of course at such a young age, he’s going to share positions of his softly deplorable father almost automatically. Figuring out which he’ll hold and which he’ll discard is a part of him growing up.
In the above conversation, I did ask him a few questions and offered my own POV. Just things like cool dude, so if I invade your bedroom and throw you out, what are you going to do to stop me? You’re like, eleven. And what if I tickle you every time you try to tell your parents about what I’m doing? Even if they listen to you and try to help, WHAT IF I JUST TICKLE THEM TOO? How long can that last? If you give up, was that your fault? I mean we were laughing, but he got my point.
Well the other day we were chatting again about Native Americans, because they are one of his favorite topics, and this time he was discussing the tragedies that have befallen First Nations people in America throughout history. He said, “They just weren’t ready for us.”
He said, “When I think about everything we did to them, I feel kinda ashamed.”
The SJW in me was proud of him for what he was saying, but I was more proud hearing how deeply he thinks about these things. We talk about philosophy and history whenever we visit. Sometimes we hit on a topic or conclusion where he knows we’re at an impasse, and he says, “We’re just gonna have to agree to disagree.”
I’ll be damned if a kid from a mildly deplorable family showing such mindfulness and consideration doesn’t give me a little hope for the future.
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So I’ve talked about my alt right brother Plenty in this thread before, I block his number from time to time so his texts don’t affect my mental state basically. Anyways I unlocked him yesterday and tonight he messages me out of the blue and this always happens so I asked him like do you know when you aren’t blocked somehow or do you just fire messages into the void all the time? Turns out he fires them into the void all the time, but apart from that it’s because he thinks they still go through? They don’t and I tried to tell him this multiple times and he claims it would say not delivered or something if it wasn’t and I was just lying to him, I told him over and over i don’t get them and he’s just like you’re a liar. We have a family gathering coming up in early April and he’s daring me to test it there, i think he should seek help? Yea or no?
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Get him help after you extract a few hundred from him.
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