What has your child taught you, lately?

I learned how to be a parent from my sons.

What a great observation and comment leading to a good question.

I’ve had the vicarious mixed blessing of seeing a lot of my theoretical ideas about micro economics, business, hiring and investing come to fruition through my daughter.

She manages a small food cart / catering operation in Madison, Wisconsin, which I helped her to start. But it’s entirely her baby, as she has birthed it and nurtured it for 3+ years now, and it has supported her income-wise for 2+ years. (The first year wasn’t exactly hand-to-mouth, it was a long and sometimes – for her – exasperating process of midwifing her own child, in a way, finding what worked and what didn’t, settling on the offerings she wanted to produce and serve, and finding the right price points that wouldn’t drive away customers or leave her busier than she could stand, and then profit-less at the end of the day. So she also worked part time for another employer during her off hours. Funny way to spend ‘off hours’, but that’s what was needed at the time.)

Two years ago she bought the contents of a commercial kitchen in a rental office space setup, and took over the space lease. That marked her total commitment to the enterprise, too: renting out unused and off-hours space to others who needed the kitchen prep space, refrigeration and tools; catering during the winter and on weekends when the cart is put away, and hiring – and firing – staff.

She has told me things (things that I once told her!) about how to locate, cultivate, train and treat people as employees and co-workers; about how difficult it can be to fire those who need firing, and sometimes to be able to do it in a way that lets them know “you’re not a bad person, and you’re not worthless, but we don’t have a good fit here – good luck in your next job”; and how to treat both suppliers / vendors and customers alike as the valued parts of your business that they are.

Last year she grossed more than I did.

I’m looking forward to learning about business from my daughter.

I was in the diner with my 5 year old about a month ago. On the partition between the booths, there was a glass piece with a stained glass design on it. In the middle of the design was a diamond shape. She pointed to that and said “That’s a rhombus.” I was like “ok.” I then found out that the diamond shape is no longer called a “diamond” it’s now called a rhombus. They say because “diamond” is a gem, not a shape.

Okay, @jca, and accurate.

But with baseball season coming up, I’m sticking to “the diamond”, and not “the rhombus” when we’re talking about the infield.

Resilience. One of my daughters had her heart broken recently, but she’s bouncing back.

@CWOTUS: Hahaha! “The baseball rhombus!”

Today, at my son’s lesson, I learned there are times when you use your thumb to play two keys at once. I had never seen this before. Of course, he was learning to do it, while I was learning it was possible. He came home and showed his sister and mother.

Technique. What a riot.

That not all nursery rhymes are real.

I learned just how difficult Bipolar people can be, as he is also. We are like twins in looks and nature.I keep telling him what to do with his illness and don’t do it myself!

My girls quite enjoy telling me when I’m pronouncing something incorrectly. For instance, I’d never heard the French phrase “quelle surprise” said out loud, and I pronounced it as if it were English (“kwell surprise”). They cracked up and told me it should really be “kehl soor-preez”. Apparently, I pronounce “fragrance” badly, too. As many times as they’ve told me, I can’t stop saying “fregrence”, sigh.

As long as you don’t say nukular we’re good.

Nukular, nukular, nullcoolier.

Letting go of adult children is incredibly difficult.

Writing Nukular is acceptable; just don’t say it, Merica.

@zensky absolutely!