question for PW

[supercheesegirl]

hey pocketwitch: remember how in intro to fiction we were supposed to bring in a story by someone else that we really liked and talk about why we liked it? you brought in this amazing story about a family with really unstructured freespirited parents and they wanted to make their kids all open-minded and just ended up emotionally scarring them. do you remember this story? do you know the title and who wrote it?

Comments

[pocketwitch.livejournal.com]

Oh wow .... I have this vague memory of that story, and of really liking it, but I am *totally* blanking. Do you remember any other details about it?

[supercheesegirl.livejournal.com]

here's what i remember of that story: the parents were hippies or something, and they had four kids i think, and wanted to raise the kids to be all liberal and secure and confident. and they exposed the kids to all kinds of things, like drugs and sex and being naked and stuff, and they were always having their grownup friends over, and they never imposed any rules on the kids, so they were allowed to run wild. and it worked for a little while, but then as the kids grew older they started imposing rules on themselves so they could be normal, and they would dress all preppy, and avoided all their parents' friends when they were over, and they felt all uncomfortable with the things their parents did. so all the parents succeeded in doing was raising scared, sensitive, insecure kids.

but i have no idea who wrote the story, or what magazine it appeared in.

on another note, what school are you about to graduate from? my roommate is looking for jobs out that way, she teaches english classes at uncg right now.

[pocketwitch.livejournal.com]

I remember the story, but ... eeeek.
I will rack my brain over it and let you know if I come up with anything, but no promises. I'd like to be able to find it again myself, because now that you've got me thinking about it, I'd like to read it again.

Was this in the short-story-writing class? I took a short-story-reading class too, but I don't think you were in that one ...