I confess: I don’t listen to every word my children say, and the reason is simple. They talk too much. And they talk about stuff I don’t care about.


For some kid-related topics, I can’t even muster up fake interest, like PC, Nintendo or PS3 games. When Evan plays some of his games and he'd say, “Guess what? I raced this guy and I was going so fast. . . ,” I’d stop her right there. With a shake of my head and the traffic-cop “STOP!” signal, I’d say, “Uh, sorry there darlin’! Don’t take this personally, but I hate your video games. I love you, of course, and am interested in anything you have to say about virtually anything other than your video games . . . school work, creative projects, philosophical musings, friend dilemmas—anything real.”


They’ve all heard variations on this speech many times. At this point, they police each other. Evan will say, “So in Tron. . .” and off he’ll go, but only for a minute or two, before Evan says, “Dude! Look who I'm talking to! Mom doesn’t care about Tron!”


And it’s true. I don’t. I care about their real lives . . . at least, theoretically, but I have to say that sometimes their real lives are boring too. There was a time last year when Evan talked endlessly about his friends. Evan would walk through the door after school, Aaliyah trailing behind him. Evan would say, “Oh my Gosh, she’s making me crazy!”


Overall though, I do care about their real lives . . . just not all the time. Sometimes they have exceptionally bad timing. Last night at 9:00, my neck was hurting and I am starting to get a cold and was trying to get everyone ready for bed, when Aaliyah said, “Hey! I like that story about princesses mom.” That is how she asks me to tell her a story.


I’m proud to say that I could respond honestly: “Yes, I remember!”But I told her that it was late and mommy hurt and it was time to go to bed.


Twenty minutes later, Aaliyah asked if she was a princess? I told her of course she was. And she then ten minutes later was finally asleep.


But you know what? They don’t always listen to me either. So there.