Ask an Empty Nester

Dear Empty Nester,

I’m about to send my youngest off to college, and the way she’s talking, I doubt I’ll even see her over the summers. It seems she’s gone for good, which I guess is the whole idea. My question is: what should be done with her bedroom? I don’t want to make it into a shrine or anything, but to eliminate all trace of her seems a bit callous. Any suggestions?

Jeannie E, Seattle, WA

Dear Jeannie,

To some degree, this is a matter of real estate: how large is your home? If you lived in a land of giant houses, like, say, Houston, any modification to that room might not be worth the bother. But if your home is typical of Seattle, sounds like you could really use a proper guest room. So you’ll want to make that room attractive to your friends and relatives, which means pulling down the BTS or Monsta X poster, ditching the stuffed animals, upgrading the battered old bumper-sticker-plastered dresser, and if necessary (e.g., if the walls are red or black), repainting.

That being said, if you want to preserve something of your daughter’s essence, in an aesthetically pleasing way, leave her bookshelf exactly as is. Perhaps you have fond memories of seeing her behind this or that book, and after all you probably bought her some of them, especially if your daughter was wise enough to insist you hold on to her favorite children’s picture books. (Note that if your kid doesn’t have a bookshelf full of books to leave behind, you’re a shitty parent and all bets are off.) (Kidding!) (Sort of!) (No seriously, I’m kidding!)

Dear Empty Nester,

My son’s grand European tour dovetailed right into his departure for college, so my husband and I got an early start on our empty nester experience. The main thing I’ve noticed so far is that we’re kind of snippy with each other, especially about—of all things—the perennially low gas gauge in our car. We used to blame our kid for this (and frankly he earned that), but with him gone it’s still going on. My husband swears he doesn’t run out the tank, and while he’s not known to be delusional, I’m sure I’m not the culprit either. Are we losing our minds?

Emily K, Portland, OR

Dear Emily,

This could just be a phase as you adjust to life without your son around. Perhaps both you and your husband are flakier than you think when it comes to filling the tank, having long scapegoated your kid, and now the size of this problem is being exaggerated. You might also reasonably chalk some of this up to sky-high gas prices; maybe you’re getting just a few gallons at a time because you keep finding yourself almost out of gas without a reasonably cheap gas station nearby.

There’s a silver lining here, by the way: at least your son learned to drive! As described in this Wall Street Journal article, a growing number of Gen-Z kids aren’t bothering to learn; in 1983, 46% of 16-year-olds got their driver licenses, whereas in 2014 that had fallen to 24.5%. Don’t get me wrong, cars suck and we should all be biking instead, but knowing how to drive is an inarguably useful skill.

Dear Empty Nester,

It’s been almost a year since we dropped our child (er, adult, I guess) off at college, and when he didn’t even come home for summer break, my wife and I relapsed right into the empty nester funk we’d suffered originally. It might even be worse this time. It’s so bad, my wife is talking about getting a dog. This initially struck me as a really weird, hail-Mary type of notion, but I’m starting to think I’m just crazy enough to try it. What do you think?

Malcolm R, Oakland, CA

Dear Malcolm,

First of all, I am not a dog person, so I am fundamentally unqualified to answer this question, but I’ll give it my best shot anyway.

If you have never had a dog, this seems like a strange time to get one; or, to put it another way, if you’ve lived this long without a dog, do you actually fancy yourself suddenly becoming a dog person? Meanwhile, there are practical things to consider: as an empty nester you now have the opportunity to travel more, but a dog can seriously cramp your style. You should probably interview your dog-owning friends see what you’re getting into.

It also strikes me that a dog would be a questionable replacement for a typical teenaged human, with their moodiness, their tendency to hole up in their room, and their inevitable lack of greeting when you arrive home. In short, it’s likely your departed teen behaved more like a cat. Wouldn’t that be a more realistic surrogate?

Dear Empty Nester,

Why are we called empty nesters, anyway? It’s not like the nest is gone; we parents are still in it, thank you very much!

John S, Ashburn, VA

Dear John,

I wondered the same thing, before learning more about the avian behavior underlying the metaphor. For one thing, as described by Audubon, a bird’s nest exists purely for the eggs and hatchlings, and is then abandoned. If we want to be pedantic about it, the empty nest metaphor isn’t very apt unless the parents sell their home and move.

But it actually gets even more complicated than that. The real power of this metaphor derives from its allusion to brood parasitism, the practice of a bird laying its egg in another bird’s nest, manipulating the creator of that nest (the “host”) into raising its young. Isn’t this how all parents feel, before their nest empties out—as in, “Who are these evil teenagers and where did my sweet little children go?!” (This is related to the concept of “soiling the nest,” wherein—perhaps by biological design—your teenager becomes more and more annoying over time, to make his her departure a relief rather than cause for lament.)

The metaphor of brood parasitism is also a means to understand the guilt you are feeling now: just to get this kid out of your hair, you’ve planted her in a college dorm, making her her RA’s and roommates’ problem. They can try to get her to turn her stereo down, stop slamming doors at night, and not leave piles of laundry all over the floor. Offloading your chick to someone else’s nest feels  downright irresponsible, doesn’t it? Yeah … she learned from the best.

Dear Empty Nester,

This is really weird: although I think I’m coping pretty well with the empty nest (it’s only been a week), I startled myself the other day by calling my husband by our son’s name! Even more surprising, my husband says this was the second time I’ve done it. Am I losing it, or is this a known phenomenon?

Tracy A, Castle Rock, CO

Dear Tracy,

I have not only heard of this, but I did it myself! I wouldn’t read too much into it … just a brain glitch I think, based on your departed kid being on your mind. Perhaps it’s like that game where you tell somebody to say “stop” fifty times in a row, and then you ask him, real quick, “What do you do when you see a green light?” and he answers, “Stop!”

If, on the other hand, you start calling your husband by your ex-boyfriend’s name, then you might have bigger issues, like you’re reverting too far back to your previous life…

Dear Empty Nester,

I am having a disagreement with my wife about how much contact we should have with our son during his first couple weeks at college. She thinks he might be shy about reaching out to us for assistance, but I’m guessing he’ll love the independent feeling and would prefer to be left alone. When it comes to phoning, emailing, or texting a recently fledged kid, how much is too much? Please reply soon … we’re sending him off next week!

Rob S, Council Bluffs, IA

Dear Rob,

This will certainly vary from kid to kid, and based on where yours falls on the spectrum from already independent to totally coddled. I guess I would err on the side of less contact, since there are so many resources available to kids these days, with their parents likely being be a last resort. Remember, when our generation started college there was no Internet; most students lacked cell phones; and there was no Amazon … and yet, we somehow survived.

My younger daughter, a freshly minted college freshman, mentioned recently during an (albeit brief) phone call home that her alarm clock had broken and she had no idea how she’d wake up in time for her first class on Monday. So I suggested she use her (non-smart) cell phone, which surely has an alarm clock feature. She seemed to shrug off this idea, and dropped the subject. Well, the next day I downloaded the owner’s manual and sent her the instructions via email. Shortly after that, I sent her an unrelated email about some college lecture notes from thirty years ago I’d just stumbled across, relating to Nikolai Gogol, a writer we both enjoy.

Well, guess which email my daughter responded to first? Correct: the random one with no practical purpose, about how Gogol was a disgusting little kid, etc. To be fair, my daughter did reply to the alarm clock one too, but only to say she’d figured it out on her own. I have to say, I felt much better about the Gogol email. Her response to it told me she was alive and well and on top of her correspondence, and I didn’t feel like a mother hen. (Frankly, I’m more of a father rooster at heart.)

Dear Empty Nester,

I’m going to be an empty nester soon, along with a few of my friends and neighbors, and at some point someone was talking about silver linings and said something about free stuff. Is there some way to get free stuff out of this deal? I hope it’s not just bumper stickers or ball caps from the university…

Peter L, Albany, CA

Dear Peter,

You’re in luck! It just so happens there’s plenty of free stuff in our community, thanks to parents cleaning out their kids’ rooms. I’m seeing all kinds of perfectly good things dragged out to the curb: desks, chairs, old lamps, a clock radio, a boom box … you get the picture. My wife set out the six or seven stuffed animals our kids didn’t insist on keeping, and they were all taken … even the home-sewn turtle whose head was starting to come off. If you hurry, you might still nab this stereo cabinet (if that’s what it is) though I already scored the little alarm clock:

Dear Empty Nester,

My son, who starts his freshman year in a couple weeks, shocked me the other day by casually mentioning he’d be coming home once a month or so to do his laundry. (His college is only a couple hours away.) Is this a standard behavior? Should I allow it?

Lisa N, Sacramento, CA

Dear Lisa,

Look, this kid has a lot on his plate. He’s got his grades to think about, and making friends besides! I think you should drive out there twice a month, pick up his laundry, and do it for him. And bring him lots of baked goods while you’re at it (cookies, brownies, etc.). And if you really care about him succeeding socially, you should probably do his roommates’ laundry as well. And then write all their papers for them.

Have I made my point? Your son presumably has his tuition and dorm fees covered … he shouldn’t even be asking about laundry.

Dear Empty Nester,

I just have to say it: my youngest is going off to college soon and I’m already feeling pretty down. One way I try to process these kinds of feelings is through art, literature, etc. that goes into the problem I’m grappling with. That said, I don’t want to spend a lot of time wallowing in my grief by reading a 400-page novel on the topic. Any recommendations for a good empty nester movie or something?

Aaron W, Minneapolis, MN

Dear Aaron,

I know just the thing: “Bao,” an animated short film from Pixar (available on Amazon Prime Video). There’s a nice interview with the director and the producer here.

Dear Empty Nester,

That bit about brood parasitism being part of the empty nest metaphor ... you totally made that up, didn't you.

Mike R, Sheridan, WY

Dear Mike,

Yeah. I did.

Dear Empty Nester,

I’m getting ready to drive my kid cross-country to drop her off at college, and I completely grasp that this is the intended outcome of her upbringing, that things are going to plan, and that the best case scenario is that she immediately adjusts, thrives socially, and doesn’t give her family a lot of thought. At the same time, I must confess I’d feel heartbroken if she didn’t miss her father and me at least a little. Is there any way for me to tell if she does, or will, and is that even realistic to hope for?

Kaitlin C, Fairfax, CA

Dear Kaitlin,

This is a common question (fielded not so long ago by the columnist College Dad as well). The fact is, you should brace yourself for your daughter to be totally unemotional during the final sendoff (even if you’re crying your eyes out), and pretty blasé in the weeks to come as well. Bear in mind, she’s blasting off into an exciting future, and all her hormones are united in jettisoning her old life with extreme prejudice. You are correct that the best case scenario is a swift and complete detachment.

That said, if your family has a pet, your daughter will surely miss him or her. Pets are much more attractive and cuddly than parents, and never pester the kids for anything but food (which after all is easy and fun to serve up). I also wonder if longing for the family pet is a kid’s way to sublimate homesickness into a more acceptable form.

Our younger daughter’s big goodbye took place last week, and it was predictably brief and offhanded (especially for her). But during her final week at home, she was moved to write a poem about our cat Freya. The poem ponders how little we can understand our cat; how differently she perceives the world; how she likely doesn’t differentiate between dream and recollection; and how little she perceives absence. The poem concludes:

Yet when I’m gone
Perhaps the slightest lack is felt, she’ll start
At one more cold place in the house.
And so I’ve left, within her scattered mind,
A memory of warmth

An Empty Nester is a syndicated journalist whose advice column, “Ask an Empty Nester,” appears in over 0 blogs worldwide.

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Interview with Santa Claus

Introduction

In his most in-depth and personal interview in years, Santa Claus reveals the trials and travails, the pressure and preoccupations surrounding this most hectic season.

Interview with Santa

Santa Claus breezes through the kitchen into the family room of his North Pole home, rosy-cheeked and jolly and looking very much like he might say “Ho, ho, ho.” No, he’s not rocking a bright red suit with white trim and a wide black belt, and he’s not as rotund as most pictures portray him, but it’s unmistakably Santa. He’s dressed casually in a comfy button-down shirt that turns out to be a Saturday Stretch Flannel from Lucky Brand. His wife bustles in the background, brewing coffee and baking cookies in honor of my visit. Other than the dark windows—there hasn’t been sunlight or even twilight here since October—and the near-chaos in the nearby workshop, we could be in any nice old couple’s cozy home.

Santa, thanks for having me up again … it’s been too long. You’re looking good—have you lost weight?

Well, yeah, I think I’ve dropped about twenty pounds, so I’m getting around a bit easier—but of course, I’m still as old as ever. Older, even!

Are you on some kind of diet? Paleo, maybe? Ketogenic?

Heavens no, I never dabble in that stuff. The main thing is, my contract with Coca-Cola came up for renewal and we just couldn’t agree on terms. Decades of partnership, up in smoke. So I’m not drinking that stuff anymore, which is the only change, but the pounds have just melted off!

Well, that’s good to hear. I’ve always wondered, frankly, how you can be as spry as you are, with millions of families leaving cookies out for you on Christmas Eve. Do you gain a lot of weight on the big night?

Not at all, I’m running around in a frenzy the whole time, and remember, I’m going back up those chimneys as well! And those cookies people leave me … not to sound ungrateful or anything, but I bring most of those back to my elves. They really dig that.

Speaking of the Christmas Eve frenzy, of course the holiday season is starting to build toward that crescendo. How are you holding up?

Well, it’s always kind of terrifying to think of how much has to happen between now and the 25th, but I’m used to it. In some ways I guess it’s actually getting easier.

How so?

Well, to be honest, business is falling off a bit. More and more, the kids are asking for digital products, and that’s never been my bailiwick. And these Gen-Z kids are all about “experiences” which means even less stuff for me to manufacture and deliver.

Does that bother you at all?

No, no … it’s never been my job to shape anybody’s tastes. I just need to make sure that what kids ask for, they get.

Provided they’ve been good, of course…

Oh, don’t get me started on that!

Actually, I was going to wait a bit for the uncomfortable question, but since we’ve stumbled into it, let’s just bash on. You’ve been under some pressure about privacy concerns … would you care to talk a bit about that?

Well, sure … everyone else has had their say, I don’t mind having mine. Look, it’s no secret I have a long tradition of making it my business which kids are naughty, which ones are nice, and so forth, and naturally I’ll leverage technology to do that efficiently. My business is all about scale—I mean, look at the population growth I have to deal with—so efficiency is always front and center. How could I not leverage the Internet for that? But I have never shared any of my customer data with third parties. In principle I collect and use personal data only to the extent necessary to determine which kids get gifts and which ones don’t. I do receive letters from kids via email but I have secure servers and a strict data retention policy around that. And to be honest, this might be the last year I even bother to try to differentiate among these kids anyway.

Wow—that’s kind of a bombshell actually. You’re talking about just giving gifts to everybody?

Yeah, the Santa Claus brand has really taken a beating because of the public’s growing—and, let’s face it, overdue—focus on privacy. There’s so much abuse of personal information by Facebook and Google and all these other platforms, I feel like the baby being thrown out with the bathwater. And don’t even get me started on achieving GDPR compliance … that was a complete nightmare. Honestly, the costs to my business are so high with these regulations, it’s almost not worth it. I can think of worse things than naughty kids getting gifts on Christmas morning. Maybe if I just throw out the surveillance completely, and give presents to everybody, those wayward kids will stop nicking their siblings’ stuff—and I’ll save a bundle on all the effort I’m no longer making, all that data I’m no longer sifting through!

That seems really magnanimous of you…

Hey, I’m Santa! What do you expect?

Since we’re already kind of in the muck here, can we talk about the scrutiny you’ve had around workplace conditions and labor concerns?

Wow, I was kind of expecting more softballs from you! But hey, it’s all good. Look, I run a fair operation here—it’s always been a union shop and I’ve never fought that. I pay these elves a solid living wage year-round despite the highly seasonal nature of our business. I invite you to walk out on the floor yourself and ask any of these elves if they’re happy here. Well, not right now, obviously—they’re busier than a cat burying crap on a marble floor—but hit them up after New Year’s and they’ll tell you how reasonable a guy I am to work for.

Well, I’m sure you’re aware some elves have been lighting you up on Twitter…

Look, any workforce will have disgruntled types … and remember, this is the North Pole. Epidemiologists have long studied how seasonal affective disorder worsens the farther north you get. How many negative tweets from my elves do you get in summer? Go check—I’ll bet you don’t find any. All summer these elves party like rock stars … they don’t even need to sleep!

Fair enough. Now, you have perhaps the most non-diverse workforce in the world … is this by design?

I’m an equal-opportunity employer and if Chris Hemsworth applied for a job I’d gladly grant him an interview. The fact is, I don’t get a lot of applicants and most of my employees are related to one another. You’ve got siblings, offspring, fathers, uncles, aunts, nieces, nephews, and on and on, some of them third, fourth, fifth generation. Lots of companies talk about being like a family; we practically are. We’re like a family-run business times a thousand. And it works out because we’ve tailored the workshop to the elves’ size, so we’ve got a great ergonomic match there where Chris Hemsworth literally wouldn’t be a good fit.

Have you tried to diversify?

Back in the sixties I hired a lot of Oompa-Loompas, but they didn’t really integrate with our elves, and ultimately just couldn’t handle the conditions up here. The North Pole isn’t for everybody. But I never laid off a single one of those Oompa-Loompas. In fact, I’ve never laid off an elf either.

Let’s talk for a minute about Amazon. You’ve got kind of a love/hate thing going on there…

Well, yeah. It’s complicated. On the one hand, they’re eating into my business like anybody else’s, but since I’ve never had a single paying customer, this just eases my burden operationally. Of course I wonder if there’ll be a day when I become completely irrelevant, but I think the charm of a stuffed stocking and piles of beautifully wrapped presents left under the tree, instead of brown boxes left on the porch, will always have their cachet. And yes, it’s true I’ve partnered with Amazon for certain deliveries which has drawn some scrutiny.

Yes, if there’s an opposite of the halo effect you seem to be getting a bit of that…

Well, exactly. I’ve been delivering gifts to homes without fireplaces for centuries—I mean, think of all those New York and London apartments with radiators, or rural homes with propane tanks out back—but still people are shocked—shocked!—to learn that I don’t always slide down the chimney. So anything that challenges their Norman Rockwell sensibilities is suddenly a crime. The reality is, I’ve used a variety of courier services for ages, and a bunch of them have recently been bought up by Amazon. What am I gonna do, upset my whole system by changing providers on principle? The guy who schleps a hundred packages up the freight elevator on Christmas Eve doesn’t care that the company name on his pay stub has changed, nor does the doorman who knows to let him in. A million details go into delivering a billion packages on a single night and I can’t be reinventing the wheel every time Amazon buys someone. It’s not an ideal situation but in the final analysis, two billion gleeful children couldn’t care less.

At this point in the interview Mrs. Claus comes in with a large tray and serves us fresh-baked star-shaped cookies and hot coffee. She smiles demurely and, without a word, heads back toward the kitchen. “Thanks, Meg,” Santa says kindly, peering at her lovingly over his spectacles.

Wow … “Meg.” It’s funny, but I never knew Mrs. Claus’s first name. I didn’t really think about her even having a name.

It’s short for Margaret.

Would she … should we ask her to join us?

Oh, she has no use for journalists. And the way you’ve been grilling me, I can see why! (Laughs.) But seriously, she is a very private person, even more so than I, which is saying something. She’s perfectly happy to work behind the scenes, running the household and so forth. She’s very old-school.

Speaking of wives, and before I forget: my wife wanted me to ask you what you think of all these shopping mall Santas.

Well, historically I haven’t had any problem with them, as they’re fun for the kids and they mean well. There was always the worry that one would get drunk during his lunch break, then climb back in the chair and do something regrettable that would tarnish my image, but I can’t sweat all the what-ifs. But more recently I’ve started to worry about how skepticism is on the rise everywhere, what with fake news and Internet conspiracy theories and all that, and that kids will start putting two and two together—like, “Hey, I saw Santa at Macy’s last weekend, and then today I see him at Nordstrom and he’s like a foot shorter!”—and will stop believing in me as a result. I’m not a demanding person, I don’t seek a lot of attention or gratitude or anything, but the idea that a growing number of cynical kids are thinking the gifts I provided actually came from Mom and Dad … that really gets me down. So the white lie of mall Santas is starting to chafe a bit more these days, but in the end I just have to shrug it off with everything else.

Thanks Santa. And now I have just one more question. I know I’ve asked some tough ones today, so I’m going to lay off and instead turn it around to you: what’s the hands-down dumbest question any journalist has ever asked you?

That’s an easy one. Some dork said to me once, “Santa, you’re more than 1,700 years old. Almost nobody lives that long, the main exception being vampires. How can you convince me you’re not a vampire?”

I hope you put him in his place!

Of course I did.

Um … what exactly did you say?

Well, duh! I can’t be a vampire because vampires have to be invited in! There isn’t a soul on this planet who enters more homes without a spoken invitation. Didn’t that dickweed see “Let the Right One In”? Besides, I really only leave the North Pole once a year … whose blood am I supposed to drink all year? The elves’?

Wow, great points Santa. And thanks so much for sitting down with me today. And please thank Mrs. Claus for the goodies!

Thank you. And sorry a got a bit worked up just now … as you can imagine, I’m under a lot of stress these days. In fact, I’d better get back to work!

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Original artwork by Lindsay Albert.

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