Kids need to be kids

I think such a desire is very telling, given the high-pressure lives that children today are forced to lead. A Sunday spent in pajamas becomes an oasis in the desert of a kid's life, it's such an elusive concept. After all, Sundays you have to go, go, go. After church there's travel soccer, lacrosse, football, year-round swim team, piano practice, the six hours of studying that needs to be done.

There's volunteering at X, Y and Z (can't get into college without a handsome chunk of volunteer service under your belt).

A kid who even tries to sleep in on what used to be a day of rest is a kid who dares put himself behind the eight ball when it comes time to try to get into college. And we can't have that happening, now can we-

It seems that for this generation of kids, the child-rearing arms race that started some two decades ago is reaching its crescendo, and maybe, just maybe, these kids are getting wise and just saying no: a sort of declaration of detente in a war launched by my generation of type-A overachievers upon the unsuspecting generations to come.

Cases in point: a teenaged girl I know who devoted most of childhood to her sport - by the age of 14 spending some 45 hours a week on it. That's more commitment required than your average full-time job.

She recently realized lifewas passing her by, and, plagued by injuries, decided to quit her sport. Luckily she did so before her entire childhood was gobbled up by it.

On vacation recently I met a young man in his early 20s. He worked on a snorkeling day-cruise boat - hardly a career path toward earning millions. I asked him if he enjoyed his job and he readily replied, "My life is absolutely perfect. There's nothing I'd change about it."

Not many people can lay claim to that without a second thought.

A friend graduated from the University of Virginia a year or two ago with a perfectly employable degree in business of some sort. But she decided that she loved to teach yoga and fitness classes, so shunned the "working world" in favor of doing what felt right. "I love to help people feel better about themselves. I can't wait to get up and go to work each day. It's not what was expected of me by my family, but I'm so very happy with it," she told me.

I hope this means that despite the filial arms race, the real message is getting through to some people.

Our son ran the gauntlet of college applications last fall, and the contrast between his experience and mine were striking - not the least of which is what he has had to achieve in his relatively short lifetime.

I was no slacker in high school. I had all sorts of sports, activities and leadership roles - the gamut. But today kids practically have to invent the cure to cancer to gain college admission.

This is due in no small thanks to my contemporaries, who felt the need from their children's infancy to strive for an unattainable level of perfection. Teach them Beethoven in utero. Suzuki violin by the age of 2. The best pre-schools, the best tutors, the best college coaches to ensure admission to an Ivy League school.

Isn't life too short to jam it all into the first two decades of life- Maybe I mean that childhood's too short to cram your adulthood into that fleeting period. I mean, don't we have all of our lives to be grown-ups-

Sure, adulthood has its privileges, but it also has its share of onerous responsibilities, which are the mantle worn by adults for a reason: They're too heavy and burdensome for a kid.

We seem intent to raise children who burn out by adulthood, who are blase, ambivalent, been-there-done-that. And for what- Now they're all so overly accomplished that no one can get into anywhere anymore without killing themselves.

At a recent high school orientation, a school principal urged parents to not be too hung up on the college track - it's not for everyone, he reminded them. He cited a kid who studied vocational training to become a bricklayer. This young man, who followed his passion, earns $70,000 a year straight out of high school, and likely wasn't racing from Suzuki lessons to travel soccer matches by age 5.

This contrasted with a young man I know with a master's degree in math who can't find work, and if and when he does, he will probably take years to earn a comparable salary.

We tend to like to compartmentalize kids into smart, college-bound, but I don't think that's necessarily the right way to view it. Smart, I think, is following your passion - whether that is to go to Dartmouth, become a bricklayer or crew a sailboat in the Caribbean. Who's the smart one - the one who didn't kill himself just to gain entry to Prince-ton or the one who teeters on the edge of a nervous breakdown for the 4.9 GPA-

It takes maturity for someone to realize what that passion is. In the meantime it's the responsibility of the parent to encourage the child's dreams, not to expect that child to fulfill his or her own dreams. A life vicariously filled will never be as enriching as one led by one's own dreams.

The war against childhood has imposed a heavy tax on our children, one I hope they begin to shun more and more. It taxes their bodies, their minds, their psyches. They pay for it with their childhood, something they can't buy back once they're making the big bucks, thanks to their overly adultified childhoods.

Makes you want to spend the day in your pajamas doing nothing.

Jenny Gardiner is a writer, radio commentator and novelist who lives in Albemarle County.