What Are Summers For: Work or Play?

Published June 20, 1985. One day last week I arrived home from the university. It was late in the afternoon when I walked in the house, only to find the children all sitting around in the kitchen. I asked what everyone was doing. “Nothing,” and “not much” were about the only responses I got.

I naively asked why no one had been out pulling weeds in the front yard. Or, why had no one started planting the potted flowers by the back door?

The response to those questions was simple. “It’s too hot.”

I then started on Lecture No. 7, “You should be out working somewhere.” I retold some of my well-known struggle stories of when I was their age; all the sugar beet rows I had thinned in the hot sun, all the lawns I have mowed for 50 cents, and how I used to repair flat tires in my dad’s service station for 75 cents each.

Neither Doug, Tammy, Brian, nor Jon seemed moved. They just sat there sipping Kool-Aid.

As I went on and on about contemporary teenagers, work, or the lack of it, my 16-year-old, Tammy, finally said, “Do you want to know what your problem is, Dad?”

Of course, every father wants to know what his problem is, so I answered. “Yes, Tammy, what is my problem?”

“All you think summers are for is work,” she began. “Do this, do that, when are you going to start such and such? That’s all you ever say.”

Well, Tammy was right on the first count. I do believe that summers are for work. That is what fathers are supposed to help their children learn to do. Work. They’ll never survive in life unless they learn to pull weeds, mow lawns, and wash windows and dishes . . . like I did when I was their age.

“But Dad,” Tammy continued, “summers are not just for work. We’ve been going to school for nearly 10 months, and we looked forward to getting out. Summers are for vacation, relaxing, playing around.”

All the others agreed with Tammy. They shouldn’t have to work a lot during the summer.

That night I told Susan of my conversation. We decided that we are probably the only parents who have a difficult time trying to get their teenagers to work during the summer. My wife agreed with me. Children should do some work when school is out. But then she sided with Tammy. Summer is for other things as well.

Later that evening I began thinking of my supposed “problem.” No child, I assured myself, will ever make it through life unless he learns to mow grass and pull weeds . . . right when parents want it done.

But then I recalled another conversation I had some years ago. I knew a famous artist who once told me that he didn’t know he could paint until he was 19, one year after he left home. He had grown up in a rural area and every day he had to go out in the fields and weed row after row of crops. He came to detest the task. But his father insisted, stating that no child would be successful in life unless he learned how to work. And work was defined as hoeing and chopping weeds. Only after he left home, when he had more leisure time, did my artist friend discover that he had an unusual talent for painting. And that is how he now makes his living.

I thought a lot about the artist. What if he had learned of his talent earlier in life? Maybe we do need leisure time when we are young to explore and discover other talents besides pulling weeds.

Tammy, maybe you are correct. Perhaps, summers are not only for work . . . but also for water coloring and things like that.

Have a happy summer.