How to Raise a Smart Ass: Parenting that Should Not Be Tried At Home by Lucia Walinchus

Work has been extremely stressful the past couple of months. How to Raise a Smart Ass has been a perfect book to curl up to at night and get a good laugh.  Lucia tells her personal story of raising two young daughters with a new brother on the way.   Lucia is a professional taking the bar exam in many states as their young family moves from southern California to New York to Virginia and finally Oklahoma.  As a working mother myself, I identified strongly with Lucia trying to balance both life and raising a child.  I also worked from home the first six years of my oldest son’s life, so I particularly identified with the chapter “working parent.”

I loved that How to Raise a Smart Ass is told in short vignettes that are perfect for e-book reading and for giving me a quick laugh before passing out in exhaustion each night.  As a mother, I loved that Walinchus told everything with no holds barred, from the excitement of being pregnant and realizing that you can eat whatever you want for nine months to just how much time you spend breast feeding when you breast feed your baby.  

There were so many excellent stories and quotes in this book, but I’ve picked out a few of my favorites to share:

“We moved into a house that a 90-year old woman had just moved out of because we thought the optimal design aesthetic should be ‘What would Michael Jackson do?’”

“I drove to Roanoke, Virginia, to take the bar, because why have a bar exam in the most populated part of the state when you can inconvenience everyone with a fun road trip to nowhere?”

“At first you have children for high and lofty reasons.  You get to sculpt a part of the teach generation.  You get to teach a child what it means to be a responsible, honorable, industrious person in society.

You probably also have the equally laudable goal of producing a new cadre of helpers for your house.  Imagine, tiny things that you can create who will bring you a beer.  Dishwashers!  Oh, the possibilities.

But then they actually come out and you stop imagining what your child could do for others, and wonder if they will do things for themselves.  Maybe, just maybe, you tell yourself . . . I can get my kid to wipe her own ass.”

“Like any good middle-class American parent, I have high hopes of my kid going to college someday.  Which is why I put them in sports early.  How else will we afford it?”

“As a kid, I thought, the Christmas season is SO long.  How will I ever wait until Christmas?  As an adult I think, the Christmas season is SO short.  How will I ever get all this crap done before Christmas?”

Overall, How to Raise a Smart Ass is a witty, funny, book that any parent will relate to and enjoy.  I highly recommend it!