As the American humorist and performer Will Rogers once said, “Too many people spend money they haven’t earned to buy things they don’t want to impress people that they don’t like.”

As Bert Lance, director of the Office of Management and Budget in Jimmy Carter’s 1977 administration, once said, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

Guilt is not a happy feeling. It’s more like that feeling when you have a sudden, agonizing itch in your crotch area but you’re surrounded by people and you can’t dig in after it and you’re just dying to get some relief. That is what guilt feels like.

Like the IRS, your family exists to fuck with you. [...] Like the certain (some might say, inordinately large) percentage of your income that automatically goes to taxes, a certain percentage of your fucks go straight to Family.

Sharing. Most parents do want their children to grow into adults who understand the concept of sharing and know when it’s the right thing to do. Just like they want them to grow up not to be serial killers. But perhaps everyone fixates on sharing a little too much when it comes to this or that toy or book or hat. As one mother said, “It would be lovely if my son wanted to share his truck [with your child], but I don’t ask you to give me a slurp of your eight-dollar iced coffee at the playground, do I? You can shoot me various imploring/judgmental/evil looks while your kid cries over someone else’s toy—I am taking ten minutes to read my phone in peace while my child is blissfully occupied with the toy I bought him.