Reno Myths Debunked and Trip Update

Reno is a unique town, and i mean that in the literal sense of the word ("being the only one of its kind").  Thanks to shows like Reno 911 and pop culture references like Johnny Cash's line "I shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die", everyone has an idea of what Reno is like -- but many people haven't actually visited Reno.  So without further ado, here are some popular Reno myths, debunked:

#1:  Reno is just like Vegas, except smaller and seedier.  This summarizes most of the other myths, so I will break down why this is wrong in more detail below -- but Reno is WAY different than Vegas, and I think most everyone who lives in or is associated with Reno (including me) vastly prefers Reno over Vegas.

#2:  Reno and Vegas are geographically close to each other.  When I was in law school, the career counselor (who knew that we were considering Reno as a possible destination) kept sending me job listings in Las Vegas.  Reno is 452 miles - an 8 hour drive - from Las Vegas.  Commutes from Reno that would be much more doable than Vegas:  Lake Tahoe (48 minutes); Sacramento (2 hours); or San Francisco (3.5 hours).

#3:  Like Vegas, Reno's topography is all desert.  The first time I visited Reno, I was stunned by its beauty.  Reno is surrounded by the Sierra Nevada mountains and the Truckee River flows through the center of town. To the east of Reno is desert, but to the west is Lake Tahoe, and Reno draws geographic characteristics from both.  There are dusty mountain trails lined with sage brush, but there is also lots of green space and an alpine feel.

#4:  Like Vegas, Reno is unseasonably hot all the time.  Reno gets all 4 seasons, but the brutality of winter and the intensity of summer are subdued by the desert climate.  The temperatures get into the 100s in the heart of summer, but thanks to the desert climate, it cools down to 70 or below every single night.

#5:  Like Vegas, Reno culture is dominated by casinos.  While the casinos do play a part, local culture is also heavily influenced by:

• Reno's frontier history:  there is a heavy independent / libertarian sentiment here.  
• California influence:  California is less than an hour away, and you can see that influence in all sorts of things - the main example that comes to mind is, at the grocery store, the organic section is bigger than the meat section.
• Outdoorsy types:  If you are into outdoor sports, Reno is a wonderland.  In the summer, mountain biking, hiking, trail running, backpacking, kayaking, etc. are all easily available.  In the winter, the slopes of Lake Tahoe are less than an hour away.  This plays a significant part in what people do with their free time and expendable income.  

It would be dishonest to say that casinos have no effect on local culture.  They dominate downtown, they draw in tourists, and they boast some of the nicest restaurants and bars in town.  Because they advertise using scantily clad women, you see a lot more skin driving around Reno than other towns.  Although locals mostly avoid casinos, you can't avoid being around gambling - there are slot machines in every grocery store and gas station.  But when you live here, you get used to the casinos and slot machines really quickly, and soon you hardly notice them.

#6:  Prostitution is legal in Reno.  It's legal in other parts of Nevada, but not in Reno city limits.

#7:  All-you-can-eat sushi is a big thing in Reno.  This is true.  And it's glorious.  If I was a competitive eater, my food of choice would be sushi.

Thus concludes my Reno myth debunking, but Reno friends, please feel free to add to the list.
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For part two of the blog, here is a recap with the highlights of our Reno trip this summer.

-Family and friends time!  I am really blessed to have awesome in-laws.  (My mother-in-law Betty is pictured above reading a story to J.)  They are so kind, generous, and fun to be around.  And they allow (and even encourage!) us to crash with them for a month at a time.  This is no small thing when you've got two toddlers running around making noise and messes at all hours of the day.  I'm so grateful for them.  We also got to see lots of friends on this trip and attended some really fun get-togethers (including a children's tea party, pictured below, and a food truck rally).

- Wherever we are in our travels, we spend a lot of time at these places:  the park, the mall, the library, and the Children's Museum (or zoo / aquarium / local museum of choice).  Reno has a really nice children's museum complete with a model Truckee River, a star gazing room, a mining tunnel, an art room, and multiple block building rooms.  The kids loved it.

- Lake Tahoe - we made it up twice this month  First, we took the kids up for a beach day with their cousins and a good time was had by all.  (Joshua spent over an hour playing with a piece of drift wood, pretending it was a train.)  Second, Kenny and I had a really fun double date with Kenny's brother Jason and his wife Naomi to see As  You Like It at the Tahoe Shakespeare Festival.

- Dates with the hubs - this is the time of year when Kenny and I really get to spend one-on-one time together outside of the house, and it's so nice.

- Running on the Steamboat Ditch Trail - a couple times each week, I ran on this mountain trail near my mother-in-law's house.  It is so beautiful and peaceful and reminded me of Alamosa.

So now we are starting the journey back East.  In a couple days, we'll arrive in Nebraska, stay with my parents for 10 days, and then head home.  Hope to see some of you along the way!
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Overprotected Children Culture Gone too Far?

Earlier this week, Ross Douthat of the NYT wrote an article about how children are overprotected and more specifically, how this trend of overprotection has led to parents being unfairly punished for not hovering over their children.  This idea - that the culture of overprotecting children has gone too far, that parents who give their children independence are at risk of having their children taken away - seems to resonate with many.  I have three thoughts about all of this.

1.  I disagree that it's a bad thing to expect rigorous supervision of young children.  I still see plenty of older kids riding their bikes around the neighborhood alone, I see middle schoolers alone at the playground, and I see elementary age kids playing alone in their yard while the parent is in the house.  It is only the REALLY young kids - the preschool and youngest elementary kids - who are expected to be supervised by someone all the time.  And since I spend a lot of time with toddlers these days and have seen their total lack of judgment and impulse control, and how quickly they can put themselves in serious danger, I think it's totally appropriate to expect rigorous supervision of younger kids.  (Note:  I'm not saying that it's easy or that I do it perfectly or that it's not a major challenge for people without support.  I'm just saying that it seems like a reasonable expectation that young kids need to be actively supervised.)

2.  I disagree that kids are wrongly being thrown into the foster care system because of our overprotective culture.   I spent two years representing abused and neglected children in their foster care cases, and when it comes to removing kids from their home, it's very rarely the case that the kid gets removed without reasons that go far a one time incident of a child being left in a park.  (It is much more frequently true that once a kid has been in foster care for awhile and the parents have made their home safe, the system can be too slow in allowing the kid to return back home.)   The cases described in the article where the kids were left at a park, or wandered through a parking lot near home unsupervised, or were at home alone for a few hours and then ended up in the foster care system -- not once in my hundreds of cases did I see a situation like this, unless this lack of supervision was the pattern rather than a one time exception.  These events might cause someone to call CPS, and cause CPS to open an investigation -- but a court is unlikely to remove a kid from their home based on a one time incident of lack of supervision.  Kids get removed because they are left alone for days at a time, or because they are abandoned indefinitely with a friend or relative, or because the pattern of being left alone has caused some kind of harm to the child (like missing a bunch of school, or the child injured himself because of lack of supervision, or the child developed attachment disorder) - not because they are left at the park once for an hour.  I'm not saying that the child welfare system never makes a mistake, or that there aren't some outlier cases where something like this might happen.  But if you're providing a generally safe home and someone reports you to CPS because your 10 year old child was playing unsupervised in the park, in the vast majority of cases, nothing will happen - the case will just close.

3.  There should never be a case where a child gets removed from a loving home just because the parent is poor.  The real story here, which is mentioned briefly in the article, is how this "culture of overprotection" is especially hard on single parents who do not have child care and somehow still have to find a way to provide for their family.  These are the cases where kids do get removed from the home -- where parents do have to turn lack of supervision into a pattern, and where this lack of supervision (at least allegedly) causes harm to the child.  This seemed to be the case for at least half of the parents profiled, and these are the ones that really tug at the heart strings.  I absolutely 100% could-not-agree-more that struggling parents need more child care support as they take steps towards economic self sufficiency.  The lack of affordable child care is hugely problematic for single parents who must meet work requirements in order to receive welfare, food stamps, and housing benefits, or who are trying to attend school or a job interview so that they can provide for their family.  We should design public assistance programs so that parents aren't forced to make these tough decisions - for example, by ensuring that parents can always get the child care support they need or else be exempted from work requirements in public assistance programs.  And for all parents struggling to find child care as they attend job interviews, community college, etc., we need to have more affordable, flexible hours, conveniently located, high quality child care available.    To me, this seems like one of the absolute best things government subsidies or charitable funds could be supporting.

 What do you think about the article, or about the idea that kids are overprotected, or about anything else on this topic?