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" In your 40s, you kind of know how things are likely to go, and you're better at saying, 'You know what? That just doesn't suit me...' I remember thinking in my 30s, 'I should go to Burning Man. I could be a Burning Man person.' And in my 40s, I'm like, 'You know what? I'm never going to go to Burning Man.' "

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" In the Nineties, there was all this new research into brain development, with evidence saying poor kids fall behind in school because no one is talking to them at home, no one is reading to them. And middle-class parents seized on this research. "

Pamela Druckerman

Parents

School

Reading

" Soccer may not explain the world or even contain the world. But it makes the world a slightly happier place. "

" Although I wrote a book about infidelity around the world, I ended up concluding that fidelity is quite a good idea. "

" My family was once invited to lunch at a chateau owned by a friend of a friend. As we drove our rental car up to the giant castle, my kids gasped and said, 'They must be rich!' "

" Unlike the time sink of binge-watching a TV series, podcasts actually made me more efficient. Practically every dull activity - folding laundry, applying makeup - became tolerable when I did it while listening to a country singer describing his hardscrabble childhood, or a novelist defending her open marriage. "

Pamela Druckerman

Time

Childhood

" Around my neighborhood, I'm known as the American who talks to her computer while she types. "

" Soon after Donald Trump was inaugurated, I got a letter from France's interior ministry informing me that I was now French. By the time it arrived, I'd been French for nearly two weeks without even knowing it. "

Pamela Druckerman

Two

Time

" One of the many problems with parenting is that kids keep changing. Just when you're used to one stage, they zoom into another. "

" I've never gotten a good idea while checking Twitter or shopping. "

" Get rid of the idea of kids' food. Kids can eat whatever adults can eat. You know, there is one dinner, and everyone has the same thing. "

" The question on my husband's birthday is always, What do you get for the man who has nothing? "

" Having lived in America and France, I've been on both sides of the picky-eating divide. "

" Practically every time I speak up at a school conference, a political event, or my apartment building association's annual meeting, I'm met with a display of someone else's superior intelligence. "

" As an American married to an Englishman and living in France, I've spent much of my adult life trying to decode the rules of conversation in three countries. Paradoxically, these rules are almost always unspoken. "

" Just as dressing well in your forties entails making choices that reflect who you are and not just wearing generic basics, looking good as you get older requires accentuating and enjoying what's specific to you rather than striving for cookie-cutter perfection. "

" Parisiennes rarely walk around wearing the giant diamonds that are de rigueur in certain New York neighborhoods. "

" Childhood and adolescence are nothing but milestones: You grow taller, advance to new grades, and get your period, your driver's license, and your diploma. Then, in your 20s and 30s, you romance potential partners, find jobs, and learn to support yourself. "

" The French aren't known for being hilarious. When I told Parisians I was interested in French humor, they'd say 'French what?' "

" Even for natives, French satire is rarely laugh-out-loud funny. Its unspoken punch line is typically that things have gone irrevocably wrong, and the government is to blame. "

" If you want to know how old you look, just walk into a French cafe. It's like a public referendum on your face. "

" You know you're in your 40s when you've spent 48 hours trying to think of a word, and that word was 'hemorrhoids.' "

" Just do what you want more often. Don't be so worried about what other people expect. "

" When you're the foreigner and your kids are the natives, they realize you're clueless much sooner than they ordinarily would. I'm pretty sure mine skipped the Mommy-is-infallible stage entirely. "

" How hard or easy it is to raise kids, especially while working, is a big part of people's well-being everywhere. "

" When my kids correct my cultural missteps, I sometimes suspect that they're not embarrassed, they're gleeful. "

" Podcasts immersed me in colloquial English and put me back in the American zeitgeist. "

Pamela Druckerman

Immersed

Back

" Eating among the French certainly affected me. After a few years here, I gave up most of my selective food habits. "

" I've got letters from all over the world saying what you're describing as American parenting is Chilean middle-class parenting, or it is Finnish middle-class parenting, or it is Slovak middle-class parenting. "

" I gradually understood why European mothers aren't in perpetual panic about their work-life balance and don't write books about how executive moms should just try harder: Their governments are helping them - and doing it competently. "

" A large part of the creative process is tolerating the gap between the glorious image you had in your mind and the sad thing you've just made. "