For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for August 17, 2022

the boys’ have clues, but not the boys themselves… wow

as for myself, I once thought of journalism either for newspaper or for a radio show, but I don’t interview well

I told mom I wanted to be a teacher when I was a little girl. I put my dolls in a circle and I was teaching them about something. I punished my dolls for being naughty. I grew up and beecame a teacher for real. Funny thing is I graduated from college with a degree in Political Science. Turned out I was not that interested – too dry and no real interaction with people. Went back to school and got a teacher degree.

This is one of those situations where the boys dutifully fulfill their mother’s ambitions for their careers. It is an exercise in wish fulfillment for the author and perhaps mothers everywhere. Lynn Johnston wanted her son to go into journalism and so his avatar, Michael, is thinking about journalism. Lynn’s actual son did not go into journalism and instead went into the profession his birth father (Lynn Johnston’s first husband) was in.

Reminds me of the movie MARTY:

“Whaddya wanna do tonight, Angie?”

“I dunno; whaddya YOU wanna do, Marty?”

It reminds me of Pinky and the Brain…. “What do you want to do today? …. The same thing we always do… Try to take over the world!”

I changed majors so many times I ended up with two bachelor’s after five year, went to grad school for two master’s and still couldn’t get a job! My advice to Mike and Laurence is do what you love, and make those connections.

I took vocational agriculture and was in FFA for 4 years. Never worked on a farm a day in my life.

Having a college major in mind is not the same thing as having definite plans for the future. It’s not even similar. Didn’t Ellie and Connie both go to college? They should know this.

This one’s funny because (SPOILER) Ellie is correct, but Michael seems unaware of it.

This is probably around the time Lynn was “suggesting” her bewildered son to go into journalism, which he was like “Um, what?” and she suddenly pushes Michael into it, lol. It’s tough out there for the child of a cartoonist. At least he ended up better than Dennis Ketchum or Christopher Robin Milne.

The problem with school is that the set fields of study don’t evolve with the times, and become uninteresting

In your minds not theirs?

I said I would get out of school and never go back. Everything else I learned was on-the-job experience and life lessons.

Teenagers having an interest in something doesn’t mean they necessarily have plans. At different points in my high school career I intended to pursue careers in almost every field except the one I wound up in.

Garden while you can,Canadians—-there’s an 8-month winter out there

Momma always knows.

I think one of the most important things for adolescents to have is fascinations… not with people but with things in the world around us. For me it was electronics (after a short fling with medicine) and it made my world grow around me wherever I went. Math and the Natural Sciences were cool but didn’t pay off well.

Journalist: Liar for hire.

Sound more like the moms have plans the HS boys are clueless.

Elly and Connie are like Momma of Mell Lazarus’ strip. They equate their children’s career to how they can outperform the other moms.

Mom’s are always sure and kids are always clueless.