Perspectives on Family...
This column on family was written for the August 19, 1982 issue of The Coral Springs Forum and clearly reflects the societal norms and the terminology of the time. The shape of the family has changed in the intervening decades, but I believe that the core of this column- the importance of family to the children in it- remains as true and vital and relevant today as it was those 31 years ago. The story was one of tragedy and failure, of a family fractured and broken, of a mother who decided that she could no longer handle the respon- sibilities of everyday life and opted to leave her children to their own devices, creating a too-soon-old eighteen-year-old son with responsibility for his young sister. And as sad as the story was, as fraught with images of brokenness and despair, the real tragedy was the fact that this tale is being repeated again and again in every community all over this nation. The family, once seen as the most important, most stable unit of our ...