Father Knows Better

Neal Pollack turns his alternadad trials into his most personal work yet.

by Andrew Parks

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Published: Jan 16, 2007

Neal Pollack thinks I hate his 4-year-old and loathe the laissez-faire parenting of his entire generation. Or as Pollack puts it in an early e-mail exchange, "Glad to see that the kids coming up from behind think Gen X is annoying. [I] look forward to your perspective."

This is all a misunderstanding, of course. What I meant to say — before we even got to officially talking — is that most kids annoy me because most parents don't seem to know what the hell they're doing. Assholes give birth to more assholes, so to speak, a matter made especially evident by the Bugaboo brigade that plows through my neighborhood with slim cell phones and (what might as well be) gold-plated strollers.

"There's nothing more annoying than the idea that parenting is some special gift to the world," says Pollack, speaking from his L.A. home. "It doesn't entitle you to anything but a bunch of sleepless nights. I hope I'm never like that."

He isn't. He has, however, lightened the blackened heart of this nonbreeder through the frank pages of Alternadad (Pantheon, $23.95), quite possibly the only postcoital child-rearing memoir to contain passages about the perils of circumcision and the economical/health benefits of vaporized pot. Finished a little more than a year ago, the book is surprisingly heartwarming, considerably jarring (if you ever had second thoughts about having a kid before ...) and funny as fuck. No wonder it's already been optioned for a film and may spawn a Further Adventures of Neal and Elijah sequel. Let's just hope Adam Sandler isn't cast in the lead.

City Paper: So your book came out today. Congratulations! Are you a little anxious about putting something this personal out?

Neal Pollack: Kinda. Everyone in my family has seen it, so they're all prepared for it. Honestly though, there's nothing more difficult than writing about yourself. I had to be dragged kicking and screaming to do a memoir because it's against everything I stand for. There's just little first-person writing that I can stand reading. Thankfully some of the techniques I picked up from fiction writing worked here. I feel very comfortable doing it now. It's forced me to be honest and simpler.

CP: So how's Elijah doing? Is he still a biter?

NP: He's not biting, but he's every bit the wild man he was in the book. That personality isn't changing — he's so smart, inventive and funny, which usually makes up for his loony behavior.

CP: Have you thought about having a second kid yet?

NP: The odds are in favor of us having another dog right now. Elijah is already 4, so the idea of him having a playmate near his age is already out the window. We haven't made up our mind, but the financial reality makes it seem unlikely.

CP: That's one of the most sobering things about your book: how hard it is to raise even one kid in this country.

NP: We were having trouble even before the kid was born. I may have been reviewed in The New York Times and done some press before, but that doesn't mean I was making a lot of money. Look, there is no social support network in this country for young families — no nationalized health care or anything. The system is so screwed up and dysfunctional.

CP: Your experience must have made you think, "How the hell do some people have two kids at a time, let alone six?"

NP: Having a kid is its own reward, but having six kids ... I don't know. I'm not here to judge people though. Even happy families are unhappy in their own way.

CP: You must be both happy and unhappy with the fact that you and your wife, Regina, both work from home.

NP: For the most part, it's been good for the kid, since he's used to having us around and we'll never be strangers to him. The detriment is not being able to focus on the actual work. But hey, at least I'm doing something important when I'm not working ... like wiping someone else's ass.

CP: As I'm sure you're aware, this book couldn't have come at a better time.

NP: People are always reproducing, but the Gen X parenting aesthetic has definitely descended. The dawn of this culture is in the book, but I deliberately avoided any writing on this topic so it wouldn't sway what I was doing. It's more of a backdrop topic to a personal story, not The Handbook for Hipster Parents. That might have more of a limited shelf life.

CP: Is what's happening now all that different than our parents getting us into Black Sabbath or the Beatles though?

NP: I think there's always been "alternaparents," but this is much more self-conscious — an aesthetic reaction to the overparenting of the '80s and '90s. There's been a blurring of youth and adulthood. In the end, though, you have to make sure your kid has clothing, takes his vitamins, has a roof over his head — all the same crap parents have always had to look out for. There's a way to be a responsible parent and retain a sense of your own identity. You don't have to become a minivan-driving soccer coach. Which isn't to say I won't be a soccer coach someday.

CP: Did you ever think twice about having a kid because the world is so fucked up right now?

NP: The world has always been fucked up though. Try having a baby in the Soviet Union while Stalin was boss. At least there's bread in the stores right now. There may be a terrible war going on and a lunatic in the White House, but at the same time there are more 24-hour channels of children's programming than ever before.

CP: What's the latest show Elijah likes and you hate?

NP: The Backyardigans. It's the most unimaginative thing ever, but he loves it. And the fact that I hate it makes him want to throw that in my face.

CP: He sounds like a smart-ass — like you.

NP: Oh yeah. He's my kid. No question about it. In a way, I have to admire him. He's every bit the boy I raised him to be, for better or worse.

CP: Before you go, I have to ask about your time living in Philly. Anything you particularly miss?

NP: It's got a lot of things going for it, like the food. I really miss the Reading Terminal Market. That place was awesome, the old city I was seeking. I also enjoyed playing Quizzo at Fergie's and paying five bucks to get into the ballpark.

CP: Any final bit of advice for new parents?

NP: Buy some body armor, try not to lose your temper and use some sort of artificial mellower.

(a_parks@citypaper.net)

Neal Pollack reads Thu., Jan. 18, 7 p.m., free, Free Library of Philadelphia, Central Branch, 1901 Vine St., 215-567-4341, www.library.phila.gov.

 

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