Parenting

The father was a total jerk; in every way possible: selfish, disloyal, indifferent to family, spendthrift, egotistical, on and on.

The mother was perfect in every way possible. (oh, yes, they divorced!)

So, out of four children, would you expect two to be dweebs, and two to be perfect?

In this case, all four were PERFECT - in every way.

Kind, hard-working, obedient, happy, friendly, unselfish, extremely thoughtful and caring to their mother.

So, what is it?

Well, I recently saw this chart; it was rather eye-opening:

The children, according to this chart, had a 12.5% chance of being like their father - a nincompoop.  But, they all obviously took the 12.5% of their mother, combined with her raising them - the 25%, and then they just inherently came with a good spirit.  So, they turned out awesome.

But, here's where it gets sticky?  Don't kind people pass that genetically to their children?  How about grumpy; is that passed on?  Gentleness, isn't that an inherited trait?

Take any character traits; aren't those passed on to their children?

So, inherently they came with their own spirit, but they actually INHERITED those good genes from their parents...right?

It's all too confusing and  to me -it always comes back to genetics.

SO, it's best to marry someone with good genes.  

Or, in other words, if you want to have happy children, marry a happy person....if you want to have smart kids, marry someone smart.

Nothing rocket science about any of that.

Except in this case....not one child was a jerk; only the father....