I noticed an interesting trend: more than a few of Kitten's friends are being raised in part or in whole by their grandparents. Some are the expected hard-luck cases: single mom after sperm donor pulled a disappearing act. Some are successful parents, but just 'stretched thin.'

I'm not sure I get it. Yes, I relied on my mother to raise me (my father having passed on early in life.) However, she signed on to raise on child. I just don't see handing off Kitten to her some score-plus years after my own childhood.

There's an inherent unfairness in it. To conceive a child is to (ideally) enter into a plan to birth, rear and raise another person. It should be done with care and forethought. To come to have a child can be all these things. To come to have a grandchild is none of them.

But, to be asked to care for your own grandchild is a request few can decline. Thus, the unfairness.

I think it does the child no favours, either. This child will grow up and think perhaps this is the natural order. Is it? Is this how society is moving?

I have no blame to fix, not trends to pillory. I'm just noting something I feel is Not Right(tm) and wondering, to start with, what's not right about it. Is it just me, so a matter of personal perception? Is it temporary, or local only to this geography? Is it a trend, or a flash in the pan? And, overall, what can I do about it, aside from not foisting Kitten onto my in-laws?