A recent study say teens who get fewer than eight hours of sleep on school nights are more likely to get involved in risky behavior. Well, that’s most high school students.

The authors of the study say it’s difficult to know if teens are drinking, using drugs or exhibiting other behaviors because they are not getting enough sleep or if the risky behavior keeps them from going to bed earlier. Either way, according to the study, a change in a teenager’s internal clock makes them want to stay up late and get up later.

Getting to bed at a decent hour has been a challenge in our household since my 16-year-old started high school. Here in Charlotte, high schools start classes at 7:15 a.m., which means that students have to get up mighty early to catch buses if their parents can’t drive them to school. And, in the evenings, there’s plenty of homework.

I’ve insisted that my daughter aim to be in bed by 10 p.m. on school nights. Sometimes she is, sometimes she isn’t, depending on the school workload on a given day. She gets up at 5:30 a.m. so she can get to the bus stop by 6:20 a.m.

It’s a difficult situation. Teenagers everywhere don’t get enough rest. And parents everywhere worry about them.

Is there a solution?

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My 16-year-old is signing up for driver’s education classes set to begin in a few weeks at her high school. Meanwhile, I’m practicing how to remain calm when it’s time for her to do her practice driving with me in the passenger’s seat. I’m also developing plans for some classes that she won’t be getting in traditional driver’s education. My father gave me these special classes when I was 16, and I hated them. But she’ll probably look back on the lessons one day, as I do, and be thankful that she got them.

Before my father allowed me to drive alone, he set up three or four classes on Saturday mornings in our driveway. The first was learning how to change a flat tire. It took a while but I finally mastered it and he moved on to basic maintenance skills: how to check the oil and other car fluids, how to check the air in the tires, how to check air filters. He talked to me about the necessity of getting the oil changed regularly and overall car care.

I didn’t like these Saturday sessions at all. A boy I liked lived a few doors up the street and as a teenager, I found it embarrassing to be outside working on a car. But a few years later, I understood the value of my father’s lessons and why he insisted that I do them. While driving to visit my parents one weekend while in college, I had a flat tire. I pulled over to the side of the road and changed it. I can still see my father’s pride when I shared the experience with him.

Over the years, I have relied often on these basic car maintenance skills. For my daughter, I’m going to turn to a mechanic to do the teaching. She’ll grumble, I’m sure. But at least she’ll be inside a garage.

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But I think he would be honored by this national memorial and urge us not to get stuck in the controversies over the various aspects of its construction but to keep pushing for change and equality. And these days, as our political environment reflects a troubling chaos and anger, we must heed his call to pursue the day when “people will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

My 16-year-old daughter and I were in Washington a few days before the memorial officially opened, and in the spirit of those who make pilgrimages to someplace sacred, we found our way to the Tidal Basin and the 30 foot tall statue of King. After having not lived in the Washington area for a few years, I didn’t exactly remember how to get to the Tidal Basin and there were no signs along the way to serve as a guide. I’m hoping the lack of signage that day just means that they hadn’t been put up yet, not that they won’t be put up at all.

But we strolled through the monuments, enjoying the specialness of the Washington Monument, the Vietnam Memorial, the World War II Memorial. We gazed over at the Jefferson Memorial as walked along the basin under the cherry trees. And when we saw the King monument, both my daughter and I nearly gasped.

Oh, how can I describe the pride. I began talking to my daughter about my memories of King — watching him on the small, black and white television sitting on the dresser in my parent’s bedroom, hearing my parents talk about him over dinner, and crying when I heard that he had been assassinated. I told her about the riots, the pain and anger.

A fence kept us from getting close to the memorial, so we gazed at it along with other people who had made the pilgrimage too.

The memorial is not perfect, and neither was King. But his legacy rightfully deserves to be recognized among Washington’s treasures. I’ll go back to see it during my next visit to Washington. And every other time that I’m in the area.

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As the women gathered around tables to begin the discussion, the moderator asked the black women, “How many of you have someone in your family who worked as the help?” All the black women raised their hands. Nearly all the white women raised their hands when asked if black women had worked for their families.

It was a profound experience, one black woman said, to watch the movie that celebrated the courage of black women who worked as the help.

Three large churches — two mostly black and one mostly white– arranged the event to help create better dialogue and understanding among women in this southern city.

In two sold-out theaters, the women laughed and cried as they watched the movie about black maids working in a Mississippi town in the 1960s and their willingness to risk their lives to share their stories to a white woman who compiled a book about their experiences.

One 51-year-old black woman, who grew up in a rural area of South Carolina, said she started working as a maid at age 12, when her mother dressed her in a white shirt and dark skirt and took her daughter to her job. It was the early 1970s. Later, the same white family helped her go to college.

A 58-year-old white woman stood up and told the group, “I grew up in an area where everyone had a housekeeper. Now, at 34, my youngest daughter works as a maid.” I overheard a black woman say, “Now, they’re called nannies.”

There were many more stories of mothers and grandmothers who worked as the help, of the irony of the relationships between the black women and white families.

“We really want to help build better relationships,” one of the moderators told the group as the session ended. Most in the group agreed that coming together around the movie “The Help” was a good start.

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My 80-year-old mother worked as “the help” for many years in the 1950s and 1960s, cleaning the homes of white families and taking care of their children. She worked for one family with three children then practically raised another girl after her mother died when the child was four years old. Later, she helped take care of a disabled man.

“I didn’t have any choice,” my mother said about her work for white families. “It was hard to get jobs doing anything else.”

My mother told me she did not like having to be a servant. She didn’t like that the white families just took her services for granted. She didn’t like feeling that she was invisible to the people who ate her food, slept on the sheets she washed and left for work confident that she would keep their children safe. (Publicity photo from The Help shows actresses Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer who portray maids in the movie.)

The white family with the three children, she told me, regularly got home after the 5 p.m., when my mother was supposed to leave. But they offered no apologies, extra pay or the option of changing her hours. So my mother left home early and returned late to her own children and dealt with the disregard for her time until she found another job. The $18 a week she earned helped pay the bills and buy food at our house, which my parents bought in 1957.

“You never had to go through that,” my mother told me. “You never had to have white people telling you what to do.”

So the mantra in our house when my sisters and I were growing up was this: Study hard. Get a good education. Do your best.

All of us went to college.

I will watch “The Help” with heartfelt respect and gratitude for the black women who bravely and quietly did what they had to do to help their own families.

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My youngest sister was with my 80-year-old mother and called the rest of us after dialing 911. All four of us were in our hometown after returning from a family reunion so we rushed to my mother’s house, arriving moments after the ambulance.

The emergency workers were able to revive my mother and took her to the hospital emergency room, where we spent the next few hours waiting for examinations and tests to figure out what had happened. In the end, the prognosis was good. A visit a few days later to her primary doctor resulted in a change in some medication.

But the experience was unsettling. Through it all, I prayed, not only for my mother’s health and comfort but for steadiness as my sisters and I deal with the challenges of taking care of an aging parent.

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My daughter has been a sort of helper over the years, hauling some items from the kitchen to the grill and back so that I could manage the fire and tend the food. That changed a couple days ago when she had her first cooking lesson in grilling. Of course, the work started a day earlier when we rubbed a spicy Jamaican jerk seasoning into skinless turkey drumsticks and chicken breasts and let it marinate overnight. Eventually, I’ll show her how to make homemade marinades.

For a few months now, I’ve been on a mission to teach my 15-year-old daughter to cook. I’m also using the classes to sharpen and broaden my culinary skills. My nearly 80-year-old mother is helping –she’s going to teach my daughter how to make biscuits next month.  I’m also using “Martha Stewart’s Cooking School” cookbook, which has instructions on everything from poaching to stewing.

While the charcoals were getting hot, I told my daughter about direct and indirect heat and how to use it while cooking different types of meat. We talked about flare-ups, caused when fat drips onto the coals. I shared a technique that someone told me years ago: Take the meat out of the refrigerator so that it reaches room temperature before placing it on the grill. This helps the meat cook more evenly.

I had a hard time trying to explain to my daughter how to know when the chicken and turkey was ready to come off the grill. I tend to undercook some meats  because I usually prepare enough to last several days. (Who wants to go through all the effort of grilling and have only enough food for one meal?) That way, when the meat is used in a stir fry or another recipe it doesn’t dry out.

Overall, things went well but there will be plenty more lessons on grilling vegetables and seafood. It took my daughter a while to become comfortable using the tongs to flip the poultry and she dropped a piece of chicken on the ground when transferring it to a platter.  I put a few ears of corn on the grill and sliced up some tomatoes from our little garden. It was a simple, delicious summer meal.

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I expected resistance to the idea. We’re eating too much healthy food, my 15-year-old complained. She already fusses periodically about having to eat brown rice and whole grain bread all the time. And the only reason she doesn’t grumble about eating Raisin Bran and other grain-based cereals is the deal we made some years ago. She gets to eat all the Froot Loops and other sugary cereals she wants during trips but doesn’t get them at home.

In teaching my daughter cook, I’m also trying to help her understand how to make healthier eating choices. Though she’s doesn’t particularly like all the changes over the past few years, I know that with time they’ll become a part of her normal eating habits.

Several months ago I began an effort to teach my teenager to cook, finding time in the rush of everything else she’s doing to spend time in the kitchen. I have been wanting to improve my cooking skills too so I enlisted the aid of  my mother and Martha Stewart. My daughter and I are using “Martha Stewart’s Cooking School” cookbook as a guide.

For our flatbread pizza, my daughter and I picked up low-fat mozzarella and cheddar cheese,  turkey Italian sausage, a tasty tomato sauce and fresh spinach. It was a quick and easy process: She spread all the ingredients on the flatbread and broiled it for a few minutes.

In the end, my daughter liked the flatbread pizza. She said she’ll make it again, using different ingredients. But, she asked, what about regular pizza? My advice: Eat it sparingly and on special occasions.

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For a few moments, I was a bit confused. The idea of being a senior is foreign to me. That’s not how I think of myself, and neither do any of my other 50-something Baby Boomer friends.  My voice almost cracked  when I responded, “Why are you asking?”

My daughter gave me the envelope she was holding and pointed to the return address, which included the words senior healthcare. The letter was addressed to me and came from my new physicians’ group here in North Carolina. I didn’t choose the doctors because I think of myself as a senior or because I have significant health problems. I figured it would be a good idea to have specialists who would already know my health history when I’m really old.  

Studies show that Baby Boomers, who range in age from 46 to 64, are fighting the description of people over 50 as seniors, unless, of course, it is used for those who are at least 80-years-old. A recent survey showed that Boomers feel much younger than their actual ages, and as age increases, the gap between their real age and perceived age expands. Turning 50, many say, is the new 40.

I looked at my daughter and could see the fear in eyes. For a 15-year-old, someone who is 30 is considered old, so a description of someone as a senior means ancient, near death. I reached over, gave her a hug, and told her, “No, I’m not a senior.”  

When life spans were shorter, turning 50 meant old age.  But at a time when older adults are still having kids, skydiving, running marathons and learning the latest dance steps, age is a state of mind.

If you’re over 50, how do you think of your age? Are you a senior or not?

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We’ve been figuring out our new roles over the past few years as Mom has faced increasing health issues and has sought guidance in making decisions about doctors and surgeries and other matters. She is no longer able to drive and needs help taking care of the house she and my father bought more than 50 years ago. 

My sisters and I have close relationships and have been able to handle difficulties over the years. We had a strong role model in our father, who until he passed away a little over 24 years ago, maintained close ties with his five brothers and one sister. So it came easily to us to step in and start helping when we realized our mother needed it.

 But we didn’t have a plan. We didn’t understand at first that we needed to sit down with each other, and our mother, to talk about her needs and how we could help collectively and individually. We were on a treadmill of sorts, responding to each crisis without an idea of where we were going. That left us with some hurt feelings.

 More than a year ago we sat down and developed a strategy. We’re now a real team of caregivers, relying on each other for support as we help our mother. How are you and your siblings handling care giving duties?

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