In 1952, champion long-distance swimmer Florence Chadwick made her first attempt at swimming from Catalina Island to the California mainland. The challenge was within her reach, but the fog was dense that day, obscuring her view of her support boats and completely hiding the opposite shoreline. After 15 hours Florence told her supporters that she and couldn’t go on.

“You’re very close, Florence!” her mother said from one of the boats. Florence tried to press on, but felt helpless. She was pulled into a boat, where she learned her destination was less than a mile away.

Florence’s time in that fog provides a good illustration for a phenomenon that’s becoming all too common – adolescents who seem ready to quit on life.

SPECIAL OFFER

GIST: The Essence of Raising Life-Ready Kids

Gist offers a fresh look at parenting that's effective, efficient and enjoyable. The focus is on instilling "life readiness" at any stage of child-rearing. Parents will understand why their previous parenting efforts may have been frustrating and futile, and they'll learn how to prepare "life-ready" kids with less drama and more joy.

Marriage in the Parenting Years

Date nights during the courtship years might have included bouquets of roses, candlelight dinners and strolls through the park. But date night looks quite different now that you have kids. These days, your “romantic evenings” may more often involve finding free food samples at the grocery store and then heading to the dollar movie theater.

My husband, James, and I even like going to the Hispanic supermarket with our kids to practice Spanish. On one such outing, we walked to the meat counter and looked for the ticket dispenser that read, “Take a number.” As I pulled out my ticket and waited for service, I wondered, Does my husband ever feel like this?

The Addams Family (PG)

This new animated version offers a peek at a clan of domesticated ghoulies who embody everything creepy and crawly. The Addamses have been quite content in their cozy haunted asylum, masked from the world by a constant fog of swamp gas. Life has been wonderfully … bad.