Time and the Pattersons......

As you know, children do not perceive time in the same way an adult does. A simplistic explanation of that, of course, would be to tell oneself that a given period of time (six days, say) is a bigger bite out a five year old's life than it would be for his thirty-something father. The more accurate explanation is that children that small live mostly in the present; they don't really accept the adult notion that what's happening at any given moment isn't going to keep on happening forever. If a parent leaves for a trip, that means that said parents is gone forever. It takes a child until s/he a lot older for him to realize that now is not forever. Too bad for the children in the Foobiverse their parents don't want to remember this; instead, they wind up getting treated like dirt because their folks expect them to perceive time in a way they can't.