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You think you have parents who hover close by while you're in college? Then have pity on Douglas MacArthur. Throughout his four years as a cadet at West Point, the U.S. Military Academy, his mother, Mary Pinkney MacArthur, lived at the Thayer Hotel right next to the Academy.

She attended many of the school's social events as his date, and was involved in other on-campus activities with her beloved son that no other parent dared intrude. It must have been tough on the future general, with the other cadets making fun of him and calling him a momma's boy. It also was said to have influenced MacArthur's choice of a first wife, a twice-married flapper who left him to have an affair with another historical Army figure, General John J. Pershing.

Nowhere in any research can I find any record of Cadet MacArthur ever saying or doing anything to get away from his mother while he was at West Point. However, whatever Mary MacArthurr's bothersome influence, it couldn't have been all bad. Douglas MacArthur graduated first in his class and went on to have one of the most distinguished military careers in American history.

I love writing humorous articles for Helium, but on this subject, and still thinking of MacArthur's possible Oedipal problem, I'm not sure I'm up to the task. I never had the parent problem in my college days, and I'm not sure having a loving parent hover around actually is a problem. What the hell! I'll give it a try. For what it is worth, here is my advice.

1. Send your parents a note saying you've quit college and joined the Foreign Legion.
2. Tell your parents you've found a new guru and you're going to a Nepal mountain retreat to chant for the next 20 years.
3. Get a vicious, incontinent dog that bites and soils on all older people who come close to you.
4. Tell your parents you've embraced a new religion that requires all parents to attend naked virgin sacrifice rituals.
5. Invite your parents to your wedding ceremony at the local jail where your new wife (husband) is being held for sex crimes.

Learn more about this author, Ted Sherman.
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