I put on a belt the other day and missed one of the loops on my pants. My brother Steve and I used to call this “pulling a Wayne,” a reference to our father who would frequently do this. Yes, we do become like our parents — whether we want to or not.
A 2020 article in Psychology Today explains that this happens due to “family scripts” that describe the acceptable ways we behave, speak and think. It says there are three types of these scripts: replicative, corrective and improvised. Without getting into the weeds, here are some brief explanations of each, according to the story.
Replicative scripts are ones you repeat from your family of origin, whether consciously or unconsciously.
Corrective scripts occur when a person consciously chooses to do things very differently, or even opposite from, the scripts they experienced growing up.
Improvised scripts are born out of necessity or curiosity. They are not a replication or a correction of the past but are rather new and often spontaneous.
A more humorous explanation of why we become like our parents can be found at cracked.com, which says that the behaviors of the elderly that we write off as “old-person lameness” are all based in biology, and that, no, we can't stop it.
This story says as we age, our brains will stop getting pleasure from new music (agreed); our physical urge to rebel will fade away (sure); our brains will start getting pleasure from boring stuff (yep); it will become physically impossible to sleep in (no doubt); us men will stop trying to change the world (never wanted to); we will find ourselves eating bland food because we can't taste it (or because spicy foods don’t digest like they used to?); and our memories of the past will become “The Good Old Days” (explains most of my columns).
As for missing the belt loops? Well, I will chalk that up to the fact that the odds have increased since I now wear a belt every day, that I now have a decrease in my range of flexibility, and that I really don’t care — and not necessarily in that order.
Have a marvelous Monday, and thanks for reading.
Shane Goodman
President and Publisher
Big Green Umbrella Media
shane@dmcityview.com
515-953-4822, ext. 305 | 
