He stared back. Horrified, and just silently mouthed back: “...what?”

“Just…go…get…a…ziplock…bag…” I spoke evenly, careful not to alarm the children.

“What is it, Mommy?”

“Yes, what did you find?”

“Nothing, just a little dirt,” I chirped in my singsong voice.

But there was no pretending. It was lice. And it was still alive.

In the prologue, the author plainly admits he isn’t a parent (yet). But the book opens with the assurance that he’s uniquely qualified to tell this story, and closes with an eight-page letter (clearly AI-generated) to his hypothetical future child.

I found it strangely curious that anyone felt compelled to write 150 pages about the topic of parenting, seemingly without ever consulting an actual parent. Like most of the advice doled out by AI chatbots, it was all theory, no practice, totally devoid of the everyday texture of actually raising kids. (You know, the texture of being the mom who texts the kindergarten WhatsApp parents’ group that her kid is Patient Zero in the lice outbreak.)

It really got me wondering: What does it mean to be an expert on anything these days? And where exactly, are the moments when I as a parent can tell I’m raising kids in the AI age?

The uncertainty of the time certainly seems to rise to the top. So much feels up in the air. Political insurrections, health epidemics, economic turmoil, climate crises. Not to mention the everyday stuff.

Like this morning, when I called a fellow school dad with bad news that we’d have to cancel our family pizza playdate this weekend (you know, on account of the lice).

He immediately hung up, called his wife, and repeated my words verbatim: “I’m afraid I have bad news.”

Her instinctive first response was: “Oh no, are you getting laid off?”

This is the reality we’re all living in. Our neuroses sit so close to the surface that a canceled playdate instantly translates to economic collapse.

Do I need advice on how to raise kids in this ever-blurry, ever-complicated digital world? Absolutely. But I’d also like a little advice on how to make sure my daughter isn’t already permanently branded as “Bug Girl” for the rest of elementary school.

By hour four in the lice salon, my five-year-old was squirming in one chair next to a seven-year-old in the midst of the same treatment. Suddenly the older girl broke into “Golden,” the hit from K-Pop: Demon Hunters.

Without even making eye contact, Lydia joined in. And the two of them sang a synchronized chorus together. The other mom and I shared a mutual grin of delight, a genuinely lovely rare moment of connection amidst an otherwise totally terrible day. They never even knew each other’s names. But they knew every word to that song.

To be sure, my kid (still) hasn’t watched the film. (It’s too scary for her little sister.) Yet somehow she’s already memorized the soundtrack. That feels noteworthy.

After all, it’s not just the age of AI, is it? We’re also parenting on the cusp of the beginning of the backlash against the deleterious social media influencer pop culture. Of memes and dances that burrow their way into your brain, the same way a single louse might eventually take down an entire household.

And that’s what makes me nervous. Digital media exposure is everywhere. If she’s already harmonizing with a second grader, how long before she’s learning TikTok dances from the fifth graders? As a parent, what’s the move, exactly? Ban playgrounds? Mute the air? You can only control so much: She’s already singing along.

Only one or two kids brought books. At one point, when another child sat without a device, the salon specialist noticed the discrepancy and leaned over to whisper in the girl’s ear: “Ask your mom for her phone too.”

Not a toy, not a book, not even a snack. A phone. That’s how automatic it’s become: The screen as a stand-in for “something to do.”

Meanwhile, my always-on AI assistant has become the answer to nearly every question — including those middle-of-the-night parental quandaries, like asking ChatGPT how long you need to quarantine lice-exposed stuffed animals, or spitballing together on the social etiquette for mentioning exposure risk to families we played with over the weekend. But it’s through these bite-sized moments that I’m training my radar for AI content.

Which is why, eight hours into our lice-salon marathon, I’m ready when another specialist pulls me aside to show me the “real nightmare” in a series of tell-tale TikToks. It’s not just lice, she warns: It’s Super lice. Even worse, a video of a professor explaining how a parasite living inside us is taking over our bodies and brains, infecting 90% of Americans without our knowledge.

As she watches, wide-eyed, hanging on every word. I watch, too. But I’m clocking the speaker’s hands, the flat monotone, the uncanny cadence. The video ends, and she says, “See?”

And I say, “Yeah, you’re right. That’s clearly an AI-generated video. This guy’s full of shit.”

“What?” she asks, taken aback.

“This is completely fake,” I reply. “You can tell from the hands.”

Making the right calls in the series of mini-moments that make up the absurdly chaotic reality of elementary-aged parenting with two working parents just trying to figure out how to navigate the next two decades of their careers.

There are no easy answers, certainly none that can be bound up neatly in a book. No single perspective, no neat frameworks, no definitive takes. The world is moving far too fast for that. (And, to be clear, so are the lice.)

If there’s one takeaway that I carried home yesterday (one of my worst-ever parenting days in five years…), it’s that it’s really hard to be an expert in something you haven’t experienced first-hand. That goes for parenting. That goes for AI. Hell, it even goes for dealing with head lice.

So if you’re a fellow parent raising kids in the age of AI, don't read a book to learn how to do it. Just do some stuff with AI. With your kid, without your kid, it doesn’t really matter. Form an opinion by doing. That way, when those critical moments come – lice, TikToks, or whatever’s next – you’ll know what you need to do.

He stared back. Horrified, and just silently mouthed back: “...what?”

“Just…go…get…a…ziplock…bag…” I spoke evenly, careful not to alarm the children.

“What is it, Mommy?”

“Yes, what did you find?”

“Nothing, just a little dirt,” I chirped in my singsong voice.

But there was no pretending. It was lice. And it was still alive.

In the prologue, the author plainly admits he isn’t a parent (yet). But the book opens with the assurance that he’s uniquely qualified to tell this story, and closes with an eight-page letter (clearly AI-generated) to his hypothetical future child.

I found it strangely curious that anyone felt compelled to write 150 pages about the topic of parenting, seemingly without ever consulting an actual parent. Like most of the advice doled out by AI chatbots, it was all theory, no practice, totally devoid of the everyday texture of actually raising kids. (You know, the texture of being the mom who texts the kindergarten WhatsApp parents’ group that her kid is Patient Zero in the lice outbreak.)

It really got me wondering: What does it mean to be an expert on anything these days? And where exactly, are the moments when I as a parent can tell I’m raising kids in the AI age?

The uncertainty of the time certainly seems to rise to the top. So much feels up in the air. Political insurrections, health epidemics, economic turmoil, climate crises. Not to mention the everyday stuff.

Like this morning, when I called a fellow school dad with bad news that we’d have to cancel our family pizza playdate this weekend (you know, on account of the lice).

He immediately hung up, called his wife, and repeated my words verbatim: “I’m afraid I have bad news.”

Her instinctive first response was: “Oh no, are you getting laid off?”

This is the reality we’re all living in. Our neuroses sit so close to the surface that a canceled playdate instantly translates to economic collapse.

Do I need advice on how to raise kids in this ever-blurry, ever-complicated digital world? Absolutely. But I’d also like a little advice on how to make sure my daughter isn’t already permanently branded as “Bug Girl” for the rest of elementary school.

By hour four in the lice salon, my five-year-old was squirming in one chair next to a seven-year-old in the midst of the same treatment. Suddenly the older girl broke into “Golden,” the hit from K-Pop: Demon Hunters.

Without even making eye contact, Lydia joined in. And the two of them sang a synchronized chorus together. The other mom and I shared a mutual grin of delight, a genuinely lovely rare moment of connection amidst an otherwise totally terrible day. They never even knew each other’s names. But they knew every word to that song.

To be sure, my kid (still) hasn’t watched the film. (It’s too scary for her little sister.) Yet somehow she’s already memorized the soundtrack. That feels noteworthy.

After all, it’s not just the age of AI, is it? We’re also parenting on the cusp of the beginning of the backlash against the deleterious social media influencer pop culture. Of memes and dances that burrow their way into your brain, the same way a single louse might eventually take down an entire household.

And that’s what makes me nervous. Digital media exposure is everywhere. If she’s already harmonizing with a second grader, how long before she’s learning TikTok dances from the fifth graders? As a parent, what’s the move, exactly? Ban playgrounds? Mute the air? You can only control so much: She’s already singing along.

Only one or two kids brought books. At one point, when another child sat without a device, the salon specialist noticed the discrepancy and leaned over to whisper in the girl’s ear: “Ask your mom for her phone too.”

Not a toy, not a book, not even a snack. A phone. That’s how automatic it’s become: The screen as a stand-in for “something to do.”

Meanwhile, my always-on AI assistant has become the answer to nearly every question — including those middle-of-the-night parental quandaries, like asking ChatGPT how long you need to quarantine lice-exposed stuffed animals, or spitballing together on the social etiquette for mentioning exposure risk to families we played with over the weekend. But it’s through these bite-sized moments that I’m training my radar for AI content.

Which is why, eight hours into our lice-salon marathon, I’m ready when another specialist pulls me aside to show me the “real nightmare” in a series of tell-tale TikToks. It’s not just lice, she warns: It’s Super lice. Even worse, a video of a professor explaining how a parasite living inside us is taking over our bodies and brains, infecting 90% of Americans without our knowledge.

As she watches, wide-eyed, hanging on every word. I watch, too. But I’m clocking the speaker’s hands, the flat monotone, the uncanny cadence. The video ends, and she says, “See?”

And I say, “Yeah, you’re right. That’s clearly an AI-generated video. This guy’s full of shit.”

“What?” she asks, taken aback.

“This is completely fake,” I reply. “You can tell from the hands.”

Making the right calls in the series of mini-moments that make up the absurdly chaotic reality of elementary-aged parenting with two working parents just trying to figure out how to navigate the next two decades of their careers.

There are no easy answers, certainly none that can be bound up neatly in a book. No single perspective, no neat frameworks, no definitive takes. The world is moving far too fast for that. (And, to be clear, so are the lice.)

If there’s one takeaway that I carried home yesterday (one of my worst-ever parenting days in five years…), it’s that it’s really hard to be an expert in something you haven’t experienced first-hand. That goes for parenting. That goes for AI. Hell, it even goes for dealing with head lice.

So if you’re a fellow parent raising kids in the age of AI, don't read a book to learn how to do it. Just do some stuff with AI. With your kid, without your kid, it doesn’t really matter. Form an opinion by doing. That way, when those critical moments come – lice, TikToks, or whatever’s next – you’ll know what you need to do.