As a parent, I have two goals: to keep my kids alive until they’re old enough to walk away from the house for good, and to firmly instill a sense of love and loyalty they will take with them wherever they go.

An Oprah-esque plan for sure, but I found out this past weekend that these two goals can sometimes conflict. Like when you want to strangle your kid to death for one of his devout allegiances.

My oldest son, Archie, is 6 years old. He — like his father and his father before him — roots for the New York Mets. It doesn’t matter that the local team who all his classmates pull for has the best record in baseball. Archie is a Mets fan. It’s his permanent chore. That’s part of our deal. I take out the garbage. He roots for a team his father grew up liking three decades ago that plays its home games 2,500 miles away.