Know Thyself

I deleted my Facebook account a few days ago. I had signed up a few years(?) ago and enjoyed it tremendously. Too much, in fact...which is why I deleted my old account back in the day. I was spending enormous amounts of time hovering over my computer, accomplishing nothing and playing endless rounds of the freebie Facebook games. I cut myself off one day and never looked back, despite the copious groans from good friends who found it the easiest way to stay in touch. Nevertheless, my life had returned to some sense of normalcy, and I refused to cave.

Last year, I was dog-less and desperate. In my quest to locate the man who had bred Theo's litter, I discovered that the only point of contact I could find was Facebook. So I created a new account and gave Facebook another go...and found myself right back in my old rut in a few short months. It's taken me many more months to break free, but I finally did it - again. Of my multiple addictions, Facebook seems to be the only one I have been able to break successfully.

But, I'm no longer dog-less, so my original motivation for being there is all but gone. Which is not to say that I don't miss it.

However, I have a reasonably objective idea of my few strengths and copious weaknesses. Pissing away hours online ranks right up there at the top of the latter list, unfortunately. Facebook is, for me, the equivalent of a pill-popper working in a pharmacy. Bad idea.

So I have lots of newly-minted time to spend in different ways in recent days. I finished a few books this week and started another this afternoon. (I'll come back to that in a moment.) I'd had Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore on my nightstand for too long, unfinished. Which is strange, because I adored every page of that book, but it was an effort to finish it. Contrast that with We Need To Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver - a book I found odious (mostly because the author's voice and the protagonist's voice are equally pompous and idiotic) but read straight through to the end in about a day and a half.

This afternoon, I had the pleasure of acquiring Jonah Goldberg's The Tyranny of Clichés: How Liberals Cheat in the War of Ideas. I'm a good fifty pages in, and it is delightful. It prompted me to get off my ass and order several books by Charles Murray that I'd been wanting to read, too. I stopped myself at ordering the one I most want to read, which is Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010 because I am a skinflint at heart. I'll pick it up when I can get my paws on a cheap, used copy. Murray has devoted a good portion of that newest book to examining the future of higher education, and I'm looking forward to it very much.

But back to Jonah Goldberg. I understand that the liberals are crowing because the inside jacket of the book states that Goldberg was twice nominated for a Pulitzer. The inside jacket does indeed state this, and it is indeed a falsehood. It puzzles me. I have to think that Goldberg knows at least as well as anyone in this day and age that any attempt at exaggeration - much less an outright lie - would quickly surface. It makes me wonder if someone at his publishing house screwed him over, quite honestly.

The content of the book, at least thus far, is utterly delightful. (I am reminded of another INCREDIBLE book, Farnsworth's Classical English Rhetoric by Ward Farnsworth. If you haven't read it, you should. No, really. Go get it right now.) My favorite line to date is "If one man pushes an old lady in front of an oncoming bus and another man pushes an old lady out of the way of an oncoming bus, to borrow Bill Buckley's famous puncturing of moral equivalence arguments, it will not suffice to say that they are both the sorts of men who push old ladies around." I am overcome with the desire to prematurely submit applications for all three of my children to Hillsdale College, stat.

Further on the topic of "Know Thyself", I am especially tickled with David Mamet's praise on the back of Goldberg's book: "What can one say to the self-proclaimed 'independent' who never has nor ever will vote other than Democratic; or to the wise soul suggesting, of any conflict at all, "the truth must lie somewhere in between"? Mr. Goldberg reminds us that one must stand up and demand of the muddled and the supine either an absolute declaration of their principles and acknowledgment of the results of actions having flowed therefrom or a straightforward admission of their intransigence in refusing a concise reply." Needless to say, a David Mamet book made its way into my Amazon cart, as well.

I've also been keeping busy with the final bits of research before I purchase Henry's 5th grade curriculum. I'd been asking him about elective materials so I could winnow out some potential interests and find the appropriate resources. (We are blessed with an abundance of external education sources that cater to local homeschooling families.) He seems very interested in music this year, so I asked about that. He opined that he might like to learn to play the clarinet...but only if I could be his teacher. After my laughter subsided and I wiped the good-humored tears from my face, I reminded him that I can't read a note of music. But I also told him that I sincerely wish I could read and play music, and that he should embrace the opportunity to learn anything that interests him, regardless of the source. I kept to myself my secret wish that he would choose piano, if for no other reason than God might grant my wish and I should find myself trying to acquire both the discretionary income and the physical space for one. The clarinet conjures up images of skeevy Woody Allen, but it is an amazing instrument...so if that turns out to be his pick, I hope to grin while bearing it. Besides, I can always bring myself back to a place of clarinet love by listening to some Leon Redbone, right?

I hope the fast-approaching end of the school year is a happy one for all of you, and if you've enjoyed any good reads recently, drop me a suggestion if you're of a mind to.

Stand For The Silent

I've written about bullying before, and out of everything I've ever written about or discussed, it remains the single thing about which I am most passionate.

Eug and I made the decision to take all of our kids to see the movie Bully tonight. Henry is 10, Xanthe is coming up on 9, and Lula is 6. It wasn't a decision I made lightly. I read a lot about the film, the reversal of the MPAA 'R' rating to a PG-13 early in April, parents' reviews of the film, and most of the 56-page viewer's discussion guide for parents and educators provided by facinghistory.org (link here) before deciding that every single member of our family should go. And so we did.

The film follows the real lives of several families who have experienced bullying in one form or another. Some were families whose children had taken their own lives, including one precious 11 year-old (!) boy. One was a wonderful teenaged girl who had 'come out' in her rural community as a lesbian. One followed a young girl who, fed up with the constant torment she was being force-fed at school, took her mother's gun and brandished it at her tormentors on a school bus. (The weapon was never fired.) Obviously, these are a cornucopia of issues that would give virtually every parent pause – it opens the door for discussion on issues of which many young children have NO awareness at a young age. Certainly, my six year-old has only the vaguest idea of what 'suicide' means and the topic of sexuality in any form is one that most parents are loath to discuss.

Because we saw the film so recently, I have yet to discover if my kids will raise questions beyond those we already discussed tonight. But my guess as to the reaction of my own children seems, at least initially, to be correct. Most of the thornier issues flew right over Lula's head, as I hoped they would. She took away from this heart-wrenching film the central truth: that bullying is real, that it can happen early in life, and that it's important to be nice to people...especially people who seem like they need a friend. The same is essentially true for Xanthe, as well. I'm sure she gathered a more nuanced understanding of the depth of the pain these kids were feeling, and the urgency we all must feel to speak up for ourselves and for others. Henry got even more from the film, and when asked what he remembered most, he pleasantly surprised me with observations about how bullied children cope with their tormentors – often to the child's own detriment. He correctly saw some – but not all – of the factors at play that made a bad situation worse. It is our job as parents to increase the depth of their understanding of these factors as they age.

My main motivation in taking my young children was to give them a front-row seat to what it feels like to live inside the skin of a bullied child. We have always spoken very directly to the kids about their personal responsibility to speak up for anyone else being made to feel less-than, and this film was an amazing opportunity to continue that work in our own family. It is, and always will be, an ongoing process. We talk about the courage it takes to speak up when someone is being hurt, the fear we might feel that to do so will turn the aggressor in our own direction, and the absolute imperative to go out of our way, each and every day, to LOOK for someone who needs a friend. We also talked openly about loved ones – some of them now-grown adults – who still suffer the scars of the bullying they endured. My kids need to know that people we know have been victimized, and that no one was there for them when they needed an ally. They also need to know that the decision each one of us makes to reach out to someone or turn a blind eye on any average day can and does have life-or-death consequences for real people. Real people that my kids got to see in an up-close-and-personal way due to this film.

There is so, so much material to be mined, here. Wonderful, salient observations and statements made throughout the film draw attention to so many easily-overlooked facets of this issue. Among them are the need for boys to see their fathers express vulnerable emotions and learn to express it, themselves; the urgency of parents everywhere to realize – as in, a punch to the face kind of realization – that what we hear from our kids (if we ever hear anything at all) is very much 'the tip of the iceberg'; the woeful lack of consequences available to educators and law enforcement and the stark reality that the few consequences authorities do have at their disposal are often never employed. Kudos must be given to the lone school district that allowed the crew to film goings-on in and around the school, even though their decision to do so has rightly opened them up to some harsh-but-deserved criticisms.

Particular attention should also be paid to the numerous ways throughout the film that school authorities pressure children to say what they want to hear, rather than the plain truth. One sees, in several instances, the incredible effort children make to speak their truth in the face of efforts by adults to get them to 'go along'. I am reminded of an exercise a beloved teacher conducted in my senior year of high school. One day, we all came into class and sat down. She remained silent behind her desk. We giggled nervously as the seconds ticked by with nothing but her direct gaze. She then commanded us to stand up. We all did so, still glancing around at each other with nervous amusement. Additional commands followed with no explanation: kneel down alongside your desk; put your head underneath the writing surface of your desk; push up on your desktop using only your head and lift it from the floor. We all complied. She then heaved a great sigh and asked us all to take our seats, again. She explained that she had just returned from a professional development conference, and the educators were encouraged to “ask the class you think is least likely to comply with your ridiculous requests” to perform the exercise. The purpose was to show educators the incredible power they wield over children – a power that must not be taken lightly, or abused in any way, knowingly or unknowingly. Our teacher was literally flabbergasted at our obedience. In the film, parents will see just how much time and space children need to muster the courage to 'speak their truth', and we must take care not to fill that space with our own words while we wait for them to find the words they need.

The awful truth that many have expressed is that this film will be far more shocking and upsetting to parents than it is to their children. They're right. I feel fairly confident that most parents are woefully unaware of the increasing hostility in which our children are steeped every day. We're far too confident that we know our children. If this film doesn't make it obvious that we don't, I don't know what will.

Because I am a “head-on” kind of person, it comes more naturally to me than many other people to talk about difficult things with my kids. For that reason, I had to temper the surge of rage I felt that I don't personally know a single other parent who has seen this movie, much less seen it with their children. I'm not saying they don't exist in my circle of friends and acquaintances, but if they do, I haven't heard about it. I'm also not saying that I'm “right” to have taken my kids to see this film where others will choose to skip it entirely or save it for a later date. I went with my gut, and I have to hope that I made the right choice. But I do believe that too often we, as parents, postpone things of great import because we're overwhelmed or reluctant to open the conversational door to questions that make us uncomfortable...and in postponing them, we just never get around to doing them. But as Edmund Burke once famously said, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” We should actively fear doing nothing, or doing too little, too late.

In my opinion, there is nothing in this movie that should not be seen by children no older than eight years of age. Yes, there is shocking language – but, at least in our household, there were no cuss words that my kids haven't heard uttered from my own lips. (A woeful habit of mine, to be sure.) Yes, there is the (fleeting) issue of sexual orientation, but none of us should shy away from explaining to our children at any age that God made us all differently and that we are to be loved equally in every regard. Yes, there is violence of the physical and emotional variety. But as my incredible better half said, “How parents could say their children are too young to see the film and then send them out in the world to the very likely possibility that they will LIVE the film is beyond me.”

Seeing this film comes with significant responsibility for parents, and I think if we're being honest with ourselves, that's why many of us shy away from it and experiences like it. There are many parent discussion guides readily available online (including the excellent one at the website I mentioned at the beginning), and no parent should expose their child to this film without undertaking the preparations and study necessary to make the experience a good one for your children.

As a volunteer working regularly with sixth graders, I can personally attest to the fact that these kids have already been a bully, been bullied and seen bullying on a daily basis. These are good kids from good families in good neighborhoods who go to good schools. If any of us persists in the notion that it's not happening to our good children, we do so at the peril of our own and other children's lives.

The Great And Powerful Oz

I have been privately seething for a few weeks over a matter of little import in terms of personal loss but much larger in terms of matters of principle. It has to do with teaching, and I think the reason I continue to turn it over in my mind like a touchstone has everything to do with my own history as a teacher in various forms.

Teaching and learning are things I take very seriously, no doubt due in large part to the heavy emphasis on education in my upbringing. Like most of us, I cherish the memories I have of the excellent teachers I have been privileged to know in my forty years on the planet. Because of these things, I never undertake the act of teaching in any form lightly.

Briefly, I took a day-long seminar on a subject that interests me more than a little. The instructor was very talented in the field, and, to be fair, this was her first attempt to teach a portion of her craft to paying students.

But the whole endeavor was so poorly designed and executed that it left me with a growing fury over having paid for the privilege of having my precious time so spectacularly wasted. I continue to wonder how anyone could assume they could teach anything without extensive preparation and self-examination. Is it arrogance or cluelessness that causes someone to assume that just because they, themselves, excel in a given area that they will be able to teach the subject matter well?

What SHOULD the seminar have been? Well, let me tell you:

• Define what you plan to teach. A course without focus is going to be nakedly obvious within the first five minutes.
  

• If you're going to give participants written materials, they should be written well, and mirror the flow of the material you plan to teach.
  

• Have a course outline that you provide beforehand. This should include the schedule for the day, including a timeline, as well as what points of learning will be explained. The instructor should always have a separate 'field guide' to navigate the instruction that they have written well in advance and taken the time to review and practice beforehand. What – specifically – do you want to impart to students, and how are you going to achieve that? How are you going to involve your students directly in the process of learning each point? How are you going to make it memorable and fun?
  

• NO CHILDREN, PERIOD. Assume that adults take paid seminars to get away from the demands of children. If the seminar is not specifically oriented to the unique challenges of working with children, then don't use children. And don't have them underfoot, either. If you can't make this happen, don't hold the seminar.
  

• Be professional. Dress appropriately. You don't have to be fancy, but nobody wants to see your crack repeatedly, either. If you're using your home, clean and straighten it up. Again, nothing outrageous – but floors should be free of food, dishes should be clean and out of sight, and bathrooms should be clean. Rooms that your participants will be in should feel welcoming, and that includes making sure you have good lighting and seating. If it's too hard to conduct a seminar in a truly professional manner in your home,then don't use your home.
  

• Don't indulge in the urge to gossip about what's juicy in your profession, or go fishing for compliments from your participants. Discourage sycophantic behavior by redirecting the conversation in class. In fact, you should be creating an environment where you are helping each student to achieve something worthy of YOUR compliments before the day is done.Their work from the day should be your focus, not your work from the day. We already know you can do 'it' (whatever the 'it' may be) – the job of the teacher is to coach a student through the process to achieve their own success. The coach doesn't say “watch me do these drills” to the team – the coach defines the work the teammates must perform and provides watchful and useful critiques along the way.
  

• The technical portion of a class should include detailed notes pre-written by the instructor for take-homes student notes. These notes should be gone over and over with a fine-toothed comb by the instructor prior to disseminating them to paid clients, to ensure that students receive clearly-written instructions that are beneficial to understanding your process and the reasoning behind it. Given the different levels of expertise in any subject, handouts that are well-designed give students something to which they can return for guidance when trying things out at home, long after the seminar has ended.
  

• If your student doesn't leave with something they are proud to have created under your mentorship, you haven't taught a single thing worthwhile.
  

• Ask for feedback and conduct at least one follow-up. Nothing is quite so telling as an instructor who avoids the opportunity for constructive criticism.
  

It seems to me that too many hobbyists-turned-entrepreneurs are jumping on a bandwagon to make money 'teaching' without even a cursory thought as to professionalism and methodology. I do more preparatory work to teach one hour-long class to children than our instructor did in conducting a day-long seminar for paying adults.

Did I learn anything? Yes, one thing: that, in this subject, the proper equipment does half the work for you. Hence, my money would've been better spent set aside for an equipment purchase. But when a student walks away from the learning experience feeling that they've just had a peek behind the curtain at the little man pretending to be the Great and Powerful Oz, you've done yourself and your profession a grave disservice.

Times Are A' Changin'

Literally and figuratively. Daylight Savings Time here in Michigan has "sprung forward". I happen to love the seasonal time change in both directions, and I am genuinely baffled by people who piss and moan about it. In the fall, we get a nifty extra hour of sleep and subsequently rushed onset of nightfall makes me feel cozy and excited for the holiday festivities to begin in earnest. In the spring, the shift allows us to spend more of our best hours in glorious daylight, and the 'lost' hour of sleep is quickly forgotten in favor of the delight of sunlight well after dinner is over.

Yes, time is changing. Things around here have changed since I last wrote, too. We celebrated the birthdays of two of our offspring at the Kalahari, which unfortunately dovetailed with a very serious illness on Henry's part. Bit of a downer, that. I managed to be alert and fully conscious on Christmas morning...quite possibly a first for me since the children were born. Lots of wintertime sickness led us to shepherd Henry through the removal of his tonsils and adenoids by, quite possibly, the worst doctor in the entire state of Michigan: Dr. Howard M. Yerman. So, yeah, that was fun.

We've arrived at March, whose weather is all lamb and no lion for quite some time, now. I found a women-only gym that I love, and even though the interior is cloaked in more lavender than I've ever seen inside one space, I am always happy to go. I have just a few weeks left before summer comes, and with its glorious arrival comes the loss of the tiny sliver of free time to workout I have during the day when Lula is in Kindergarten.

But that's okay.

Because the summer brings all kinds of joy with it, and it also brings excitement, anticipation and lots of preparation for Henry's homeschool-through-middle-school to begin. He has taken a serious shine to playing his recorder and learning music, and he lit up like the proverbial Christmas tree when I told him we should spend some time considering whether he might like to pursue music lessons with the instrument of his choice. He wants to cook (Glory, Hallelujah!) and ride bikes with me "after we have our lunch together". I am so, so lucky.

I got a new camera body, a Canon 5D Mark II - the stuff of my dreams. I am taking tons of online courses from lynda.com, a resource I am so grateful to have found.

My better half weathered a marathon trip through India and got to see the amazing Taj Mahal and Agra Fort. (I wanted to be jealous, but hearing the pure wonder in his voice on the phone as they were leaving made my heart so incredibly happy.)

So much has happened, and so much more is coming. I don't know how much time I'll have to blog as this new phase of life approaches, but I'm sure I'll be back when something has my Irish up or when I find something too funny not to share.

In the meantime, I hope your cup runneth over, friends.

Shut Yer Piehole.

I think I have an inner Roller Derby Girl, because for the past three days I have fantasized about punching/elbowing various people straight in the kisser. We just got home from the grocery store, which was, as you might imagine it would be, insane during the days leading up to Thanksgiving. My grocery store has been too uppity to stock regular tabloids in the checkout lines in years past, but today there was a National Enquirer for me to peruse while we waited. Both Eug and the cart were in front of me, and I was standing a comfortable but not ridiculous way back from my better half. We couldn't move the cart forward, because the cashier needed us to wait while he found the code for some items the store had special-ordered for us. The conveyor belt moves forward, because we don't have that many items...but we're stuck for the moment. The old broad behind me seizes upon the six inches of free space on the conveyor belt and pushes me to begin loading her items onto the belt. Oh, wait - she did say "Excuse me"...in a snotty tone of voice. Instantly, I was thinking, "You can go FUCK YOURSELF if you think I'm moving, bitch!" I refused to budge and she continued to push me. When we could finally move, I pushed past her to replace the tabloid on the rack with an equally snotty "Excuse me". Is the ten fucking seconds she saved really worth being so goddamned rude? The problem is likely our grocery store of choice - a dear friend had recently taken his brother in there, upon which said brother remarked, "It smells like old people in here." Indeed. Although I happen to think it's their shitty richer-than-thou attitude that likely stinks.

The Christmas stuff is down from the attic and awaits my attention, and once again I am fantasizing about replacing my Christmas tree lights. I want some fancy LEDs in soft pastels with white wire to go on my Christmas tree, but I don't know that I'm spendy enough to spring for them, as I would need something like 12 strands. Plus, I would be foregoing my all-pink lighting scheme for the first time, and I'm rather sentimental about those fire-y pink lights on my silver tree. I'm not even going to *try* to decorate the outdoors, because I have too much on my plate as it is. The interior, however, will make Liberace proud! If you want me to buy new Christmas stuff, just cover it in glitter - I'm that easy. But first I have to do some major cleaning in the living room, including denuding the couch and washing all of the cushion covers. Four cats and a puppy will do that to you.

The upcoming weeks will be IN. SANE, what with two Thanksgivings, two kids' birthdays, one trip to the Kalahari, a December birthdays family celebration and all of the attendant chaos that comes with Christmas itself. My priorities could likely use some adjustment, given that the overriding desire du jour is to find a Santa hat for Farley to wear. If I ever win the lottery, I've got two words for you: personal assistant. That would rock.

I hope your Thanksgiving is filled with gratitude and pie, and not necessarily in that order. Also, please pray that I don't actually punch anyone in the kisser, wouldya? Thank you evah so.