Traveling with Kids

We just got back from the longest vacation that I have ever taken. Everywhere we went, be it camping on the beach, crashing in a hostel, or checking out various roadside attractions, people around us seemed to be united in one common diagnosis: we were brave to do whatever it was we were doing with a 2 and 3 year old.

Brave? Really? I thought it was fun to do these things with our kids. Even though they're very young, I think that what we were doing was enriching to them, for whatever that was worth.

Bringing Toys

When we went on our first big road trip with our girls at about this age, it was six months ago. It was a shorter trip and I think that we over prepared. We packed little backpacks for both of them filled with little toys, drawing boards, coloring books, stuffed animals, etc. Our idea was that by going through all of these things neatly packed into the bag as theirs, they would busy themselves and the time in the car would pass easily for them. Instead, it was a constant game of dropping and fetching that drove my wife crazy. There was a lot of discontent and crying when a favorite knick-knack would be lost in the bowels of the backpack.

This time, we cut toys down to a minimum. We bought generic travel magnadoodle things for each girl and invited them to bring along one favorite stuffed animal. There were also about half a dozen children's books. This time around things were easier to keep track of and the drawings got more and more creative as the magnadoodle things ended up being the best toy we could have thought of.

Special Gear

Since we were doing a lot of camping, we packed them each a small flashlight. This not only helped with the potential fear involved in camping, but it also made them feel that they held an important and self-directed role around the campground.

We packed two big sleeping bags for the girls and two small ones. We ended up camping in some remote and cold places and having them zipped in a small bag and snuggled into a larger bag with their sister was very helpful. They also enjoyed that we bought a rechargeable lantern with a little night light.

Little Responsibilities

Our kids like to feel like they're helping. We learned early on that it was best to buy two small or medium sized road atlases that they could each hold. We pointed out the grand view of our route and they liked to pretend to show each other exactly where we were, where different friends of their were, and where their aunts, uncles, and grandparents live. Using a pen, they drew all over the maps to show us where to go.

There were also lots of times that we let them decide what we were going to do: go for a hike, play with a ball, go for a drive, a swim, whatever.

Proper Expectations

Early on, we thought surprises would be the way to go. For example, on a day when we were going to go to the beach, we didn't tell them before hand. We dressed them in their swimming suits and told them that we were going to go for a swim. When we ended up at the beach, they were very disappointed that we weren't at the community pool back home. It took a good while before we could properly pump them up about the beach--usually one of their favorite things. With that in mind, we were sure to tell them the day before we went to Disneyland and talk about all the things we could do there. Kids seem to frame their world in their expectations and anticipation is half the fun--at least.

Imagination

As we prepared for our trip, everyone and their dog had one suggestion. It can be summed up by what a coworker said to me: "You've got to get a DVD player for your car, if you don't have one." I just don't know why I would take my kids on a 6,000 mile road trip if I just wanted to plop them down in front of a TV. I would do that at home and buy a more convincing TV with all the money we would have saved by not driving around the country. I wanted them to experience things. I wanted them to see the world around us: the redwoods in California, the arches in Utah, the desert in New Mexico, the Rockies in Colorado, etc. I even wanted them to experience how boring it can be for miles and miles while we try and make it to our next stop before sundown.

There's something that I think a lot of people forget: the gift of being bored. Boredom is something that is almost alien to me since having kids as every moment can potentially be filled with work, study, or dealing with the kids simultaneously. But boredom is the mother of invention. When they got bored, they started looking around more, drawing more, asking about letters and numbers more often and little stops at curio shops end up being big fun.

Our Mantra

It's about being a family together. Being in the car, in a remote campground, or at a busy theme park with your family is what the trip is all about. The night before we left, we had a tiny family conference where we said that we were going to have a "good trip." Our oldest daughter held her hand up in sort of the sign-language sign for "I Love You," (which seemed to pick up from "Yellow Submarine" or something) and said "Good Trip!" This became our mantra for the trip.

We agreed that if someone was grumpy, upset, angry, or dissatisfied in any way, you only had to lift your hand in the special sign and say "Good Trip!" and things got to start over free of penalty. You didn't need to warm up, you didn't need to hold a grudge, you didn't need to swallow your pride, it was just "Good Trip" and you're better.

This worked well for parents as well as kids. When I was upset and disappointed about something, my wife would remind me with a "Good Trip" and I was able to shift my frame of reference. And when we were having fun, one of the kids might just up and say it to remind us of what a special moment we were in.

***

Traveling with kids is fun. It's good for them, you, and it's good for your collective identity as family. There are going to be some fits and some problems and it's always more expensive than you think it will be, but it's worth it. It's one of those things that's not about time or money but transcends those things to become so much more than what you've spent on it.

One Year Without TV

This last week was national Turn Off TV Week. It happens to mark the one-year anniversary of my family being without TV. It's hard to believe that it's been only a year, and a year ago I never would have thought that it would last.

Let me clarify, though. My family does own a TV. But we've tamed it. We haven't had or paid for service for a year, but we can watch movies on DVD and shows on AppleTV, should we choose. The virtues of this are found in having no commercials and in being properly mindful about what we watch. Still, we can over do it so things like Turn Off TV Week come along at great times.

We decided to downgrade our TV to monitor status at the end of last year's Turn Off TV Week. It was an eye opening experience for us that made us a stronger family. Without shows to watch, we find ourselves with extra time. We find ourselves spending more time with each other and paying more attention to the family in general. Without commercials, we've cut begging for things out of our family experience altogether. While this year's experiment wasn't nearly as elaborate as last years--as we have cut our watching down to about 10% of what it used to be--we still took some time to ourselves to celebrate not having a light-and-sound-box communicating with us. Last week, we went to the zoo, played outside, read more, spent time at the library, fixed the A/C unit, and took care of my wife while she fought off the worst flu-sore-throat-combination-nightmare of all time. Yes, it can come at bad times, but we managed fine.

This last year without a TV has been nothing less than liberating. No longer do we watch shows that we don't enjoy, or flip channels, or have to sit through commercials while waiting to see what's going to happen to Ben on Lost. No longer do we make plans to be home by a certain time or go to bed at a certain time in order to accommodate the schedule of the small-screen. Our daughters have no idea what Bratz are, who Miley Cyrus is, or just how annoying Elmo can be. They are free from the marketing of those things, free to make a choice that has nothing to do with conformity or acceptance from people who don't know you as anything but a consumer of their products.

We are free of celebrity news. We are free of investigative reports about child predators. We are free of nasally narrators on Swiffer commercials, and Truck Month, and Gwen Stephani, and political ad campaigns, and whatever other forms of Hell that are lurking around out there.

While discussing TV as a medium of popular culture, I offered my students the idea of going without TV for a week and writing about it. Not one student took me up. They laughed and scoffed at the idea that a life without TV was somehow better.

And maybe it's not inherently better. But it's more yours. You manage time differently; watch less and do more. Your thoughts are unencumbered by commercial jingles and Family Guy reruns. Television time is time that you surrender to someone else. It's time that you give up and let someone else live for you. And, my students are right, it doesn't have to be a bad thing.

But shouldn't someone be willing to try going without it for one week? The fear that they expressed over the idea was enough to show the virtues of the project. What is wrong with us that we can't miss a week's worth of shows? What's wrong with our lifestyles if that is frightening to us?

The week may be over, but it's not too late. Try it yourself. Don't shy away from having some extra time for your family this week.

The Hostile Educational Climate of Testing

I'm a teacher. At this point, I'm just about a year away from having earned a doctorate in Education. I can't stand the thought of my kids going to school when standardized testing is ruling the terms of the classroom.

No Child Left Behind is un-researched, underfunded, and simply senseless. I can't imagine why--despite the glittering generality of the title of the bill--people voted for it. There is no reason to believe that all children learn at the same pace. There is no reason to believe that some students just aren't ready to go on to the next grade. There is no reason to believe that every student in every corner of America should be learning the same things at the same times and demonstrate the same skills. It's nothing short of madness.

The federal government pays for about 10% of public schools. Despite that small amount of funding, No Child Left Behind intrudes upon each and every classroom and, essentially, dictates a common curriculum for all students to learn. I see three major problems with it.

Problem #1: Educational Diversity

In nature, species survive through genetic diversity. If the climate changes, a new predator is introduced, or a certain disease comes through, the variety of genetic make-up will help some of those creatures survive. Those advantageous genetic qualities will the be passed on, improved upon, and posterity will benefit. You can't expect every creature to survive every epidemic, but you can, reasonably, expect that the species will push on. This is why inbreeding is frowned upon in polite societies of animals; too much of one specific gene pool will result in decreased genetic diversity.

In Universities, they don't hire their own graduates most of the time. If UT hires only UT alumni, they will, in effect, be in-breeding. They will have a lack of educational diversity which will lead to narrow thinking. This narrow thinking will result in a lack of diversity for problem solving--all people will approach problems in the same way, drawing from the same education, and at some point, a problem will come along that will be unsolvable to them.

This is what we're doing to the nation at large. If every student is forced to learn the same materials for the same purposes, the homogeony will make the country much less creative problem solvers. We will be faced with plenty of problems that will be unsolvable.

Problem #2: Common Denominators

Many students who are behind in class are there because they are way ahead of the class. They get bored, frustrated, and end up living in their own heads rather than paying attention. Then they can't demonstrate the skills that were taught simply because the subject matter wasn't engaging to them.

This is why we push for smaller class sizes. It's not just that each student gets more attention, but that each class can move faster, or, at a pace more common to all the students. By saying that we won't go on without every last student, even the bright students might be chastised for holding the classroom back.

Problem #3: Negligence

The worst advertisement I've ever seen was for Kindermusik. It showed a girl playing a drum and said, "The same rhythm she uses for music, she'll use for dribbling down the court." So that's the value of music education? What it can do for your basketball skills?

This has been the attitude towards educating the arts for as long as I can remember. I took a lot of music when I was younger and was always disgusted when someone would mention that music was good for your math skills. I always thought that math was good for your music skills.

Arts aren't just good for learning the important stuff: they are the important stuff. By focusing testing and benchmarks on English and Math, schools neglect not only music and art, but science and history as well. These things are important. These are the way that we move a culture forward. They are what being human is about, even if they don't use it to benefit society. Or basketball.

No Child Left Behind, by focusing on the "practical skills" is, in a sense, saying that education is for making money in the future. It's not. Education is supposed to be for thinking for yourself, understanding of your place in the world, and should, ideally, enhance your creative skills. Let's see them demonstrate creativity by filling in a bubble with a number two pencil.

I live for the day when we realize that some students may not be ready to move on--even emotionally. And when we see that some students should move very much farther on. If we could take the funding for NCLB, and many other ridiculous educational programs and put it to making smaller class sizes and increasing the range of subjects that students can learn, we will make out country a stronger place.

Or, we can just give programs fancy sounding names that limit our students and look fancy to our constituents so we can stick around the beltway a little longer and increase our salaries. That's a good idea, too.

Related:
Education vs. Schooling (On Steve-Olson.com)

Changes

The other day I was driving from Houston to Austin and I got a call from an old friend of mine. I've known her for as long as we've both been alive and she became a mom shortly after I became a dad. We were talking about potty training--the ups and downs of the whole thing--and, specifically, we were talking about cleaning out the tiny potty after, well, number two.

I broke into my own conversation, which was in a very descriptive stage, to point out that all the years we've known each other, the subject of cleaning crap out of a plastic receptacle had never really come up before; things had changed a lot in the past couple years. It was a mildly interesting interjection.

I remember when I was really young hearing my grandma say that nothing in this world is constant but change. While I feel that change is constant, the rate of change is fluctuating. If I think about the changes that occurred in my life from ages 15-17, it can't begin to compare to the changes in my life from ages 25-27.

It's like plate tectonics. Pressure and tension build up over time and then WHAM, an earthquake slaps the surface. And now, watching my daughters grow up is like having massive aftershocks every single day. They are expressions of flux, every day growing and learning. They learn more in a single day than I can take in during a semester of graduate school.

Without a doubt the biggest moment of change in my life was when my first daughter was born. It was a palpable feeling; probably something like dying would be. Seriously. Or maybe like being born, myself. I felt like I fell apart and was something else entirely. As much as I've tried to write about that moment over and over in my life, I've never found the right words. I've never come close, and I really don't expect to any more.

The earthquake of that moment is still being felt. In a single instant, priorities shifted forever, concerns toppled, things were put into focus and others taken out of focus, the world that I lived in seems silly and trifling now, and the world now seems multilayered--stratified with superficial concerns on the bottom, ideas of consumerism waddling in the muck going up to petty concerns about money, and the lightest layers floating on top; the joy and mystery of life, the feeling of a baby falling asleep on your chest.

I think it's a shame that some people are able to overcome the power of that change. Some people are able to go back to their old concerns and priorities. Maybe they've just been rooted in them for so long. Maybe they feel that there is time in their lives for everything.

The world is at once infinite and temporary to me, these days. I think it's important to take a moment now and then, see where we've been, and take note of where we are. Where are my priorities today? Have I put them in the right place, or have I fallen into really old habits again? How can I help guide the change that will happen today, push it in a positive direction for my kids? Yes, it's just one day. The world they make today, they will change tomorrow, so every single step counts.

10 Activities for Toddlers on a Rainy Day

We spend a lot of time outside. For at least a few hours every afternoon, we go outside and play, either on the playground in the backyard, or ride trikes, or play with the neighborhood kids. This is addition to going on walks or feeding the ducks at the pond down the street.

The burden of spending lots of time outside is felt when the weather isn't cooperative. We don't live where it snows, and though we get a lot of rain here, it comes on a comparatively small number of days a year. If they're used to being able to run around and cut loose everyday, a couple days without it can lead to pent-up energies that can result in high octane arguments and first rate fighting. It's no fun, for anyone.

So we've spent a lot of time trying to navigate these inside times. We have a mix between old standbys and new favorites. Play around with some of these and see what works for you.

1. Playing Rice
This is one of my wife's inventions. On the kids craft table, she sets out buckets, funnels, measuring cups, spoons, and bowls. Then she fills the buckets with rice (dry, obviously, as cooked rice would have some pretty frustrating results when poured through a funnel). The kids are happy to "play rice" for up to two hours at a time. Two hours! This is a great time to clean the kitchen or read a book. You could probably also play beans, or play macaronis, or something.

2. Play dough
This is an obvious one. Play dough, or any comparable knock-off, is cheap and versatile. They really bank on you buying a lot of accessories for playing with the stuff, which you really don't have to. Household utensils work wonders with the stuff. And, if you really want to get affordable, with a little bit older kids, it's easy to find a recipe and make the stuff. They get a kick out of it. Plus, you can find recipes that harden in the oven for painting. Great for the holidays. That brings us to...

3. Painting
Watercolors are fine, and washable paint is okay. But, really, any acrylic craft paint can be washed off if caught in a relatively short period of time, and the colors are so much more bright and vivid.

4. Shaving Cream Paintings
If your kids get sick of the regular old painting, or if they like finger painting, then this is a great activity. Mix shaving cream in a bowl with the desired food coloring. Then, they can spread the colored fluff all over a page to make intricate designs that bleed into each other. Fun.

5. Shaving Cream Cleaning
Shaving cream does a great job of cleaning surfaces like tables and counter tops. Let the kids spread it all over the place, and when it is wiped off, the table is shiny clean. Pretty awesome to have fun and clean.

6. Build a Fort
The only drawback of turning the couch or the beds into a fortress is how often they'll want to do it in the coming days. Having small, cozy places to hide and stay is wonderfully comforting to a toddler. It may serve as inspiration to make a cozy reading nook in their room.

7. Throw a Party
This can be especially fun if you know that the next day is going to be unpleasant and you want to turn the tides by setting up a morning surprise. Put up streamers, hang balloons, bake a cake, play dance music, set up simple games like pin the tail on the donkey.

8. Music Time
Getting the family together to sing is engaging and very good for child development. If you're not musically inclined, look at it as an opportunity to learn along with your child. Get a used guitar, buy a book, and learn some children's songs.

9. Dress-up
We have a dress-up trunk in our kids' closet. It's full of old clothes, aprons, sunglasses, Halloween costumes, and the like. It's great to pull out on rainy days.

10. Bake something
Making bread, muffins, biscuits, or cakes can be a lot of fun for kids, especially if they know they're going to get to eat them later. This may be better for older kids, and it is best if you can find different responsibilities for the kids to be in charge of in the process.

When seen as an opportunity to break from routine, enhance artistic skills, and spend some family together time, bad weather can be a good thing. If you have some other activities that get you through a rainy-day schedule, please post them below.

Potty Party Part II: The Outcome

Last week, I reported the details of my family's desperate plan to potty train our kids, the potty party. As a quick recap, the plan was to throw a day-long party to celebrate the absence of diapers in our home. The idea was that by forcing them to come up with non-diapered means of expulsion through a positive theme, we would circumnavigate all the hurt feelings and frustration that we've been experiencing over the whole idea.

The whole day was a wash. I mean, we had fun, but there was no notion of household productivity. The decorations were hung, the cake was made, and just to throw a harpoon in the whale of the notion of diet, we had homemade chocolate chip buscuits for breakfast and brought in pizza for dinner. The day was shamefully full of movie watching, and the yard rested quietly outside, escaping even the slightest effort of mantanence that I might have considered appropriate on a regular Saturday. But the pottys were set up and waiting, and that's what mattered.

It worked--mostly.

We now stand at a new and exciting ratio of potty users in the famiy; our older daughter has not worn a diaper since Friday, and it is now Wednesday. To top that off, she hasn't had even a single accident.

All we had to do was weather the first excruciating half of Potty Party Day (as it will hence be refered). She screamed. She begged. She ran in circles. She wanted a bath (presumably to be used as a covert urinal) and argued that her dirty fingernails demanded bathtime attentions. All the while, her little sister sat happily on her potty--holding everything in for all it was worth.

We almost caved at least once every hour.

And finally, at noon, she could hold back no longer. She sat on her little potty, positioned comfortably in the living room, squeezing my hand in terror. Then, finally, she looked at me and said, "Daddy, don't be happy." I assured her I wouldn't be.

"Daddy," she said, "Don't be proud." Again, pride was far from my demenor.

"Daddy," she begged, "Don't clap and say 'yay.'" And I told her I wouldn't.

"I pee-peed."

The chear that I let out instantly broke all of those forced promises, but she cheered, too. She wanted to call her grandparents. She wanted the world to know. And she pull on her panties with what can only be described as glee.

Ever since then, she has, perhaps, over-pottied. She takes such pride that if she's not fully occupied, she will choose to practice her art.

For whatever reason, our younger daughter just wasn't ready. She begrudgingly returned to diapers. Despite sitting on the potty, she just won't go in it. Her big sister is trying to teach her, with limited success. We'll try again, soon, to get her to go cold turkey like her sister, but, heck, she is a year younger.

So, if you're stuck with an older kid in diapers, the Potty Party just might be for you.

Potty Party may lead to Pity Party

My daughters are ages 2 and 3. They are bright young girls with vocabulary skills that really blow my mind from time to time. And while every parent takes pride in the developmental milestones of their children, there's one that I'm just plain vexed by. That damn potty training.

To be honest, I feared it for long before I ever had kids. I have an abnormal memory, as far as I can tell, remembering many mundane events that happened before my second birthday. I remember the frusteration of not being able to communicate and I remember the dread and despair of potty training. Why in the world would my Mom insist that I try using a potty when the diaper thing was working out just fine? Well, probably because she was six months pregnant and didn't want to have two kids in diapers.

Man, do I understand that now. Our older daughter has been ready to use the potty for at least a year. She can tell you when she is planning on going pee (especially a pleasure in public) and she sequesters herself when she has to do any more than pee. Then, she gives you a report about her estimated size of the delivery.

It's heartbreaking.

And we don't know why she hates the potty so. We're sick of hearing people's advice on the subject because there just isn't any correlation between her and a potty-using child; there's no common ground on which to compare them. She just won't sit on the damn thing. Not for reward or punishment (though, I suppose, we stopped short of any kind of punishment, and maybe a taser would work wonders).

Our second daughter is on her way down the same path. She did like to sit on the potty, though there was never any positive outcome, as she would then stand up to pee. But watching and imitating her sister is the subject that she has most mastered and she can tell that this potty thing must be some kind of trick, trap, or otherwise undesirable type of monster. S she now refuses to sit.

I think this is about control. I think this is about power.

We're very read-up on the subject. We haven't taken this lightly, and all the advice we have heard and read about has been tried. But still, we can't get over the idea that they have mastered their digetive tracks well enough to do it and that we don't want to cause them any lasting emotional trauma.

With all of this in mind, we are going to try one more time.

The Potty Party. It's our last hope. After this doesn't work, I'm going to wait until they go to college and let the dean of student activities deal with the situation.

Tomorrow morning, they will wake up to a near-Christmas caliber event. Wrapped, new potties, one for each. Soli's favorite color is pink, and Luna's oscillates between blue and green. We will rid them of their diapers under the majesty of streemers and balloons. Their brand new baby dolls (today's payday, in case you didn't catch this expensive trend) will have to be potty trained. The girls will delight in this, of course, as they understand the wonderment of potting even though they haven't indulged.

Then, they will have to put things into action for themselves. There will be fancy, cute, panties at their call standing by for wearing. And there will be cake baking, should they make the big score.

It's silly. And, honestly, I don't want such a party every time I go potty (though a little more fanfare would be nice). And I just don't know if it will work. But I'm sick of diapers. I'm sick of feeling like I can't do it. In many ways, this mirrors the frustration that I had when I potty trained, only now I'm having it from the other side.

So wish us luck, because we'll be want for it. And I'll let you know after the weekend if I recommend your own potty party, or if it was a bust.

In the meantime, please enjoy an on-topic video:

9 Ways to be more Productive

Yesterday I had a pretty embarrassing moment of consumer-culture thinking. My neighbor is getting a lot of yard work done and workers were tearing out the old brick on his walkway. I asked the workers what they were planning to do with the old brick, and they said they were going to throw it out.

Naturally, I couldn't see all those tons of brick going to waste while our back patio is rotting to pieces, so with their permission, I started to haul it away. I had on my leather work gloves which haven't been used in years and was bent over throwing the dirty bricks into a wheelbarrow. The smell of the dirt, gloves, and barrow suddenly reminded me of something. I thought to myself, "Wow, this smells just like a home and garden store."

My next thought was, "Man, have I gotten soft."

And later on, after all the bricks were moved, I noted to myself that I haven't been so sore since the last time I went to the gym--which was a long time ago. Too much of my life, I realized, is built around consumerism. If I'm going to lift weights at the gym, I may as well stay home and get some yard work done. Or build a playhouse, ride a bike, fix my fence. And, by God, a home and garden store ought to remind me of working in my home and garden and not the other way around!

I want to set some goals for myself that I can follow to make my life more productive and less driven by consumer culture. Following the idea of making small, measurable goals, I'm focusing on what I can do this week to set new standards for myself. Here's the list:

1. Eat Only at Home
This may be easy for a lot of people out there, but it has always been a pain for me. Through a series of financial ups and downs in my childhood, I have come to associate eating at home with stress and eating out with celebration. And when things get stressful for me now, I want to go out to eat to alleviate it. Being aware of this pattern is not enough to change it for me. So I will think day-to-day that I will have less guilt if I just eat at home.

2. Make food from Scratch
In the past, I've made the resolution to eat at home and then done something that I feel is just as bad--eat half-homemade foods. But so far this new year, I have made myself proud. I don't eat out of a box or out of a can (unless I'm using canned ingredients for something that's out of season). In fact, I haven't even bought a loaf of bread in almost three months. Instead I bake all of my bread from scratch. It tastes better and costs about 25 cents a loaf. And no, I don't have a bread machine. You don't need a bread machine to make bread at home. And you feel good about yourself when you can take something so basic, do it yourself, and have it be better. It goes from being empty filler to being something substantial.

3. Find a new way to get to work
Biking to work is an impossibility for some people. That is unfortunate. We actually bought our house with this in mind. Actually, we even moved to this town with this in mind. When I ride my bike to work, I don't stress about traffic, and though it takes a little longer, I arrive at work or at home feeling better. If you can't bike to work where you live, perhaps you can take a bus, a train, or walk.

4. Walk to the park with the kids
Where we live we're in walking distance of several parks with playgrounds. Taking a walk with the kids to one of these parks has the dual effect of getting exercise for me and wearing out the kids. It's amazing, but over half of Americans get no exercise every day. Absolutely none. When I was younger, I never would have thought of walking as exercise, but now, sure, it's more than I usually do.

5. Make a Garden
If you don't have one yet, make one now. We have a pretty big yard and get lots of rain. There's plenty of space to start growing our own food. I've never been all that fond of vegetables, but it's about time I changed my mind about that. I think that growing my own will make the whole process feel more rewarding, much like the bread making. If you don't live in a situation where you can have a garden, there is the possibility of a community garden.

6. Build Something
I don't know what I'm going to do with those bricks. I can make the new patio with it and save money, or I could see it as a gift and make a barbecue pit. Again, lifting weights is great for getting into shape, but wouldn't it be more interesting

7. Donate Stuff
It's that time again. Every so often it's a good idea to get rid of unplayed with toys and unworn clothes. My house has the tendency to fill with clutter and I just don't know how it does it. But I know the cure. Not too long ago, we sold 20 boxes of books to a used book store. It was nice to get rid of all the books we won't read again and know that they can move on to people who haven't read them.

8. Volunteer
There's a community beautification project this Saturday. Or, Habitat for Humanity is building about 15 miles away and still needs people. Next week, my wife can lead a workshop about self-esteem for preteen girls. There are tons of volunteer options out there and we don't take advantage nearly enough.

9. Make a Date with the Wife
My wife and I spend a lot of time together, but it is always family time. There's nothing wrong with that, but I do feel like it's important to nurture the one-on-one relationship. Maybe my sister will play with the girls while we go out. Or maybe we'll put the girls to bed on Friday and instate a no computer, no tv, no books night. We could play board games, work on a project together, or have *ahem* other kinds of fun. Anyway, we won't waste our night and we'll be taking time for each other.

***

It's important to take time and make it useful. So much of our time gets wasted and we feel like it's taken from us. Focus your energy, focus your time, and the resulting productivity will resonate throughout your life.

The Power of Language in Childhood Creativity

Certainly the most amazing thing we will ever accomplish is over and done with by age five. Scale Mt. Everest, swim the Pacific, be the first person to walk on Mars, and it doesn't matter--your very biggest accomplishment is resting softly behind you with no laurels, no medals, and hardly a thought put into it after the milestone of preschool is reached. Of course, what we're talking about is the aquisition of language.

But to say "the aquisition of language" and act like we have a true understanding of what we speak of is to make the greatest understatement in human history. To aquire, master, or even understand any form of language is to gain a cognitive universe, full of ups, downs, emotions, colors, textures, and thought. All of these notions that we have about what reality is are based on the way that we use language. Our very perceptions of reality would shift dramatically without this basic skill.

Much has been written about this that I'd love to quote, but a blog entry can only be so long and, after all, I have a point to make somewhere after this meandering, so let me show you what I'm talking about.

Words as a substitute for understanding

When my oldest daughter was just beginning to speak, she expressed her curiosity about the world through her use of language. We, in turn, showed her the world that surrounds her by also using the language. As she aquired words, she not only had ways of saying things, but she aquired understandings about the world around her. And, even if she ultimatley didn't understand the concept she was trying to grasp, using a word as a replacement for the understanding being sought was enough for her.

Here's a good example: She started to wonder where I went all day. She would wake up, and I wouldn't be there most days of the week. For her, the universe is small, the population mainly centered in and around our house, and she, of course, couldn't fathom what it was I was doing not within the framework of her universe. She said this by shaking her head, putting out her arms, and saying, "Daddy? Where Daddy?" Easily enough, her question was posed.

The answer was, "At work."

And every day, she would nod and say, "At work."

This progressed. After a week or two of this question/anser jag, she started coming into the room and announcing, "Daddy at work."

Let me ask you this: what did a 14 month old know about "work?" Nothing, really. It was a place that Daddy goes instead of staying at home. She couldn't possibly know that this was normal for daddies everywhere, or what a myriad of different meanings "work" can have, both by definition and by context. But she was more than willing to take that word and use it as understanding, as meaning. And only now that she's three does she have much of an understanding at all.

Our kids do this with everything we teach them. Every little tiny thing. They take it as understanding and meaning. So how we present the world to them doesn't just offer description of a reality, but it gives them the only reality they know. This is heavy stuff. This is their world.

Okay, so what do we do with this information?

First of all, beats me. I mean, this is a big realization, that our responsibilities are not just to teach our children to speak, but to actually design the world that they live in. My wife could have easily told my daughter that I was off "killing" instead of being at "work." And it would be easy to show the ways that my part in the system of education can lead to things like poverty and war and deaths. And this is the world that she would be living in now.

But I think this presents us with great opportunity. I don't think that children should be molded. I think it's unavoidable that we should show them our beliefs and our ideals, but I don't think they should be forced. And I think this realization about language is a chance to steer things away from the brainwashing of the world.

Instead, I think we should see the aquisition of language as a great chance to nurture their creativity. Try and expand their vocabulary, especially if you speak English. English has more words than any other language ever has and is the only language that requires a thesaurus. It is a shame that we use so little of these words.

One of the greatest writers of English was Joseph Conrad. In his very slim book, The Heart of Darkness, he shows how versatile and beautiful the English language can be. It can be, in fact, much more like mood music when describing a scene or an action, and the understanding of his meaning comes across in painted pictures rather than concrete descriptors.

This is, of course, notable because Joseph Conrad held English as his third language. His outside perspective of the language enabled him to see the true spectrum. He was free of the usuage of language that his parents and peers employed.

In many ways, it would be ideal if our children were free from the bonds of language that we impose on them. And in other ways, they will be; afterall, children get their accents not from their parents, but from their peers.

Conclusions?

No. But I think it's important as a caring father to have an expanded awareness of how we raise our kids. Creativity is an attribute that should be cultivated in our children, regardless of how it helps them do on standardized tests. We should embrace their interpretations of the world and let them indulge in their own thoughts and ideas as much as we can. Encourage them to play with language. Engourage them to think outside of the box. Ask them their interpretation of the world before offering them the easy answer. You may be surprised and, hopefully, you'll be open to the idea that you are no more right than they are; you just agree with the majority.

Not Willing to Give Up TV? 10 Ways to Tame it.

I’ve had a lot of response for my post, Giving up TV. In fact, on a normal day, the “hits” on that post register about 100 times more than hits on any other post. What’s the deal with that? Are we so fascinated by the idea that we actually can live without TV that it deserves to be met with such curiosity and excitement? Are there really people out there who haven’t thought about giving up their TV addiction? I don’t pretend to know the answers, but as long as I have the attention of a pretty large number of people, I want to encourage this movement away from media-dependence. You’ve probably noticed how pervasive the TV is.

With the TV on in our houses, our day is not our own. We make our schedules around it. We make decisions based on it. We give corporations a window into our houses. We hand out kids over to the corporate culture without thinking about it. And we pay for most of it.

And yet…

We are so fascinated with what they have to say about the weather that they say it every six minutes on morning. Then, after they’ve told us about the weather, they promise more about it in another six minutes. And we tune in again. Why is the weather so important to people in the morning? Bring a sweater! Put an umbrella in your car or bike! You don’t need to know what the day has in store! They’re probably wrong and you probably have a pretty good idea yourself.

We alter plans and possibilities of human interaction because of what’s on TV. They have molded your day when this happens. I once had a date tell me that she had to go home because TGIF was on ABC. Okay, it probably wasn’t the “quality” programming that was driving her away, but it seemed like a logical excuse to her. It seemed so because this isn’t uncommon. A friend of mine in college said that he called his mom because he was having a rough time adjusting and she said, “Let me call you back after Big Brother.” We establish and nurture relationships with the characters on TV even at the expense of our own friends and family.

The corporations that have us pay for their service make money not only from us but from the channels and advertisers on the other side of things. We are paying to watch ads. The shows are really just unfortunate side effects for the TV companies (unless, of course, they present good places for product placement). And we willingly sit our kids down to watch shows that leave them desiring cheap, useless merchandise that they don’t really want. Kids, especially pre-teen and teenagers, feel worse about themselves after watching commercials.

And I know what you’re thinking, “I’m not affected by commercials.” Then tell me why advertisers pay $200,000,000,000 a year for advertising on TV? You’re telling me it doesn’t work? You just don’t see the big picture like they do. It works. Trust me. Or trust them, at least.

But there are ways that you can help these strange events happening under your own roof. For one, you can get rid of the TV. But many just won’t do that. Luckily, there are other ways.

So. You’re not willing to give up the TV?

Big deal. This doesn’t mean you can’t join the fight against it. What the TV’s function is in most households is really the acknowledgement that you’re there, you’re alive, you’re awake. People wake up and turn the thing on as a symbol for “clocking-in” for your day. It will remain on, even if muted, for the rest of the day as long as you are in your house. For some people, this even means turning on TVs in multiple rooms. This TV being on is comforting for us. We were raised that way. We may even perceive our pets to prefer the presence of the all-knowing box. There are some very solid steps that you can take to tame the beast.

1. Mindful TV Watching
TV doesn’t have to be mindless. Only watch TV when there is something that you want to watch. Read that last sentence again. Make it a mantra. There is no reason to flip through channels seeking you-know-not-what. And don’t turn on the TV just because the kids want to “watch something” or “watch TV.” Ask them what they want to watch. Turn it on if you think that’s a good idea. Don’t offer suggestions, make them discern what it is they want to do with their time; this shouldn’t be just to waste time.

2. Impose Time Limits
I use to really make fun of friends of mine who said, “My mom only lets me watch an hour of TV a day.” But first, let us look at that statement. What, besides TV, does a parent let their child do for more than an hour a day? There just aren’t that many activities that we do that beg for four or five hours of our time every day. And those that do should hopefully give you some sort of product, like a backyard deck or a new guestroom, after a certain number of days.

3. Flexible Limits
You don’t have to stick with a certain amount of TV every day. I know parents who give their kids tickets to watch shows. This often results in siblings coordinating TV watching plans. Or, you can sit down on Sunday and map out a plan for the week—which shows are “important” to watch or a special movie night or some such.

4. Time Frames
Or, maybe TV watching is free in the morning, when little kids wake up too early and parents follow suit, but then goes off after everyone has had breakfast and gotten dressed for the day. That would at least encourage a view of TV watching as having a docile purpose in the day rather than a dictator of it.

5. Keep kids away from certain shows
What shows? Shows that are nothing but commercials masked in plots. Shows like Dora, Power Rangers, and the like. If there’s a huge amount of products associated with it, you should urge them in a different direction. These shows created misplaced desires and they direct those desires by changing characters, adding characters, encouraging collection, etc. And when you kid does collect them all, they will only see how unfulfilling it is when the movie comes out and all the old characters become irrelevant. Instead, shows like Arthur that are more closely associated with books can be a better alternative (but don’t fall for something like a Dora book—those things are like poison put to print when your child wants you to read it again and again).

6. Get Rid of Cable
And I don’t mean “buy Dish!” I mean, get rid of all those damn channels. How many of them do you watch? They spread the good channels out within their three or four strata of service options so that you have to get 150 channels to watch five good ones, but 200 channels to watch nine good ones. And having cable really detracts from the idea of mindful TV watching. Maybe you have a good antenna and can get the local channels. But I don’t recommend getting “basic cable” because a) they’ll talk you into getting a bigger package at less money and b) because you don’t need to send their kids to college—stop lining their pockets.

7. TIVO
I have no experience with TIVO whatsoever. But I have a few problems with it. 1) you’re paying for a service; 2) you probably still have cable; 3) You have to fast-forward through commercials when they should be automatically blacked-out. So, instead:

8. Get an AppleTV
I swear they’re not paying me to say this again. But with one of these expensive systems hooked up to your TV, you can only watch shows that you decide to pay for. You will automatically limit TV to shows that you actually want to watch and you will cut out commercials altogether. Plus, you never, ever have to change your schedule around a show (though you’ll often have to tell your neighbors not to say anything about Survivor until that weekend). I would happily rather pay for a show that doesn’t have commercials than watch a show for free that does. I’ve been saying that for at least 10 years before the AppleTV came out.

9. Get a DVD player
Oh, you have one? What’s it there for? I’ll tell you what it’s there for: mindful watching. Only shows you want, no commercials. This is especially helpful with the increased presence of quality TV shows being put on DVD compulsively and online things like Netflix getting them to you.

10. Get a blanket
To put over the screen. Make it hard to turn it on. Only take that blanket off when you really, really want to watch something. Bonus points if it’s a pretty blanket or a tapestry.

And, as always, there are plenty of alternative to watching TV at all. You will find yourself with more time, more energy, and more room for your families. Such are the things that being a badass dad are all about.

Valentine's Day

First of all, a happy Valentine's Day to those of you out there reading this--especially to those who care to have a happy one.

When I take a poll of my students to see what they think about Valentine's Day in my classes, they either say that they love it, or that "it sucks." And I wonder why the emotions are so strong about it. There is almost no one who feel in the middle about the subject and I don't think that the lines are drawn between those who have dates and those who don't; I think it goes much deeper than that. But for whatever reason, I can't find myself to feel passionate about it either way. I am hoping that readers here will offer their opinions and experiences to help shed light on the myriad of angles of this strange holiday.

I've come to the conclusion in recent days that I don't know exactly what to think about Valentine's Day. I can't find any convincing evidence that the day is based in a pagan holiday, like many of our meaningful holidays are. There's a sort of a conundrum in my mind that I can't find my way to resolve regarding Valentine's Day. It is an internal fight between a holiday that seems to have a great potential for fun, and a holiday that plasters our world with crappy, disposable gifts that are supposed to somehow relate the idea of Love. Let me explain.

The Negative Side

Obviously, this falls into the realm of rampant consumerism that I would rather my children weren't a part of. If I don't want them to buy into the consumer hype, I don't feel like I can participate. So this rules out buying any kind of presents that are specific to Valentines Day. Not that I find them to be great gifts in the first place, but those rows and rows of pink and red that adorn every grocery store are made to be temporary. They fall into the realm of "planned obsolescence," that is, products made to break or otherwise be temporary. Therefore, you essentially throw your money away on stuffed bears holding hearts singing lame songs about love, or boxes of sub-par chocolates, or daisies dyed red.

Not only is the consumerism side of things repulsive because they plan on taking our money for sub-par products that don't serve as proper emissaries of our love, but the whole thing reeks of obligation.

Many of the girls in the classes that I teach (I suppose for this and many other purposes, I treat them as a very unscientific data-collection group) say of their boyfriends, "He'd better get me something." And I don't know about you other husbands and boyfriends out there, but I rarely feel like I'm being loving or giving if I feel like I'm being measured by my performance. I should stress that this is not the majority of the voices that I heard, but the sentiment is not at all uncommon.

This is stressed by the convenience with which someone can buy Valentines Day presents. They are strewn about the fronts of super markets and WalMarts; they are sold on street corners; stores set up outdoor drive-up stands for chocolates and flowers. So let me ask you, if it's the thought that counts, how much thought goes into driving by a store on the way home from work and asking the boy in the drive through flower stand what they have left for under twenty bucks? Or, for that matter, picking up a gaudy red package of chocolate at the WalMart?

If it's an expectation or an obligation, and the products at large are being peddled, I can't be more repulsed by the idea of Valentines Day. But there are other sides to it, as well.

Positive Sides

To look at the positive side, I really go back in my mind towards my childhood, when I wasn't so aware of consumerism and there were no expectations placed on me to perform.

I used to love V-Day in school. We would decorate boxes and bring those stupid packs of cards for everyone in class. There was an excitement and exuberance in getting a card (though obligatory) from the girl that you liked. It was a fun activity and a nice break from the normal activities of school.

My parents used to get us little presents for Valentines Day, too. Not much, of course, but it was always welcome. I remember one time getting a gift certificate for Tower Records. But the best of all was a pocket-knife. It was a big step for a boy, getting a pocket knife. And I'll never know why Valentines Day was chosen for this, or if it was a thoughtful relationship or not. But whatever the gift, my parents never gave us stuffed heart-bears, and the present was always exciting.

The Ambiguity

With my role as husband, I don't know exactly where I currently stand on this strange holiday. I love my wife and look for ways to show it every day. I don't think that a day associated with a remote saint and a greeting card company is really the best opportunity for it. I know that my first couple V-Days with a girlfriend or a wife I labored under the notion that they were going to be really special. I expected to be let into some kind of super exclusive club of have Valentines Day Daters who were going to understand the true meaning of the holiday.

And it's no knock on my wife that this didn't end up being the case. Sure, we had fun. But really, the day didn't end up being all that, well, special. The distinction between something like a birthday or an anniversary is that those are days with a specific history to us. We can talk about our wedding day. Or where we were that time three years ago. Or about our past birthdays. Or whatever. I feel like we're celebrating something.

With Valentines Day, we're surrounded by other people at restaurants. The menu is limited (usually a "special Valentines Day Menu") so they can get people in and out as fast as possible. And really, it feels like it just emphasizes how often we don't go out on a special date. We've had better times going out to eat on the 15th or the weekend before, or whatever. So while I'm thrilled to show my wife my love and I'm happy to take her out on a date whenever I can, I don't see that as the best night to do it.

I've read statistics that state that this is the number one day to get engaged. Well, that's cool, I guess. Then in subsequent V-Day's, they'd have a special event that they are commemorating. But, then again, this falls into the whole expectation thing. I wouldn't want to "pop the question" on a day that she so thoroughly saw it coming. But then again, surprising my wife is one of the severe challenges of my life.

The Conundrum

So where does that leave me? I want to introduce this holiday to my kids before the media does. They are still too young to pronounce it, so I'm jumping on it soon enough. I think that I'll try and find a small, non-Valentines Day, present to give them. I'll tell them about how we love each other every day, but today is often the day that people feel like telling each other that. Why? Well, I don't have a good answer.

As for my wife, honestly, if pay-day were today instead of tomorrow, maybe I'd be out trolling the stores. She has made it abundantly clear that she doesn't want anything. I do look for chances to get her things that nurture our relationship. So much of our time and money is spent on nurturing our family--which is a wonderful choice--that I like to take opportunities for us to nurture the just us part of the family. I just don't know if this is the day to do it.

Suggestions?

The only real suggestion that I have is that you and your partner communicate openly and clearly about your expectations for the day. You should be open and honest. And if your wife or girlfriend or boyfriend or whoever really wants something, you should probably take that into consideration--it may be a bigger part of their traditions and belief system that you recognize. And if you plan on not getting them something, maybe you should be clear about the whys of that decision. It might be helpful to pick another day near this one or during another time of year that you can make a special and meaningful day without all the societal baggage.

So, I ask you, how do you celebrate Valentines Day? Is there a way that you've cut out the consumerism and expectations, or do you just put up with it for today? Or, do you ignore the day? Or, do you have a new tradition to introduce or a special way to make the day meaningful for our kids? I'm asking because I don't have a clear answer myself.

Five Quotes to Live By

Getting caught up in the day to day experiences of life can blind one to the things they truly care about. It doesn't do a lot of good to lose focus and lose balance. But these following quotes--chosen because they a) are great and b) aren't cliche--are short meditations on what it is to embrace one's priorities. Read through and maybe you'll find one that speaks to you today:

1. Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise: seek what they sought. ~Basho

In my writing classes, I try and stress the ideas of respect and acceptance of our fellow classmates. This is sometimes harder to achieve than you might think. In my classes students are encouraged to write about their own experiences and what has brought them to their beliefs. This causes a lot of trouble between different ideologies the students might hold. But this quote really puts into focus what I try and stress to the class. "Whatever you've been through, whatever you've done, it's brought you here," I tell the class. "We have at least something in common, some part of the goals we reach involve this place and this time. Don't knock what has brought the person next to you. You didn't need to go through that to get here; he or she did."

Basho is one of the great masters of the haiku, so it is perhaps without surprise that he is so quotable (if you haven't read any of his poems, you need to). It always reminds me that my life doesn't to be like that of the people or religious leaders whom I admire. There may be a lot of things to learn from their lives, but my lessons will be different.

2. Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. ~ Mark Twain

Twain in perhaps my favorite author. To me, he really shows his stuff in the second part of this quote. While he, being somewhat of a sailor, may have meant it more literally than I take it, it really speaks to the adventurous nature of this quote. Many of us, I'm sure, have read and understand that first sentence in some form or another, it's the second part that really brings it to life, that lets you feel what he means. Taking this pulnge to follow your dreams has never sounded more exciting and appealing than he makes it sound. This quote often inspires me to drop my petty concerns about a project, a trip, an expenditure, or a big decision.

3. Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness. ~Chuang-tzu

How Taoist is this quote? Just decide to be happy and you are. How can it be that easy? Well, if we apply this notion to the ways in which we are always striving to get more, more, more, then it comes to light. This can be seen as a tremendous argument for simplicity. Decide, for yourself, how much is going to be enough. How big of a house, how much stuff, how much money, how much time shopping, how much vacation time, and hit that mark. If you don't have any idea of what kind of ceiling there is, you'll keep wanting more. And if you want more, then by definition, you will always feel unsatisfied with what you have. So stop trying. Look around you, look at what you have, decide that that is enough.

4. We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves happy. The amount of work is the same. ~Carlos Castaneda

I know people who spend all their time being miserable. They complain about their days, they whine about service at a restaurant, they loath their coworkers, the weather has ruined their day, etc. They are the type of people who put a negative spin on everything. And I catch myself doing this at times. It's not appealing. Look around and decide that you're going to be happy. Decide that no matter how bad this day gets, it can be turned around. The kids can have a terrible morning, whining and crying, and I can have a terrible day at work. But, in the moment it takes to complain about something, we can change our days and our focus. We can make ourselves and our families happy and remind them that the day is never lost.

5. The mind is its own place, and of itself Can make a hell of heaven, a heaven of hell. ~Satan from Milton's Paradise Lost

There's nothing like using a quote from Satan to put a positive spin on your day. But this quote is very related to the last two. It is our frames of mind that make us happy, that make us miserable, that make us satisfied or unsatisfied. And I imagine that Satan, with his experiences in Heaven and Hell would be as much an authority of their properties as anyone. So let's trust the guy. This quote is a tremendous argument to rid yourself of anxiety and pressures, of assessing your situation and being content with it, of making the most of things. If things don't turn out like you planned, adjust to the new plan.

I write these quotes down today as an affirmation. I want today to be good. I'm stressed, I'm behind in my grading, I have one more week left of my statistics class. But there are reminders everywhere of the power of our own determination to take control of our days. To make the most of things and set a good example for ourselves and for our kids.

Deep breath.

Let's go.

Five Keys to Mindful Behavior (and not losing your temper)

We don't exist in a vacuum. If we did, it would be easy to be the person we want to be. It'd be easy to manage time, set goals, reach out, and expand ourselves. Being more would be accomplishable in the next five minutes. But our time and energy is constantly hijacked, borrowed, robbed, or given away. Not always for the worse, true, but these things add up. Eventually the pressure is a bit much and we lose sight of how we want to see ourselves.

What I'm talking about is patience, I suppose, and temper. It's too often that I find myself frustrated and angry at my circumstances. I want to get X done, but Y,Z, and A are still sitting in the back of my mind, demanding attention. And I have an important meeting and there's homework due and I haven't cleaned the kitchen in weeks. The frustration of all these little factors can tie itself up in knots in my mind. And the pressure builds. And I finally snap at my wife, chastise my kid, or yell at the puppy. And the picture that I've painted of myself at that moment, that ugly representation of all the space being rented in my mind, is forever burned into my children. It momentarily tarnishes who I am to my wife, and if it's not cleaned off, it can rust.

Sure, conflict can be healthy. I don't think it's a good idea to avoid talking about issues of contention. Things need to be aired out between you and your partner, if you expect this partnership to work at all. And yes, you need to raise your voice once in a while when dealing with your kids, be stern, set your foot down. But these things should be done with intention. There is a world of difference between a calculated move, a planned intonation, and a knee-jerk reaction.

Knee-jerk reactions set you off balance. They disturb harmony. They loosen ties.

We can't be perfect all the time. But if we can maintain control of ourselves, we stand a much better chance of setting the example we hope to set for our families. Everything we do is a reflection of who we are. Losing your temper, getting angry, and being petty can really distort that image.

Kids are like sponges, if you haven't noticed. They soak everything up. The other day, my three year-old broke a crayon at a restaurant. With perfect and cold pronunciation, she said, "God damn it," and went about coloring with half of the blue crayon. My wife and I looked at each other. She didn't get it from TV. We got rid of that thing. She got it from us. And of course we couldn't be mad, but we did explain that it wasn't the polite thing to say, that we were sorry we gave her use of those words.

Sometimes our kids can be our compasses for how we act. If we want our kids to exhibit proper behavior, we have to model it. When there is a lot of traffic, I can hear her strapped into the seat behind me say, as if to herself, "C'mon, dude. Move it." I didn't realize that I said that to stopped cars until she pointed it out. If I were apt to lose my temper in the car rather than get annoyed, she would show me what I look like with road rage.

I don't mean to say that we should edit ourselves or hide who we are from our kids. Instead, I think we should mindfully express who we are based on our lofty self-conceptions. A lot of times,