Dept: I ll vouch for them, its true. How did that get on the ceiling?

I'm thinking of this scenario and trying to make it into a math equation.

If you have a plastic 5 ounce container of chocolate yogurt on the edge of the table which is less than three feet high, or less than a meter high from the floor, and you hit the container, no brush the container with your hand as you pass by so the container flips up in the air spilling out its contents, how high can the contents of yogurt go?

Answer 10 feet or about three meters.

Yes, believe it.  No your kids did not throw the yogurt container up in the air, or shake it up and down while it was open.  Yes, it is very possible that the contents got on your ceiling by someone accidentally hitting the container off the table. 

Folks, I too would be a nonbeliever, and I would have yelled at my daughter for throwing the yogurt on the ceiling if I hadn't in fact been the culprit. Albeit an accidental culprit (as opposed to an accidental hero)

There was the container of chocolate yogurt sitting on the edge of the table like this. But opened.

  My daughter was snacking on it. I innocently walked by it and must have brushed it with my hand or elbow as I passed.  I really didn't see it go up in the air.  The next thing I felt was wetness on my cheek, and I looked and saw that I had yogurt on my shirt, neck and pants.  And it was on the floor.   Well (sh)  it happens, said my wife and got a cloth to clean the floor before I could.

Then something caught my eye and, "How on earth did it get up there?"  There was a big chocolate yogurt blotch on the recently painted white ceiling, said ten foot high ceiling.  We all looked at it, but nobody had any idea and therefore said nothing.  I didn't even see the container get flipped up.  I didn't see any of it.  But how did THAT up there get up there?  

Here is the blotch on the ceiling.  Proof of the pudding.

So next time you got a splotch of something in a very hard place to be splotched, and your kid says "I didn't do it, it got knocked off the table and got there" please don't yell at them.  Do some simple arithmetic and make an estimation, that yes, it could have gotten there by the way he/she says.  And give them the benefit of the doubt and don't yell.

Anyway, I still yelled at my daughter for putting the container of yogurt right on the very edge of the table so that anyone walking by could hit it by mistake and knock it all over the floor or as the case may be, on the ceiling.  That was stupidity, I told her, and sent her to her room without supper. 

Intermission: Dream, embarrassed at the Post Office

I m going to get a bit intimate in this blog, because I am going to relate a dream I just had the Saturday morning before I wrote this.  Nope, sorry, no sex in it, just a lot of Freud and Jung imagery probably, and hidden messages which I haven't found  yet.  This post isn't about parenting, or patience, or kids in general.  It might be indirectly related to parenting by "delving" into my psyche to see if I am developing fears and phobias which hinder my work.   Is it a persecution complex or the Frye complex of dreaming of being in public in your underwear?  Then again, it s good filler until I get up this magna opus intro on the next problem for Dads as major caregivers.  Read it now, I ll probably get embarrassed that I posted it after a week and take it down. 

From the minute I started reading Kafka, I understood from where he was coming.  Many of his stories were (just) dreams.  The country doctor is the one that always pops to my head as the perfect example. I know this without reading any amount of Kafka analysis because I have the same dreams.  Well, the same structure.  I think everyone does, but most people cant remember their dreams.  Kafka did apparently.  Me too.

Here we go.

I had to go to the post office to do something or other.  Either pick up some mail or pay some bills by sending money through the post.  We can do that here.  I got to the big post office down the street from where I live.  I went in the door and realized I had no shoes on.  I thought to myself, now how could I have gone out the door AND ridden the street car and not known I didn't have my shoes on?  I had some sort of slipper or home soft boot with me, but only one.  So I put it on one foot and stood with that foot over my other non booted, sock foot.  Meanwhile I got a ticket number at the post from the machine and waited for my number to be called on.  The ticket machine wasn't working so well and I got number 55 even though this number didn't seem to be close to any of the numbers coming up, by far.  But I sat down and waited.

It was then that I noticed two more things as I sat in a chair at a desk.  First, the back room of the post office was closed and dark.  They normally do money transactions in one of the rooms.  Maybe it was some holiday, or half holiday and those rooms were closed for the vacation.  The post office did seem a bit sparse on people.

The second thing I noticed to my horror was that I was in my pajamas.  There I was sitting in my Homer Simpson pajama bottoms with my "surf rats" t shirt top.  This was infinitely worse than just forgetting to put on my shoes. I suddenly felt exponentially more embarrassed, scared and self conscious.  I wondered how long it would take my number to be called.  Should I stay or should I go?  Should I get out of here RIGHT NOW and sneak home in my pajamas, taking all the back alleyways of course?  I looked at my ticket number and the numbers that were being called.  I wondered if I could wait on sending this money or if I should do it now while I was here.  How would I feel standing in front of the post woman doing my transactions, paying, IN MY PAJAMAS.  And my Simpsons pajamas to boot.  I thought about it and got more nervous and self conscious sitting there in my night clothes.

Then I looked around again and it seemed that all of the patrons and post people were in some sort of costume also. I racked my brain trying to remember if it was some costume day?  Festival time had just finished, but maybe it was left overs.  About two weeks ago, or maybe a little more, I had watched the carnival parade march down our street.  My littlest girl and I had walked with it for several blocks.  Everyone had been in costume or riding big bikes or walking on stilts.  Maybe they all worked at the post office.  All the people here were in costumes.  There was some lady in a black cape and a big pointed black hat.  Obviously a witch.  I felt like I could blend in a bit better in my Simpson pajamas. "Hey, how do you like my costume?  Pretty fancy eh?"  I made up my mind and decided to scram the post office and forget about paying my bills.

I was getting up from my desk and I was back in my clothes... but with no coat on.  Jeans and a blue old button up shirt.  Cant remember if I had my shoes on or not.  I didn't look.  I wanted to leave this place.   It was haunted. 

I got through the first set of automatic opening sliding doors.  Like many places it had two sets of sliding opening doors, with a tiny interim vestibule between the doors with no purpose whatsoever except maybe to keep the cold or heat out.  I don't know.

 I had gotten through the first set of doors when a big fat guy caught my leg between his two legs in a very tight vice grip and he would not let me go through the second opening doors. I was caught by him in between these two sets of doors.  I started to yell at him to let me go, but he wouldn't.  And the grip he had me in was real tight.  I swung at him with my fist, but he was too far away.  I felt that if I could only hit him with a swing he would be knocked out.  I don't know why I thought that, he was very big and paunchy and had enough fat and also strength and protection to not be knocked out after many punches.  Besides that, none of my swings even came close to his face.  But I kept trying.  Let go of me.  He was so fat, how was it that he was so strong too?  He had my leg in such a tight hold that I couldn't get away.

Finally from inside of the post, inside the other doors, a lady said, give him his plastic back and let him go.  That was the other thing.  The bully had taken a little plastic little... I don't know what it was.  It was something plastic from kitchen ware and he wouldn't give it back to me.  I had to give it to my daughter.  It was hers.  She had gotten it from a supermarket as one of those little kids freebies they give out as promotion.  You spend so much money at the store and get a little ticket and when you have ten tickets, you get the little action figure.  But this little plastic thing... I don't know what it was. It looked like a plastic three ring hole puncher.  The fat bully had taken it from me and wouldn't give it back.

"Give it back" the lady from inside yelled.  But instead of giving that back to me, he gave back my post waiting number 55 ticket which was a stone with the number 55 painted on it set on a stone wrist band.  That was actually very nice art, but it was not what I wanted. I didn't care about my post

number anymore, I wanted the plastic hole punch to give to my daughter.  Give THAT to me, you big fatty and let me go.   The grip on my leg tightened. 

Somehow I got free of him, or maybe he let me go.  I don't think I had my hole puncher with me though.  Either he had not given it back or the situation changed and it was not there anymore and I didn't need to give it to my daughter.  I went outside in a huff and a big black cloud hanging over my head.  It was indeed cold outside and even though I was now in my clothes, I still had no jacket.  I was indignant and crossed the street to wait for the street car to take me back home.

I woke up much more tired than if I had gotten up at 5am and stayed up instead of going back to sleep, when I woke up at 5am.   

To be (there) or not to be (there) helicoptering

I was having a discussion with a relative of mine who has been a university professor for the past 22 plus years and she brought up the subject of a new type of college student and their "hovering" parent(s) that has become more prevalent, say in the past five years.  In fact it coincided with the rise of the cell phone and especially the smart phone (since 2007).  The parents are called helicopter parents.  Professors can always tell the students who are children of helicopter parents.

The term actually was coined  way back in 1969.  It does pertain more so to teenager or college age children, but it also can be used for parents of toddlers and small kids.  Here is a definition article on the term.  http://www.parents.com/parenting/better-parenting/what-is-helicopter-parenting/  

I was quite surprised by the term and had never heard of it before.  I started to think about my own "Dadding" style.  The one sentence that got me concerned was the "always playing with and directing his/her behavior, allowing him zero alone time,...".  I recalled with our first child when it was my days at home with her, I never wanted her to be alone.  This was pre pre school, so she was less than 3 years old.  Sometimes I escaped to the kitchen from playing and piddled around in the kitchen making tea or cleaning up.  But then I would start to feel guilty that I was just trying to get away and I was leaving her alone, and get back to her.  I did not want her to be by herself unless she was napping.


Could I have been a helicopter parent?

In retrospect I think I might have been a bit of a helicopter with my first daughter.  But I think that came about because of other circumstance.  Namely that she wanted me or her Mother to be there.  She always loved playing with us.  I have to pat myself on the back and say I made up some pretty good play scenarios, like trip to the moon in a toy box and riding the horsey etc etc.

The second reason is that in my opinion it might occur naturally in her DNA to be a lower self esteem person.  In other words, perhaps it runs in the family and it is not because of any helicopters.  The ol nurture vs nature argument.  Its in her nature.  Now we have to try to NURTURE self confidence in her if this is true.  

And as the article states, making a 3 year old`s bed is not the same as making a 13 year old`s bed.  I will not be making her bed when she is 13.  Uh.... well, I will say that now anyway.

In the meantime she has matured and likes to do some things by herself AND still likes to play games with her parents.  I breathe a sigh of relief that I am not helicoptering, or even being a drone. 

There was less chance of being a hovering parent with her littler sister.  She always did what she wanted to do.  She has been doing jigsaw puzzles by herself since she was two.  At first she needs my help.  Afterwards she does it by herself.  She has six of them so far.  When I was sick in the last two

months (from this writing) and she was at home, I took a nice nap in the morning while she did all six puzzles.  (Well in fact I could have used a bit more rest, she still did them too quickly.)  If she wanted her parents to be there with her, she would ask us and direct us what to do exactly or play (same as her sister would do).  If she didn't, she would do her own thing.  I found that in the summer.  I was watching her older sister swimming and making sure she didn't go out too far and I realized her younger sister was gone and I started to panic.  But she was just up stairs playing in the sandbox because she didn't like swimming as much.

On the other hand she is a bit scared around new people and hangs around our legs and doesn't want us to leave.  She wants us to be there.  I try to oblige. I play it by ear.  I let my children direct me too.  I figure most of the time they know better whether they want me to be there or not to be there. I even say sometimes now, "No, you try it by yourself first."  

In the end, I say to myself, "Look", there are so many conditions and phobias and hang ups a child can acquire as they are growing up.  Unfortunately every child has to spend some of their adult life getting rid of the "demons" they got when they were a kid.  I don't think it can be avoided.  Lets just hope the time your child will have to spend to expunge the demons is minimal.  As a parent, all you can do is try to be aware of the pitfalls and do everything in moderation. As long as you are NOT  an alcoholic or drug addict or abuser.  If you stay away from those then the worst pratfalls are gone.  Avoiding all the other wrong doors we can open while bringing up children will be more like Indiana Jones avoiding all the death traps when he is stealing the treasure from the Temple of Doom, Right?  Except as mere mortals I think most of us are not going to make it through the Temple to retrieve the Golden Crown.  (Personally, I just hope I don't fall into the basement which has all the snakes in it.  "I hate snakes")     

I ll have to go back and study the other type of parents I should be aware of and not be.  I DON'T have to even consider the "bulldozer parent".  I wont even read the definition on that one.  It ain't me.