Single Fathers Stay Strong

I was going to bring up something else on this post, but I met a friend on the metro yesterday and I just had to tell his story.   Its a message to all men bringing up kids, but maybe mostly those who are doing it by themselves, yes they exist, to stay strong. 

I ve known this guy for about 15 years off and on, but I still think he is under 30.  He would come into my shop to buy music.  I don't know if he wanted to be a DJ full time, but he was into it and kind of serious.  It didn't seem like he had to pull much money to survive at the time, not that he had silver spoon money, but just that he knew how to and did survive on little.  A good guy.  He had his tough times too.  But he was and is a very positive sort who maintains good vibes. 

 He came into my shop say a year and half ago after not being there a long time.  He brought his girlfriend and .. his new baby.  He still bought some music but said he had to pay attention to the needs of others and had to stay on a budget.  Understandable.  

Then I met him on the metro yesterday from the day of this writing and in the trip of four metro stops he gave me his update, though it might not be 100 per cent correct as I couldn't always hear it properly on the metro with the noise, but here it is:

His wife or girlfriend (don't know if they got married), "left him" several months after their baby was born, I would guess after the child was more than six months.  She didn't take the baby with her and she didn't exactly leave him and the baby, she just went back home or stayed at other people s houses and not with him or the baby. She was probably partying.  So it seemed.  My friend was taking care of the baby, but still I think he said that the Government said that if she didn't shape up some, they might have to take the baby away from both of them.  

She returned to them.  Left them again for a couple weeks.  Then came back.  She wanted to stay and be a good Mother.  But she would have a date to go out and promise to be back at 10 pm and come home at 4.30 am.  

She doesn't have a job.  I would gather they are getting some State support.  But if she leaves him for good with the baby, she has to pay child support to him.   

The Father, my friend, has a job.  He is a personal caretaker.  I met him on Saturday morning at 11am and he said he was getting off work just then.  He was probably at work taking care of an elderly person from 6am, helping them with their shower and clothes, getting their breakfast ready and served and maybe setting them up with anything for the rest of the afternoon.  He would probably go back in the late afternoon, make supper and maybe prepare the person for bed or at least the evening.  He might have to stay there till they went to sleep or beyond.  He worked on Sundays too. 

The Mother was actually at home taking care of the baby.  She was back with them at this time.  But whether she would be back forever or leave again was a question.  

He couldn't get help from his girlfriends Mother as that Mother didn't like him and did not accept the situation, so I understood.  It seems like the girlfriend was kind of estranged from her Mother also.  So there was no support from that Grandma.  Which, OK, we cant always expect our Grandparents to take care of things.  They are older, maybe not capable anymore of lending help.  But....I don't know.  

My friend said, his girlfriend needed to be out and get out. He said he understood it and was cool with it.  It seems she was younger and not ready for the responsibility, or just immature. 

So he is de facto the single parent both taking care of the baby and having a job. He didn't know when the Mother would be in or out.  Maybe mostly at night she was out.  However, she might just pick up and leave again totally.   He was OK with that.  He wasn't complaining, he was just giving me the update.  But it was a tough story. I realize there are many many single Mothers, many more than single men, who do this,  but it doesn't matter. It is a tough situation.  He was STILL keeping a very positive outlook.  

I felt devastated for him.  More so, I felt devastated for the baby.  I told him, "Man, you know you got to stay strong.  You got to stay there for your baby, because the baby needs parents.  It needs the warmth, it needs the hugs.  You`ve got to stay strong for your baby, Man"  Sh... I felt like crying over the situation.  If the Mother leaves again and he falls apart, then the baby has nobody.  And that, that is too too much.  One more baby, one more Being brought into this world who wont get the love who wont get the nourishment they desperately need.   And how will that effect them growing up?  What will they grow up into?  

We rounded the corner outside the metro and were going in different directions.  I said, "Stay strong, my friend, you are doing great work.  It is no problem to be a Father and be taking care of a baby these days, it is not strange.  So stay strong.  You've got to,"  I told him as we parted, "I am with you," and put my hand on my heart, but really that doesn't help him physically if he cant handle it and starts to fall apart, it wont mean much to him.  I wish it would.  I think he is a strong enough individual that he can keep it together and give his baby a lot, not all, but a lot, of what it needs.  It does need two parents, but that isn't certain it will happen.  

For what its worth, I hope the strength of God is with him.  And to all you single parents out there,  you've got to stay even stronger over the holiday season.  Look, you may not be able to give your kids everything, but what you do give them is great and giving them love and nourishment is probably the best.   

Stay strong.  
Respect.  

When your children discover......

My kids have changed over the last couple months.  In fact just since the end of summer.  My wife noticed it too.  It seems they have discovered something new.   And it is quite obvious what it is.  My kids have discovered.... how to fight.

I mean, they kick at each other and pull each others hair and sometimes bite a bit harder than they should.  Where does this come from and what am I doing about this as a concerned at home part time father?

My wife doesn't understand it as she was an only child, so she didn't fight with anyone besides her parents.  And she says to me sometimes now that she thinks about it and thinks she lashes out at me,  sometimes with a very harsh tongue, because she never had this fighting period when she was young.

I was walking down the street the other day and I saw the younger of two boys, maybe 4 or 5 get behind his older brother and tweak his hair or neck.  This set the older boy off kicking the younger kid and running after him.  The younger boy shouting with glee.  The Mother said, "enough"!  And something to the extent of, `I m going to let you walk home by yourself unless you stop.  Enough`.  I saw all this in under ten seconds while I was walking toward them and then past them.  I had to laugh because I knew they might stop now, but it would start up again. And that I could see this type of behavior between siblings ten times a day if I watched closer. 

And I have a bit of experience with it as I had several siblings and my older siblings fought with each other and I fought with my sister closest in age.  I do regret now that when we made a very long drive in the summer my poor Father had to put up with me and my sister teasing and fighting each other in the car.  I recall that I often did start these sessions.   My Father would take it for a while and then yell at us, which got us quiet... for a bit.

So where does this come from?  You know, articles say it may come from different needs of each child and competition and jealousy with siblings.  But you know what?  I never recall feeling jealousy or fighting for my mother or fathers attention when I was 4 or 6.  You know what I think?

It is just fun to fight.  That's all.

Therapists and behavior scientists are trying to say, it teaches you this, it is an expression of this... when the small lion cubs fight with each other, it is in preparation for learning to fight in the jungle.  Bull sugar.  It is just fun.  Plain and simple.  It is fun to tease and get the other person riled up and get their goat and then get into a small hitting match.  We never would hit in the face, just in the stomach or something.  We weren't trying to really hurt each other.  Well, I can only talk for myself, not my sister, but I certainly enjoyed fighting with her.

Was it used as some outlet or learning skill?  Maybe,  but I have no idea really.  As far as I recall then and now, it didn't teach me a dmn thing.  I was just having fun, kind of like sliding down a hill of snow or sliding on the bare floor without shoes on.  Just fun.

What am I doing about it as a part time stay at home Father?  NOTHING.

In one article I read, it said:  DONT GET INVOLVED  And that is my policy too.  I set up rules for fighting.  I tell them, never hit to the head or squeeze the head.  In fact don't do anything with each others heads or eyes.  The head is just too important for anything to happen to it, I say.  No attacks on the head.  No biting, I say to one girl.  My wife made a rule that if one girl bites too hard, we let the other bite back just as hard.  Try not to bite hard.  But sometimes, the younger is trying to protect herself too much and she bites hard.  Then we stop it.  Otherwise, I just let them go at it until one of them cries. 

Also I am conscious that I should not favor one over the other.  If one time I side with one, the next time I will try hard to side with the other.  By butting in, the parent can become the source of the problem.  So, basically, by now, I am pretty good at just sitting there and doing nothing.  You can disagree with me.  Give me reasons, please, why you disagree, but for now, I just let them go at each other.  If it gets out of hand, I say, OK, lets settle down, quite calmly, but I know they will be back at it tomorrow, or even in an hour. 

So, in conclusion, I will have to utter an apology.  "I'm sorry Dad.  I know you had a low tolerance level for us messing around, and I am sorry that we, OK, I caused you frustration when you had to make those long drives with us, but... really you should have known it was part of sibling life and let it slide off you.  But you probably couldn't.  So I am sorry about that."

But, my girls wont have to apologize to me when they are older.  "yeah, at this age you started fighting with each other a lot more.  But no biggie, that's life, that's the way it was and will be, you don't have to apologize to me.  Maybe to your Mother."

 On the other hand, I am going to drastically change my tune if something bad happens.  OK, a further admittance:  its not like I do nothing. I do watch out of the center  of my eye and make sure they are following rules and not ripping each others hair or even worse eyes out.  I do put away any knives or sharp things that are out before they get to fighting.  You know, a little precaution also never hurt anyone.  Just making sure.  But after that... some exercise of any sort especially with winter coming on, is a good thing.   So cheerio, keep a stiff upper lip and let them fight some.

Rather what I really dread is that in ten years it will be the opposite and they will discover how to be really mellow and non active, namely, they will discover drugs and marijuana.  That will be a tougher issue for me to handle.  This fighting,.... piece of cake.  No worries.  

If you have an incredulous disagreement with me, I am open, voice your concerns.

Listening to the new Planetary Assault System album  "Arc Angel"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cX84WPkLlOg

32 or even 52 OR EVEN 70 is the new 8 year old

 

Recently,  after I turned 40 (hahah, its a small joke) yes I am more than 40, let it be known,  a relative said, "40 is the new 25".  Even more recently than that, a friend turned 50 and got a t shirt which read, "50, the new 30".   Wait a sec.  Whose math is bad here?  How can 40 be 25 and 50 be only 30?

One of the unfortunate implications of these number changing schenanigans is that we are supposed to be just as free and in good health at 40 as we were at 25.  40 is 25, meaning we act like we are 25 years old.   That doesn't sit well with me.

Granted when I turned 40 I was still going out to all night parties and going to a lot of shows and eating out a lot.  But all that changed when something called, a child, My Child, came into my world.  Now wait a sec, it didn't mean I became a stodgy old geezer dad, not exercising and being a couch potato.  Well, actually I did become more of a couch potato, even though I don't have a TV. But there are many Stay at Home Dads that do a lot of exercise and keep themselves fit.  Some do fall into tire iron territory, but it doesn't have to be that way.   BUT it did mean that I had more responsibilities that I HAD to take care of, whether that meant waking up at 3am or 7am or pushing my writing to between 10 pm and Midnight if I had the strength.  It meant doing house chores and  baby cleaning (both of which I enjoy) and making sure neither house, nor baby, nor Mother fell into a chaotic spiral downward.  Again, this is called responsibility.  Some of us may need to spell that word out to get it.   I admit I am weak on some of my responsibilities, getting enough money for the household is getting me down, and some times bad trade offs of being home all day in exchange for other days when I come home at 8pm is not good.  I am not sure that is the right balance.  But the point is, I have to work on it, and I have to get better.  It is my duty to.

Unfortunately ( I will use that word again) many men take the literal meaning of 40 IS THE NEW 25 and continue to party like its 1999.  Not only that, but their morals have taken a suicidal leap off the proverbial cliff and they try to convince themselves that they are Gods gift to women. Still.  This, even when they have a successful marriage even to a wonderful woman, or maybe a faithful woman who loves them, despite problems in their husband|s character.

But the worst is that some men carry on like they are 25 when they have kids.  They are 32 or even 52, they have a kid(s) and yet they don't know they have responsibilities to all involved.  This to me should be one of the ten commandments, or at least the 11th.  Thou shalt not cavort around like a 25 year old imbecile when you are married and have kids and you are REALLY 40 or even 52.  Fine, call me a judgmental preacher, PC "holier than thou" tosser.  But look at the truth of this.

Anthony Weiner, 52, was a Congressman, a US Congressman no less, and he lost it due to his sexting (sending sexually explicit pictures of oneself via mobile cell phone).  Then he runs for mayor, and gets caught sexting again.  Does he go to rehabilitation and admit he has a problem?  Nooooo, he sends a close up of his crotch to a 17 year old and... loses his marriage this time.  Now, who the, what the, this is... this isn't 52 acting like 25, this is 52 acting like 8 years old!!   Anthony, get a clue.  You threw away a high governmental position, a mayoral race, and now you have thrown away your family.  Just so he might have a chance to do it with a 17 year old?  Anthony don't you see that either you have a serious inferiority complex or you are arrogant and have an extreme case of narcissism.  You have a problem.  Your next texting will be from jail to your warden.

This my friends is the result of not realizing your responsibilities and really thinking you are 25 when you are 52 when in reality my 8 year old is more responsible and a better person than you.

Look, if you want to run around with Sue and be showing off your good looks and your pecs or even genitals or tire iron in hopes of getting something, fine, go ahead.  But do not, do not do it when you have kids or equal responsibilities.   Do not.  Stop it.  Now.

Because  even worse, you want to know the worst case scenario?  Death! That can be the end result.
Death of a poor little toddler.  A really nice looking kid.    Now admittedly, it sadly happens more than it should that toddlers are left in the car in a sweltering heat.  This isn't the first person.  And the father charged, has not been found guilty and is innocent until proven guilty.  However, the facts are that he was sexting to at least 6(some underage) girls and he was not happy with his family life.  The result is the gruesome death of a beautiful child.

Look guys, if you want to be a free wheeling playboy that is fine.  I know guys who have done that until they are 50.   A good friend did that.  But you can not, repeat, not, start a family AND THEN decide you dont like family life and you want to go back to the free wheeling partier.  No no.  Once you have made that decision whether you made it unconsciously and unthinkingly or you planned it, you cant turn it around.  You cant go back to "the good ol days", if they were that indeed.

Friends,  it is time for us to realize what we are getting into and then act responsibly.  If you are having trouble at home keeping up your responsibilities, the best is to find professional people to talk to, or even your church leader if you want, or a friend you respect.  It just makes me sad how we have lost the value of responsibility.  Let 40 or 50 equal 25, but in health and strength.  And let 40 equal 40 in wisdom and maturity.  Dont let 52 equal 8.  Or else you might as well be Benjamin Buttons going back in age, or you might end up like:
                                            

• Here is a t shirt I want to give to some people>

  

  
  

  
  

  
    

  
  

Freud, Sigmund got it wrong. Its Singing not Sex.

I would like to take this space rented from Google to propose a new theory.  Humans are loud.  Their natural state is to be loud,  shouting or talking loud or even mainly, singing at the top of their lungs is a natural "need" of people.  Freud said humans are sexual beings, even when they are kids, but I have to disagree.  

August turned into a hot month and as a result I had to keep the windows open all night.  Even though we are on the fifth floor, we live on a street with fairly high apartment buildings on each side and a narrowish street.  As a result, any noise on the road below echoes like in a canyon.

There are laws in the city that cafes have to close their outside sitting areas by 10pm in the evening if they are in residential areas.  Noise ordinances.  I wanted to petition the government to make a law forbidding talking on the street after 10pm too.  I know I know, it`s ridiculous and it makes me sound like some sort of old, nasty, geezer grandpa complaining, but people should know I hear every word of their conversations five floors below on the street.  And you cant say to me, "get a life, why are you listening?" Because I have a life and that life involves sleeping which I am trying to do, but they keep me from this valued commodity which I can`t get enough of.  In fact I would have a better life if I didnt have to listen to their conversations.  But I do.

What is worse, and now I finally come back to my original theory, is that its not just conversations, but it seems that every male, and quite a few females to boot, once they have a certain level of alcohol in their blood,  seem to think they are Luciano Pavarotti and it is their deepest wish to sing at the top of their lungs at 3am whilst walking up my residential street.  Inhibition is gone and there they are singing Three blind Mice or the like at volume 11.   They need to sing. And loudly.  Now where did that come from?  

I ll tell you. It comes straight from childhood.

Now it is school time again and my daughter gets up at 6.50am.  Ten minutes later she is in full swing with energy and is singing the aria from  "Grandma bought some Apples at the grocery store" or some such operetta ... at the top of her lungs.  We try to tell her "sh sh, your sister is still sleeping" or "the next door neighbor is still sleeping"  She has an apartment literally adjoining ours and we can hear everything.  An aside, I am just being polite, but really I couldnt give a figs eye about our neighbor as she is usually coming home at 5am and discussing matters in the hallway with some boyfriend or other and what comes next I really dont want to hear, but I have to because I am a light sleeper and well, we have very thin walls... So fiddlesticks to her.  But out of good neighborliness I tell my daughter, "sh sh" at least be quiet before 7am".

Now, you`d think my daughter would get the rule and stay quiet, but, noooooo.  A couple days later its, "Grandma bought some apples at the grocery store" at high volume all over again.  Look I dont want to discourage her from doing what she likes and maybe developing a talent, but there has to be some rules, and singing Three Blind Mice, Grandma bought Some Apples, How much is that doggy in the Window, or ANY such title at 7am in an apartment building has to be NOT ALLOWED.  ES IST VERBOTEN. Konec, finished.

And so the rule gets laid down and they are told not to be loud and they become inhibited about singing in general and are quiet and polite in public.

Until 15 years later they are walking up the street and they have several pints or liters of beer in them and they are twenty one years old and they have lost all inhibitions and all the layers of rules and regulations suddenly get stripped off and they say, "Goddamnit, I want to sing.  I want to sing at the top of my lungs.  I used to like to sing and I am going to sing now and everyone will hear that I am a good singer and that I love to sing!!"   And it is 3am and yours truly has his window open because it is August and hot and ... I cant sleep because, well, you were told not to sing when you were 8 or 6 or 4, but now you are free to sing because, well you have a high level of alcohol in you and the memory comes back that you loved to sing when you were a kid.

Basically, I cant stop the natural need of humans to be loud and communicate through song, even at 3am.  It was there when we were a small kid and it comes back when the inhibitions are gone.  That is why I think Freud got it wrong.  There isnt a latent sexual urge in kids.  There is a latent singing urge IN ADULTS.  Because what kid didnt like to sing when he was 4 through 8.? And how many were told, "SHUT UP"? in more or lesser polite ways?  And then how many of them suddenly start singing when they are tanked up?  The answer is ... All of them.   

I listened to this while writing, an altogether downtempo, relaxed orchestral music:

 Jherek Bischoff

Cistern

2016

Summer Vacation 2016 part I : The trip makes me need a vacation

Disclosure :  As I have said before, there is not a day that goes by that I dont thank the luck I have had and the upbringing I was born into.  It is the luck of the draw really.  I can complain about piddly things while I know many many other people have real big life threatening worries that they must live through every day.  I try to send my heart to them also.  God be willing all good people will be blessed in the end. 

Well.  At the time of this writing, my last post was at the end of JUNE.  Two months ago.  Kind of a long interval.  I pray the millions of my readers (take that statement with a mountain of salt.  I hope I have more readers than just the `bots` checking out to see if I have used any licensed material) didn't think I had packed it up and left the blogisphere.  I have not.  HOWEVER.   I did do some packing.

As I have said before, I often get nervous before a trip HERE. and also here some




Five days before this trip I was planning how it should go and getting nervous.  It was our big summer vacation trip going to visit Grandma in another section of the world.  I was running around trying to take care of everything and get my business in order which was a bit more difficult this time as I am moving my office down a floor in the building where I am.  It just meant that it made things more ugly,  cutting off my Internet connection, people yelling at me to get things done, and the likes, which puts a wrench in actually getting things done.  This always makes me want to cancel the whole thing and fagetaboutit and just stay home and sleep the whole ENTIRE time.  But that wouldn't be good, or responsible, or father like now would it?

But the thought of travelling, even moving,  can get me into a panic.

Well the big day came.  It always does.  We made it to the airport on time.  We usually do.  I have never been at fault for being late for a plane.  But what made me more nervous this time was that we were going through an airport (no names at this time) which had been a true hassle and nightmare the last couple times using it.  Long customs lines, and getting from one point to the other by bus and just so much moving from place to place, at an airport for jimminys sake.  The airport should move you.  You shouldn't have to move much in an airport.  Kind of silly reasoning these days when getting from one end of some airports to the other can be a trip in itself.   But to my utter bewilderment everything was OK.  And this coming on the tale end of world scares about terrorist attacks at airports etc.  I think there had been an attack at the Turkish airport a couple days before we left.  

What was disappointing and annoying to say the least was the airport at the OTHER end of the trip.  Since we were flying from overseas to the US, we had to go through customs and pick up our luggage and then check it back for the last connecting flight.  And this was not a huge airport.   But that whole process took well over an hour, an hour and a half.  And this after a 7 hour flight.

Imagine 500 people in this area

You have to go through one line and get a picture of all travellers, then go through another line to get through customs.  Each line was a couple hundred people.  Well, just as we were getting to the customs police officer to get questioned after swimming through two lines, my youngest daughter threw up.  This time I did not catch it in my hand nor did I even attempt to.  She had had only  water, so it wasn't much, but still.  They used to let parents with small children go ahead in the line, but not here it seems.  So we were standing there for over an hour after a seven hour flight.  THIS is too much for a little girl.  Out of contempt for the airport I just let her throw up on the rug.  

To be fair the customs policeman was nice to me then even though I had carried a forbidden apple from the plane onto American soil.  No fruits allowed.  Can you believe the dog sniffer sniffed out my apple?  Or maybe it was actually the leftover chicken bone.  Good nose on that pooch.  And maybe I should write the airport a letter asking if this particular day was bad because of some crisis or whatever.  But then we still had to get to the other end of the airport and it seems my daughter was in full movement sickness mode.  We were on a walking escalator and she did it again. And again I did nothing and just let the throw up go down between the cracks on the escalator.   Our gate for the connecting flight had to be a half hour walk away.  Down this long long hallway with no sense to it, no rooms off of it, no outlets, no stores just an amazingly long hallway.  I am not in airport construction nor design, so I don't know, but it made no sense to me.  It only serves to make people later for their plane, or good for movies of people running down the endless hall trying to catch their plane. But for poor little girls tired already from travel and sick to their stomach the consequences are not pretty.

Once we got to our gate both my children fell asleep, it being around 2 am our old time.

I knew what was coming upon my daughters waking, and it did.  This time, I had a Kleenex out and my hand ready.  This time I caught it and then I carried her under one arm and "it"in the other hand down to the nearest bathroom, leaving the other daughter sleeping stretched out on the waiting room chairs. Oblivious.  I got the sick one cleaned up and changed her clothes as I hadnt caught it all.  

A man came up to me and said that he was a children¨s physician and if he could do anything to help?  And then his wife also asked if she could bless my daughter, which I had no reason to deny, the blessing that is.  At the least we now had the insurance of the doctor on our flight AND Jesus on our side, so I figured nothing more could go wrong.  No more bad would happen. 

She just had one more throw up to do once we got on the plane for our last connecting flight.  This one we caught in the seat pocket doggy throw up bag.  The lady sitting behind us said she was a children's doctor and if there was anything she could do, let her know.  I see, this was the flight of children's doctors going to some conference or other in the Northern woods on a lake.  Maybe.  I declined her help and she proceeded to talk to her seat mate the whole journey (luckily just half an hour) about how she loves driving her new big pick up truck and how she missed it even now.  I frantically looked in all the other seat pockets for another throw up bag, but this time not for my daughter but for myself.  I found none.  There might be more trouble coming from me and I hadn't been blessed by Jesus.

Oh man, I need a vacation after this trip.       

Bully part 2

I am not an angel.  But more angel than devil.  That is to say,  I did bully and harassed some people when I was a small kid, but mostly I was a bystander and didn't mess with people.  I can remember more bullying on me than me harassing other people.

I did harass this one girl when I was 7 or 8 years old.  Followed her home several times, perhaps chasing her or called her names.  I think it came to an end either when her parents called or her big brother came calling on me.  I think that effectively made me think twice about harassing others and from there after I was more a victim.  I still am deeply ashamed of even my little bit of bullying.  At a high school reunion in the early 2000s I apologized to the girl face to face for five minutes and told her how awful I feel about it to this day.   She let me off the hook and said it wasn't so terrible.  I didn't really do anything terrible.  All the same...  I wasn't good.  Shameful.

But I have to tell a short story of another middle school bullying incident which was just brutal.  It was brutal to watch even though, sadly at the time, I think most others just put up with it and really didn't do anything about it.  It disturbs me to this day thinking about it.   Someone should have alerted the authorities about what was going on.  But, I don't think High School kids work(ed) that way.

Well, in actuality there wasn't any violence or physical interaction, it was mostly just words.  So one guy, who was kind of nerdy himself and definitely was not handsome, though he was built with strength from sports he participated in, but not a regular sports dude, found out that it was quite easy to pick on this other guy of the same age who definitely was of small build with not much strength and on his way to becoming a math geek.  Whenever the bully saw this guy he would call him the stupidest name, namely his own name attached to the victims name.  But it got the victim so angry.  Or the bully would walk behind the victim and try to step on the heel of his shoe as kids did at that age to get the shoe off.

See, nothing really bad.  It never came to blows even though sometimes the victim would turn around and try to strike the bully,  in which case the bully would easily dodge the fist and laugh at him.  What made it horrible was that it was so incessant.  It was continual, whenever the bully saw the kid, easily 5 times a day which made it so disgusting.  At most someone would say, Dude, lay off the guy already.  And the bully would say, "yeah I know, its just so much fun".

I don't recall the exact year, but the victim did leave our school, I think after the second year (in 8th grade).  He went to another school in the area, a private school from what we heard.

Then he came back to our school in the second to last year or even the last.  And my how he had changed.

He had turned into a long haired burnout which is someone who smokes a lot, and not cigarettes.  On occasion he would ask me if I had some dope or if I wanted to smoke dope with him, I guess because he knew I was alternative and thought I smoked.  I didn't.  He was not a geek at all, or rather he was exactly a dopehead on a moped.  Still small in stature.  He wasn't doing well in school, nor did he seem to care.

What had happened to him?  Had he been bullied in the other school too and the whole thing had just drove him to drugs and dopeheadedness?  Or was it a natural progression from math geek to pothead? That was possible.  A lot of kids changed a lot going from 12 years old to 15.  But what worries me is that the incessant bullying from the first guy had just ground him down creating scars deeper than skin deep.  That the bullying was the direct cause of his dropping out of the regular school kid life and just destroyed him.  I wouldn't doubt it.  But even worse is that it may have scarred him for life by effecting which direction he was taking in life.  Or maybe it caused such a detour of his life that it took him so much longer to get back into the swing of life.  Or maybe he isn't even with us anymore.  I cant find his name on the regular social networks, but that's because his name is somewhat common.  Or maybe he is hiding out to this day.

The bully, nothing happened to him.  In fact he is an attorney in the city he grew up in.  I was told by another friend what happened to him, and his trajectory through life was fairly straight and successful.  I am told he has a big mouth just like he had in high school which probably contributes to his success.  Also probably contributing to his success is his belief in himself and the thought that he is on the right side. He argues strongly because he strongly believes he is correct.  He has done no wrong in his mind.  And he is able to drive to work every day and argue his clients cases because he has the strength of personality to do so.  Probably if I met him toady he would barely remember, or would just say, "oh yeah, I remember that."

It makes me hope there will be justice sometime, maybe in the after life.
This is not how I want my kids to grow up, to bully.  They will know from the beginning that bullying is wrong.  

There are pictures of the bully, but I wont put them up.   Instead: to the victims, stay strong.

Another Doctor Story. A hatful of sky and a handful of...

 I think Doctor stories are becoming my biggest issue on my blog.  There must be three or 4 of them

up by now.

Dads, I know there are a lot of you with muscles of steel and iron will temperament.  A lot of you have seen action and seen your buddies get their legs blown off.  I remember reading Viet Nam war stories with the sentence, "I strapped my best buddies innards back inside of him waiting for the medic to come."  Or, "I looked at his leg, it was hanging together by one tendon. `You are going to be all right`, I lied to him."

That is not me.

Sure, call me a coward, call me a wuss, whatever,

But the point I am leading up to, is that, I hate trips to the doctor.  And now my wife says as a 40 per cent Dad, I have to take the kids to the doctor more.   I am the Dad, I have to live up to my position and moniker,  Dadnamit.

Taking a trip to the doctor gets me as nervous as having to take a bus trip (see this story).
I start getting nervous the night before.  I have a few trips to the doctor already under my belt, and I think I have it in control.  Uh..... maybe, maybe not. 

Yet, the further point of this story is is that I experience everything my daughter experiences.  Its not like I can close my eyes when she is getting punctured and is screaming and then say, "See, that wasn't so bad now was it?  Keep a stiff upper lip little girl".  So I have to watch and...  I don't like the pain.   Lets face it, many women can take the pain and the blood and punctures better than men.   For certain reasons they are used to having blood run out of their bodies and can take or watch pain better.   I assume. I  may be wrong or stereotyping.  I hope I am not Donald Trumping.

Fathers, prospective Stay at home Dads, I hate to say it, but some of your duties will call you to view the pain of your children at the hands of the doctors.  I have seen enough of them, my daughter crying when they punctured a ball in her ear to let the pus out.  I was at the major one when they took her out of Mothers stomach and she was hanging by a thread so to speak to her Mother, which was actually a strange one to see.  But today's view was having to watch them stick a Kleenex into each nostril all the way to the bridge of the nose.  She didn't scream, but I could see when they were putting it in it was terribly uncomfortable for her and she wanted to cry.  I have to admit I nearly broke down crying for her.  While looking at your buddies leg hanging by a tendon would be 10k times worse, having to watch your helpless, very sweet daughter who you love more than anything, nearly life itself, sitting there in discomfort with two Kleenex up each nostril...  just drives the adrenaline from my body, drains me out, saddens me, depresses me ad nauseum.

What is worse is she probably has some allergies, so I will have to be bringing her to the doctor from the Fall once a month for all these tests, and, ......... I wont get the medal of honor for doing so.  Just all in the days work of the stay at home Dad, bringing up daughter, but who cant stand to see his little girl in pain or discomfort.  Lord give me strength.

B.  A Hatful of Sky.  A Handful of...
So we are riding back on the tram back from the doctor.  And this is the second ear nose and throat doctor, and after a complete test for allergies earlier in the year, this second doctor tells us it is probably allergies, it is not due to sickness and your daughter is not sick. Come back in the Fall.  My daughter is suddenly very tired, has a headache and her stomach has been hurting all morning.  She is sleeping on my lap.  "Not due to sickness," were docs words. 

"Daddy,  I think I am going to throw up" were her sudden words while riding back on the streetcar.   Now for someone who rides the street cars every day, the disdain of having what you think is drunks puke on the floor is mighty.  So, these words caused just a bit of forward movement in the noggen muscle;  it got the wheels in the head turning VERY quickly.  I said, "We have one more stop, after this one, can you hold it?"  With stupid questions come answers.  Within two seconds, I knew the answer would be  a resounding NO.

So, I put my hand up to her mouth and caught about 50 per cent of the vomit.  The rest, as it turns out went on her jacket, pants and my pants.  But none, let me repeat that, NO VOMIT got on the floor of the street car.  So for the next ten seconds until we reached a stop, I was holding a handful of vomit.  Now believe it or not, this did not bother me at all.  And the interesting part of it was that she had eaten exactly nine strawberries, strawberries being in season at the time of this writing, for breakfast. So in fact it was strawberry vomit.  In those ten seconds, I thought about all the Strawberry Shortcake and Pinkalicious story books I read my girls and thought it a perfect oxymoron that here I am holding a handful of strawberry vomit.

Without any problems I hoisted all our stuff, my 22 kilo daughter and a handful of strawberry vomit all off the street car without spilling a drop.  She promptly threw up on the sidewalk outside the tram.  Cushlemacree.   I have to say the whole thing was pretty amazing.

As I am wiping her down on a bench in a park at the stop, I again remembered that wonderful Joan Rivers joke where Joan Rivers has absolutely no problem taking a piece of food from her daughters mouth that her daughter doesn't want to eat and eating it herself.  Parents do these things.  Like holding a handful of strawberry vomit until it can be displaced in a not so unreasonable location.  I was totally calm through the whole thing as I wiped the vomit off her pants and coat and my pants.

One for the grandchildren.  One for the Gipper.    

The Big Bully. Part 1

It is a big topic.  I intend to write a book about it, but I have to say, as a Father concerned and taking time to be involved with his kids upbringing, I think there is one thing I don't want my children to be.  A Bully.  If my children are being bullied, I am going to go to the proper authorities and make some noise.  If my child is bullying and I find out about it, and she initiated the bullying then there is going to be some serious talking to my child and probably some crying too and guilt on her part.

In fact both have already happened.  My girl was pushed into the boys bathroom and they barred the door on her once, and then she was tripped on the stairs.. and things kept happening.  My wife went to talk about it with the teacher and the teacher agreed there was a problem.  The bully`s parents came in and it appeared the bullier was having trouble at home because of a new baby brother.  She probably didn't think she was getting the love she used to get and was probably angry about it and took it out in part on my daughter who was actually her friend.  They never stopped being friends, but it was touch n go for a while.  We didn't want her to be friends with someone who was pushing her around and hurting her physically sometimes. 

The thing is, it seems, bullying and bullies existing in childhood is endemic,  even across all generations and countries.  Can we divide kids into three groups?  The bullies, the bullied, and the bystanders who usually don't do anything but are usually a friend of bully or bullied.

It makes me wonder, the sociologist that I am, whether there is some inherent purpose for bullying?  It  either plays a role of vying for head of the group or functions as socializing youngsters to act the way of the group.  For example the bullied can often be the weaker "weirdos" who profess an alternative way of thinking or acting than what is normal.  Then you get the bully to put them in their place and make them act "like the rest of us" and doesn't let the person be alternative because that would destroy or weaken the mores, the social fabric, of the group.  

Or else bullys form some pecking order of strength, like in a gang or a circle of people.  The best bullyers will of course be the leaders. The real tough guys.  In the past the biggest bullies in fact might have been rewarded with the best food or the best mating choices.  Maybe they still do.  

Bullying grows out of some social purpose for carrying forward group mores and group socialization.  Or else it establishes the leader and hierarchy of the group.  And humans are a very hierarchical animal.  Here is a good article, strangely from Forbes magazine, which puts the finger on the issue  

That is,  in the old days when it was Us vs Them.  Haven't we evolved to, "Us vs Ourselves"? 

 Haven't we evolved, outgrown this earlier "need" for both the method for achieving a hierarchy (through bullying) and the necessity to spurn those different from us?  In fact  these days, we need differences in communities and groups.  The more diversified a group you grow up in, the stronger the individuals we have for society and for even leading society.  Sadly, the bullying still exists and has not kept up with our evolutionary growth.  Or, just as sadly, bullying still is an effective method for both "putting people in their places" and establishing who carries more weight around in this street, school or community.  

In my next installment I will be remembering a bully from my time and see where he is today.