Skiing, or not, as the case may be.

Could have learned how to ski here

If I had known when I was five years old that I was going to have daughters who could ski so well, I would have right away at that time asked my parents to get me some skis and a teacher and get me learning how to downhill ski if they could have afforded it. 

Well, sadly I did not, and sadly I can not ski downhill.  

I don't know why I didn't learn.  One of my older sisters learned and she had great times going on ski weekends with her friends. She loved it. I don't think she does it now though, but probably because she lives in an area of a state which doesn't have much downhill, maybe cross country. I don't think her son learned how to ski.  So maybe it wouldn't have helped to have learned how to ski when I was five.  Maybe not.

Five? Yes five.  If there are three things you should get your kids to do as soon as possible in life it is in this order:  start learning a second language,  eat and like fruits and vegetables, and if you live in a state which gets winter or you are near mountains, teach them to ski and ice skate.  (Fourth would be to get them to learn to play a musical instrument or sing).  

Swimming is a close second, but if there is one thing which is great to do with the family as a family outing in winter it is skiing or ice skating.  Ice skating is probably better, because you can hold hands and skate together or play chase or mess around on the ice.  But it is only an hour or so outing.  

Skiing is an all day family event, if not a full weekend or EVEN a full on winter week holiday.

I think I have mentioned it before, but my one daughter started skiing when she was three.  The other started when she was four.  This is about the right time to get them going.  We tried to get the second daughter started at two years old but it was a bit premature.

 She just stood there crying on her skis and wanted her mother to help her and help her take the skis off. I think she went up the pulley a hundred yards once or twice.  Anyway, she was ready at four.  Now she is six, just two years later and she is going down pretty big hills by herself and not falling. She is skiing well. The older one is not Ester Ledecka ... yet,  but is a little ski devil who doesn't need any help.  Now they are skiing down hills like these pictured.  

It is really a great shared family activity.  Its not that you allgo down together and hold hands, but skiing downhill just pumps up your adrenaline a lot.  It is a natural high, and you know that everyone feels the same so that when you get to the bottom of the hill you are all smiling and you know why. You all are sharing in the excitement, even though it is not a team sport. At the end of the day, probably for the rest of your life, you can talk about "going down that one time" or "that one hill" or that one time it was icy, or...  all the shared downhill skiing experiences in your memory, memories, collectively.   Its a great bond for the entire family.  

Except for those who don't know how to ski.  

I know what you are saying.  You are saying, "well remedy the situation and learn how to ski.  Its never too late."   Well, no its never too late for some people and for some things, but believe you me, it would be easier to get skis on a horse and teach IT how to downhill ski than me.  Really. 

So where was Daddy today when Mom and the two girls were bonding skiing downhill?  I went off on a hike up the hill on the green line. I did around 10 kilometers in three hours up the mountain and back down.  I didn't bond with anyone, not even Mother Nature.  I was alone with my thoughts walking through the snow.  I was composing and going over a book I am writing which takes place a lot in the winter.  And I was thinking about this post on bonding doing downhill skiing and me not bonding walking through the woods.  By myself.  

Dads, if you can not go back in time and learn how to ski when you were five years old, I strongly recommend you try to learn now and take the whole family skiing.  Either that or go sledding all together.  That is pretty good too.   We will do that some weekend and then I wont be able to compose any post when I am doing that because the adrenaline will be soaring.  

 C`mon, the NFL season is done, get off your tushes and get outside with the whole family.  

Discipline for Parents. How to be a Better Child.

Please note, by far I do not support any form of violence or abuse of kids.  Please do not get the impression by reading this that I do, or that I regularly yell at my kids.  There is joke and  hyperbolic content in my words, tongue in cheek.  Thank you. 

Just going to tell you that lately I have been reading a lot of parenting blogs.  How to be a fine parent.  How to be a better Dad.  I have a favorite link on the side of all my posts for instance, this blog: MichaelByronSmith: Helping Fathers to be Dads  I have much respect for the advice and support and help, don't get me wrong, all of them in fact, I wouldn't have a link for a blog if I didn't like it.  Being a good parent is a learned job, it doesn't come by heredity or automatically.  No it doesn`t. 

But... 

One of these girls should be writing blogs
Not sunning themselves in the English rain

I think something is missing.  Or there is an opportunity for a new niche of blogs.  

Let me explain.  

In many of these blogs they teach you, or write about staying calm and getting away from stress parenting and most of all yelling at our kids.  

I agree with that.  

To think of how it used to be, and worse, for centuries and centuries, it can make me cry.  I mean, even just one generation ago it was quite normal for kids to be hit or even whipped.  That probably didn't even go out till I was a kid, and it may have been around just ten or twenty years earlier in the 1950s.  I can fathom that even now a lot of kids are getting whipped in places in the world.  That, I must say, is very very sad for me.  It shouldn't be like that.  

In the US, they seem to be moving even further and trying to move parents away from yelling at their kids.  I can agree with this too.  Yelling at your kids only teaches them that yelling is OK and they will mimic your actions and may start yelling at their friends, or whomever.  Worse yet, they may grow up to yell at their kids.  A cycle of wrong parenting continued.  I am against the yelling, even though, it may be very hard to change, admittedly.  

Fathers in particular will find this new rule especially difficult to unwind and reject.  Naturally yelling may still be one of fathers methods of discipline, though we have evolved to not include hitting anymore..... hopefully.  

So I was reading a blog about a positive method of discipline, not punishment, not yelling, but teaching and education (I didn't need to say both those words, they are pretty much synonyms).  In fact the word discipline comes from the Latin word disciplina, which means educate and of course a disciple is a learner of a teacher.  Discipline is not punishment, there should be no yelling.  

I was thinking about this a lot, but all that popped into my head while reading is all the yelling that goes on in our household.  I was asking myself, how can this change?  How can we teach our six year old to stop yelling at her parents constantly.   

Hmmm.  

I thought about how I could turn around the lesson of the blog and give that information to my six year old.  Here is the blog and here is how I might change it on a couple of the points. 

1. The core of positive discipline: There are no bad kids, just bad behavior.  Changes to, There are no bad parents just bad behavior.  

"Look my daughter you have to realize that when there is a bag of chocolates sitting out over night, your father, a confirmed chocoholic belonging to chocoholics anonymous, is going to nab one chocolate when he is up late at night and the chocolate is calling him.  Though in earlier days or years, the whole bag would be gone.  And please don't yell at me for sitting on your bed, I really just wanted to kiss you good night and it is hard to do so without putting some part of my body on your just made bed. Yes, I realize you like it tucked in and straightened, but that is no reason to give daddy a yelling.  It was just bad behavior on my part in wanting to kiss you good night.  Wont happen again.  And I am truly sorry for throwing away that little tiny crumpled up piece of paper which was sitting on the floor in the hallway, I had no idea it was part of your scrap paper collection.  I thought it was a discarded piece of cardboard box from the chocolate box which should be thrown out.  I know I know, bad behavior on my part.  But please stop yelling at me at the top of your lungs about it."  

2. Instead of pointing out what the child did wrong, show the child how to set things right.  Becomes, instead of yelling at daddy, tell him how he can set things right.  For example, you the parent could say “That was not a good choice, we don’t yell at daddy for everything. Do you want to say sorry and make daddy feel better?”  

3. Whenever possible, offer choices.  After offering empathy, you can take it to the next level by offering her some choices. Choices give your child a sense of control. Not only is she not “bad”, instead of being “punished” she is given control… Here are some of the choices you can give her, I suggest.  "Now honey, after you have decided that yelling at daddy is not the best answer, you can make it up by being extra nice.  For example, you can clean out the bathroom toilet which is my job, but it hasn't been done in two weeks.  Or you can go buy me a bag of potato chips or chocolates so I have my own dessert instead of taking yours.  Or you can just stop being a mean, nasty kid and stop yelling and being loud and apologize and stop your yelling because it s driving me crazy and sometime I m just going to Pow Alice, right in the kisser and.... 

whoa whoa whoa,  that isn't one of the options, that is a line from the TV show the Honeymooners.  I just need a time out or time in, whatever the case and relax now.  Breathe easily, count to ten, better make that one hundred.  Lets calm down everybody.  

I really learned a lot from that post on that blog site.  I must disclose I did plagiarize some of the text from that post to my post.  For the full text and educational experience, I give you the link once again here. And please use education and not punishment the next time you are disciplining.

But I have to add at the end, that I am scouring the web for some blog written by a three to six year old on better understanding toward their parents and using education with parents instead of yelling at them all the time. 

I still haven`t found what I`m looking for.  Maybe if we all look together.... we still won`t find it. Obviously an opportunity there for some aspiring three year old.

In the end, my six year old told me to go to the corner and sit on this chair as I had been a bad Daddy.

Between a Small Child and a Policeman`s Badge. A Hard Place and a Rock

This happened to me in December before Christmas 

For some reason my daughters really wanted their mother to walk them to school.  My older girl doesnt need a parent with her, but since the older and younger sister go to the same school at the same time, we all can leave and walk together.  

Now, I try to be accustomed to my younger daughter not wanting me to take care of her if Mom is around.  She has been this way since she was two.  If her Mother is there she wants Mommy to do whatever it is.  I get it.  I am starting to think that kids go between liking Mother and Father at different ages or they choose one over the other when they are toddlers.  They may choose the other parent later in life.  So,  I¨m cool with it.  

That¨s a lie of course.  It still hurts to be rejected even like this. 

Especially when I try to be an active Father taking care of the kids, well, at least 40 per cent during the week as the title of my blog implies.  Since the 1960s in the U.S. there has been an evolution of parenting with fathers wanting to do more and spending more time with their kids.  My Father was pretty good about this and did some housework too.  I think he was ahead of his time. But now I am the next generation and we have to move this farther, evolutionize the role of dad as caregiver even more.  

But my littlest daughter wont let me.  If Mommy is around, Mommy is the one. 

Anyway, back to the incident.  

It¨s just a couple blocks to school, takes about 10 minutes to get there.  Well, there were days in December in which my wife just couldn¨t take the kids to school.  But they pushed hard for her to take them.  

Finally a day came when Mommy just couldnt, had to go sooner or later to work, whatever.  Couldnt.  

My older girl got all pouty and said, well she didnt have to go with a parent and she wasnt going to go with me.  She used to like walking to school with me.  I wrote a post about it HERE, now several years back.  But that is OK too, as kids want to be able to do stuff by themselves especially as they get older and older. That is a frequent cause of friction between kids and parents, BUT there is much scientific material which says that kids who act by themselves grow up more secure and independent.  

Fine,  you can go your own way, my daughter.  

But I still legally had to accompany my younger daughter.  She didnt like that at all.  She ran ahead of me.  But even though my legs are getting older, I have longer legs and could keep up with her. She didnt like this and yelled at me, but waited for me at the street corner before crossing.  She was very frustrated that I was staying up with her and walking with her to school.  

It was another day later in the week, maybe even Friday and I had to walk her to school again. She was angry.  Why couldnt Mommy go with her?


This time she got to take the scooter (at the time, we only had one scooter and the girls  would switch off taking it).  So we went out and crossed the first street and she was off.  I ran, but I couldnt keep up with her when she was on the scooter.  Luckily she waited at the next crossing.  But after we crossed she was off.  Faster.  I ran a block then walked.  

It was about two minutes later that I reached her.  She was standing at the corner waiting to cross it looked like.  But there was a big man next to her.  I came up to her and noticed it was a policeman.  

"Is this your daughter sir?", he asked.  

"Well yes, she is.  She got ahead of me on her scooter and I couldnt keep up with her."  

"Didnt look like you were so interested in catching up to her. You were just walking."

"This block, but I had been running before. I have a bad leg, it cramps up easily."

"That may be, but you cant let her get so far ahead of you. She is still, she told me she is 6, she still needs a parent or guardian to be with her outside."  

"Well yes. Not to sound disrespectful, but that is why I am walking here on the street.  Though, as I said, she got way ahead of me on her scooter."

"Yeah, she got too far ahead of you Sir.  You better either get yourself a scooter to stay up with her, or not let her ride the scooter and get so far ahead of you.  I wont write a citation now, but this is my regular walk beat in the morning, if I see her again and you arent in sight... it could be bad for you sir.  Just to warn you.  It could be bad for you as a parent.  You are her parent or guardian?  Do you have an ID, does she?  Can I compare the names?"

Lucklly she had her picture ID in her bag and I always go with my ID in my back pocket.  But I wasnt too pleased with this incident. IF I had been a kid, I would have gone into a tantrum, yelling, "it¨s not fair, I was trying to stay up with her, she was the one who didnt want to walk with me. It¨s not fair."  But, I kept it inside and bit my lip. 

We walked together down the last block to school.

It`s still the first month of the new year and I have taken them at least ten times to school.  There havent been any complaints and I run alongside my younger daughter as she rides her scooter.  They both have scooters now.  I make sure to keep up with her, but she is a bit slower in winter and walks it up the hill to school.

Its a tough call.  Who do you choose when you are between a young headstrong little girl... and a policeman with a badge and the full weight of the law behind him?  


I have been listening to the newest Four Tet album "New Energy".  Its his best album in several albums.  I sell both the double vinyl and CD in my music store Maximum Underground.  Come and visit and perhaps buy if you are in the neighborhood.  



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWInZ4N6C2g

Christmas: Joy or Problematic?

Whew,  glad that that is over.  

I guess I can`t speak for any man but myself, but I have a feeling that I am not the only man around here, in the world, that has problems with Christmas.  

You know, in the true tradition of denying the problem myself and pinning it on someone else, I don't think it is entirely my fault.  It is the fault of my Father. For one reason, I contain his DNA, (I hope), and for the second I watched his reactions all the time I was growing up. I seem to be pretty much in line with how he reacted.  

My Father, not big on emotions, didn't show much of them even during Christmas.  I ll give him the benefit of the doubt and say he was a reserved man, quiet, stoic, thinking about things all the time because he was always writing books, and therefore, his reactions and emotions were low key.  So, not his fault either.  But certainly not mine.

But I didn't want to talk about my Father.  

Aghhhhhhh

Christmas problems start back in September when you think, this year I am going to get gifts early.  Well, December tenth rolls around and you say you still have time to get gifts.  Well, the kids have written their wishes and it is December 20th and you still can make it.  Of course you know what is happening on December 23rd, while you are working and don't have time to do anything.  

Buying the gifts is the first problem.  Do other men have problem with this too?  

I did get some pretty good gifts this year.  Some.  In fact I am proud of the game set I got which is in high demand these days with my kids and we are playing a lot of checkers, and other board games I got.  But usually I have trouble picking out gifts.  That is the second problem.  My wife is easy, she tells me what to get.  But I was also told what to get the kids... and I still messed it up.  

There was a crisis Christmas morning when one child opened up her gift and found Ninja Lego's instead of Lego friends.  My wife took me aside later in the day and seriously if she had had a sharp kitchen knife, I don't think I would be here writing this today.

"I told you exactly what to get.  You wrote it down.  How could you still get it wrong?"
"Our daughter said "ninja" and it stuck in my head and I thought it was Ninja I was supposed to get. I don't know.  I messed it up.  I know.  But it all worked out.  She likes the Ninja Lego's". 

My wife wasn't  convinced, at least that is what the daggers in her eyes said.  Oh boy.  Luckily my daughter was a very good sport and got interested in it anyway and put it together happily. 

Two or three years ago I got a 1000 piece Micky Mouse puzzle for my youngest daughter.  That was a big hit. I have pictures of it here from an old post.  That was a success.  So problem number two, I usually get half or most of the gifts wrong, with one or two good ones that I luck out on.  

Problem number three.  I never feel good about giving the gifts anyway.  Gift giving should be from the heart and joyful.  But when my kids open my gifts I always feel like they weren't good enough.  I feel like saying, "sorry, I didn't get you ten gifts of the same nature."  Or, "I'm sorry I didn't get you a bicycle this year, I really was going to get you a gold plated ten speed BMX mountain bike, but.....I didn't.  Jeez, I know all the gifts I gave you suck."   Is it just me, some weird DNA, that I don't feel good about giving gifts, or is this a standard "man thing"?  

To my credit, I have evolved.  My Father didn't even get gifts to the best of my knowledge.  My Mother always wrote "from Mom and Dad", but besides his money, I am not sure how much of his time he spent looking for gifts or how much of his spirit he spent looking for gifts.  And my older sister the University professor doesn't give gifts and doesn't give a rats a.. that she doesn't.  So,  maybe it is not just me.  

But still this year, my wife told me that our oldest daughter said to her, "most of these gifts are from you not daddy right?"  It is the first year she doesn't believe Santa brought them.  Our youngest daughter still believes and I want to keep it that way until she is 20. Then I can always blame Santa.  But sadly..... 

To be fair again, I did get a number of the gifts for Christmas day.  See, we celebrate both Jesus bringing gifts the evening before, on the 24th, European style, and Santa bringing gifts the next morning on 25th, American style.  I did get most of the gifts for the Santa gift giving.  I did.  But that doesn't help.  

Then the last problem is the joy of the yuletide time of year.  It brings out the happiness in all of us.  Well, at some point it usually brings out the wrath of Satan in one of my relations, which brings out Conan the Barbarian in me.  Usually Satan rears his head at my Mother in laws after Mom in law has offered the relative one more drink of champagne or wine.  This is the cue for Satan to come up from Hell and enter the person and stay there until he is exorcised by the Priest knowledgeable in these matters.  Until that occurs it is pretty much exactly like the movie (uncut directors version) the Exorcist on the way home from Moms  and for the next couple days or weeks whenever we meet. They live nearby.  

I tried to put a stop to Satan occupying a body during Christmas 2016 and said to the relative, "you are drinking ANOTHER beer?".  That worked about as well as extinguishing the fires of hell with a spoon of water.  It backfired.  Well, not the choicest words, or best strategy to put a stop to it, yes yes I know. It seemed reasonable at the time. 

And so friends, lovers and enemies,  I adore summertime.  Summertime is joyous for me.  All of it.  But Christmas is just hideous in many parts.  I know it is wonderful for all businesses and a time of merriment for many, but, no no, I wont give up.  You can`t cancel Christmas just because some men (maybe some women too?), have problems with it.  And another point, I don't want to ignore other religions, maybe you have just as many problems with Hanukkah, the Russian Orthodox or Greek Orthodox Christmas, not to mention Ramadan or Tet Nguyen Dan?  But we can`t cancel the holidays.  I will make a concerted effort to do better next year.  By gum I will.  I will take back Christmas so it is once again a happy, joyous occasion and a celebration.  Remind me about it in September. 

In finishing, I am just wondering... you know that song by the rock band the Police?  Message in a bottle?  Where he sings the last stanza about finding 100 billion bottles  (Man, talk about pollution in our oceans) washed up on the shore, each with an SOS about being alone.  "It seems I m not alone in feeling alone,"  Sting sings.  I wonder if I put the question to all 28 of my readers whether they enjoyed Christmas, if the unifying, resounding answer would be,

NO.

Thanks for reading. 
Happy January 
War is over
Christmas is over

the police message in a bottle lyrics

Dr. Strangemusic or how I learned to love (tolerate) the Bieber

Justin Bieber has a monkey on his back

It must be almost a year ago from this writing that for some reason an acquaintance was suddenly commiserating to me or into his Dixie cup beer that his son wasn't enjoying the same things he had enjoyed with his own father when he had been his son`s age.  I thought that was strange.  I guess I hadn't heard of any movies the guy was talking about that he said he used to watch with his father.  I have a feeling they were like ultra artsy movies for kids.  Whatever that is.  His son got the nickname "hooligan" when he was in nursery school, so I didn't think he would be watching intellectual English movies.  His son was 10 years old at this time.  Hmmm.

Anyway, that got me thinking on the merits of your kids growing up in the exact same tennis shoes that you grew up in.  I mean it seems akin to cultural incest or at least in-grown toe nails to give your kids the exact SAME that you grew up on.  Unless you are a teen age parent, do you really want your kids listening to the same music that you did, 20 or 30 or 40 years ago?  Shouldn't they listen to their own stuff, discover their own music and arts and crafts and their own path in life?

Another anecdote.  I remember a greaser classic rocker type proclaiming to me proudly that his children didn't listen to anything past 1977, and mostly Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin.  I think he was a closet racist and was glad his kids weren't listening to hip hop like everyone else in the neighborhood was.

How weird is that?

But wait, people who live in glass houses shouldn't denounce Billy Joel.

I realized that off and on for the past several years Santa Claus, wink wink nudge nudge, was giving my young kids CDs of either the Beatles or the Ramones.  The two most famous and original bands in the universe.  I mean how smart is that Santa that he tried to turn my kids on to the modern classics?

On the other hand, how weird is that?  To have your six year old humming around the house, "I'm living on Chinese rock.  All my best things are in hock.  I'm living on Chinese Rock.  All my things are in the pawn shop".  Or, "The KKK took my baby away, they took her away, away from me".  Songs written by Dee Dee Ramone and Joey Ramone respectively.  If you know what those songs are about, well, not stuff for a six year old, even though they are great tunes.

It was just last Sunday that I was sitting on the couch with my daughters, one messing on her mobile telephone playing some car race video game, the other with the computer watching music videos by some pre teen teeny bopper girl band called the Hackensack Sisters or something like that.  I watched one or two videos, one where the group tried out for the "cheer dance squad" and another where they sing that boys (11 year olds) are so terrible and lame.

I walked away and went to the kitchen to clean the dishes and I thought, wow, I am not bringing up my kids well.  I have to get them away from this junk.  I am not a good father.

Then I thought, well you know, how many quarters did you waste when Missile Command and Asteroids came out?  And when PAC Man came out, my grades slipped and I had serious holes in my pockets where no money could stay.  And I recalled the biggest band of the early or mid 90s was probably the Spice Girls.  Not that I watched them, but this Hackensack girl band is just an updated, younger version of the Spice Girls and how many people loved the Spice Girls?  If my girls would have been around at the time, they would have watched the Spice Girls. No big deal.

I mean,  both things are true.  Every generation has to find its own path and or create it.  Or do they RE create it?  Because, there is nothing new under the sun.  In a way, Elvis was the first boy band and its all been repeating itself every twenty years.  Sort of.  On top of that, each generation thinks that their pop culture they grew up on is the REAL sh.. stuff.

Is this the Life we Really Want?

Roger Waters (formerly of Pink Floyd) has a great album out in 2017, but I am not going to push it on
my kids.  When they get to their teenage years they will discover some music which is just as great or better than Pink Floyd but within their own generation.  And you know what?  If I get bothered by it or say it is crap, listen to this... then I ought to be pinned up on the wall and they should throw shoes at me.

So, I am going to let them play video games on their telephone, well, as long as they don't get addicted to it and they have their homework and studying and guitar practicing done and have cleaned their room first.  And they can watch the Hackensack Sisters videos too.  A bit cheesy, but hey, so were the early Beatles, "So pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese ... love me do", sheesh how corny can you get?

Uh... just this Christmas will be the last time.  I have word that Santa already got them a CD of the Ramones last album "Adios Amigos" and the Beatles "Magical Mystery Tour".  I can`t tell Santa to throw them away can I? But this will be the last time.  It  may be the last time, I don't know.

Universal Kids

Well, now that it is the end of October and the last survivor of summer, my Mother, left the summer house in mid October, boarded it up, there is still time for me to reminisce about August.

It was pretty much last year at this time that I wrote a blog announcing the new trend of my two girls to fight with each other.  That has not changed since then.  It has only continued.  I wouldn't say it has gotten worse, but, the song remains the same, and so have my girls.

Also, several summers ago I wrote a blog on the universal Mommy's and now I would like to add to that, universal kids.

Remember the guy who impressed the US government in the 1800s because he brought several guns to the military, took them all apart and put them all together again with pieces from whichever gun? I knew you remembered that incident.  It was the beginning of industrialization, mechanized universal parts.  Kids are... probably also universal kids. In other words, pretty much, you can go over to your friends house or your neighbor down the street with kids, or some strangers house 3000 kilometers away with kids like the age of yours and pretty much expect the same behavior and know what to do in all the houses with the different kids but with the same age as yours.  In other words kids are interchangeable too.

You know that if you have siblings they are going to fight.  My wife didn't know that because she is an only child.  But I knew it.  I brush their fighting off like dandruff on the shoulder now.  You know they are going to be hard to get to bed most nights and you have to keep them moving and ... broccoli and spinach, forget it.  Don't even try that stuff with any kid, ANYWHERE in the world.

And you know, unfortunately, for the most part, they will be doing something or other which will bug the effing innards out of you.  My pet peeve with my older child is her smart phone. I don't have one myself, because i don't want one or need one. For some reason it still gets me unnerved all the people not paying attention to anything except swiping this or that and reading something stupid or watching something on their phone, swiping again, putting it in their pocket, taking it out and swiping again after one minute.  Now I have to watch my 9 year old daughter messing with that sh.. too.  What a pain.  But no matter, if it wasn't the phone, it would be listening to Justin Bieber (who surprisingly, I can take with out much pain) or it would be fashion daughters or not doing homework, or, whatever.  There will be one or several things that your kids do, that just drive you batty.

Deal wi` it.
Without hurting anyone!

Kids are just not going to put away their stuff right away.

In the intro to the TV show the Simpsons there are two bicycles left sitting on the lawn I think, or some big mess outside.  I always laughed at that and thought, those low class Simpsons, you only have messy front yards in the front of lower class people because they just let their kids throw all their toys all over the front yard and don't yell at them to pick it up, or it just sits there.  Boy, did I put the biggest shoe into my mouth learning that that is just kids being kids . Po` fokes, or rich bastards, it doesn't matter.  I am somewhere in between the bastard and the po foke, but sure enough... sloppy front yard.

We don't have a front yard for the rest of the year, we live in an apartment complex.  But this last summer when both the girls got bikes, boom, at least once a day both bikes are thrown on the front area just sitting there just as in the Simpsons, waiting for Daddy to yell at them to put them away, or to put them away himself, more likely.

Back in our apartment, I count myself lucky that at least one daughter makes her bed, for some reason these days right before bedtime, but all the same, I am thankful for that.  The other unmade bed, well it stays a mess.  fagetaboutit.

And so expecting parents and parents of toddlers who will soon be "older kids", get ready to deal wi`it.  In other words, be a duck and let the water run off your back.  Your kids are going to fight, they are going to be messy, something they do is going to upset you nearly every day, and a string of other antics which I didn't go into.  It just will be.  And that's the way it is.  As I said, the song remains the same.  Universal, interchangeable kids.  But....

Gotta love them all the same.

Thanks for reading my banal meanderings.

The boring routine of summer vacation was paradise

The second week of school is starting at the time of this writing and it is getting into cold Fall weather.  Good time to write a post about the middle of summer.  Obviously.

I got so behind on my writing because I never seem to get to my blog in the summer.  Frankly I just don't want to write the blog in the summer.  I am having too much tired fun being with the kids all day and then sitting with my Mom watching news or talking after the kids go to bed, and of course they go to bed later.   Summer is important for doing THESE things.  It more than often got to be mid night before the day was done, and then I wanted to read a big long book too.  So.... blog gets behind.

However, to put me and the blog back on track..... here goes....

I notice two trends from my vacation that I would like to go into in this post.  First though, I am talking about the second half of the summer, August.  We got to our usual summer house abode at my Mother`s end of July this year.

Swim in the lake

1.  Continuing on the theme of the last post, I really think a routine, even a very boring routine, is the way life should be; is better for us all and even very nice and pleasant.  In my summer house place I don't need to go anywhere.  Its all right there, swimming, biking, playing, walking in the woods if someone wants..  So here is the routine, brace yourselves for some brutal boringness.

Riding bikes

building sandcastles

Three or four games a day

The kids would get up around 8.30 am and watch an hour of GOOD cartoons.  Well, Curious George is OK.  PBS Television generally.  At one point my older daughter asked if they could watch the Disney channel and I strictly forbade that one.  No way,  Disney, even if you offered me a stipend for my blog, I could not recommend your morning cartoons for kids.   Sorry Roy.  Then we do some bike riding, or this or that around the house.  Many times we would go out in the mid to late morning to go food shopping, or go do the laundry and I took the kids to the splash park down the street from the laundry place. I wrote about the wonderful splash park in the very small village of Kingsley, Michigan some years ago and I have to repeat how wonderful it is that a small little village can do something very big and nice for kids.  Respect.  Or in the later weeks I was playing a new game with the girls which I taught them (Clue) and they went gaga over it and we played it all morning.  Or some mornings we would play other paper games my Mom invented with words and numbers.

Somehow, it was after 1pm when we ate lunch outside on the deck and finished at 2.30.  Then if we weren't out at some park in the afternoon, we might take our first swim at 2.30. In fact I am not sure what we did at this time, it must have been very routine and boring.  Somehow we get to 3.30 at which time they watched very good cartoons again, the Kratt brothers in the Wild Kratts. I strongly recommend this wonderful cartoon show of the Kratt brothers exploring every habitat and all animals great and small and giving them all respect.  (disclosure, no advertisement money paid)

Then we would swim from 5.30pm till 7 or there abouts.  And then it was supper outside after that.  And then it is 8 or even later and sometimes we had time for a row or some bike riding around the circle, but in the later weeks it was getting dark already and we would have to go inside.  But friends from down the way would often come over in the night with their dog for a short visit and the girls would fight over who got to sit next to the dog.  I would do some language training EVERY EVENING (try to get YOUR kids to study every day during summer) with my older girl, and Grandma would read to my younger girl.  We would be in bed with lights out by 10 or 10.30 pm after I read them a story, which is late and I don't recommend for little kids, but you know, summer.  They could sleep as long as they wanted in the morning.

And that's about it.  A day boiled down to three paragraphs.  Oh sure, we had special events during the week, going to a fast food restaurant (I don't want to say which one, I am not getting paid) which had a nice playground inside, and going to the big beach downtown, to the park.

East Bay swimming

 To other parks too, nearby.  There was usually something "special" every day, from food shopping (my kids loved to go to the supermarket, I have to say.  It was special to them to shop with Grandma) to the beach, to the eclipse if you recall that event, but for the most part, our days were as I wrote above.

The routine was boring right?  No, no no. On the contrary, it was paradise.  I wrote every day down in a journal and when I am 80 years old, I will say and I will know that those summer days were paradise and I am and will be thankful and grateful for them for ever.  For ever.

2.  The second thing that I have to mention about the summer, is it was quite enjoyable being both a Father and a son at the same time.  My Mother was taking care of things she always took care of since I was small, like the laundry,  cooking and preparing lunch and dinner and doing the shopping, I was being a responsible Father and spending nearly every minute of the waking day with my kids.  Two hours free time when they were watching TV.  Besides that I was in control and in charge of the agenda, or okayed what they wanted to do.  And then I was always there, from riding bikes and swimming with them to eating and going to the parks with them and then playing games and reading in the night.

One of the points of this that formulates in my mind, is that parenting is a two parent job.  One person has to be taking care of the structural foundational elements of the day, cooking, cleaning, keeping things in order.  The other parent has to be taking part / care of the kids and being hands down in the dirt along side them.  I have said it before and I say it again now,  I don't see how a single parent can play both roles necessary, and they are both necessary.  Or else, they are very very busy. Or else they also have grandma, or sister or someone to help them.  One parent households.... well, they lose out, and this is very sad for me, because two pillars are needed to hold up the household and if you just have one pillar holding everything up, the household just is not so strong.  Not strong at all. And everyone suffers.

Please folks, for the better all around health of your kids AND you,  .... two parents is really the best. Lets stop fighting and start compromising and ironing our differences out and stay together and emphasize our commonalities of being together as parents.

The other point is, is that it is really great being a kid again.  Relax, open up and be care free and re live childhood by being with your kids, especially in the summer.

I love summer.  I am one lucky guy folks.  Despite all the problems, I am very lucky.  Why don't you look at your life too and see how lucky you are and how much you have.  Don't look at the things you don't have, look at what you`ve got.

Thanks for enduring my routine, banal, boring, soapboxing post.