Thursday, September 16, 2010
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Making Contact
Ava and I have worn both Pip and Polly since each was old enough to handle life in a baby carrier. While neither kid could ever settle into an infant sling, the moment their necks were strong enough to keep their heads from falling to the side, I threw a carrier over my shoulders and used it to strap them to my chest. For Pip I first used a standard black Baby Bjorn, then a purple wrap, and finally a black and purple Beco Butterfly. I carried him around when I did housework, during trips to the grocery store, and just about anytime a stroller might be in order. As he got bigger we got a backpack for me to carry him. I used that to take him hiking, to mow the yard (with a mechanical mower), and to make frequent trips to the zoo. When Polly was born, Ava bought a brand new Beco with an infant strap that allowed me to carry Polly around even earlier than I had with Pip. It was wonderful because I could drop her in there and still be able to move around with Pip. I still use it every day to put her down for naps and to get her to sleep at night. Eventually, Polly also took over Pip’s position in the backpack and this spring she probably spent as much as two hours a day riding around slung across my shoulders.
All of this baby wearing and baby carrying has turned the physical act of touching Pip and Polly into one of the more important tools in my parental toolbox. At a purely functional level, it has made me aware of how much information a simple touch can transmit. I frequently use a light hand on the shoulder to remind Pip of something I told him earlier. He often puts his leg over mine during meals as a way of letting me know he needs a bit more attention. Sometimes Polly will do the same. Each of these gestures is wordless, and their relative subtlety is key to their effectiveness. It is tough to feel nagged when you are the recipient of a soft touch.
There is a feedback loop at work as well in these gestures that adds to their effectiveness. To be in such close and frequent physical contact with someone is to obtain an certain intuitive understanding of that person. For me, it means I gain an extra layer of sympathy for Pip and Polly. Our daily contacts - from roughhousing, to rubbing their backs as they go to sleep, to having them playing around my knees, to holding hands when we cross the street- give me constant input on how they’re feeling and what state of mind they’re in. And, just as important, they get the same information from me. When it’s all working well, this back and forth exchange helps keep us all going in the same direction.
This connection is subtle and often times not really noticeable until its gone. Every once in a while Pip and I have passed through periods when we haven’t been in contact as much as normal. It usually is not a conscious choice. It’s just a change in life patterns that we have to catch up to. When these periods occur, I usually notice that Pip is acting out in some way. He’s louder than usual. He’s more aggressive. He’s less patient. And I am more easily frustrated by all of it. The combination makes both of us unhappy. During these periods, we lose the ability or the willingness to work together, and it just makes every task we need to accomplish that much more difficult. I viscerally feel the lack of contact in much the same way that I feel it when I forget to brush my teeth. I get a nagging sense of missing something important before I even know what it is. Once I realize it, I make an extra effort to rub his back or have him sit on my lap while reading in order to get ourselves back in sync.
As I still get to carry Polly on a daily basis, this kind of conscious effort has not yet been necessary with her. But, I can feel the end coming. Since moving to Lexington, Polly has been in the backpack only a couple of times. Much of this is because Peter rides his bike every day now, and I have to put her in the jog stroller to keep up with him. But there is also the factor that as Polly wants to be more involved in everything, she is less willing to be tied down in a backpack or carrier. Throw in the reality that in the next year she will probably start going to sleep without being walked in the carrier, and I can see the end of the line for my child wearing days. This makes me aware that my days of frequent contact with them are numbered as well. The hugs, the kisses, the random collisions, the quiet back rubs will all diminish as Pip and Polly get older. It makes me sad to think about it.
And so, I’m already thinking about substitutes, ways to literally stay in touch with them without being awkward or overtly smothering. In this, I have come to recognize the value of the high-five.
I employed high-fives frequently when I used to play basketball and soccer. It doesn’t seem like much, just a simple slap of the hands or even just a quick tap of the fingers, but that contact often had the effect of creating a bit more connectivity between me and my teammates. A quick high-five after a good play made me feel more invested in them and enabled us to transmit the accomplishments of individuals throughout the team as a whole. This investment in each other seems like a decent approximation of what I’d like to maintain within our family.
Pip learned what a high-five was from our neighbors in Cincinnati. As a two-year-old, he was not ready to shake hands with people when we would stop and talk with the folks who lived around us. Some of the men introduced him to the high-five, and he liked it immediately. The opportunity to joyfully slap hands with adults thrilled him. He quickly developed a technique whereby he would straighten out his right arm and swing his hand through the fullest possible arc before making contact. His intent in doing this was to make a really loud pop. If it didn’t happen the way he wanted, he would swing his arm again and again until he got it just right.
Polly learned to do a high-five from my dad during my parent’s visit to our house last spring. I imagine she had watched Pip closely because it only took Dad a couple of tries to get her to open her fingers and hold her hand up for him to tap it. She was so proud of herself that whenever Dad entered the room for the rest of the weekend, she would hold up her little open palm for him to give her a high-five.
With both kids getting a kick out of doing high-fives, I started using them to dole out praise and to acknowledge their accomplishments. At first it was just another fun way to connect with them, but now I am thinking strategically. I’ve started trying it out in various situations – at the playground, during meals – to see where it will work best. I hope that as other points of contact start to disappear, the high-five can slide in and provide me with that little something extra that makes our family a cohesive and functional operation. It’s certainly no replacement for the kind of contact we had while I was carrying the kids around on my chest, but every little bit of extra knowledge, every little bit of extra trust that we can glean from each other can do nothing but help us live more happily together.
All of this baby wearing and baby carrying has turned the physical act of touching Pip and Polly into one of the more important tools in my parental toolbox. At a purely functional level, it has made me aware of how much information a simple touch can transmit. I frequently use a light hand on the shoulder to remind Pip of something I told him earlier. He often puts his leg over mine during meals as a way of letting me know he needs a bit more attention. Sometimes Polly will do the same. Each of these gestures is wordless, and their relative subtlety is key to their effectiveness. It is tough to feel nagged when you are the recipient of a soft touch.
There is a feedback loop at work as well in these gestures that adds to their effectiveness. To be in such close and frequent physical contact with someone is to obtain an certain intuitive understanding of that person. For me, it means I gain an extra layer of sympathy for Pip and Polly. Our daily contacts - from roughhousing, to rubbing their backs as they go to sleep, to having them playing around my knees, to holding hands when we cross the street- give me constant input on how they’re feeling and what state of mind they’re in. And, just as important, they get the same information from me. When it’s all working well, this back and forth exchange helps keep us all going in the same direction.
This connection is subtle and often times not really noticeable until its gone. Every once in a while Pip and I have passed through periods when we haven’t been in contact as much as normal. It usually is not a conscious choice. It’s just a change in life patterns that we have to catch up to. When these periods occur, I usually notice that Pip is acting out in some way. He’s louder than usual. He’s more aggressive. He’s less patient. And I am more easily frustrated by all of it. The combination makes both of us unhappy. During these periods, we lose the ability or the willingness to work together, and it just makes every task we need to accomplish that much more difficult. I viscerally feel the lack of contact in much the same way that I feel it when I forget to brush my teeth. I get a nagging sense of missing something important before I even know what it is. Once I realize it, I make an extra effort to rub his back or have him sit on my lap while reading in order to get ourselves back in sync.
As I still get to carry Polly on a daily basis, this kind of conscious effort has not yet been necessary with her. But, I can feel the end coming. Since moving to Lexington, Polly has been in the backpack only a couple of times. Much of this is because Peter rides his bike every day now, and I have to put her in the jog stroller to keep up with him. But there is also the factor that as Polly wants to be more involved in everything, she is less willing to be tied down in a backpack or carrier. Throw in the reality that in the next year she will probably start going to sleep without being walked in the carrier, and I can see the end of the line for my child wearing days. This makes me aware that my days of frequent contact with them are numbered as well. The hugs, the kisses, the random collisions, the quiet back rubs will all diminish as Pip and Polly get older. It makes me sad to think about it.
And so, I’m already thinking about substitutes, ways to literally stay in touch with them without being awkward or overtly smothering. In this, I have come to recognize the value of the high-five.
I employed high-fives frequently when I used to play basketball and soccer. It doesn’t seem like much, just a simple slap of the hands or even just a quick tap of the fingers, but that contact often had the effect of creating a bit more connectivity between me and my teammates. A quick high-five after a good play made me feel more invested in them and enabled us to transmit the accomplishments of individuals throughout the team as a whole. This investment in each other seems like a decent approximation of what I’d like to maintain within our family.
Pip learned what a high-five was from our neighbors in Cincinnati. As a two-year-old, he was not ready to shake hands with people when we would stop and talk with the folks who lived around us. Some of the men introduced him to the high-five, and he liked it immediately. The opportunity to joyfully slap hands with adults thrilled him. He quickly developed a technique whereby he would straighten out his right arm and swing his hand through the fullest possible arc before making contact. His intent in doing this was to make a really loud pop. If it didn’t happen the way he wanted, he would swing his arm again and again until he got it just right.
Polly learned to do a high-five from my dad during my parent’s visit to our house last spring. I imagine she had watched Pip closely because it only took Dad a couple of tries to get her to open her fingers and hold her hand up for him to tap it. She was so proud of herself that whenever Dad entered the room for the rest of the weekend, she would hold up her little open palm for him to give her a high-five.
With both kids getting a kick out of doing high-fives, I started using them to dole out praise and to acknowledge their accomplishments. At first it was just another fun way to connect with them, but now I am thinking strategically. I’ve started trying it out in various situations – at the playground, during meals – to see where it will work best. I hope that as other points of contact start to disappear, the high-five can slide in and provide me with that little something extra that makes our family a cohesive and functional operation. It’s certainly no replacement for the kind of contact we had while I was carrying the kids around on my chest, but every little bit of extra knowledge, every little bit of extra trust that we can glean from each other can do nothing but help us live more happily together.
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Daddy, I'm Scared
Each night it is my responsibility to put the kids to sleep. And each night, after the lights are off and Polly is starting to fall asleep, Pip gets antsy. I don’t know exactly why but at that moment when Polly’s head starts to nod, Pip seeks out ways to avoid settling down. Sometimes it involves rolling around on his bed. Other times he complains about being too hot or too cold. Many times he asks random questions for which I have no answer. All of this activity is usually harmless. Pip will eventually go to sleep. He just has to get this last something out.
But, one night a couple of weeks ago, he brought out something new:
“Daddy?”
“Yes?”
“I’m scared.”
“Scared of what?”
“There are strange noises out there and its dark.”
While this exchange felt straight-forward, the sound of his voice suggested otherwise. There was none of the halting nervousness that Pip gets when he is frightened by a bad thunderstorm. Instead, there was this tinny, searching quality, a trait that usually shows up when Pip is looking for some kind of attention.
I had expected something like this might be in the offing. Earlier that day I had spent more time than usual cooking while the kids were awake. I was trying to get some eggs and some potatoes made up so we would have them for later in the week. Pip and Polly are used to having my undivided attention, but for a time they found ways to occupy themselves without involving me. Eventually, Pip began to feel the effects of my neglect. His voice got louder. His movements became more jumpy and exaggerated. He started getting into things on the shelves that he normally doesn’t touch. The situation did not spiral out of control, but for the rest of the afternoon, I was very cognizant of Pip’s state of mind. As such, it wasn’t a surprise when he sought some extra attention at bedtime.
The substance of his complaint was not that surprising either. One of the books in our regular rotation contains a story about a little girl who is afraid of the dark. She hears sounds she can’t identify and calls in her mother to explain them away. The book ends with the little girl realizing that there is nothing to be afraid of, but its difficult to know exactly how a kid interprets the ‘lesson’ of such a book.
Oftentimes, when we encounter a situation in a book that suggests ideas we’d rather not have Pip and Polly chewing on or mimicking, we attempt some counter-programming. This usually consists of changing a few words here and there or just skipping over the questionable pages altogether. Our most successful counter-programming effort to this point has been with a Sesame Street book in which Elmo’s class takes a field trip to a doctor’s office. During the field trip, Elmo’s teacher winds up getting a shot. Before the doctor administers the shot, Elmo and his classmates are scared and they talk about how brave their teacher is. After the shot is finished, they relax and mention how much the shot will help him feel better. When Ava and I read this book to the kids, we just skip over the parts about being scared. We reason that if the kids don’t know they are supposed to be scared of a shot, they are less likely to make an issue of it when they have to have one. Since we first started reading this book, Pip has received multiple shots and has handled each one without a single tear. Also, whenever he pretends to be a doctor, he gives all his stuffed animals shots and makes no extra effort to comfort or reassure them. In his mind, they don’t need it. A shot is no big deal.
Of course, counter-programming isn’t really possible when, as with the story about the little girl in the dark, the whole premise of a book is based around a particular fear. In this case, our challenge is to present the proper reaction if and when the subject comes up.
I have learned over time that managing my reaction is one of the fundamental skills of parenting. This is because all human knowledge is based on a series of experiments. You try something. You see what reaction occurs. Perhaps you do it again and again and again to establish a sense of how repeatable that first reaction is. If the reaction happens with some consistency, you assume the presence of a pattern. Knowledge is essentially the assumption that pattern one observes will continue to hold true. With kids, this process of knowledge creation is amplified. They don’t have a large backlog of experiences to draw upon, so each act they make takes on a heightened importance. Their actions and the reactions that follow establish precedents for their future assumptions about the world. In other words, if Pip tries out the ‘I’m scared of the dark’ line and gets a reaction like the little girl in the book got, he is well on his way to learning that being scared of the dark will get him attention.
The real trick is that with something like being scared of the dark, it is very easy to overreact. Standing there in the darkened room, it was very tempting for me to either pacify Pip (“It’s okay. I’m here”) or deny his statements (“What’s wrong. There’s nothing to be scared of.”). However, both choices essentially would provide Pip the extra attention he was seeking. Silence was not option either. Pip is very intuitive. He can sense my uncertainty and will internalize that reaction. He will also still demand that I respond to him in some way. He is very tenacious in that respect.
So, after our initial exchange, I paused trying to figure out how best to avoid creating a downward spiral where Pip’s experiment with being scared of the dark eventually morphs into an actual, attention-seeking fear. Hoping to prompt a touch of self-awareness, I decided to take an indirect angle. I asked Pip if he said he was scared of the dark because of the book.
“Yes,” he said.
“Maybe we shouldn’t read it again for a little while.”
“Okay,” Pip said.
After a brief pause, he continued. “Daddy, I’m still scared.”
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s get your sister to sleep.”
The next night after the lights were out and Polly was once again starting to fall asleep, Pip said to me again,
“Daddy, I’m scared.”
I realized then that the night before I had made a mistake. By suggesting that we not read the book for a while, I had managed to provide feedback to Pip’s search for attention. By saying “Daddy, I’m scared,” Pip had made something new happen. The feedback was negative, but it was feedback just the same. He wasn’t sure how or why it came, but now he was trying again to see if he could get a similar result.
Fortunately, because knowledge is not an instantaneous thing, because it is the result of doing something again and again until the outcome feels given and predictable, I had a second chance. This time I wanted to acknowledge his words without giving them too much importance, a situation perfectly suited for the frustratingly bland “Okay, I understand.” I’ve used this many times before when Pip or Polly wants something that I am not prepared to give them. It always feels a bit insidious coming out of my mouth, but it’s an effective way to avoid saying the word “no.” And it worked this time as well. Pip and I went through the cycle a couple of times that night before he fell asleep and again every night for the next two weeks. He tried the idea a couple of different ways, but I did not waver from my blandness. Finally, Pip got bored and, to my relief, dropped the question of darkness in favor of requesting an extra trip to the bathroom. This allowed me to put ‘fear of the dark’ back on the shelf with all the other silly things I don’t want him to get hung up on.
Now, if I can just get him to eat some broccoli, we may really be on our way…
But, one night a couple of weeks ago, he brought out something new:
“Daddy?”
“Yes?”
“I’m scared.”
“Scared of what?”
“There are strange noises out there and its dark.”
While this exchange felt straight-forward, the sound of his voice suggested otherwise. There was none of the halting nervousness that Pip gets when he is frightened by a bad thunderstorm. Instead, there was this tinny, searching quality, a trait that usually shows up when Pip is looking for some kind of attention.
I had expected something like this might be in the offing. Earlier that day I had spent more time than usual cooking while the kids were awake. I was trying to get some eggs and some potatoes made up so we would have them for later in the week. Pip and Polly are used to having my undivided attention, but for a time they found ways to occupy themselves without involving me. Eventually, Pip began to feel the effects of my neglect. His voice got louder. His movements became more jumpy and exaggerated. He started getting into things on the shelves that he normally doesn’t touch. The situation did not spiral out of control, but for the rest of the afternoon, I was very cognizant of Pip’s state of mind. As such, it wasn’t a surprise when he sought some extra attention at bedtime.
The substance of his complaint was not that surprising either. One of the books in our regular rotation contains a story about a little girl who is afraid of the dark. She hears sounds she can’t identify and calls in her mother to explain them away. The book ends with the little girl realizing that there is nothing to be afraid of, but its difficult to know exactly how a kid interprets the ‘lesson’ of such a book.
Oftentimes, when we encounter a situation in a book that suggests ideas we’d rather not have Pip and Polly chewing on or mimicking, we attempt some counter-programming. This usually consists of changing a few words here and there or just skipping over the questionable pages altogether. Our most successful counter-programming effort to this point has been with a Sesame Street book in which Elmo’s class takes a field trip to a doctor’s office. During the field trip, Elmo’s teacher winds up getting a shot. Before the doctor administers the shot, Elmo and his classmates are scared and they talk about how brave their teacher is. After the shot is finished, they relax and mention how much the shot will help him feel better. When Ava and I read this book to the kids, we just skip over the parts about being scared. We reason that if the kids don’t know they are supposed to be scared of a shot, they are less likely to make an issue of it when they have to have one. Since we first started reading this book, Pip has received multiple shots and has handled each one without a single tear. Also, whenever he pretends to be a doctor, he gives all his stuffed animals shots and makes no extra effort to comfort or reassure them. In his mind, they don’t need it. A shot is no big deal.
Of course, counter-programming isn’t really possible when, as with the story about the little girl in the dark, the whole premise of a book is based around a particular fear. In this case, our challenge is to present the proper reaction if and when the subject comes up.
I have learned over time that managing my reaction is one of the fundamental skills of parenting. This is because all human knowledge is based on a series of experiments. You try something. You see what reaction occurs. Perhaps you do it again and again and again to establish a sense of how repeatable that first reaction is. If the reaction happens with some consistency, you assume the presence of a pattern. Knowledge is essentially the assumption that pattern one observes will continue to hold true. With kids, this process of knowledge creation is amplified. They don’t have a large backlog of experiences to draw upon, so each act they make takes on a heightened importance. Their actions and the reactions that follow establish precedents for their future assumptions about the world. In other words, if Pip tries out the ‘I’m scared of the dark’ line and gets a reaction like the little girl in the book got, he is well on his way to learning that being scared of the dark will get him attention.
The real trick is that with something like being scared of the dark, it is very easy to overreact. Standing there in the darkened room, it was very tempting for me to either pacify Pip (“It’s okay. I’m here”) or deny his statements (“What’s wrong. There’s nothing to be scared of.”). However, both choices essentially would provide Pip the extra attention he was seeking. Silence was not option either. Pip is very intuitive. He can sense my uncertainty and will internalize that reaction. He will also still demand that I respond to him in some way. He is very tenacious in that respect.
So, after our initial exchange, I paused trying to figure out how best to avoid creating a downward spiral where Pip’s experiment with being scared of the dark eventually morphs into an actual, attention-seeking fear. Hoping to prompt a touch of self-awareness, I decided to take an indirect angle. I asked Pip if he said he was scared of the dark because of the book.
“Yes,” he said.
“Maybe we shouldn’t read it again for a little while.”
“Okay,” Pip said.
After a brief pause, he continued. “Daddy, I’m still scared.”
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s get your sister to sleep.”
The next night after the lights were out and Polly was once again starting to fall asleep, Pip said to me again,
“Daddy, I’m scared.”
I realized then that the night before I had made a mistake. By suggesting that we not read the book for a while, I had managed to provide feedback to Pip’s search for attention. By saying “Daddy, I’m scared,” Pip had made something new happen. The feedback was negative, but it was feedback just the same. He wasn’t sure how or why it came, but now he was trying again to see if he could get a similar result.
Fortunately, because knowledge is not an instantaneous thing, because it is the result of doing something again and again until the outcome feels given and predictable, I had a second chance. This time I wanted to acknowledge his words without giving them too much importance, a situation perfectly suited for the frustratingly bland “Okay, I understand.” I’ve used this many times before when Pip or Polly wants something that I am not prepared to give them. It always feels a bit insidious coming out of my mouth, but it’s an effective way to avoid saying the word “no.” And it worked this time as well. Pip and I went through the cycle a couple of times that night before he fell asleep and again every night for the next two weeks. He tried the idea a couple of different ways, but I did not waver from my blandness. Finally, Pip got bored and, to my relief, dropped the question of darkness in favor of requesting an extra trip to the bathroom. This allowed me to put ‘fear of the dark’ back on the shelf with all the other silly things I don’t want him to get hung up on.
Now, if I can just get him to eat some broccoli, we may really be on our way…
Friday, August 27, 2010
Inside the Bubble
“Ted Stevens died in a plane crash last month. Oh yeah, and Daniel Schorr died too.” Ava said this to me casually as we sat by a duck pond on Saturday morning feeding the kids a snack of raisins, crackers, and blueberry muffin bits. “I thought you might want to know.”
This is how I get my news these days, in little tidbits that slip out during moments of idle conversation. It’s how I learned about the BP oil spill, the final passage of healthcare legislation, the earthquake in Haiti, and just about anything else that has happened outside the confines of our new neighborhood. I effectively live in an information bubble. Partially a matter of circumstance and partially of my own making, the bubble is a powerful filter that keeps me largely ignorant of just about everything going on in the world right now: politics, the economy, technological developments, trends in popular culture, you name it. I can tell you astonishingly little about any of these things.
And I love it.
The bubble started forming with Pip’s birth. The TV went into a cabinet. The computer went on a shelf. They only emerged for a few minutes each night after he went to sleep. Following Polly’s birth, the increased demands on my attention gradually weaned me from a regular consumption of NPR and sports talk radio as well. Now, aside from an ongoing subscription to the Atlantic Monthly, almost all my information of the outside world comes from Ava.
In place of the global array of news and stories that I used to get from various sources, I have the intensely local experience that is caring for Pip and Polly. They provide me with such a focused, first-hand array of comedy, drama, excitement, suspense, heartwarming moments, achievements, and thrills that the second and third-hand accounts of the world that come in through the news media, Facebook, movies, and the like all feel hazy and very far away. For example, in the last twenty-four hours, Pip completed a thirty-piece puzzle of the world practically on his own, asked me to talk about car wrecks over and over (this became a physics lesson), gave Polly an actual and unprompted kiss on the cheek for the first time, and melted down into tears on at least four different occasions. For her part, Polly added the words ‘cat,’ ‘yellow,’ and ‘purple’ to her vocabulary, happily gobbled so much macaroni and cheese that I thought she would burst, pooped in the toilet for the first time, and subsequently decided to celebrate by waking up at 11:45 last night and refusing to go back to sleep until 2 AM. There is nothing that I can read or watch that will ever match all of this.
In the last month, I have had an extra chance to ruminate on the bubble. I have made two trips up to Cincinnati to check in on our house, mow the yard, and do some basic maintenance, and each time I spent the entire 90 minute journey north listening to NPR. It was like briefly visiting a place I used to live in. So much was familiar and comfortable: the voices, the music, the regular sequence of the news segments. But, as has been the case anytime I have returned somewhere after a long absence, I noticed two things that I hadn’t felt before.
The first is that with all the reports and updates and commentary and analysis, it’s difficult to tell on a daily basis what is signal and what is noise. I used to think that I could filter through all the incoming material and figure out what mattered and what didn’t. Now, after my return visit, I don’t think that’s possible. So much of what is important in any given news narrative is determined post facto. The stories I heard on my way up to Cincinnati may be critical or may be worthless. For example, did the large drop in the Dow Jones Index signal a bad turn for the economy or did it just make more room for it to pop back up? The odds are with the latter, but it all depends on what happens the next day. There is no way of knowing beforehand. If I want narratives that are efficiently meaningful, I’m better off with history books. The daily (or hourly or minute-by-minute) news is just a giant crapshoot.
And that leads me to the second thing. When I turned off the radio upon arriving in Cincinnati, I felt somewhat informed but mostly just primed with anticipation about what will happen in the coming hours and days. I wanted to listen to more news on the way back to Lexington to see how things had changed during the two hours I was away from the radio. Then I wanted to check back in the next day. It was a compulsion that while not overwhelming was significant enough to make me think, “Was I addicted to the news?”
Usually upon hearing the word ‘addiction’ I think of things like alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, etc. But the withdrawal process I went through after each trip to Cincinnati had all the patterns of a person coming off an addiction. It makes me wonder. I’ve always thought of addiction as something abhorent and outside the bounds of normality. But if something as simple as listening to the news creates this kind of attachment in me, maybe I need to reconfigure my understanding. What if the propensity to addiction is a fundamental property of being human and the only real differentiating factor is the value placed on the things you are addicted to? If I substitute the word ‘addiction’ for ‘habit,’ how does that change my view of the world? I guess these are questions for another time.
In the meantime, I know that there is a balance to be struck between the world and my kids, a certain meeting point to be found between global and local knowledges that would make me a more socially functional person. But right now I am really happy with my bubble. The kids have less than five years before we release them into the wilds of the public school system. It’s a limited time opportunity. So, I’ll take some global ignorance in exchange for a little extra sensitivity to the local details. There’ll be plenty of time to catch up on all that other news later.
This is how I get my news these days, in little tidbits that slip out during moments of idle conversation. It’s how I learned about the BP oil spill, the final passage of healthcare legislation, the earthquake in Haiti, and just about anything else that has happened outside the confines of our new neighborhood. I effectively live in an information bubble. Partially a matter of circumstance and partially of my own making, the bubble is a powerful filter that keeps me largely ignorant of just about everything going on in the world right now: politics, the economy, technological developments, trends in popular culture, you name it. I can tell you astonishingly little about any of these things.
And I love it.
The bubble started forming with Pip’s birth. The TV went into a cabinet. The computer went on a shelf. They only emerged for a few minutes each night after he went to sleep. Following Polly’s birth, the increased demands on my attention gradually weaned me from a regular consumption of NPR and sports talk radio as well. Now, aside from an ongoing subscription to the Atlantic Monthly, almost all my information of the outside world comes from Ava.
In place of the global array of news and stories that I used to get from various sources, I have the intensely local experience that is caring for Pip and Polly. They provide me with such a focused, first-hand array of comedy, drama, excitement, suspense, heartwarming moments, achievements, and thrills that the second and third-hand accounts of the world that come in through the news media, Facebook, movies, and the like all feel hazy and very far away. For example, in the last twenty-four hours, Pip completed a thirty-piece puzzle of the world practically on his own, asked me to talk about car wrecks over and over (this became a physics lesson), gave Polly an actual and unprompted kiss on the cheek for the first time, and melted down into tears on at least four different occasions. For her part, Polly added the words ‘cat,’ ‘yellow,’ and ‘purple’ to her vocabulary, happily gobbled so much macaroni and cheese that I thought she would burst, pooped in the toilet for the first time, and subsequently decided to celebrate by waking up at 11:45 last night and refusing to go back to sleep until 2 AM. There is nothing that I can read or watch that will ever match all of this.
In the last month, I have had an extra chance to ruminate on the bubble. I have made two trips up to Cincinnati to check in on our house, mow the yard, and do some basic maintenance, and each time I spent the entire 90 minute journey north listening to NPR. It was like briefly visiting a place I used to live in. So much was familiar and comfortable: the voices, the music, the regular sequence of the news segments. But, as has been the case anytime I have returned somewhere after a long absence, I noticed two things that I hadn’t felt before.
The first is that with all the reports and updates and commentary and analysis, it’s difficult to tell on a daily basis what is signal and what is noise. I used to think that I could filter through all the incoming material and figure out what mattered and what didn’t. Now, after my return visit, I don’t think that’s possible. So much of what is important in any given news narrative is determined post facto. The stories I heard on my way up to Cincinnati may be critical or may be worthless. For example, did the large drop in the Dow Jones Index signal a bad turn for the economy or did it just make more room for it to pop back up? The odds are with the latter, but it all depends on what happens the next day. There is no way of knowing beforehand. If I want narratives that are efficiently meaningful, I’m better off with history books. The daily (or hourly or minute-by-minute) news is just a giant crapshoot.
And that leads me to the second thing. When I turned off the radio upon arriving in Cincinnati, I felt somewhat informed but mostly just primed with anticipation about what will happen in the coming hours and days. I wanted to listen to more news on the way back to Lexington to see how things had changed during the two hours I was away from the radio. Then I wanted to check back in the next day. It was a compulsion that while not overwhelming was significant enough to make me think, “Was I addicted to the news?”
Usually upon hearing the word ‘addiction’ I think of things like alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, etc. But the withdrawal process I went through after each trip to Cincinnati had all the patterns of a person coming off an addiction. It makes me wonder. I’ve always thought of addiction as something abhorent and outside the bounds of normality. But if something as simple as listening to the news creates this kind of attachment in me, maybe I need to reconfigure my understanding. What if the propensity to addiction is a fundamental property of being human and the only real differentiating factor is the value placed on the things you are addicted to? If I substitute the word ‘addiction’ for ‘habit,’ how does that change my view of the world? I guess these are questions for another time.
In the meantime, I know that there is a balance to be struck between the world and my kids, a certain meeting point to be found between global and local knowledges that would make me a more socially functional person. But right now I am really happy with my bubble. The kids have less than five years before we release them into the wilds of the public school system. It’s a limited time opportunity. So, I’ll take some global ignorance in exchange for a little extra sensitivity to the local details. There’ll be plenty of time to catch up on all that other news later.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Thursday, August 12, 2010
On the Playground
I had trouble getting my head around things this week, so here’s a story from just before we moved out of Cincinnati.
Marlin: I promised I'd never let anything happen to him.
Dory: Hmm. That's a funny thing to promise.
Marlin: What?
Dory: Well, you can't never let anything happen to him. Then nothing would ever happen to him.
- From the movie Finding Nemo
I took Pip and Polly to a playground a couple of weeks ago. The one we went to is in a great spot, set up on a bluff overlooking the Ohio River on one side and the local general aviation airport (i.e. private and corporate planes) on the other. The playground itself is set back off the bluff about fifty yards in a pocket underneath some large oak trees. It’s a nice playground because it’s not that big and all those trees create plenty of shade on a hot day. As an added bonus, the park is a bit tricky to get to, so it tends to be less busy than some of the others nearby.
We met some friends up there for a playdate. The kids are the same age as Pip and Polly and, they all enjoy following each other up, down, and around the playground equipment. Slides are a particular favorite for Pip. He can do the slide route over and over and over until he finally wears a hole right through his shorts.
This day it had rained the night before, and we were trying to determine the best way to dry the slide so that Pip et al could get rolling. I went back to my backpack to see if I had left any hand towels in there from a previous playground trip when I noticed the appearance in quick succession of about eight to ten SUVs and minivans. Within five minutes we were engulfed in a wave of children spewing forth from what seemed like every direction. Some preschool had decided to do a summertime ‘meet-and-greet’ at the park that morning and every parent there had brought multiple children with them. Suddenly there were kids all over the place, flooding the playground equipment and running around with the frenetic energy of ants after someone kicks over an anthill.
Pip was not pleased with this development at all. He likes focused play that is generally free of interruptions or distractions. He does not like a chaotic environment unless he is the one creating it. Whenever there is a lot going on around him, his inclination is to back out of the way, to seek out a spot of relative calm from which he can take a measure of things. In the past this spot has often been right between my knees. If things felt crazy, he would just swing in between my legs and hang out there until he found a zone of comfort or a satisfactory way to venture out beyond my shadow.
This day, that option was not available. The week before Polly had taken the training wheels off and started walking on her own. Up to that point I had always carried her around a playground in our backpack while Pip played. But now that she was walking on her own, it was time for her to get into the playground action as well. Unlike Pip, Polly does not mind crowds. She just dives in and goes about her business as if there was no one there at all. This day her business was attempting to climb up anything she could get two hands on. This forced me to follow her around very closely so that I could help her navigate the various steps and ladders while also keeping her from turning the wrong direction and falling on her head from a couple of feet up.
My unavailability left Pip confused. One second he wanted me to stay with him and the next second he was asking me where Polly was going. With all the chaos and the constant challenge of keeping track of Polly, Pip’s whole understanding of what a playground morning was supposed to be was upended. This new world as it was left him jumpy, uncertain, and slightly manic.
And then came a moment I had long dreaded while never fully appreciating how complicated it was going to be.
One of the pieces of playground equipment on this playground is a little single person spinner. It consists of a small circular platform set about a foot above the ground with a vertical pole coming up through the middle. The whole apparatus is mounted on a rotating joint that allows it to spin freely. During a moment of calm, Pip sat down on this platform to take a drink of water. I bent down to get Polly something out of my backpack about ten feet away. While rummaging around in there, I heard the voice of an annoyed little girl say “Get up.” I looked up to see this four-year-old girl standing over Pip with her hands on her hips. “Get up” she demanded once again. Pip looked over to me in confusion. This is not how we interact at home nor is it how we have taught Pip to interact with other kids. So, he was looking for me to intervene, for me to politely tell this little brat to wait her turn. He had no idea how else to respond to the aggressive entitlement of this little girl. But I couldn’t. This wasn’t my child, and the only words in my mind at that moment were not suitable to be used with children. As such, I was frozen in place as Pip stumbled up from the platform mumbling pitifully “I wasn’t done with my turn…” As soon as he slunk away, the little girl promptly sat down on the spinner looking slightly disappointed that Pip didn’t put up more of a fight.
The whole experience left me feeling pretty shaken. On the drive home I replayed everything a couple of times in my mind, and I realized two things:
First, I can’t always protect the kids from that kind of indignity. The world has its ugly moments. They are unavoidable, and my kids will have to figure out how to deal with them. I had known this logically but until that moment I had not known it experientially. There is no teacher like experience.
Second, I have not done a good job preparing the kids to handle such moments. It’s something of a double bind because the experience that they need to learn to handle is the very experience from which I am trying to shield them. There’s no reason to knowingly subject kids to barbarity, however small, just to ‘toughen them up’. But I do need to give them some tools to try out when such a situation arises again. Pip had no possible strategies to draw upon except walking away from things and, while that is an effective strategy in many instances, in this case it felt like a huge failure. He should have had an opportunity to defend himself and his place on that spinner.
Later that afternoon, Pip and I talked about the incident with the spinner and what he might do in future situations like that one. I told him that it was okay to say no to that little girl and then politely tell her to wait her turn. I’m not sure that he really understood what I was trying to tell him. The real lesson of the day – that Daddy can’t always intervene to create fairness in the world - was still too present in his mind. But I didn’t know what else to do. I guess the best I can hope for is that he’ll remember that the next time something like this happens to him.
Marlin: I promised I'd never let anything happen to him.
Dory: Hmm. That's a funny thing to promise.
Marlin: What?
Dory: Well, you can't never let anything happen to him. Then nothing would ever happen to him.
- From the movie Finding Nemo
I took Pip and Polly to a playground a couple of weeks ago. The one we went to is in a great spot, set up on a bluff overlooking the Ohio River on one side and the local general aviation airport (i.e. private and corporate planes) on the other. The playground itself is set back off the bluff about fifty yards in a pocket underneath some large oak trees. It’s a nice playground because it’s not that big and all those trees create plenty of shade on a hot day. As an added bonus, the park is a bit tricky to get to, so it tends to be less busy than some of the others nearby.
We met some friends up there for a playdate. The kids are the same age as Pip and Polly and, they all enjoy following each other up, down, and around the playground equipment. Slides are a particular favorite for Pip. He can do the slide route over and over and over until he finally wears a hole right through his shorts.
This day it had rained the night before, and we were trying to determine the best way to dry the slide so that Pip et al could get rolling. I went back to my backpack to see if I had left any hand towels in there from a previous playground trip when I noticed the appearance in quick succession of about eight to ten SUVs and minivans. Within five minutes we were engulfed in a wave of children spewing forth from what seemed like every direction. Some preschool had decided to do a summertime ‘meet-and-greet’ at the park that morning and every parent there had brought multiple children with them. Suddenly there were kids all over the place, flooding the playground equipment and running around with the frenetic energy of ants after someone kicks over an anthill.
Pip was not pleased with this development at all. He likes focused play that is generally free of interruptions or distractions. He does not like a chaotic environment unless he is the one creating it. Whenever there is a lot going on around him, his inclination is to back out of the way, to seek out a spot of relative calm from which he can take a measure of things. In the past this spot has often been right between my knees. If things felt crazy, he would just swing in between my legs and hang out there until he found a zone of comfort or a satisfactory way to venture out beyond my shadow.
This day, that option was not available. The week before Polly had taken the training wheels off and started walking on her own. Up to that point I had always carried her around a playground in our backpack while Pip played. But now that she was walking on her own, it was time for her to get into the playground action as well. Unlike Pip, Polly does not mind crowds. She just dives in and goes about her business as if there was no one there at all. This day her business was attempting to climb up anything she could get two hands on. This forced me to follow her around very closely so that I could help her navigate the various steps and ladders while also keeping her from turning the wrong direction and falling on her head from a couple of feet up.
My unavailability left Pip confused. One second he wanted me to stay with him and the next second he was asking me where Polly was going. With all the chaos and the constant challenge of keeping track of Polly, Pip’s whole understanding of what a playground morning was supposed to be was upended. This new world as it was left him jumpy, uncertain, and slightly manic.
And then came a moment I had long dreaded while never fully appreciating how complicated it was going to be.
One of the pieces of playground equipment on this playground is a little single person spinner. It consists of a small circular platform set about a foot above the ground with a vertical pole coming up through the middle. The whole apparatus is mounted on a rotating joint that allows it to spin freely. During a moment of calm, Pip sat down on this platform to take a drink of water. I bent down to get Polly something out of my backpack about ten feet away. While rummaging around in there, I heard the voice of an annoyed little girl say “Get up.” I looked up to see this four-year-old girl standing over Pip with her hands on her hips. “Get up” she demanded once again. Pip looked over to me in confusion. This is not how we interact at home nor is it how we have taught Pip to interact with other kids. So, he was looking for me to intervene, for me to politely tell this little brat to wait her turn. He had no idea how else to respond to the aggressive entitlement of this little girl. But I couldn’t. This wasn’t my child, and the only words in my mind at that moment were not suitable to be used with children. As such, I was frozen in place as Pip stumbled up from the platform mumbling pitifully “I wasn’t done with my turn…” As soon as he slunk away, the little girl promptly sat down on the spinner looking slightly disappointed that Pip didn’t put up more of a fight.
The whole experience left me feeling pretty shaken. On the drive home I replayed everything a couple of times in my mind, and I realized two things:
First, I can’t always protect the kids from that kind of indignity. The world has its ugly moments. They are unavoidable, and my kids will have to figure out how to deal with them. I had known this logically but until that moment I had not known it experientially. There is no teacher like experience.
Second, I have not done a good job preparing the kids to handle such moments. It’s something of a double bind because the experience that they need to learn to handle is the very experience from which I am trying to shield them. There’s no reason to knowingly subject kids to barbarity, however small, just to ‘toughen them up’. But I do need to give them some tools to try out when such a situation arises again. Pip had no possible strategies to draw upon except walking away from things and, while that is an effective strategy in many instances, in this case it felt like a huge failure. He should have had an opportunity to defend himself and his place on that spinner.
Later that afternoon, Pip and I talked about the incident with the spinner and what he might do in future situations like that one. I told him that it was okay to say no to that little girl and then politely tell her to wait her turn. I’m not sure that he really understood what I was trying to tell him. The real lesson of the day – that Daddy can’t always intervene to create fairness in the world - was still too present in his mind. But I didn’t know what else to do. I guess the best I can hope for is that he’ll remember that the next time something like this happens to him.
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Adventures with Children and Boats
Ava and I are both first children. We got the first crack at most things and didn’t have to bid our time until we were big enough to do something our siblings were doing. The significance of this experience wasn’t fully appreciated by either of us until the arrival of Polly, our second child. Now, each day we get a reminder of how influential that birth order is…
My parents live in a house on a lake. As such, they have the requisite dock and a pair of vehicles for moving around on the water – in their case a jetski and a 21 foot cruiser. The boat used to spend its weekends pulling around skiers and crazy teenagers on inner tubes. Now, it mostly leaves its cradle for a nice sunset cruise or to ferry people from one place to another.
How the kids would handle the boat had been an item of discussion between Ava and I prior to our trip to my parents’ house. The last time we had visited them Polly had not yet been conceived and Pip had been too young to go out on the boat. So this would be their first opportunity to take a ride and we could only guess how they would react to it. With the noise of the engine and the force of a twenty mile an hour wind hitting you in the face, a ride on the boat hits a lot of senses pretty hard. I felt like Pip would be okay, but was not sure that Polly would understand enough to be able to enjoy it.
The first full day of our visit with my parents brought us the opportunity to find out. We decided to visit some of my parents’ friends on the lake and make use of a small, shaded beach these friends had created on their property. The quickest, easiest, and cleanest way to get there and back was by boat. Pip had gotten the chance to go out on the boat for a short while the evening before and, after a warming up period, had found that he liked it. As Polly did not get this kind of test run, we debated some over whether to drive Polly over by car. Ultimately, we decided to let her give the boat a try. It turned out to be a somewhat rough experience.
To start with she did not like her lifejacket. It was a black and yellow infant model designed to keep a young child’s head upright should they accidentally fall into the water. This made it extra bulky, particularly around the neck. When Ava first attempted to put it on Polly, Polly made her displeasure well known. After a few minutes however, Polly settled down enough for us to continue on with the experiment. She waddled down to the dock looking uncomfortable, top-heavy, and quite suspicious about what was to come next. We hoisted her into the cabin area of the boat and set her up on my lap so that the windshield could block much of the wind. As we slowly pulled out from the dock her little chocolate eyes flipped back and forth between Ava and I letting both of us know that this was not her idea of a good time. When my dad ran the boat up on to plane, Polly went to a special place. She let her legs and arms go limp. Her face held no expression. Her only movement was to periodically squint when I inadvertently let too much sun hit her face. It was as if I was holding an inanimate doll on my lap.
Once we got to our destination and got off the boat, Polly came back to life. At the beach she happily got out of her life jacket and set off to play in the sand. She spent a good hour digging holes with a stick and splashing in the first few inches of water at the edge of the lake. But when it was time to go, she went through the same process again. She fussed while we put on her life jacket and then went to her special place while the boat was in motion. I guess that’s what she needed to do to make it through the ride.
A couple of days later my parents wanted to take Pip by boat to see one of the lake’s long-standing institutions. One of the marinas has over time built up a herd of a large catfish like fish called carp. On the back side of the dock where this marina has its gas pumps is a eight by ten foot area where people have for at least thirty years fed popcorn to these fish as a way to pass the time. The herd now is a couple hundred in number and when you throw a handful of popcorn to them the fish start jumping and splashing all over the place in their efforts to suck up every last floating kernel. Its quite a sight, and my parents rightfully thought Pip would get a kick out of it.
We talked about whether to bring Polly as well but given her discomfort with her first boat ride, I decided to keep her back at the house. While Pip and my parents went out, I would give her a bath and spend some one-on-one play time with her.
So, when the kids woke up from their nap that afternoon, my parents told Pip what we had planned. He was very excited and ran over to where the life jackets were kept. Polly was sitting on my lap at the time. When she saw Pip coming back to us with his life jacket in his hand, she quickly got up and, without making a sound, toddled over to the life jackets, picked hers up, and brought it back over. She stood directly in front of me and dropped the jacket into my lap. My parents barely held off a peal of laughter, but Polly was determinedly matter of fact about things. The look on her face said, “He’s not going anywhere without me.”
For a moment I considered trying to dissuade her but quickly realized how foolish that effort would be. So, we got both kids suited up. Polly grimly allowed us to once again buckle up the jacket around her neck and once again she went to her special place until the ride was over.
Both kids enjoyed the carp immensely. Pip threw popcorn, and Polly watched intently as the bodies and tails of the fish flopped around the surface of the water. My mom got some great pictures. But there was one picture she did not get that I wish she had. It was of Polly walking back up from the dock after we had returned home. Bobbling along the sidewalk with her life jacket still in place, there was a look of accomplishment on her face and almost a swagger to her movements. I could easily imagine her saying “I am the second child, and I will not be left behind.”
My parents live in a house on a lake. As such, they have the requisite dock and a pair of vehicles for moving around on the water – in their case a jetski and a 21 foot cruiser. The boat used to spend its weekends pulling around skiers and crazy teenagers on inner tubes. Now, it mostly leaves its cradle for a nice sunset cruise or to ferry people from one place to another.
How the kids would handle the boat had been an item of discussion between Ava and I prior to our trip to my parents’ house. The last time we had visited them Polly had not yet been conceived and Pip had been too young to go out on the boat. So this would be their first opportunity to take a ride and we could only guess how they would react to it. With the noise of the engine and the force of a twenty mile an hour wind hitting you in the face, a ride on the boat hits a lot of senses pretty hard. I felt like Pip would be okay, but was not sure that Polly would understand enough to be able to enjoy it.
The first full day of our visit with my parents brought us the opportunity to find out. We decided to visit some of my parents’ friends on the lake and make use of a small, shaded beach these friends had created on their property. The quickest, easiest, and cleanest way to get there and back was by boat. Pip had gotten the chance to go out on the boat for a short while the evening before and, after a warming up period, had found that he liked it. As Polly did not get this kind of test run, we debated some over whether to drive Polly over by car. Ultimately, we decided to let her give the boat a try. It turned out to be a somewhat rough experience.
To start with she did not like her lifejacket. It was a black and yellow infant model designed to keep a young child’s head upright should they accidentally fall into the water. This made it extra bulky, particularly around the neck. When Ava first attempted to put it on Polly, Polly made her displeasure well known. After a few minutes however, Polly settled down enough for us to continue on with the experiment. She waddled down to the dock looking uncomfortable, top-heavy, and quite suspicious about what was to come next. We hoisted her into the cabin area of the boat and set her up on my lap so that the windshield could block much of the wind. As we slowly pulled out from the dock her little chocolate eyes flipped back and forth between Ava and I letting both of us know that this was not her idea of a good time. When my dad ran the boat up on to plane, Polly went to a special place. She let her legs and arms go limp. Her face held no expression. Her only movement was to periodically squint when I inadvertently let too much sun hit her face. It was as if I was holding an inanimate doll on my lap.
Once we got to our destination and got off the boat, Polly came back to life. At the beach she happily got out of her life jacket and set off to play in the sand. She spent a good hour digging holes with a stick and splashing in the first few inches of water at the edge of the lake. But when it was time to go, she went through the same process again. She fussed while we put on her life jacket and then went to her special place while the boat was in motion. I guess that’s what she needed to do to make it through the ride.
A couple of days later my parents wanted to take Pip by boat to see one of the lake’s long-standing institutions. One of the marinas has over time built up a herd of a large catfish like fish called carp. On the back side of the dock where this marina has its gas pumps is a eight by ten foot area where people have for at least thirty years fed popcorn to these fish as a way to pass the time. The herd now is a couple hundred in number and when you throw a handful of popcorn to them the fish start jumping and splashing all over the place in their efforts to suck up every last floating kernel. Its quite a sight, and my parents rightfully thought Pip would get a kick out of it.
We talked about whether to bring Polly as well but given her discomfort with her first boat ride, I decided to keep her back at the house. While Pip and my parents went out, I would give her a bath and spend some one-on-one play time with her.
So, when the kids woke up from their nap that afternoon, my parents told Pip what we had planned. He was very excited and ran over to where the life jackets were kept. Polly was sitting on my lap at the time. When she saw Pip coming back to us with his life jacket in his hand, she quickly got up and, without making a sound, toddled over to the life jackets, picked hers up, and brought it back over. She stood directly in front of me and dropped the jacket into my lap. My parents barely held off a peal of laughter, but Polly was determinedly matter of fact about things. The look on her face said, “He’s not going anywhere without me.”
For a moment I considered trying to dissuade her but quickly realized how foolish that effort would be. So, we got both kids suited up. Polly grimly allowed us to once again buckle up the jacket around her neck and once again she went to her special place until the ride was over.
Both kids enjoyed the carp immensely. Pip threw popcorn, and Polly watched intently as the bodies and tails of the fish flopped around the surface of the water. My mom got some great pictures. But there was one picture she did not get that I wish she had. It was of Polly walking back up from the dock after we had returned home. Bobbling along the sidewalk with her life jacket still in place, there was a look of accomplishment on her face and almost a swagger to her movements. I could easily imagine her saying “I am the second child, and I will not be left behind.”
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