Praise Worth Having

It is the custom in our house to eat dinner together, around a table, with food cooked at home, using real ceramic plates and knives and forks and all that good stuff. I have heard that this sort of thing has become unusual, as if there are actually families that don't do this. This is a difficult thing for me to comprehend. Far from being a chore, this is one of the greatest delights of my life -- to sit at table and share good food with those I love most every day. It is not usually fancy, but always good. When my wife is cooking, the meal is often as good or better than much of what passes for cuisine and fine restaurants. I am not exaggerating when I say that. Of course, sometimes it is sometimes ridiculously simple (milk and cereal) but it is always received with thanks and shared with love.

Of course, it is not really ultimately about the food. The food is just the glue that brings us all together. It is a family ritual that both shapes our family life and rises out of it simultaneously. It is a ritual I love to imagine my daughters taking for granted, and making their own, in their own homes, with their own children.

It is also our custom to take time at the end of the meal to read a book aloud. This is Dad's job, as he usually finishes eating first, and because he loves to hear his own voice. We are currently reading Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. I read this myself when I was perhaps 11 or 12 years old, and I remember enjoying it very much, but I realize now how many of the details have faded in my memory. It is a delightful read aloud. Previous to this, we read Captain's Courageous by Rudyard Kipling, which, while a fine story with great characters and themes, turned out to be very difficult to read aloud. There was something about the rhythm of Kipling's prose that does not flow easily off the tongue, however it looks on the page. Alcott is not like that at all. Her words flow beautifully, even in spite of the dated phrasing and archaic terms. 

And every once in a while, she hits something squarely -- if you can imagine a demure and slight New England lady whacking you on the forehead with a two by four. Tonight we finished the chapter "Meg goes to Vanity Fair" in which Meg, the oldest March daughter goes to stay with wealthy friends for the week, and learns the dangers of wealth without character. Her mother encourages her, rather than seek the approbation of people who may be "kind, I daresay, but worldly, ill-bred, and full of vulgar ideas, to  

Learn to know the value and praise which is worth having, and to excite the admiration of excellent people by being modest as well as pretty....

What hit me between the eyes on the next page was the following passage where Marmee is telling Meg and Jo her hopes for their future:

I want my daughters to be beautiful, accomplished, and good; to be admired, loved and respected; to have a happy youth, to be well and wisely married, and to lead useful, pleasant lives, with as little care and sorrow to try them as God sees fit to send. To be loved and chosen by a good man is the best and sweetest thing which can happen to a woman; and I sincerely hope my girls may know this beautiful experience. It is natural to think of it Meg; right to hope and wait for it, and wise to prepare for it; so that, when the happy time comes, you may feel ready for the duties and worthy of the joy. My dear girls I am ambitious for you, but not to have you make a dash in the world -- marry rich men merely because they are rich, or have splendid houses, which are not homes because love is wanting. Money is a needful and precious thing -- and when well used, a noble thing -- but I never want you to think it is the first or only prize to strive for. I'd rather see you poor men's wives, if you were happy, beloved, contented, than queens on thrones, without self-respect and peace. 

I can't say that I made it all the way through that paragraph without having to stop for a second. I had something in my eye that made my vision cloudy and it made it hard to read. At the same time my throat unaccountably spasmed and it took a second to let it pass before I could continue. 

I am often amazed at the power of well chosen words representing high and noble ideas.

Pride and Joy

(I wrote this several months ago, and it got lost in my files. I discovered it and decided it might be worth putting up here)

I suspect that there is no way to predict with certainty the outcome of raising a child. Just look around you. There are untold examples of children of decent parents with lousy kids. It is the stuff of proverbs. Of course there are proverbs that say differently - that parents shape children, either intentionally or unintentionally.

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

A chip off the old block.

Yet, if you look around you, the truth of these other proverbs is also apparent. You can look at a child and every once in a while, the veil falls away and you can see the parent -- in a gesture, in a turn of phrase, in an approach to a problem. Of course, this cuts both ways. Bad apples fall as close to the tree as good ones. 

The outcome of child rearing is not predictable but I am pretty sure that that how a child is raised has some effect. The interplay between nature and nurture is complex, and very far from being a straight line thing. It isn't so much an simple expression ( 2+2 = 4) as a complex equation with many variables.

Much (perhaps even a majority) of the influence is unintentional and below consciousness. I'm not sure how it works, but it is really something to watch. Every once in a while I see something in my girls that just amazes me.

Today, my Bride took our youngest to her Girl Scout meeting. This included a trip to the library -- a big treat. I was home when they arrived. After kissing everyone hello, I noticed that Little Bright Eyes was not in the house. "Where is she?" I asked. "In the car reading some of her new books from the library" I was told. I looked out the door and sure enough, she's still sitting in the car, happy as a clam in the sand, looking through her new stack of nice fresh books. I watched her for a second, thinking, "That's my girl! Brought her up RIGHT. Yes I did." 

You see, I love books. Books are among the greatest joys of my life. I was truly excited to see that joy transferred to her. It was a little moment of pride.

But I fear such pride is misplaced. Really. There must be thousands of examples of parents who read and read to their kids, and yet the kids grow up to hate reading. And just as many examples of brave and prolific readers who rise out of families who don't even own books. The transfer of such things from one generation to the next is neither sure or predictable. I believe that I did influence my girls' love of books, but my influence alone is insufficient as to be thought of as a primary cause. It's all just too complex to be reduced to any kind of "just that" or "merely this."

So I can't take pride in it really. But I can take joy in it.

What did Jesus Drink?

A few nights ago, I was drinking a beer with my dinner. For those you who care, it was a Sam Adams Hefenweizen, an unusually roasty, fairly hoppy wheat beer.

My oldest remarked that she had a conversation with some friends at her home school co-op regarding the “legality” of drinking alcohol for Christians. It seems that the friends were remarking upon the evils of alcohol, and how the consumption of it is condemned by God. I asked her what she said. She replied that she simply told her friends that her Mom and Dad often drank beer or wine and it seemed OK to her.

When I asked her what she thought the Bible had to say on the subject, she went directly to the heart of the matter. “Well…Jesus drank wine all the time, so it must be ok.” I must confess that at that moment my heart swelled with love and pride for my oldest offspring, for this is exactly the answer I had hoped for. We discussed it further, talking about the wine vs. grape juice controversy, and then moving on to other topics after I ascertained her friends’ reaction to her stance. I wanted to know if they ostracized her for her position. She said no, they just disagreed. I also found this gratifying, knowing how easy it is in certain circles for judgment to be meted out by those unqualified to judge. She was completely unfazed.

Over at Jesus Shaped Spirituality, a commenter dropped this lovely sentiment regarding things that Jesus had to deal with that we also have to deal with. I’ve never heard it put quite this way before, but it seems to be a remarkably pithy and accurate conclusion given the evidence of the story.

Charley states that Jesus actions at the wedding at Cana essentially stated “that booze is ok, and if you run out before the party’s over, get some more.”

Of Cabbages and Kids

A married couple comes to a local potluck dinner. They bring a lovely cassarole of roast vegetables. In the course of conversation it comes up that the vegetables are from this couple's garden. They grow much of their food on the land behind their house. They also keep some livestock in their barn and a few chickens, from which they get a significant part of their meat and all their eggs. The reason, they say, is simply that they like to know where their food comes from, what is in it, and most of all, they simply believe that home grown food tastes better.

Most people would find this admirable. They might not want to do it themselves, preferring to run down to the local grocery store. Even so, they admire the industry and appreciation of good things that motivates this young couple to self-sufficiency.

On the other hand, another married couple comes to the same potluck dinner. They have several children. In the course of conversation it comes up that the children are taught their school subjects at home. The reason, they say, is that they like to know what their children are learning, to have a more direct hand in shaping their character, and they just like having children around.

For some reason, it is common for the second couple to receive many subtly raised eyebrows in their direction, and questions posed in tones carefully veiled to hide the skepticism lying behind the questions. It seems that most everyone understands why growing ones own food is a good and noble thing, even when it's all available at the store for just a little money. Nevertheless, to undertake the teaching of one's own children just seems like such a crazy thing to do when there are trained professionals right around the corner, who are already paid to do it for us. It's all just so much time, and so much work, and frankly, just a little strange.

What strikes me as strange is the double standard.

No Child Left Inside

My daughters do not play outside nearly as much as I did at their age. One might tend to think this is the result of their age or that they are girls, but I think not. My mother's litany was, "It's a beautiful day. Go outside and play." And I did. I did not worry, and think my mother did not worry much either, about various dangers and accidents -- that was all just part of raising boys. The horrors of predatory adults were not high on the radar either -- at least I think not.

I am concerned that even though I live in a distinctly rural area, my kids are living a suburban life. They don't play as much as I think they should. We tend to think of kid activities as things we must take them to. Yet our house is surrounded by woods. I can't think of a better playground. It's not that the girls aren't interested in it, either. The eldest loves all things vegetable, animal and mineral. But tell them go to outside and there are a million reasons why things get uncomfortable or scary and the boomerang back in.

An article I recently came across in Drive Magazine made me think of this more. Apparently I'm not the only one who thinks that we are raising kids who are very "concerned" about "the environment" but don't actually spend much time in it.

Within the space of a few decades, the way children understand and experience nature has changed radically. The polarity of the relationship has reversed. Today, kids are aware of the global threats to the environment – but their physical contact, their intimacy with nature, is fading. That’s exactly the opposite of how it was when I was a child. As a boy, I was unaware that my woods were ecologically connected with any other forests. Nobody in the 1950s talked about acid rain or holes in the ozone layer or global warming. But I knew my woods and my fields; I knew every bend in the creek and dip in the beaten dirt paths. I wandered those woods even in my dreams. A kid today can likely tell you about the Amazon rain forest – but not about the last time he or she explored the woods in solitude, or lay in a field listening to the wind and watching the clouds move.

Worth Reading and thinking about. I'm sending my kids out there and locking the door. It's for their own good.

Call me Ishmael...

I am apparently throwback.-- an atavistic remnant of ancient culture.

I prefer that children call me by the honorific Mr along with my last name. I teach my children to call their elders Mr Smith, or Mrs. Smith. My children address me as Dad, or Daddy, most certainly not by my first name. When my oldest gets a little exasperated, she will revert to calling me “Father.” Although the term thus used is tinged with a certain level of sarcasm, I will let that slide a little. A little.

I once greeted a friend of mine by enthusiastically saying, “Mr K_______!” He immediately corrected me, saying, “Don’t call me that. That’s my father’s name.” I was sorry (but more than willing) to have to break the news to him. “Rick,” I says, “have you looked in the mirror lately? You just retired. You ARE Mr. K_____. You earned it. You might as well own it.”

I remember the first time a clerk in the grocery store called me “sir.” I was in my early 20’s and I thought it was the coolest thing ever. That doesn’t make me stuck up. It just means that I was more than ready to be an adult and to act like one.

At one of my daughter’s softball practices, one of her teammates came up to her father, with whom I was speaking. As she left, she said, “Right Bill…” I allowed as how I would nip that sort of thing in the bud. His response was something along the lines of “You pick your battles.” I guess that’s a battle I would pick. To name something determines a great deal of how we think of it. One could certainly make a case that there are more important things than a name. A rose by any other, and all that. Nevertheless, to assume that everything is equal and without differentiation seems a dangerous worldview. It’s a matter of respect and of viewing the world as it is.

For what it’s worth, I have made it clear to my girls that calling me Dad is not their duty. It is their privilege. No one else – NO ONE – gets to call me that except them. It is their special name for me that is reserved only for their use, and it’s use confers special privileges on them. The use of that name does not distance them from me. It actually makes us closer.

We dress for church out of respect for God. We wear suits to business meetings out of respect for our colleagues and acquaintances. We call our leader Mr. President to his face not because of him, but out of respect for the office that he fills. Adults should be addressed by children with special respect because they have earned it.

To address someone with a formal title is not an insult. We should learn to accept the honor being given. We should shed the prevailing cultural value that tells us that aging is something to be ashamed of. Every stage in life has its difficulties and its benefits. Let us learn to take the good for what it is, and own it.

The Team Sport Conspiracy

I’m getting fairly suspicious of this contemporary trend toward organized sports for children. In fact, I have always been fairly suspicious of it, even as a child. One could accuse me of sour grapes, since after all, I did not make the cut for most organized sports teams, and the few that I did allowed me to see little, if any, playing time. OK then, just to clear the air let me say right now that those coaches were clearly blind to the talent that lay before them, as an amateur rockhound might miss the rough diamond sitting at his feet amongst the pebbles. I also take consolation in the fact that I’m pretty confident that today I could kick the collective asses of 98% of those kids who were just “great athletes” in school.
Without going too deeply into our specific family situation here are my basic objections in outline:

• The benefits of highly organized and supervised sports for young children are limited. Free play is much more valuable. Nothing wrong with playing ball, but let the kids get together and have a game. If there aren’t enough to field a full team, let them figure out how to adapt.
• Over-emphasis on competition as opposed to the joy of play and movement will stunt their growth as surely as smoking cigarettes.
• By my observation, adult organized sports for kids younger than 10 do not teach social skills. They learn social skills through interaction. I see limited interaction in these settings. Free play seems much more effective.
• Team sports have a limited lifespan for all but the gifted and disciplined few. Better to teach a sport that one can take into adulthood: tennis, golf, skiing, running, paddling, hiking, climbing, walking, yoga, pilates, weight training, calisthenics, etc.
• Team sports do not teach physical fitness. They train children to think that the only reason to get up and run around is to win the game. When the game is removed, then they sit and watch others play games.
• Team schedules take too much time away from home and family. In short order, I can see that if my daughter wants to pursue softball that will mean 4-5 nights a week we are out of the house of several hours.

So, just who is pushing this crap? It's just expected. And I'm in a situation where the pressure is minimal compared to some high-powered suburban sub-cultures. I reject their pathetic notions of healthy well-rounded physical education. I reject the notion the team sports are necessary to success in life. I reject the assumption that team sports must become progressively more competitive and time consuming as children become older.

I gotta go. My kids wanna play tag. Wanna play?