I Just Wanna Know You Better

Camp Papa and LJ

Yesterday my tennis coach said to me, "Becky, all I'm gonna say is, enjoy your kids while they're young." She had been regaling me with stories of how her college-age children were driving her crazy. They actually sound like delightful people, but her family is adjusting to their new life stages.

This morning, Laura wanted to get to school early for a science review session, so we pulled up in the drop-off lane at 7:45, right after we got Hank to school. Kids aren't allowed in the building before 8, so we sat together in our heated seats while Taylor Swift sang on the radio. Laura was tired and not animated. She'd been home late from swimming and then had studying to do. In the mornings--some mornings--I bear the brunt of all of Laura's annoyance with the universe. The angle of the sun, the air temperature, the sogginess of a cheerio, these things are probably my fault. It's okay, I am maddeningly unfazed by her moods. Some days she saves all her charm and her stories, all her sparkly cheer, for her daddy, which I get. I totally get it.

She sat there and woke up a bit and then kids started to pop out of cars and go into the building. A male teacher I didn't recognize walked by the car and smiled in at us through the window. I said, "Who is that?" Laura opened the door and slid down from the seat. As she did, she turned back and said, "He's one of the vice principals. He's in charge of discipline."

She said "discipline" so archly! How does she know to do that? And she raised an eyebrow and half smiled. In that moment it was like she was twenty years old. I felt like I was looking at myself. Her whole expression just nailed this humorous, like, skepticism about the whole enterprise of, I don't know, discipline? The institution of school? It made me laugh, and she walked away, and her long blond hair was behind her like a flag.

For some reason, out of a whole day, that was a moment I wanted to tell you about.

(Because I also napped, had lunch with Matt, and played tennis, we could talk about those but the shadows grow long.)

I hope you had a moment you liked.
xoxox

I Think That I Shall Never See

Laura making an entrance.

We are still follow, follow, following that yellow brick road, until this time tomorrow night. As a tree, Laura is in all six shows. Her line is a scornful, "She was hungry!" after Dorothy plucks an apple from one of the trees. Then all the trees throw their plastic apples down at Dorothy and Scarecrow.

Then in another scene, she's an oak tree. And in the Haunted Forest, she has Spanish Moss. So, you know, a full tree acting range! As my dad said, "Epiphytes are hard to pull off."

But Laura is hilarious. She's complaining that none of the other trees stay in character. She's like, "We're supposed to be mad! And all the other trees are turning their heads to watch Dorothy. We don't care about those humans!"

It is a fun show. I remarked on it last year, but there's a load of talent in that group of kids. The little Dorothy is the complete package. And for some parts, Toto is a real dog, who totally steals the scene.

Never work with animals, people.

Goodnight Oz!

More tomorrow, my pretties!

Bring Your Own What?

Hank's Kindergarten teacher has sent home a letter and a permission form for Bring Your Own Technology. BYOT, as they call it, is widespread in our school system, but with Laura I don't remember it being a thing until she was in the fifth grade.

I remember the middle school orientation at the start of the year, where it quickly became apparent that it was basically required for each kid to have some kind of device they could do certain tasks on and use to read their online textbook. Parents were saying, "So should I just buy her an ipad, or some other kind of tablet? A laptop? Just say the word." I was like, "Do whut?"

I don't have an ipad. I have my beloved iphone 5 and a four year-old laptop that, though nice in its day, is now missing the left-sided shift, capslock, and 's' key covers. 

Not being able to hit the left-side shift has done interesting and probably permanent things to my typing.

Laura has an ipod touch that she got a couple Christmases ago and a Kindle Fire that she spent her 11th birthday money on. (That kindle is nice--I think those are a good deal.) Her Kindle Fire is what she takes to school and works on. Hank has none of this. He has a Nintendo DS that he plays with sometimes. He has our xbox, Legos, and the air and sky. I have not been inclined to put a smart phone-type object into his six year-old hands. Having that kind of thing is not part of his six year-old life.

Really, it's not even about the money, at a certain point it's about the having, maintaining, and keeping up with all of these small expensive objects. And indeed, since our older kids started doing BYOT in school, I know of a handful of lost and broken devices among my friends and neighbors.

Of course, the teacher writes in the letter that no child will be left out, that it's not mandatory, that there are a few classroom devices for kids who don't have one, etcetera. On the way to school this morning, Hank brought it up. "Mom, the permission form for BYOT is in my folder." (The way he says BYOT, with emphasis on each letter, is adorbs. Bee, Why, Oh, TEE.)

I said, "Well bud, what are most people doing for BYOT?" He had the precise metrics: 16 kids in his class have an ipod touch, he said. And Christopher and Max have ipads. The remaining six of them can use the classroom computers and the three classroom ipods. 

Having to use one of the classroom devices sounds fine to me. Hardly a deprived situation, right? And he didn't complain or whine about it. I just said, "Well honey, you don't have an ipod, I don't think you really need one." 

But this morning I told Laura that I would like for her to do her brother a favor and lend him her ipod every Friday, with the understanding that if it gets lost or broken, I'll underwrite the loss, and she was fine with it. 

What do you think? Is this the norm where you are? 

Varying Levels of Mastery

Just now, Hank came home from Kindergarten and announced that he had his report card. I looked over it and noted that he had high marks in each area of assessment, except he had just a 3 out of 4 in "Language and Vocabulary Acquisition." This is the child who, as he handed me the report card, said, "Prepare to be dazzled."

Somehow I feel that he will make himself understood in this world. Or that is my hope.

He is branching out all over. On Wednesday, he went to his first after-school meeting of the Lego Club. When I picked him up, he said, "I learned a lot about the history of Legos." I told him I was very interested to hear it. He told me that Legos were first invented in 1289. I allowed as how that seemed rather early to me, and he said, "Well, they were made of wood back then."

Yes, I suppose they would have been. Or carved out of bone by Vikings.

And speaking of wood.

At Laura's middle school, the kids rotate through a series of elective classes every nine weeks. Or "elective" isn't really the word, because they don't choose them, actually. Laura got to choose a year-long chorus class, and then the other classes could be PE or health or something else. I like this system, because I don't think kids really know what they like, necessarily, and they should just be made to try things.

So Monday she came home, having started a new quarter, and announced that she was enrolled in Woodshop. Y'all, the look on her face when she told me how the floor was covered ("just abolutely covered") with wood shavings. It made me think of the time we paid her to eat a pickle.  Anyway, back to woodshop, I was a bit mystified, because her schedule says "Engineering and Technology," and I figured this would be a computer lab. She said that the teacher presides over a computer lab and the woodshop, and told them that they would be spending most of their time in the shop. This will be interesting and new.

.....

Her exposure to new areas of craft may have left her feeling extra venturesome. Yesterday I went to work out with Pretty Neighbor in the afternoon, and accidentally left the house locked up. I didn't know it was locked; I figured Laura would get off the bus, let herself in, and be waiting for me there.

When Hank and I arrived back home, sure enough, she was waiting inside. She said, "Where WERE YOU?" I was like, where am I ever? What's wrong? She goes, "You have to hear MY STORY." I was all, okay! What!

She told us that she'd come home, found the front door, back door, and basement door locked. I was like, "Yet here you stand, in the house, how did you get in?" She had gone down to a basement window, removed the window air-conditioning unit, and climbed right in.

That's how I found out that our house could be broken into by a preteen girl. Or really by anyone. I praised her resourcefulness, but wondered aloud why she didn't use her phone to call me. Or to come look for me at the only one or two places I could be. And that A/C unit is heavy! But okay.

Later she said, "I'm kind of glad that I got locked out. When I put my leg up over the windowsill and hopped in, I felt..." and then she trailed off and just made a kind of finger-waggling gesture, like, happy jazz hands.

A girl's first B&E is very special.

I hope your reentry to school and routine has opened some new vistas for you. xoxo

Swim for Your Life, O Human Child!

Ursula's Lair

Our thoughts and takeaways from watching multiple, multiple middle school performances of Little Mermaid:

Laura is one of the black-clad Poor Unfortunate Souls up there, but it was basically impossible to photograph her because dang Ariel was always standing in the way. And Laura was in the back because she's tall, the light was greenish and dim, and the souls were constantly, like, writhing. After a couple of shows, I was like, "Laura, scoot up front! Elbow some of the other souls out of the way, but subtly!" But she didn't.

There she is, the one who's almost in focus.

Her other incarnation.

There were two casts of lead actors, but Laura and the other members of the corps were in every show. And there was a lot of girl talent in this group! Both Ariels were truly great singers, I couldn't believe they were twelve and thirteen years old.

This little girl who played Flounder just totally killed it.

Pretty costumes.

So the girls were awesome, but you know who was not awesome? The boys. All of the boys seemed like maybe they were bribed to be on stage, and maybe they had been. It was hilarious. It was like probably they'd never spoken English sentences before. Or worn clothing, or talked and moved at the same time. Discussing it later, Matt said, "You know, science has yet to devise a use for the middle school boy." And I had to agree. Bless their hearts!

The shining exception was both little boys who played the crab, especially this kid here. He had it together and he even did the Jamaican accent. But observing the general dearth of boy talent, I understood why the high school's production this fall was Little Women.

During the show week, a rumor was circulating that next year's play would be Aladdin. We thought, hmm, that would be fun, but it needs too many strong male leads. Matt was like, they should just do it with all girls, and I was all, is there something that has even more girls than Little Women? Laura mentioned Annie. That might do the trick.

K-I-S-S-I-N-G

The other thing that cracked me up was the tizzy the entire cast was in because Ariel and Prince Eric actually kiss on stage. Look at this picture and look at the kids in the background. (There's Laura in the back right.) Not a single one of them is in character at this point, they are all reacting to their classmates kissing for real on stage. Six shows, they were like this. And when Laura talked about it, she was like, "OHMIGOD!" Oh man, so funny and kind of sweet.

It was a fun week. Having a teeninsy role to play was just about perfect for Laura. She loved being part of something bigger, but with no actual pressure. She also loved being fussed over and getting into her costumes.

We liked the big Poor Unfortunate Soul hair.

Our final takeaway--Matt's and mine--was that we do not think we are raising an actress. Laura, we feel, only wants to play the role of Laura. Which can be very appealing, and I can imagine other parts in this show she could have done well in. She is not afraid to stand up in front of people and do things. But actually acting like someone else? I can't see it. I suspect that she will find, though, that in many life situations, acting like yourself is enough. Also showing up, being cheerful, and working the hair.

I hope that you have enjoyed this journey under the sea. If for some reason you do not yet feel like YOU sat through five shows of this pageantry, the set of flickr pics is here.

Raccoon Girl Treads The Boards

Smoky Eye!

Tonight was Laura's first Little Mermaid show. She had to show up wearing black eyeliner and mascara for the makeup ladies to start with. She did it herself; this pic is after her first attempt, before I got in there and smudged her up a bit. Then she goes, "I look too goth!" And I'm like, "You're playing a lost soul who has been enslaved by a sea witch. It's not too goth. And how do you know what too goth looks like? Also hush."

So her show was from 7-8:30, then she had to come home and do her homework, which took until after 10. And it was the lamest dumb ass busywork that there could be: Answering 18 questions for a "study guide" in science, and then turning right around and writing definitions to vocabulary words, right out of the same chapter. This was not a high-level learning activity. And I have never complained about a teacher in seven years of Laura's schooling, but I'm going to email the principal and register my discontent. This teacher has a false notion of "rigor" that she seems to be reaching for, but what is revealed in all of her assignments is that she's about one chapter ahead of the students AND she doesn't know what's most important and significant in the material. She was hired to fill in for a teacher who fell ill and had to retire suddenly, and I remember when at curriculum night, she boasted that before she took the job teaching, she was in "private industry." Oh! Oh well my goodness! Tell us a story of the tycoons or magnates you have known! Children, how lucky we are!

Not to be a bitch or anything.

I didn't go to the show tonight, but I'm going to--I kid you not--the next five. My parents are accompanying us tomorrow, then Matt's mom on Friday, and then I'm taking pictures at the Saturday shows. I can't wait to see it all put together with the lights and the costumes. When I picked up L and her friend after the show, they were bubbling with excitement, even after a full school day and then hours at the theater. Youth. I hope by the end of the run, we are still so excited and not collapsed in a little goth puddle.

Anway, that's all from here. xoxox

PS: Weird day, huh? Post-election hangover, only in a good way. Coming down from the nerves? Sleep deprivation? Dunno, something. I tried on a bunch of hats in REI and that soothed me. How are you?