Long Summer Days

There is something about long summer days that beg for every ounce of sunlight to be absorbed and utilized to the fullest.  Even with the sunlight gone at the end of the day but with dusk still lingering, there is a pull within me to leave the house and stand outside till the bats come swooping in to eat their dinner.  I don't have to do anything, all I have to do is exist.  Sunlight drives the motor within me to move, to function, and to be active.  The summer days at the end of June are by far the best.  Humidity has not yet reached epic levels that are usually hit in July and the days are the longest of the year.  Sunlight streams simply unhindered directly down up me, warming and rejuvenating me.  There is something about having those extra hours of sunlight that make summer seem endless.  There is so much more life to eek out of the day when the sun shines till 830 at night and the sky doesn't turn dark till after 9.  Who else remembers childhood and those endless plea's we all made to stay outside just a few more minutes or to go out after dinner till the stars came out.  Even with the stars out and the warmth still radiating off the earth, it seems like summer days just don't end.

I find that I have a hard time sitting indoors if the weather is beautiful out.  I find that if the sun is still beaming in the evening, I will stare out the window longingly, wishing that I had nothing to do inside and that all my time could be spent outdoors.  As an adult it is difficult sometimes not to throw a tantrum screaming "I want to go outside, I want to go outside."  Responsibility is a bitch that I want to throw into a cold winter prison cell sometimes.  Yet I don't.  I put off till later what I could do earlier just so I can get back outdoors.  It must be something primal that pulls us humans into the sun.  I know not everyone is as much an aficionado of the sun as I am, but there are plenty out there like me.  Some of my closest friends have that same pull.  Perhaps it is that those who revel and look for those perfect sunny days to spend outside are drawn together by some solar force, driven to befriend other like minded sun worshipers.   Perhaps not, but I would like to think so.  And with today being my birthday, I'm pretty sure I will soak up every last ounce of vitamin D that the sun has to offer and be outside till the moon comes up, the stars come out, and the sky is completely dark.  That is my day today, and what a perfect day it is with hopefully almost no humidity.  Enjoy the sun people, enjoy the sun.  

A Good Father's Day

This past weekend flew by way too quickly.  It was Father's Day, as most of you know, and I got to spend a lot of time with both our children.  It all started on Friday when our son's daycare had a Father's Day picnic for any dads who wanted to come.  (Our daughter is not in daycare on Friday).  So of course, with it being Friday, I quit work early and headed over to be with my son for his afternoon snack.  There were a good number of dads there and we all sat around on the ground with our children and enjoyed the craziness of a whole group of 3 and 4 year olds.  Being there for that afternoon snack made me realize how much I could not run a daycare.  There are two adults for over 10 children and it is nuts.  It was fun for the 45 minutes I was there, but to handle those children all day every day would be too much for me.  So after the snack, which our son didn't care too eat, we played in the sand box with a few of the other boys.  It was good to see our son interact with his friends but the best part was that I was there.  He was excited to see me come around the corner of the building for the picnic and we both had a great time.  And that was only the beginning.  

Saturday our whole family went over my parents house to celebrate Father's Day a day early.  It was supposed to be nicer on Saturday and rain Sunday and we figured if we wanted to use the pool, Saturday would be better.  Well, Saturday started off nice and then got cloudy early.  Didn't matter to our son though who was adamant that we go swimming, even if it was a little bit chilly.  So the two of us went swimming, just me and my son.  Luckily my parents had turned the pool heater on or we would not have been venturing in.  We were in the pool for a good 45 minutes before I suggested that we get out due to my son's lips turning blue and him shivering while in the water.  Even despite my suggestions, he wanted to remain in the pool.  A little fish he is.  He can't swim yet, but with his swimmies on, he is a non-stop swimming monster.  As for me, I love the water as well and had absolutely no problem staying in with him.  He didn't warm up for quite a while after that and asked that he remain wrapped in a towel and held in my arms.  Who am I to complain about my son wanting to do that?  With it being so cold, our daughter did not accompany us, but rather stayed inside with the rest of the family.  

Sunday, the actual Father's Day, was even better, if only for the fact that I got some alone time with our son in the afternoon.  It rained most of the morning leaving us inside and doing puzzles and playing with trains.  Luckily, though, it cleared up so we decided to get outside for a bit.  Well, once the sun came out after all that rain, it got extremely humid.  It got to the point where we didn't want to be outside anymore and felt it would better if we just spent some more time inside.  I got the idea that maybe we should go to my parents house and use their pool.  They consented and so I took our son and headed down with him.  My wife and daughter stayed home as they were not going to go swimming.  So it was just my son and I, no problem.  We took the doors off my Jeep, made sure we had towels, and headed out.  We went swimming for a bit and then on the way home, we went strawberry picking.  It was such a joy going strawberry picking with him.   I went to the farm that I had gone to with my mom when I was little to pick strawberries.  We walked around the whole farm and couldn't find the strawberries.  Turns out, they moved the strawberry patch across the street, down a dirt road, and over the train tracks.  And what a field of strawberries it was.  As a rough estimate, 4-5 football fields could have easily fit into the strawberry patch.  And there were only a handful of other people there.  It was awesome.  And of course, my son didn't really help put the strawberries in the basket, he was more focused on shoving as many as he could into his mouth.  So of course I took pictures of it, red juice flowing everywhere.  

All in all, it was a great weekend that, as most weekends do, ended too quickly.  There was one little sad note throughout all of it and that was that this is the first Father's Day without my grandfather, Dziadziu around.  It was different just knowing that he is in heaven and not having him to crack a joke and make us laugh a little more.  But he is at peace now.  Now it is time to enjoy my son and daughter.  And that is exactly what I did this past weekend.  Yes, I spent a little more time with my son, but every second I was at home, I enjoyed my daughter as well.  I consider myself blessed to have two such wonderful children.  

Refugee Status - Not for Me Please

If you live in a developed country that is free of war, famine, or economic hardship, then you should feel blessed.  There was an article in the NY Times yesterday morning on refugees world wide and how that number as of 2014 has reached almost 60 million people.  The most common reason for a person either leaving their country or re-locating within it has been an either internal or external conflict or war.  The civil war in Syria alone has contributed almost 11 million refugees to that number, about half internal and half leaving.  It is disheartening to hear these news reports about how hard people in other countries have it.  I would even like to say that I can empathize with them, but to be honest, empathy is a hard thing to come by when there is no frame of reference in which to empathize.  I have never even come close to feeling what a refugee must feel like on a daily basis and stemming from that, it is hard to place myself in their shoes and imagine a life as a refugee.  I can try, but in the end, it is next to impossible.  This is not to say that I don't feel for these people, their condition is just so far removed from anything that I have dealt with in my life that it is hard for me to come to know their situation.  It is a horrible situation, being a refugee and living in a camp that has no guaranteed food supply, conditions are often sub par, and no work or means of supporting or relocating.  I wouldn't wish it on anyone, and yet it is happening to more and more people across the world.  

The hardest hit areas are Africa, the Middle East, and Southern Asia including the Ukraine.  Through famine and conflict, some of which haven't been resolved for years (Somalia), people are being forced to relocate to save their lives and the lives of their families.   The conflicts and famines that are occurring are placing destination countries for refugees in a difficult situation as well.  How many people can relocate and still be supported by another country.  And yet, people in power perpetuate these conflicts, sometimes with no end in sight, and without a second thought about the lives affected.  There seems to be a never ending supply of war and even less thought about recovery and helping refugees return to normal lives, if they ever can.  

Here in the United States, we are lucky to be largely removed from any large conflicts (except our own bickering amongst ourselves and the conflicts overseas into which we inject ourselves).  Yet for all those overseas conflicts in which we help to create situations that create refugees, the impact on our daily lives is nil.   We take in some refugees, but not nearly as many as other countries that happen to neighbor countries in conflict.  I would say that many people take for granted that they live in a country where they have the freedom to wake up every morning in their own bed, in their own home, and can go make a pot of coffee and breakfast.  Something as simple as that is barely a thought in a refugees mind.  It might be a dream of theirs, but depending on how long they have been a refugee for, that dream might have faded as their hopes of their lives ever returning to normal as faded.  We can complain about all the little things that go wrong in our lives, but there are almost 60 million people who definitely have it worst than we do, who have been forced to move one way or another, away from their homes and sometimes their families.  We should never take for granted that which we have.  

The Oak Tree

There are many trees that make their home in Connecticut.  To be honest, I couldn't even name half of them.  I know my maples, my cherries, my dogwoods, my beeches and birches, and of course, the majestic oak tree.   That is about it though.  I know the names of plenty of others, but in terms of identifying them, I would have a much harder time.   Trees are a majestic plant to look at.   Simple and stately, yet complex and dominant.  They all start from a tiny trunk with a few simple branches and grow till they reach 60-100 feet in height with a multitude of branches reaching for an open spot in the sky from which to gather sunlight.  I have come to love looking at trees and admiring their structure, sometimes whimsical growth, and imposing presence almost everywhere in Connecticut.  I love them in the spring and summer when they are adorned with leaves.  And I love them in the fall and winter when their leaves turn brilliant colors and then are shed revealing the naked branches in all their sinewy, serpentine, glory.  But most of all, I have come to love and admire the oak tree.  The white oak is the state tree of Connecticut and also one of the most majestic.  

I have this one tree in particular that I love to stare at in my yard.  It is old, with an enormous burl perched near the base of the trunk and branches that twist and turn and snake outwards towards the sunlight.  There is one vantage point that gives an excellent side view of the branches as they reach for the sunlight (more on that in a minute).  My house sits in a clearing that is maybe a few hundred feet by a few hundred feet.  Not enormous, but enough to create a little bowl in which the trees that surround it reach inward with their branches to garner as much sunlight as possible.  It is this reaching inward that has created such a magnificent display of my favorite oak.  The vantage point I spoke about is from our second floor bathroom.  Looking out the window, you get what seems like a side view of the oak.  Almost all of the oak tree's branches look as if the are wind blown, dealing with a persistent wind that has forced them to reach a certain way with only time cementing them in place.  Yet there is no persistent wind, just the everlasting struggle to find that open piece of sky in which to sprout a leaf and drink in the sunlight.  It is an inspiring view and one that I could look at for hours.  Even the view from beneath this oak tree's canopy is breath taking.  The branches reach out from the trunk perhaps 30 feet in some areas and it almost seems impossible that a tree with branches that large can still stand and survive.  I have even built our fire pit beneath its boughs.  

I have come to love looking at more than just our oak tree.  There is something about an oak tree and the seeming random display of its branches that is enticing.  Tracing a line up an oak tree is not nearly as simple as tracing it up any other type of tree.  Many trees split off branches quite evenly, making a beautiful rounded top with perfectly spaced leaves and branches.   Oak trees seem to be the renegades for me with almost no rhyme or reason for their branches and their twists and turns, the ones that die and the ones that live and grow on.  I never try to figure out the rhyme or reason, I just look at the branches and admire them.  Any oak tree, anywhere.  Even more amazing is if you can find an old grove of trees where the forest floor is absent of almost all other life.  There is one bordering my property that has been un-touched for years.  The floor is packed with leaves and the trees themselves are no less than 60-80 feet tall.  The first branches begin perhaps 40-50 feet above the ground giving one the sense of being in a living cathedral.  For someone who loves nature like myself, there are few other sights that compare in terms of simplicity, beauty, and grandeur.  Sure, there are spectacular vistas to behold across the world, but for being so close to home, I'll take my oak trees and their canopy and the view they give me any day.  

Late Night Rebel (3.5)

Our little boy, while being an adorable, helpful, kind and loving boy one minute, can turn into a royal pain the rear when it comes to bed time.   These past two days have been particularly trying, so much so that at times his antics turn comical.  Part of me wants to laugh, except that I know that laughing will only exacerbate the issue and the is the last thing I need when at 9:15, our son is still not sleeping.  We even tried two different tactics with him over the last two nights, myself putting him to bed one night and my wife the other.  So without further delay, lets start with two nights ago. 

Our son's normal bedtime, the time that we feel it is best to put him to bed, is around 7.  Occasionally we will let him coast till 7:30, but that is normally about it.   Two nights ago, we weren't letting him go past 7 because he seemed tired and we knew that if we let him go any longer, he might get so tired that he could catch his second wind and then never go to sleep.  So up into bed we went, I the designated bedtime reader and singer, and after about half hour to forty five minutes, I left.  He wasn't asleep, but I reached the point where if I laid there any longer singing songs, I would have fallen asleep and that would have been the end of me for the night.  Almost as soon as I left, the issues started.  The first one was that he decided to drink almost all the water we left him with and managed to spill some on himself and his bed.  So up my wife went to change the sheets and his clothes.  Next came the desire for mommy to come upstairs and wind his bear that sings "you are my sunshine".   There were a few other attempts to get out of his room, stay awake, suck us into staying with him or doing something for him that was completely unnecessary at that time of night.   Eventually, he was quiet for five minutes and I went outside to get some work done.  Well, on one of my trips past a window, I saw him standing in the kitchen with my wife.  I don't even remember what he wanted, but I had to carry him upstairs once again, and put him back in bed.  We tried everything.  Eventually, I stayed outside to watch the bats flit around, my wife went to bed, and when I finally made it to bed, our son was sleeping on my side of the bed.  (Sidebar: we have a rule that if he comes into our room, he needs to sleep in his sleeping bag on the floor that we have permanently set up for him).  So I picked him up, put him in his sleeping bag amidst his protests that "mommy said I could sleep in your bed".  "No buddy, she didn't."  Within five minutes, he had climbed back in bed next to my wife.  I had not fallen asleep yet so I picked him up once again, and put him back in his sleeping bag.  Then he started talking.  I told him to be quiet.  After that, I feel asleep only to wake up in the morning to find him sleeping in our bed.  Damn it!

Fast forward to last night.  Almost as soon as my arrived home with our kids, we started the discussion about what we were going to do for our son's bed time.  Instead of pushing for a 7 o'clock bed time, we figured we would eat dinner and let him play outside a little bit more.  So we ran with it.  He didn't seem as tired, and we let him play outside till 8.  It seemed long enough and we sure as hell weren't going to let him play outside any longer.  It was my wife's turn to take him to bed so up she went, returning almost an hour later, and announced that she was going to bed.   I was hoping for the best with our son and expected the worst.   Well, I was throwing the ball to our dog Aspen, and I hear our mudroom door open inside, and then close.  I go over to our open garage door and see our son standing there with his boots on.  "Daddy, I have to go pee behind the shed."  Really?  Its after 9 and he is still not asleep and thinks that it is OK to get up, get his boots on, and go pee behind the shed when there is a bathroom right next to his bedroom.  Needless to say, I sent him upstairs.  I go back outside and no sooner had I started throwing the ball to Aspen again than I hear his head bang against a window above me.  Sure enough, there he is, smiling and staring down at me.  I simply look up at him, point, and he runs off.  I was hoping he would run off to his room, but I knew he probably went right for our bed and onto my side.  I finished up outside within another 10 minutes.  After taking my boots off, my first destination was our bedroom to see if he actually was there.  Surprise, surprise, he was.  So I picked him up and despite the protests and myriad excuses that I got all the way back to his bedroom, I still plopped him down in his bed and told him to go to sleep.  Instead of venturing very far, I sat down in our dining room (which happens to be right below his bedroom) and turned on our computer.  No sooner had I logged in and brought up the Internet than I hear his little footsteps pattering across his floor and sure enough his door opens.  I don't even get up, I just told him to get back into bed.  "But daddy, I'm scared."  My response, "It's OK, I'm downstairs and nothing will happen."  Believe it or not, that was it and he actually stayed in his bed.  What a process though.  Two nights in a row he didn't fall asleep till after 9.  

I don't even care that he didn't fall asleep till after 9, I just want him to stay in his room and in his bed for the night, not our bed.  I can appreciate the fact that he might be scared, but he won't tell us what he is scared of most of the time.  He will occasionally allude to something, but those times are different than the everyday excuse he tries to use to get into our bed.  We have asked him what he is scared of only to be met by silence on most occasions.  Hopefully within the next month he will start returning to a state of equilibrium as he nears his birthday, but I won't bet on any of it.  Even if I was a gambling man, the odds or not in my favor and I know it.  I will simply hope for the best and expect the worst.  Luckily tonight, both my wife and I are heading out and we won't have to deal with bedtime.  We will just have to deal with getting our son back to his own bed when we get home.  Oh well, it could be worse I suppose.  For now, short of putting a lock on the outside of his door (which I don't think I could do), we will try more tricks and see what works.  It may just be a matter of one of sitting in the dining room catching him every time he tries to leave his room with some excuse or another.  Even if it is to announce that he found a tiny piece of paper towel that needs to be thrown out.  (That really did happen as well!) 

The Beauty of Bats

I love being outside when the weather is nice.  I love the fresh air, the sun on my back, the cool breeze gently undulating through the oak trees.  I love all of that and more about being outside.  Yet, I hate mosquitoes.  I absolutely loathe them.  If there was a way I could de-create the mosquito permanently, I would.   With all my work in the field of de-creating things (which really amounts to nothing), I have not yet figured out a way to get eradicate mosquitoes.  There is the option of having my yard sprayed with noxious chemicals that in theory will either kill the mosquitoes or keep them at bay.  However, with our family moving towards as much of an organic lifestyle as possible, those chemicals being sprayed in my yard doesn't sound enticing.   I could theoretically wear a bee-keepers suit whenever I venture outside, but that would get in the way of the sun on my back.  So for now, I use our home-made organic bug spray and deal with the bugs.  There is one more option that could be the best one around for our yard, bats.  We have one or two resident bats currently circling our house every evening in search of mosquitoes and other insects that fly.  Last night, with the sun sinking beyond the horizon, I remained outside and watched the bats flit around as I threw a tennis ball to my dog Aspen.  If you have never watched a bat fly around eating insects, it is an amazing sight to behold.  

The flight path of a bat is nothing graceful like an eagle soaring through the sky, riding thermals with wings spread wide.  No, a bat's flight path is more akin to an novice driver learning how to drive a manual transmission combined with a fighter pilot engaged in a aerial dogfight.  Steady for a few feet, then a quick jerk to the right, left, right, dive, capture, and ascend again.   Last night I watched our resident bats for about half hour as the sky grew darker and darker.   This one little guy (they are quite small), circled over and over an over again, eating his quota of mosquitoes to make me happy.  His little body never rested, just performed its aerial acrobats for me to watch in awe.  A bat's flight path becomes all the more amazing when you consider that everything is performed not with sight, but through echo location; essentially sonar to figure out where a bat's surroundings are.  For a bat to discern its surroundings, and especially be able to follow a mosquito with sonar and then actually catch it, is mind boggling to me.  There were times last night when the bat came within perhaps five feet of my head, eating its dinner.  I just watched and watched, timing the throwing of the tennis ball to when the bat was not in the vicinity of where I would be throwing it.  Seeing the efficiency with which the bat was eating, I can't wait to build myself a bat house.  

Yes, even before last night, I started researching how to build a bat house for our yard.  Seeing as a bat can eat up to 1000 mosquitoes in a single night, bats will become my new best friend.  I don't want thousands of bats, that might be considered going over board, but around 20 would probably be a good number.  Think about it, if I had 20 bats, that would mean around 20,000 mosquitoes would be devoured every night leaving that many fewer to bother me and my family.  Once I started reading about bat houses and how to build them, I discovered a few interesting things.  First, it is recommended that you don't put a bat house on a tree, but rather high up on a pole or attached to a house.  This is due to the fact that bats need a very warm environment in which to raise their young and on a tree in the shade will do no good.  Second, it needs to be painted a dark color so that it gets warm inside.  The version I am embarking on building is about 2 feet by 3 feet and should be a nice place for them to call home.  I will even put a welcome mat on my roof for them if it means that more will come and eat my mosquitoes for me.  In fact, if I get ambitious enough, I just might build it tonight.  But for today, as my nocturnal bats go to bed for the day, I wish them a good sleep and a hearty appetite for their dinner of more mosquitoes tonight.  

Feeding Curiosity

Sunday was one of those days when it was a little difficult to get things done around the house.  I tried in the morning as best I could, but it just didn't work out.   Turns out I had to feed curiosity instead.  It all started out when I went to try finish digging a pit for my wife's upcoming "pit fire" for ceramics.  It is essentially what it sounds like; a bunch of pottery is placed in a pit, doused in different substances to add color, and loaded with wood and set ablaze.  It is a different method for firing pottery that adds random colors and designs that can't be reproduced.  So while trying to finish digging the pit, our son decided that he needed to help.  Normally I absolutely love his help, except when it could potentially cause injury to myself or himself.  This time it happened to be me.  I was using a pick ax to loosen up rock in the hole.  He had a piece of wood that he was using as a pick ax to do the same thing.  The problem was that when a three and a half year old boy is swinging a piece of wood within close quarters, his aim isn't always the best.  I almost got nailed in head multiple times before I asked him to stop and let me use the pick ax alone for a minute.  Well, he immediately lost interest and tried to get me away from digging the hole.  Well, it worked.  Instead of getting frustrated that I wasn't getting the hole dug, I put the tools down and followed him over to our big pile of sticks (which leads me to another small tangent).

We have this fairly large pile of small trees that I had cut down this past fall to clear an area for our bonfire pit.  Nothing special about this fire pit, I just had to clear a place in the woods to put it and there happened to be dozens of small trees filling the area that I deemed best for the fire pit.  So after cutting all the trees down in the fall, I made a huge pile of them next to our shed.  Most of them I will end up re-using as part of my garden fence (which I will get into another time).  The pile stands about 4 feet tall, and given that I left all the branches on the trees, it bounces when you stand on top.  I found this out in the fall, and over this past weekend as our son was climbing the pile, I showed him how we can bounce on top, almost like a trampoline, just a touch more dangerous.  Our son doesn't have the confidence to bounce on it himself, so he attempts to drag me up there periodically to bounce with him.  This is what happened Sunday morning.  After giving up on finishing digging the pit,  I made my over and we bounced on the pile of sticks.  Unlike a trampoline which makes it relatively easy to bounce, sticks and trees don't have quite as much give and it takes a lot more work with my legs to make it bounce.  After about ten minutes, my legs were burning and I had to take a break, much to our sons dismay.  I then proceeded to sit down on top of the pile and he dropped right in my lap and leaned back.  Soon after we both sat down, I tracked a mosquito that was closing in to his landing spot right on my son's forehead.  As soon as he landed, I smacked my son ever son gently in the head and killed the mosquito.  So he didn't think I was just randomly smacking him in the head, I explained what I was doing.  That led to a five minute discussion about mosquito's and other bugs.  Curiosity.  I could have brushed off the questions or given him short answers, but I went into depth and explained everything about mosquito's.  That discussion veered off to a hawk that was circling way up above our heads.  So we talked and we talked and then we sat in silence for a bit before we were up and running off to some other activity.  

The reason I don't get much done during the day with our children up and about is that they like to be involved, ask questions, and figure out the world around them.  I could easily brush them off, but that would do them a disservice.  It is more our son at this point than our daughter, but the time will come where she is just as vocal as he is and will want either my wife or I to explain things to her as well.  I can see where there would be a temptation to stifle that curiosity, not intentionally, but out of a desire for a little peace and quiet.  In our house, there is almost never any peace and quiet, but that is the way it is supposed to be with two little children running around.  A house with children should not be quiet unless they are involved in an activity that is devouring all of their attention.  Our children do not have the crutch of iPhones or TVs to rely on should they get bored.  They simply do not play with them and will not until they are much older.  They play with blocks, crayons and markers, sticks and mud, train tracks, and because of all that, their imaginations are blossoming.  Their curiosity is insatiable, as long as we feed it, and I strive every day to do that.  It is easy to stifle that curiosity, with just a simple shun or dismissal, but all they want to do is learn.  There is no stupid question, even if it may seem stupid to an adult, and there is where the magic lies.  Those simple questions which can sometimes require a lengthy explanation, are necessary if a child is to remain curious about the world around them.  I try and answer every question our son asks.  It may not happen immediately if I am involved in something else, but I do my best to answer every one.  It could take me 5-10 minutes to explain mosquitoes or why we are digging a pit for mommy's pottery, but those questions lead to more questions and so on and so forth.  If I don't know the answer, I tell him, and then we figure it out.  There in lies the magic, living in the moment and not thinking about everything else that I need to do that he doesn't care about.  Nothing that is pressing in my life is pressing in his and the more I can remember that, the more I can be attune to what he needs and to what my daughter needs.  Our daughter will get to the stage our son is at in a few years and the magic will begin again.  Even now, I am reliving the days when my son first became curious about the world around him with our daughter.  She is now clamoring to be where her brother is and get involved in everything, even if she isn't fully capable yet.  The time will come though.  All I know is that I will continue to feed their curiosity as best I can, without the use of technology as a crutch to entertain them.  

Just Another Monday

I'm having one of those Monday mornings where everything seems to be taking longer to slip into functioning mode.  My alarm went off this morning, and despite my best effort to telepathically tell it shut off and go away, I had to manually hit the snooze button 3 times.  Yes, I gave myself an extra 27 minutes of sleep this morning, and still, it felt like I was waking up way too early.  Part of me wishes that I had "forgotten" to set my alarm last night.  To sleep in on a Monday morning would be glorious.  With two young children and a wife who is a high school teacher, those days are long gone.  I technically could sleep for another hour, but I like to wake up slowly, have some personal time in the morning with which to stare at a computer screen, discerning what I should write about.  This morning, there was nothing.  Staring at a blank screen was like looking into a mirror and seeing exactly what was going through my brain; nothing.  Nothing, nothing, nothing.  To be completely honest, there were a few little grains of thought that sparkled, but they were as elusive as lightning bugs and I just couldn't get a handle on them.  So I sat and stared, waiting for someone to either turn the switch on my brain and kick start my day, or for something else to happen.  I don't know what that something else is, but that is OK, I will survive.  

I have a very strong feeling that my lethargy on this early Monday morning stems from our incessant need to get things done around our house.  We were outside so much over the course of this weekend that our son actually asked to play inside at certain points on Saturday and Sunday.  I, of course, being an outdoor junky, secretly fumed at the thought of sitting inside on a day when the skies are nearly cloudless and a slight breeze is gently swaying the ancient oaks around our house.   Yet being inside gave me a chance to just sit and relax, watch our son and daughter playing, and think about what else I wanted to do outside.   So to compensate for not getting things done when watching our son and daughter, I work extra hard the rest of the time.  And when I do all of that and never rest, Monday mornings look like this. 

My first cup of coffee is still working its magic, or at least I hope it is, because I am still dragging.  My eyelids feel like they weigh a hundred pounds and to the best of my ability, I am writing something down here.  It may be nothing of value, but at least it is something.  I know what happens to me if I put off writing for more than a few days.  I eventually end up putting it off for a few more, then a few more, and then before I know it a few weeks have gone by and nothing has been written.  Writing, even for the sake of just hitting keys on the keyboard and forming sentences with some sort of meaning keeps the brain juices flowing.  OK, enough for today, my coffee cup is empty and I have nothing left to give.  Tomorrow, I shall wake up a new man with new found energy.  At least I hope I will.  

Its Not Easy Being Three and a Half

Last year around this time, our son was spending his evenings, after being put to bed, re-arranging his room or running around like a maniac and bouncing off the walls.  Re-arranging his room consisted not just of moving a few things around, but of dragging furniture to opposite corners, pulling drawers out of his dresser, and pulling the mattress off of the box spring and shoving it in front of his door.  There were other activities that accompanied his 2.5 year old period of disequilibrium.  Luckily as a parent, the memory of those outbursts and misbehavior tend to fade over time leaving you with just a sweet vision of a loving son.  He still is loving.  He still is kind.  Yet there are times that I would like to slam my head into a wall these days due to his obstinance and emotional break downs over the smallest event or occurrence.  It doesn't take much to send him over the edge into a fit of tears and wailing.  I could simply go outside to start the charcoal on the grill without telling him only to hear him start crying and wailing inside over the fact that I didn't tell him.  Yes, I didn't tell him because he was in the midst of playing with his toys and looked like he was having a grand old time.  How was I supposed to know.  Well, obviously as a parent, these things should be automatically known (at least according to our son).  That is just one example of many that happened just yesterday afternoon in the span from when he got home around 430 till he went to bed around 7.  There is one more that I will share with you, just because I find it mildly humorous.  It involves pretzels, a large container of pretzels from Costco.  He wanted some for a snack yesterday so we took the container (about 1.5 feet tall) from the cupboard, took the cover off, and put some pretzels on the over turned cover for him.  My wife also took some for herself which turned out to be a bad idea.  You see, our son had it in his head that he was going to eat the whole container of pretzels.  The fact that my wife wanted some did not fit into our son's view of the world.  It just couldn't happen.  So he had a break down and started profusely crying.  It got to the point where I took all the pretzels away until he stopped crying and told him he could have the over turned cover filled with pretzels, and when he finished those, he could have more.   About three minutes of crying and going back and forth before he finally acquiesced.  Turns out he really only wanted to eat about five pretzels, not the whole container.  

And that is just half the fun.  His little tantrums I can handle for they merely take a little understanding of him, a calm demeanor, and steadfastness.  The part that is extremely difficult for me to handle is his seeming inability to listen.  Not to hear (although sometimes it feels like that is the issue), but to truly listen to what his parents are saying.  He has this habit of touching everything, even if we tell him not to and it takes about three repetitions of saying "Don't touch this because...(pick a reason, normally safety oriented)" before he finally decides to listen.  We have had discussions about it, talked about the importance of not touching before asking, but it hasn't sunk in yet.  His absence of listening carries into not even responding when we call his name.  There are times when I will call his name because I either want to stop him from running to the front of the house, or doing something that could hurt himself, and there will be absolutely no response.  I will repeat his name louder and louder until he finally responds, "WHAT" or "Stop yelling at me Daddy." If I get the response, "Stop yelling at me Daddy", I tell him I was only yelling because he wasn't responding and if he doesn't want me yelling, he should probably respond not on the fifth time I call his name, but on the first.  In all seriousness, that is the only time I yell, when I am trying to get his attention.  Either he gets so engrossed in what he is doing that he puts up a wall that won't let any sound in (or at least the sound of his parents voices), or he just truly is ignoring us.  I'll go with the putting up the wall just to make myself feel better.  Its not easy sometimes to keep ourselves on an even keel and deal with him, but we make it happen.  For all his not listening (which he is starting to do at daycare as well), crying, and emotional break downs, he is still a very kind and loving big brother.  

Just the other day, his little sister was walking around crying (either her molars or extreme tiredness, I don't remember which), and he went up to her, gave her a hug and a kiss on the forehead and told her, "Its OK, its OK."  It was perhaps the sweetest thing I have seen him do yet.   They play really well together for the most part, and he is always excited to see his sister, always.  Its moments like those that get me through the tough ones where I have to deal with a manic, over tired, cranky, obstinate, three and a half year old.  He is even helpful around the house, desiring to vacuum, put things away, clean up, and take care of chores around the house.  The only thing I would like is for him to listen a little better and I can handle everything else.  That is the one thing that gets on my nerves.  His break downs are simple for me.  And as almost every seasoned parent will probably tell me, be prepared for the not listening to continue.  I know, he probably will never listen very well, but I can still hope and dream for the day when it improves at least somewhat.  Oh well, for now, I will just keep the image of him giving his sister a hug and kiss in my mind.  That and the picture of him feeding her eggs in the morning.  That is also incredibly cute and adorable to watch.  

Gender Re-Assignment

I am a firm believer that people should have the freedom to do what they want with their bodies.  People should have the right to ingest what they desire, love whomever they wish, and if they are uncomfortable with the body that God gave them, then they should have the right to alter it in whatever way they see fit.  People can make themselves look like lizards for all I care, it doesn't bother me.  While it may not bother me and I feel that everyone should have the right to do as they wish with their bodies, that doesn't mean I will understand the underlying motive for changing  or altering things.  For me, I have always been comfortable in my own skin and as such, have never had the desire to alter anything.  There is a certain woman who just a few days ago graced the cover of Vanity Fair with her new look and name.  I will mention her name only once as I don't feel like she needs any more attention, Ms. Jenner.  She never used to be a woman until recently, and while I have no problem with her changing everything about herself from a man to a woman, I do have a problem with her using the media to attract attention to herself and inflate her lifetime ordeal to star status.  She used to be a male Olympian, used to be married to a Kardashian (a family I come very close to despising), and lately it seems as if she needed some more attention so orchestrated her "coming out" as a women so meticulously that it took a nation by storm.  Or at least almost by storm.  There was an article in the New York Times and there will even be a mini series documenting her transition for all the world to witness and follow.  Did she really need all this attention to validate her being in some way?  Was simply altering her identity not enough?  If her identity as a man was what really bothered her, then altering it and sharing it with her close friends should have been enough.  Perhaps since her divorce from a Kardashian, her fame has plummeted and the attention granted to her was waning so much that she needed another ploy to bring her back into the spot light.  I am not by any means doubting the fact that she was uncomfortable in her own skin, but I do question methods for gaining more attention.  To me, it seems petty and self-serving, but who am I to judge?

There has been a proliferation of even younger people having gender re-assignment surgery, most notably at my wife's high school.  She has dealt with a number who have considered it, and one who actually went through with at least part of the surgery this year, just reverse of what the lady mentioned above did.  This student went from being a female to a male.  I don't have a problem with the procedure, however, I do have a problem with the age that some people are considering the surgery and changing outward portrayal of who they are.  The teenage years are full of hormonal fluxes, raging one minute, absent the next.  These fluctuating hormones can seem to tear at the very fabric of who these teenagers are, making them question their friends and family, making them question themselves, and sending them on such highs and lows that it is often hard to keep on a normal track.  With hormones raging, the teenage years are perhaps the worst time to undergo gender re-assignment surgery, at least in my mind.  Once the hormones have settled down and a person has time to sit with themselves as they are, in their 20's, truly discerning their identity, then they can make a more solid decision about changing who they are.  Along with gender re-assignment surgery is the new fad that is also taking over in high schools and that is being gender neutral.  That is where a person can't decide if they are a male or female and wishes to be called addressed in a neutral manner.  This I have more of a problem with than the actual surgery.  Regardless of what a person feels they are, everyone is given either a male or a female body and as such, should own that body and run with it.  We can discuss that at length, but I will revert back to the simple topic of gender re-assignment.  

For myself at least, while I feel people should have the freedom to do as they wish with their bodies, there is a part of me that will never understand why someone would go through with the aforementioned surgery.  It all boils down to personal identity and how we view ourselves.  I believe that personal identity is derived both from our minds and our bodies.  Our minds contribute most of what we consider to be ourselves, however, our body offers the vessel for our identity to travel in and to an extent becomes part of who we are.  We can not separate ourselves from our bodies and as such, I feel we need to come to terms with who we are.  There is obviously something that occurs within certain people that make them feel disconnected form their bodies, and for those people, that surgery could help.  I don't understand it, but then again, I have never had those feelings.  If a person's body is truly so disconnected from their mind that they feel like they are never themselves, then maybe the surgery is warranted.  My only hope here is that people, especially teenagers, don't rush into this surgery thinking it will be a cure-all for whatever they are feeling.  People need to sit with who they are, after they have exited adolescence, before making the monumental decision to change their bodies to an extent that is very hard to reverse.  

Daycare Prom

You know that moment when you think you have heard of all the nonsense that parents have to go through and think to yourself, "ahhh, nothing else could top what I have already heard and none of it will affect me."?  Well, I thought that moment had passed for me and my life would be smooth and without incident for our children.  OK, maybe not smooth and without incident, but at least void of all the insane and deleterious events that parents are sucked into while simply being parents in the 21st century.  I think you know where I am going with this...I thought wrong.  Yesterday, my wife sent me an email that she got from our children's daycare inviting us and our son to a prom celebrating the graduation of the pre-school class (which my son isn't even in yet).   Let me just say that one more time in case you missed it, a prom in honor of the pre-school graduating class.  Let that sink in for a minute, really sink in, that the parents and children in pre-school and one year behind, were invited to a prom, the likes of which they will probably forget in a few years.   The first time I read the email, I almost thought it was a joke, but the email was long enough to be taken seriously, and attached to the email was the actual sign up sheet to indicate how many people would be attending and what kind of food we would be bringing to share.  Is there some sort of dress code for a "daycare prom"?  Do I have to go rent a tux for my son at three and a half so he can run around and get it covered in food?  What about the parents, are we expected to dress up as well, mingle with non-alcoholic drinks in our hands as we watch our children dance to Raffi and Sesame Street music?  

Even if I am exaggerating a bit, why is there a need for a daycare prom?  If it isn't even truly a prom, then why call it that?  After reading and re-reading and re-reading the invitation, it sounds more like a simple gathering after a graduation.  That doesn't change the fact that it was called a prom, our son isn't even in the "graduating" class of pre-school, and to top it all off, doesn't even know anyone in the graduating class.  Maybe I should go, get a limo or party bus, shuffle all the little kids on and make a grand entrance.  Then again, for those of you who know me, the mere thought of attending a "prom" for a daycare gives me a twitch and raises my blood pressure.  Perhaps the person writing the letter doesn't really know what prom means, because if they did, the probably wouldn't have used it in place of "party".  A "graduation party" I can attend for our son, a "graduation prom" I can not.  The definition of prom is as follows, "a formal ball held for a school class toward the end of the academic year."  Maybe it is a formal ball, but I doubt it.  I doubt that they would expect parents to get all dressed up along with their children to attend a pre-school graduation.  At least I would hope they don't expect it, because I have none of that in me.  Let's break it down even more, pre-school is not academic by any means.  There is no "narrow focus on or display of learning especially its trivial aspects."  Pre-school, and daycare in general, is about learning basic skills and socialization, nothing more.  It is about preparing a child for school and academia without actually entering its realm.  But I digress, we were talking about a prom.  A PROM!  

Needless to say, we will not be attending the prom.  No way, no how, its just not happening.  Even if our son asked if we could go, I would say, "no, we can't".  I would even explain my reasoning behind not going.  I would tell him that prom's are for older people, not young kids his age, and I would also explain that I simply would not be going to an event called a "prom".  I am done with proms, have been done with them for 14 years, and there is no way in hell I am going to one again.  Simply put, my prom days are over, and my son's will not be starting till he is actually in a school that is involved in the study of academics, not pre-school, kindergarten, or any grammar school grade.  Sorry, I am going to be the spoiler here, but that's my job as a parent, to be a spoiler and take all the fun away, at least when I feel it should be postponed for, I don't know, about 13 years at least.  That is all, you may carry on with your lives now.  

Nearing 1.5 Years

Having two children, I get to re-live the different stages that our son went through with our daughter.  Some of them I am glad are past me forever such as the early baby stage where they are not much more than a crying, breathing, being that is uniquely void of any real personality.  That doesn't mean I didn't love my son and daughter at that stage, it just isn't very exciting for me.  There is only so much you can do with a little baby before boredom begins to set in.  There are also stages in our son's development that I do not look forward to having our daughter go through.  Example:  potty training.  I know that girls are supposed to grasp the concept using the bathroom much more quickly than boys, but I still have to go through it, even if it is just for a few months.  And yet, there is so much more that I am excited about that going through potty training will just be a little bump in the road.  The best news about the potty training is that I only have to go through it one more time and then I am done with it forever.  

So what exactly am I excited about?  For starters, the emergence of a distinct and unique personality in our daughter.  What started blossoming at around a year is becoming more and more definitive and special.  She has this quirky little smile, a sly little side grin that she throws around, and is stubborn as an ox.  There is no disputing that she is our daughter, but even with her similarities to her parents, she is showing early signs of becoming her own person.  That, I love.  She is a generally happy toddler, except when she doesn't get what she wants, and has the most adorable laugh ever.  Now that she is in the early stages of coming into her own, she is getting along even better with her older brother and can now interact and play more with him.  For the most part, they play really well together, make each other laugh, and are an adorable sight to see.  At daycare, even thought they are in separate rooms due to the age difference, when they are outside, their play areas are adjoining and they can often be found at the fence separating the two, playing with each other.  I just hope they continue to get along as they get older and enter their teenage years where I feel their friendship will be a great help to them.  Only time will tell.  

But back to our daughter.  In addition to her blossoming personality, I love the fact that she enjoys the outdoors just as much as her brother.  Now that she is walking everywhere, she will often head for the back door and try to escape into the outdoors.  She can't reach the handle yet, but she knows how to get out and the whole process that goes along with it.  If she is wearing slippers, she takes those off, places them neatly on the shoe rack, grabs her shoes and plops down on the floor attempting to put them on.  Once outside, she loves to explore, throw balls in the driveway, and stick her hands in mud and dirt.  With mud and dirt, she is funny.  If she wants to, she will readily shove them right in, try tasting the mud, and has no qualms about any of it.  However, if she is walking and loses her balance and falls, she doesn't like her hands getting dirty from bracing herself.   Yet, while she may have her occasions of not liking her hands getting dirty, improved balance and time should cure her of that.  One thing she loves to do is go for walks.  Whether on our property in Vermont where she sits atop my shoulders as we traverse the hillside and stream or just in our yard where she either walks around holding a hand or rides serenely in her stroller, she loves all of it.  

From this point forward, things will only get better.  I know we have some rough times to go through still, namely all the half year stages where disequilibrium takes over their little bodies.  For all the rough times we have to go through, however, there are plenty of joyful times to balance it out and keep that smile on my face.  As I have said, even with our son when he was little, I take everything one day at a time.  I do my best to get home from work when they are getting home and make sure I see them every day.  Yes, I need to work to pay the bills, but that is all.  The rest I devote to family.  So will I ever be rich?  Probably not, but I'm OK with that, I have my wife and children and that is all that really matters.  

A Girls Work Ethic

The argument or debate about women in the work force is still raging, not in terms of them actually working, but about the pay they receive and how it is normally less than what a man working in an equivalent position would make.   My opinion is that pay should absolutely be equal and not gender based.  Many women work just as hard if not harder than men and they should be afforded equal opportunities to show their skills and receive ample compensation for their work.   I have seen the bias of men versus women first hand.  In my industry, myself being a painting contractor, it is almost a given that men do the work.   How do I know this?  Well, years ago, perhaps 5-6 at this point, my wife was working for me over the summer and one of the jobs I received was being subbed out to me by another contractor.  When I told him that I was planning on bringing my wife, he asked politely that I not do that because the customer wouldn't "like" it.  Now, I don't know if it was the customer or just his "old school" mentality that drove him to suggest that my wife shouldn't come.  But it did happen, and I am sure it still happens to a certain extent now.  Granted, some of the ladders and equipment that I have to move and use on a daily basis are cumbersome and heavy, but that doesn't mean a woman couldn't move them, it just might be difficult.  My wife was always a hard worker and was one of the few that I could trust to work to my standards.   That has always been one of the trickiest aspects of hiring someone to work for me; finding someone who can learn and execute what I ask and work to my standards.  There have been many people who have tried working for me and could not pass muster.  So, for the most part, I work for myself.  This year, however, my wife who is a high school teacher asked if I wanted to be part of the internship program at her school.  I figured why not.  I would get a high school senior looking to work and on top of that it would be essentially 120 hours of free labor.  Both my wife and I figured that one of the high school boys from the tech ed department would take the internship.  Well, we were both wrong.  Instead, one of her students who will be going to art school in the fall took the internship and she has so far proven herself to be a harder worker than all the young men I have hired.  

It has only been a little over a week, but so far she listens well, works hard, and if there is every any down time, she is always asking if there is anything she can do.  If she notices there is something that needs to get done, she asks and then executes.  Even young men years older than her have had trouble working as hard as she has.  Her skill level isn't where I need it to be yet, but it is a learning process and being an intern, I can take a little extra time to show her how to execute certain aspects of the daily work without worrying about losing money.  Even after just a week, she has already asked if I need help over the summer and if she could have a job.  Talk about motivated.  She is only the second woman to work for me, my wife being the first.  Comparing those two women to the other men I have hired, I am not sure if I want to hire another man to work for me.  I know that not every woman would be willing to work as a painting contractor, but the same obviously holds true for men.  There is just such a vast difference in work ethic that I don't know if I could go back to having some guy working for me.  

I have never been one to discriminate based on a person's gender.  I didn't grow up surrounded by the type of people who placed men as more important and harder workers than women.  I was never subjected to the cultural stigma that women should not have certain jobs because they are women.  At this point in my life, I am glad that I never had those discriminatory aspects in my life.  I can now say I will afford equal opportunity to both men and women, but honestly, I might actually favor hiring a woman over a man now.  In my world, the pendulum is swinging the opposite way.  I won't discriminate against men for any reason, but I will now be more inclined to look for a woman to work for me instead of a man.  My intern has obviously just started and time will tell if she can keep up, perform to my standards, and continue learning about the painting business.  I have a feeling she won't have a problem though.  This may be all new to her, but it would be new for any high school student.  For now, I am relishing my free labor and seeing how girls can work harder than the boys.  

Logic and Potty Training

So I'm going to jump from one end of our life cycle to the opposite; from losing logic and faculty, to gaining and learning everything.   I'm going to talk about our son today.  Potty training is one of those activities that, as a parent, I have absolutely dreaded and still take no joy in.  I'm not gonna lie, even from the outset, potty training sucked.  There was nothing I liked about it at all.   Give me a temper tantrum with objects being thrown and feet being kicked and I will gladly jump right in and deal with that over training any child to potty, let alone our son.  Despite all that I am saying, I do love our son very much, however, potty training I can do without.  But, lest I jinx myself now by saying this, the days of potty training our son are nearing the end.  (Yes, we still have our daughter to deal with, but at least we get a little reprieve.)  The last time our son had an accident was weeks ago.  Every so often he will still have an accident, but his muscle control has grown leaps and bounds and the periodic accident I can handle.   Whenever he announces to the household that he has to go poop now, I want to jump for joy, run in circles shouting at the top of my lungs in celebration, and break out the party music.  I don't do any of that despite a burning desire to do so, I just usher him inside quickly and tell him how proud I am of him.   It is even getting humorous at times.  Yesterday, we were outside starting up the charcoal for dinner when he announced that he had to poop.  He ran inside, grabbed his mommy, and had her help him out on the potty.  The poop went well.  On his way back outside, according to my wife, he stopped at the door, turned to announce, "I have to poop some more", and started running back to the potty.  Before he was even out of the room, he stopped, turned, and said "uh uh, Mommy, there's no more poop, I just had a little gas".  That was it, but hearing it from a child is hilarious.  Everything must be announced and broadcast to the household.  I absolutely love the up front honesty of a child.  It puts a smile on my face and makes me laugh more often than not.  

Going along with mastering his potty training, our son is now gaining a new tool in his arsenal of manipulation.  Logic, or at least the early stages of logic.  Yesterday, the same day where he mistook gas for poop, we were unloading the car from the grocery store.  After asking him to grab the cheese, he instead headed to the front of the car.   Curious as to what he was doing, I follow him and see him standing in front of the car, pants and underwear dropped, peeing on the driveway.  Of course, my first question is, "What are you doing?"  "I had to pee".   "Yes, but if we have to pee outside, we pee behind the shed, right?"  "Yes, but I was staying close to you Daddy."  At that point, I stopped and thought to myself about our son, "Your good you."  Seeing as we try to get our son to stay close when we are at a store, he employed that in his desire to pee on our driveway.  So amending my earlier statement, I proceeded to tell him that I appreciate what he did, but next time he can just tell me and I will accompany him to the shed so he can pee back there instead.  You see, I an effort to speed along the potty training, I taught him how to pee outside so he didn't have to run inside all the time.  Sounded brilliant at the time, but now he pees wherever he wants outside, including the occasional time at daycare.  Yes, we get chided for that, however I would much rather have him pee outside than have to clean him up and change him after he peed in his pants.  Now it is just a matter of teaching him peeing etiquette.   As for the logic, it just means we need to tread ever more carefully in what we tell him and say to him as he will not begin attempting to use our words against us.  He is a joy, regardless, and between him and our daughter, I couldn't be happier.  I just hope our daughter is easier to potty train than he was.  We are not completely in the clear yet with him, but the end is in sight and what a beautiful end it will be.  

Off topic briefly, yesterday morning my son and I decided that we needed to cut our hair, so yesterday afternoon while his sister was going to bed, we broke out the clippers, and began cutting.  I cut his hair first, nice and short for the summer.  He sat still through the whole process and periodically ran to check his hair in the mirror.  When I was all set with his hair, he said, "Alright Daddy, my turn to cut your hair."  What could I say?  I handed him the clippers, and he went to town.  I proceeded to check my hair in the mirror periodically, and overall, he did a pretty good job.  There were a few tufts that he missed here and there, but he insisted that we were done and he put the clippers away.  I didn't argue at that point, I just finished cleaning up my hair after he went to bed.  Its funny how life works.  I was talking to gentleman a few weeks ago about kids and he was saying that as kids grow older, it just gets better.  I would have to agree at this point.  Every time I think we have reached a point where I enjoy our kids as much as possible, they get a little bit older and I enjoy them even more.  Can't wait to see what's next with my two little ones.  

A Self Destructing Mind

Last weekend, the weekend before Memorial Day, I decided that I needed to go see my grandmother, Baba, again.  She is my mom's mother, and lives in a nursing home in Westport.  She has been there for the past two years and is dealing with dementia that is slowly unraveling her mind.  Her personality still comes forward, but she rarely remembers who people are and most of the times when she talks, it is very hard to follow what she is saying.  That is how it was last Monday when I went with my mom to go visit her.  Her pin straight gray hair is longer than I have ever seen it, past her shoulders, and her face looks simply tired, partly from being in her 90's and living a long life, partly from the meds that they keep her on to mediate her volatile temper.  When we arrived, she was napping in her wheelchair just outside her room which is visible down a long hallway immediately after disembarking from the elevator.  With Baba, you never know exactly how she is going to be when you visit, although according to my mom, these days she doesn't really remember much of anything.  So, we approached her down the long hallway, watching her nap in peace with not a care in the world.  We woke her up when we got to her and as would be a typical response from her when asked if she was napping she said, "No, I just closed my eyes for a minute."  She was periodically coherent in what she was saying, but most of the time when she tried to convey a thought of hers, she jumped around so much that my mom and I couldn't follow.  I'm sure that it made sense in her mind, but to us, it was a jumble of words that she struggled to put together in three different languages, English, Spanish, and her native Russian.  At least she was happy to see us and have us as visitors.  And when I showed her pictures of my children, a huge smile came over her face and you could tell she was excited to see pictures of little children.  We had to explain that they were my children, but that doesn't matter at this point.  The only thing that does is that it brought a smile to her face.  Despite the fact that she didn't know who my mom or I were, she is still a mom and a grandmother to us respectively and we won't forget who she is.

Part of me wonders if the medications she is on has contributed to her trouble in assembling coherent thoughts and communicating them to others.  Even with her unraveling, self destructing mind, I would like to hold on to a glimmer of hope (even though that is probably long gone) that she still has some of her faculty left.  I understand completely why she is on the medications she is on.  Before she left my parent's house where she used to live, she would get periodically violent when she would forget where she was or when she thought that my parents were breaking into their own house.  Even in her earlier time at the nursing home, she would get extremely upset if someone touched her in an effort to help or if she had a roommate she did not agree with.  Her temper would ramp up to the point where they would have to sedate her in order to calm her down.  It wasn't good for her or those around her and unfortunately in order for her to stay there, she had to be put on medication.  Dementia, unlike Alzheimer's, seems to be more of a disease where the connections in the mind come undone and re-assemble themselves in weird and distorted ways.  Its almost like a person with dementia has taken an ungodly amount of hallucinogenic substances and is incapable of seeing reality the way the rest of the world is.  There are still areas of overlap, areas where there is a mutual understanding of the reality at hand and a comprehension of what is being said, but mostly there is no overlap.  It is a weird disease, it dementia even fits into the category of a "disease", and unfortunately there is no cure.  Its like watching someone travel down the rabbit hole, still being able to communicate with them, but not understanding what they are seeing.  Our reality is understood based upon what we all agree on.  We, meaning all conscious humans, agree that a tree is a tree based upon the fact that it is made of wood, surrounded by bark, is tall, has branches at the top, and unless it is winter in the northern areas, has leaves that help it to grow.  Baba, whose mind has traveled down the rabbit hole, might still see a tree, but where we would see only a tree, Baba would see a tree from her childhood, with notches in it from children climbing it, perhaps with a tree house in it, and that tree could even be Russian, in her back yard from her childhood.  A grossly simplified example, perhaps, but not being able to see what Baba sees, that is the best I can surmise.

What I do know is, Baba is still around, she is still my grandmother, and while life is hectic with two children running around the house, I still owe it to her to visit as much as my schedule allows.  After all, I only have two grandmother's left.  Out of those two, one can see me but doesn't know who I am, the other is blind and knows who I am but can not see me.  An interesting situation when you think about it, but I still love them both.  Seeing my grandparents get old as made me resolve to never get old myself.  I am not sure how I will accomplish that yet, but that is my goal.  OK, so that might be a little beyond my control, but what I will do is do everything in my power to stave off dementia and diabetes, the two diseases that my two grandmother's have, and the two diseases that have rendered them incapable of caring for themselves.  How I wish things were different sometimes, but alas, these are their lives and at this point we can do nothing but visit them, love them, and let them know we still care....even if one of them doesn't know it is her grandson and daughter who visited her.  

Update

Hey everyone, be back Friday with a new post. Internet is down at our house and won't be back up till Thursday sometime.

Post Funeral

My grandfather's (Dziadziu's) funeral was on Saturday.  It was a long, emotionally draining, beautiful day.   It was nice to see all the family and friends who came to pay their respects and it was good to catch up with many family members who it seems we only see at weddings and funerals.  When family disperses, that's how it goes sometimes.  Regardless of how infrequently we see our extended family, its nice to know they still support us as we would support them in both good times and sad.  I was a wreck on Saturday, but I expected to be after spending so much time with Dziadziu.  It was a blessing to me to be able to help them more when they got older, especially when they moved closer to my parent's house.  Not everyone gets the opportunity to be close to their grandparents and I am lucky that I had that great opportunity.  As a friend shared with me online, "A grandfather holds his grand children's hands for a while, he holds their hearts forever."  I believe that to be true and felt it to be true at the cemetery on Saturday.  Being a veteran of World War II, Dziadziu received a military burial.  It was one of the most beautiful ceremony's I have witnessed.  There were no guns being fired off, just a lone bugler playing taps in the quiet of a cemetery.  And then the flag, being expertly folded, end over end, tucked tight into a triangle, and handed to my grandmother (Babci) by a young military man.  Simple, reverent, final.  It was a beautiful day and despite the many tears that flowed, it was good to say goodbye one more time.  

The night before the funeral, my wife and I went over a friend's house to hang out for a bit, sit by a fire, and have a few beers.  After sitting there for a while, he offered his condolences after seeing my post on Facebook earlier.  He asked about Dziadziu a bit and then asked a question that got me thinking.  It was, "have you ever thought about what your grandfather was doing when he was your age?"  I had never put Dziadziu's life into perspective like that.  As a grandson, it seems we always perceive our grandparents as always being older.  Most people, I would imagine, never or rarely look at their grandparents as people who could have lead different lives when they were younger.  I think its more an issue of the frame of reference we come to know them in.  While we hear stories of their younger days, and see pictures of them, we never take that moment to picture them in a different milieu.  So, sitting there on Friday night, I started thinking.  Doing that math, Dziadziu was born in 1924, in the height of the Great Depression.  I heard the stories about how he grew up with next to nothing, on a farm, and how he went to war when he was old enough.  He didn't get married until he was 27, after he got back from Europe, and as it turns out, that was a little after I was married.  It was unusual for that time to be married so late, but being in the war, there was no other option.  My dad was born a year later, and by the time Dziadziu was 32, my dad was 4 years old, almost the same timeline that I am on with our son who is three and a half.   So when Dziadziu was my age, 32, he was raising a little hellion like all little Polish boys are.  As to what else he was doing at that time, I don't really know, but it definitely makes me want to find out.  I know he worked at Pratt and Whitney for a long time and he also owned his own welding business, I just don't know which came first or if they overlapped or how it all worked.  The question that got me thinking of that was definitely thought provoking and necessary.  

So what to do now that the funeral is over.  Well, get back to living with Dziadziu taking his place with the rest of my family that has passed.  They are both in Heaven and my heart.  He was the only grandfather I got to know in my life.  My other one, my mom's dad, passed away young when my mom was only 14.  I have pictures of him, and I know that him and Dziadziu are getting to know each other now.  So for now, its good bye, but we will all meet again.  The sadness will fade, but the knowledge that they are watching over our family sits deep within my heart.  I am blessed to have the family that I have and know that they will always be there for me as I will be there for them.  So looking forward, its on to happier times, watching over Babci, and keeping a smile on my face and a joke on my lips.  Thank you again to all my friends and family for their kind and thoughtful words over this past week.  

My Grandfather's Trip to Heaven

A little while back, around Easter weekend, I wrote about my grandfather (Dziadziu in Polish) not doing well and our family not knowing how long he would be around for.  Well, yesterday morning, he passed away.  He went in for hip surgery on Tuesday, presumably because he fell once again and did some serious damage, and while the surgery went well, the recovery did not.  They couldn't get his blood pressure back up to where it should have been, his breathing became labored, as him and my grandmother had decided, they didn't want any extra measures taken to revive him or prolong his life.   At that point, the only thing the doctor's wanted to do was intubate him (put a tube down his throat to help him breath).   So, instead of dealing with the pain of a tube down his throat and the pain of recovery, he passed away.  He had managed to hold on for quite a while after this last Easter, but we all knew it was just a matter of time.  The last time we saw him, he could barely stay awake for 5 minutes at a time without dozing off for a few more minutes.  He lived for 90 years and what a life it was for him.  

He was a veteran of World War II, a truck driver and no where near the front lines, and he used to love telling the story of how he brought a little dog back with him from overseas.  They weren't supposed to bring any sort of animal back, but he was small enough that he was able to hide him in his accordion case and bring him back anyway.  Dziadziu was a welder, owning his own business in Chicopee, Massachusetts for many years.  Most of all, though, he was a loving husband, father, and grandfather.   He loved life, took every opportunity he could to break out his accordion and play music, and loved to dance the polka with his wife, my grandmother.   Two of my fondest memories of him date back to when I was a little boy.  In Chicopee, where they lived, an old train track ran behind their house, unused by the time I was around, and perfect for walking along and seeing what we could find.  Seeing the old side track where they used to deliver coal and hearing the stories about it, the factories just across the river from the tracks, and best of all, searching for the railroad spikes that had shimmied loose and lay strewn about as if in due time, the train tracks themselves would disassemble.  I don't know where those spikes we collected are today, but that memory is seared into my mind and is one I will never forget.  The other memory that sits fondly in the recesses of my mind, never to be forgotten, are the Thanksgivings we spent out on Cape Cod at the house they had there.  I used to help stoke the fire in the fireplace with Dziadziu, play cards early in the morning betting for pennies, and run little toy cars through a patch of dirt that we had made roads in.  Those memories will last forever with me and I often think about them to this day.  

I am thankful that I got to know Dziadziu like I did and spend the time with him when I was younger.  Yes, the tears are coming now for despite the fact that I know he is now without pain and in a better place, I still miss him.  I am glad that I got to see him Easter weekend and spend time with him and I am glad that at least my son will remember him to an extent.  He was a good man, faithful, and always ready to crack a joke at a moments notice.  Everything was sacred to him, and yet every situation could always be filled with a laugh.  It will be those moments of laughter I remember, his all encompassing smile, and his love of family.  So while the tears come, I am happy that he is now without pain and I know he will be looking over us now, especially my son and daughter.  Rest in peace, Dziadziu, rest in peace and know that one day we will share jokes again.  

Little Princess in the Dirt

So far, and I am happy to report this, our daughter loves everything that her brother does.  From little cars and trucks, to coloring on the easel, to playing outside in the dirt, she is taking after her brother's interests...to an extent.  I am not by any means saying that she is exactly like him, for she is not.  Her temperament is completely different than that of her brother.  Where he is the more emotional, shy, one, she is the outgoing, opinionated, throw it in your face little girl.  And she is only 15 months old.  Yet while she may be obstinate and opinionated, giving me flashbacks of my youth, she is also adorable and quirky in all the right ways.  Simply put, she knows what she wants (or at least she thinks she does) and will make you smile right after she throws a fit.  Seeing her now, at her age, I know I am in trouble.  But I will love every second of it.  Especially the fact that she loves to try and eat topsoil right now.  Whenever we are out side, which happens to be whenever it isn't raining, she and her brother take to playing with the dirt in their wagon.  Our son has filled it up with dirt and brick, to "build his house" as he says, and with a little addition of water, they have mud to play with.  Our daughter absolutely loves the mud.  Its fun to sit back and watch her stick her fingers right into the mud, relishing the cool, squishy feeling, and then pulling them out wondering if she should feel disgusted by the dirt on her fingers.  There are times, I swear, when she almost has a desire to shaker her hand in disgust that she just got it dirty, but she never does.  She will, however, grab a handful of dirt, and if we are not quick enough, turn her back to us and shove it in her mouth.  While she may almost get disgusted by the dirt on her hands, for some reason whenever she sneaks that dirt in her mouth (which isn't very often once we figured out she likes it) a smile erupts on her face as if she has found gold.  

Just like her brother, our daughter loves being outside.  Whenever she is ready to go outside, which happens to be quite a bit, she will head right to the back door and try to get out herself.  She even tries to get her own shoes on, which while a noble effort on her part, usually leads to her getting frustrated that she can't do it herself.   Once outside, aside from attempting to eat dirt, she loves following her brother around and attempting to do whatever he does.  If he is riding the tricycle, then she must also ride the tricycle and will waddle after him as he cruises along.  And thanks to her Grammy who showed her that she can sit on the tricycle and be pushed around, she now loves for the adults around her to be her chauffeur and drive her around our driveway.  Yet, the fact that she loves being on a bike outdoors is all that matters to me.  The fact that she now has one more object to share with her brother when she doesn't understand the concept yet makes it ever more interesting.  Our son has become excellent at sharing.  So much that he expects our daughter to share with him just as much as he shares with her.  To be honest, his version of sharing is a bit on the selfish side, but at three and a half, I'm not complaining.  Its comical to watch at times.  He will bring over one of his toys to "share" with his sister, just so he can have whatever toy she is playing with.  Ah, the joys of childhood and learning.

While our daughter will follow her brother around much of the time, she also heads off on her own and wants to go exploring different areas of the yard.  She will reach for either my wife's or my hand and take us on a journey.  She waddles along, perfecting her gait, and taking in all of the outdoor world.  From sticks and stones to rocks and random seashells left in the yard, she has to touch it all, feel it, get to know what life outside is all about.  She even has taken to trying to throw the ball to one of our dogs.  We have one of those Chuck-It objects, the ones that hold a tennis ball and are essentially an extension of your arm to make throwing the ball easier.  She has figured out what needs to be done in order to throw the ball, even if she can't do it yet.  She picks up the tennis ball from our dog Aspen, places it in the Chuck-It, and half throws the entire Chuck-It with the ball onto the ground.  It is cute to watch.  Other times, she will try putting the ball from the Chuck-It right into Aspen's mouth at which point Aspen glances at me wondering why she isn't throwing it.  The important thing is that she is trying.  I don't care if she doesn't always like dirt, but as long as she loves being outside, the world will continue to turn.  And if she doesn't, than I will still love her, I will just have to drag her outside periodically.  

Additive Free

Additive free.  What exactly do I mean when I say "additive free"?  I am referring to all the products that we use on an everyday basis.  And not just products that we would apply to ourselves, but also to the food that we ingest.  Yesterday I talked about the wonders of the Internet and globalization and how they have brought the far reaches of the world to our fingertips.  While in many ways, it is beneficial to have the world at our fingertips, it can also be a curse.  And how we interpret it as a curse is all dependent on how we view life and the food and products we use every day.  There are many people who simply disregard what goes into their food and how it may affect them in the long run.  I used to be one of those people, eating anything and everything regardless of the ingredients contained in a given product.  The change didn't happen overnight, but it was a slow eye opening experience that, while I absolutely love the way I feel now, I sometimes curse the day I started looking at the back of packages and what ingredients products contain.  Its not that all additives are bad, but I now live by the motto that if I can't easily pronounce an ingredient, it probably shouldn't be either ingested or applied to my skin in any manner.  Once you start doing even just a little bit of research into what the ingredients actually are that companies put into products, you start realizing that maybe they aren't as safe as they are said to be.  A big one is aluminum.  Almost every sunscreen you buy has aluminum in it.  So what is the big deal with aluminum?  Well, aluminum, once absorbed into the body, builds and can increase your risk of getting Alzheimer's.  I for one, never want to get Alzheimer's and will do everything in my power to keep aluminum away from my body.  So does that mean I just walk into the sun every day without applying some sort of protection from the sun?  No, it just means we have taken to making our own.  I know, it might sound a little crazy, but making sunscreen at home is incredibly easy, especially with the availability of products on the Internet.  (If your interested and want to know the ingredients, leave a comment and I will get back to you).  The same goes for deodorant.  Almost all deodorants have aluminum in them.  The good news is, they actually sell deodorant that is aluminum free.  It is simple things like altering buying habits that just might add a few extra years to our lives and make us healthier in the here and now.  Sunscreen and deodorant are the big ones when it comes to products that we apply to our bodies.  So what about foods?

Foods are the tough one.  In our household now, we are striving to keep all products that contain GMO's, chemicals, and preservatives out of our cupboards and drawers.  GMO's seem to be the big ticket item that is brought up in many debates these days.  There are those that say GMO's will do no harm to a person and those that say they will.  We are part of the group that say they have the potential to do harm, and not just because they are GMO, but because of the reason they were genetically modified to begin with.  The trouble with any food that is genetically modified is that it was done so to prevent that plant from being killed by herbicides and pesticides.  That is not the only reason, but that is a major one.  That means that any plant that is genetically modified probably contains at least trace amounts of the pesticide or herbicide they were sprayed with.  If you eat enough of these pesticides and herbicides, you could harm your body in unimaginable ways starting with your stomach which has to process all the food.  So what kind of pesticides and herbicides are we talking about?  Take the product, RoundUp.  We all know it kills weeds, and around the house it is best known for killing poison ivy and other pestilent plants.  The key ingredient is glyphosate.  This means that all the corn that is genetically modified is usually done so in order to be sprayed with RoundUp and not die.  Pleasant.  That means every time we eat corn (90% of which is GM), we are probably eating RoundUp, especially if that corn came from a big farm.  Its scary once you start learning why things are done and what the effect is.  That is only the GMO side of the additive equation.  I haven't even touched on chemicals or preservatives (usually one and the same).  In terms of preservatives, I will give you two examples that floored me when I read them.  (Disclaimer:  if you like the cereal Lucky Charms, read no further).  I used to love Lucky Charms when I was younger.  The little marshmallows made the milk taste so much better and I always tried to save the marshmallows for the end so I could eat them by the spoonful.  About a month ago I was working in a customers house and saw a box of Lucky Charms sitting on the counter.  (I haven't eaten them in years by the way).  Curious, I picked up the box and started going through the ingredients.  There were a lot of ingredients that were puzzling to me, but the one that really stuck out like a sore thumb was TSP or Tri Sodium Phosphate.  As a painter, I use TSP as a cleaning agent (which is actually its main use).  It is an excellent cleaner for removing soot, grime, and grease and leaves walls ready for painting.  It is also an excellent floor cleaner.  Now why would they put TSP in my favorite childhood cereal.  I don't know, but according to the FDA, it is "generally recognized as safe".   Yet, after having used it to clean floors and walls with, I don't really want to be ingesting it.  The other one is lemon juice.  We used to buy it at the store until we found out that it had a preservative that is a known carcinogen.  Now ask yourself, why would a company use a carcinogen as a preservative.  Probably because it is the most cost effective way for them to operate.  Needless to say we don't use that product anymore.  There are many products that we don't use anymore for exactly these reasons.  Once you start reading about what the chemicals are and what they can do to a body, you start not wanting them in your body.  Since eliminating as many preservatives and GMO's as possible from our diet, I have felt healthier than ever.  I could go on and on, but I will end it here for today.  My advice, do your own research and come to your own conclusions.  This was not meant to tell you how to eat and live, but to suggest that you look a little harder at what you are consuming.  

The Trouble With the U.S. and Iran

As I grow older and somewhat wiser, my views of the world change.  I have started to look at the bigger picture differently.  It is not due to any one source, but rather a slew of outside influences and the shrinking of the world due to globalization.  Globalization I feel has had the greatest impact.  It has brought the far corners of the world to my finger tips and allowed me to learn about different cultures through different avenues without even leaving my home.  It allows the unbiased information from across the world to travel almost instantaneously to my lap top.  This allows me to sort through what I feel is bull shit propaganda versus what may actually contain some grains of truth.   Everything is biased to a degree, but that is not a topic for here nor there right now.  The information we have at our fingertips is not meant to be wholly absorbed as is, but rather to be processed and verified using whatever tools we have available to us.  One tool we have that brings the world closer is the news.  As I mentioned above, everything is biased to a degree, and while the news is supposed to take a neutral stance, there are many times when it does not.  Yet, what other tool do we have that can bring such a vast array of information instantaneously from around the world?  None.  So, as I normally do every morning, I read the New York Times and peruse their different columns.  Currently reading the paper online, I have access to the videos that are produced either via the paper or their correspondents.   A while ago, I stumbled across a series that is still on going, called "Our Man in Tehran".  This series is about a news correspondent, Thomas Erdbrink, who delves into the lives of everyday Iranians and the issues they face.  Some of the topics addressed so far are those of radicals, the death penalty, marriage, and drought.   In each segment, a small picture is painted of life in Iran.  The only time it deals with the government or people in power is when they are talking about radicals and the effect the government has on those radicals.  When you start to look at the world through the lens of everyday life, things start to look very similar to everywhere else, albeit with a different cultural twist.  People have similar struggles regardless of where they live.   Everyone has to put food on their table.  Everyone has to deal with family members.  Everyone has a government that they either like or dislike.  The human condition varies from country to country, but if you start to identify with people as people and not "Iranians" or "Americans" or "pick a country", then it is easier to start seeing that their lives matter just as much as ours do.  Just because our government casts a country in a demonic light doesn't mean that every person living there is demonic.  Rather, the people living there probably have more in common with us than we would ever think, if we only took the time to look at their lives.  "Our Man in Tehran" does just that.  It takes everyday life in Iran and makes it accessible to the rest of the world.  Writing this now, I wonder if any other countries would watch a series on the United States and the people living here; their struggles and how they live.  Perhaps it would be useful for Iranians to see that we in the United States, while half a world away, deal with similar struggles.  

The accessibility we have to other countries today, even if they may be our governments' ardent enemies, is astounding and can do more to pull down barriers than anything prior.  The more we see how similar we are to those around the world, the more we realize that it is government propaganda that we must fear the most.  It is our governments and their power play for the upper hand that ultimately casts a shadow on certain parts of the world.  Scarier still, it is the people who buy in to that propaganda who ultimately create the larger problem.  The people who refuse to look past our governments' picture are the ones who perpetuate feelings of hatred towards other countries and who become the unwitting foundation of our governments' actions.  If our governments did not have people to support their actions, those actions (in the form of sanctions and wars) would fail.  It is the people who follow our governments blindly, without questioning them, who take away the humanity of people living elsewhere.  If we react solely to a government, an entity, we are relinquishing any possibility of seeing the people behind that government.  If we peel back the layers, we start to see the same human emotions that are universally shared; love, hate, fear, hope, etc.  Those are basic emotions that we all possess.  The more we can pull back the veil of government and see the people behind, the more we can relate to them and begin to pull down the barriers constructed decades ago.  As FDR stated years ago, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself".  If we are afraid of a different culture for whatever reason, we immediately begin to construct barriers, and those barriers stoke the unwarranted fear.  Most times, there is nothing to be afraid of.  Most times, fear comes from a lack of understanding.  That fear is played upon by governments to control a people and perpetuate their reasoning for their actions.  We must begin to look past our fears and see the other side and seek to understand.  Now, with all my writing against governments, I am not saying that governments are not useful.  We need a government to keep order and to run a country, but in most cases, government goes too far.  If more people began to look at the broader picture and the humanity contained within that broader picture, our governments would have less traction and might actually re-align themselves with the will of the people.  I know, lofty ideals and hopes for our governments, yet it has to start somewhere.  All we need is to relate on a human level, forgo religious denominations, political alignments, racial prejudices, and simply see others for what they are.  For we all are "human, all too human."