Valor

Somehow I managed to miss Sonar X5’s four year immunizations.  Not sure how, but considering how many childhood immunizations there are nowadays, and the certainty of springtime illnesses around here, I suppose it isn’t too surprising.  He must have them to enter kindergarten in the fall, so off we went to get him up to date.  

I believe in letting the kids prepare themselves for hard stuff such as this, so last night we were talking about shots, talking about what he would take with him to help him feel brave, answering his questions, and giving him detailed lessons in immunology.  

X5: Will I get them in the arm or the leg?  

Me:  You’re a big kid now.  Arm for sure. 

X5:  How many shots will there be?

Me:  (feeling uninformed) I can’t remember.  Not more than four.  Probably two or three. 

X5:  Shots hurt, but then it will be over with and I won’t have to think about it again for a while.

Me:  Right.

This morning he chose to bring along a small stuffed elephant, just right for squeezing one hand around the middle in a moment of pain or panic.  He was his usual self in preparation, except that he wanted to sit in my lap in the waiting room, much to Sonar X3’s chagrin.  

When we asked the doc how many shots there’d be, and she cheerfully answered Four at Four, I mentally kicked myself.  Sonar X5 shrugged nervously, wrinkled his nose and asked if they’d do two on each side.  :)  The doc left (aren’t they just cowards) and the nurse returned with the four syringes and Sonar X5 squeezed his elephant and rolled up his sleeves.  Even Sonar X3, who had been climbing and bouncing all over the waiting chair seemed to recognize the gravity of the situation and sat completely still, watching in silent horror as the nurse spread the implements of torture and four banana yellow bandaids around Sonar X5 on the table.  

I asked if he wanted to hold my hand (no), cautioned that he needed to be still, and joked that he shouldn’t kick or hit the nurse (she didn’t laugh).  She told him that if he moved and the needle came out, she’d have to poke him again.  He tersely nodded his understanding.  

With the first poke, he squeezed his eyes tightly shut, maybe a small tear leaked out at the corner.  With the second poke, he took a deep breath, squeezing the elephant within an inch of its life.  Now the nurse was impressed.  She lavished praise for his bravery as she applied the banana yellow bandaids to the injection sites.  Pokes three and four followed in similar fashion.  Not a squeak.  Not a yelp or a twitch.  

He faced down each injection with a fierce kind of bravery, and when it was over, blew out a long slow breath, accepted with a tiny smile all of our praise and adoration and hugs and hair ruffling.  

The nurse wished that all kids were as good and brave as he was (we hoped the same for her), and that she was sure he would be her best patient all day.  

Both Sonars got stickers.  We popped into the grocery store for fresh bubble solution, luscious smelling strawberries (that were on sale!), a small watermelon, and  sherbet for a milkshake.  

We should all face our trials with such conviction, confidence, and fortitude.  Maybe it would help if we got bubbles and ice cream every time we had to do something hard.  :)

Mother's Day, Part 1: An Idyllic Time

There has been magic in my family this year. I turned around the other day and caught sight of it. Good thing, too. I might have missed it entirely.

My Sonars are getting bigger, getting more independent, doing more and more things to take care of themselves and to take care of me.

In August, Sonar X7 started going to and from school on his own, on his bike. I’ve facilitated his transfer only a handful of times, during rain and illness. After a couple of weeks of anxiety, in which we followed shortly behind him to make sure he didn’t need to be scraped off the sidewalk, the pride settled in for me. I was proud that he was able to negotiate the bike, the helmet, the backpack, the half-mile, the crossing of the big street, the parking, the locking, and the satisfaction of arriving under his own power. His joy at going fast, or slow, or meandering, or whatever way he decided to go, was so apparent and so infectious.

One consequence of his independence was the other two Sonars not having to get up and get ready as early in the morning. Through kindergarten and first grade for Sonar X7, we all got up at the same time, all ate breakfast, all rushed and flurried out the door to walk or drive up to the school. Then the preschool pack and I would come back and settle into our routine. Now though, Sonar X7 is up and off before the other two even crawl out of bed. So our mornings start off quietly and gently, sometimes one at a time. I love this because there are unexpected moments of quiet snuggling, sleepy morning questions and dreams.

Another consequence of Sonar X7’s independence is that the rest of us get a leisurely quiet time in the afternoon, not interrupted by the packing up and heading off to school to pick him up. So we each settle into a spot with books or puzzles, or as often as not for me, the computer, for a while. Some of us sometimes go to sleep. Then we wake up and color or draw until Sonar X7 gets home. Our afternoon then tumbles into a flurry of snacks, homework, and playing outside until dinnertime.

Tucked away in the spaces in between, Sonar X5 is learning to read. Watching him figure out the way the letters and words work to make meaning is one of the coolest things ever. I’ve been here before with the biggest Sonar, but it’s still magic. Each of them has stumbled toward literacy in his own way. Sonar X7’s reading acquisition reminded me of childbirth. It came later than I expected, and then it was sudden and messy and violent and then he was a reader. Now he reads anything and everything he can lay his hands on. His bed table holds the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and encyclopedia of the weird, a comic book, and he’s lying in bed reading Dragonrider by Cornelia Funke. Sonar X5 is sneaking up on literacy. Quietly working out the words that are all around him. Cereal boxes. Some of his books. An activity page here or there. A question about how something is spelled or pronounced. And now he can read all the words on a kindergarten readiness page. He can read most of the words in a few books, partly from working them out and partly from memory. And it’s so delicious to watch how patiently and hard he works at it. Shaping the words in his mouth, listening inside his head, then smiling proudly when realization hits. This is not to say that he doesn’t get frustrated. But he doesn’t let the frustration overwhelm him. When he gets tired, he walks away, knowing in his quiet way that tomorrow he will try again.

In other quiet spaces, Sonar X3 is wondering where he fits in all of this. Nothing so dramatic as learning to read, though he is discovering that he knows most of his letters and numbers, and that feels good to him. He is figuring out how to draw lines and shapes with more intention, which he finds funny. His development though is focused now on the emotional. He sees the things that his siblings are doing, and tries to understand it. He is bold, and a combination of our encouragement and his personality has mostly kept him from being babied by the other kids and most of their friends. But the gulf that separates them is spreading right now. Reading, and very soon kindergarten for Sonar X5 will stretch that gap even farther. And I think Sonar X3 is feeling a little sad about that, though he’s not yet capable of expressing it. I don’t know how this will work itself out, how the two of us will negotiate our time when the older kids go off to school together in August. But I’m excited to figure it out.

Next school year we will likely return to all rising together to accompany Sonar X5 to school. I think there’s a very good chance that he won’t want my company for as long as Sonar X7 did. Seven was forging a new path, with all the anxiety and excitement that entailed. Five sees how his brother has gone before, and has a better idea of what to do. Perhaps after a time the two of them will go off together without me and Three. Three will follow suit in two years, going off on his own kindergarten adventure. And my patterns, my negotiations and requirements will shift again.

I am feeling profoundly lucky today, as a mom, for this right now. For the reading, for the independence, for the emotional development, for the relatively calm and quiet transitions, for having time with each kid that is just mine and theirs. For being able to be here and see it with the confidence that our family is secure, that Partner and I are in agreement about how we want things to work, that each of us is doing our share on the team as we all grow together.

Happy Mother’s Day to all of the beautiful women out there, wherever you are in your negotiation of life.

Politics, Personal

In all seriousness.

President George W. Bush will make his seventh and final (hallelujah) State of the Union Address this evening.

According to the U.S. Constitution, Article II, Section 3

“[The President] shall from time to time give to Congress information of the State of the Union and recommend to their Consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient.”

I celebrate the State of the Union Address today, not so much because of any political motivation, but because the (generally) annual speech to the joint houses of Congress and to the nation and the world, coincides with a more personal event for me. Thirteen years ago, my partner and I set off on our first adventure together.

It started on a Friday. We worked in the same lab together, he a molecular biology grad student, me a biochemistry undergrad. Chatting over epi-tubes one Friday morning, we planned a lab-group outing. A performance art group was presenting a new piece that night on campus. I was on my way to class, and so he said he’d pass along the event to the other members of the lab group when they came in. We agreed to meet at the theater 15 minutes prior to showtime.

I showed up a few minutes late to find him waiting outside the door to the theater. Alone. He shrugged, and said that he guessed everyone had other plans. I learned later in the weekend that he had completely neglected to mention the plan to any of our friends or colleagues. We watched the show. We went out for coffee. The time we spent together stretched longer and longer. The sub-zero nighttime air of the desert in January did not deter us from ending up on the roof of the Chemistry building in the middle of the night to look at the stars. We ended up at a different coffee shop at five a.m. And not a thing had passed our lips but conversation and food.

Our waitress happened to be another chemistry student. She was due to get off work at six. We cooked up a hair-brained scheme to go to Tucson all together when she got off work. (Tucson was a four or five hour drive from where we were, across the desert and one state line, and none of us had ever been there). We waited, but she backed out, begging fatigue. Undeterred, we climbed into his truck and hit the road.

There is no rational explanation for why we did this. It was really rather stupid. For both of us. For a lot of reasons.

We spent the day in Tucson, driving around, eating again, and then drove back home late in the afternoon. Sleep-deprivation makes the next couple of days a hazy blur for me, but by the time of Bill Clinton’s second State of the Union Address in January of 1995, after a dizzy weekend, we were firmly Together.

And though we were married in July a couple of years later, each year we tend to note the passing of the state of the Union with a little bit more nostalgia and enthusiasm.

So here’s to us babe, and our Union. May we bear witness to many more presidential speeches together.

Love Note

From “Pepper” by the Butthole Surfers

I don’t mind the sun sometimes
The images it shows
I can taste you on my lips
And smell you in my clothes

Inspirational Teacher Meme

Astraea has tagged me for a meme about inspirational teachers.

As far as in-the-classroom types, I have three that jump to mind immediately.

Mr. Gastman

He was my Language Arts and Resources teacher, and I was his student aid at Cleveland Middle School. Bits I remember of him: he had a way he walked, a sort of measured lope, so that you could tell it was him even from very very far away. He was always chewing on a piece of raw ginger. He was the first person I ever knew who observed the Jewish high holy days. He taught me what it meant to be a critical thinker, to question everything, and to have fun while doing it. He also gave me my first editing credit. I was one of a handful of students who tested many of the problems in a creative problem solving workbook he wrote. He gave me an introduction to philosophy and a tiny peek into what it might mean to be an academic, who worked to study ideas.

We kept in touch for a few years after I went on to high school. I wrote him notes about my classes and whatnot every few months. Each Christmas and birthday, he sent me some beautiful little card or another, often these gorgeous embossed, white-paper things, or contraptions of intricate paper cutting. And no, he was not creepy or inappropriate. Get your brain out of the gutter.

I feel certain that he would continue to be a dear friend if he had not taken his life. I was 17, I think. Or perhaps I’d just turned 18, when a friend (also a former student of Mr. G.) called to tearfully tell me that he’d committed suicide. His memorial was filled with former and present students, colleagues, and friends, who all tearfully told stories, sang songs, recited poetry, in celebration of the man who asked me “Is it possible to think of Nothing?” and didn’t blink twice when I suggested that I teach myself to speak Hawaiian for no other reason than that I was curious about it.

Dr. Dan Pinti

When I met Dr. Pinti at New Mexico State University, I was a biochemistry major, on a path to med school or research. I signed up for an Honors Class he was teaching, Arthurian Literature, I think. Pinti was charmingly self-effacing, critically challenging, and made medieval literature seem alive and real and relevant. He was pleasantly surprised to find a science major who was both interested in old books and astute in engaging high-end critical questions (his words, not mine). He invited me to consider his Chaucer course the following semester. The Chaucer course was an unusual choice for anyone other than English Majors. I declared a double-major and jumped right in. I had several classes with Dr. Pinti over the new three years. Chaucer, Dante, a medieval lit. seminar, and independent study in Anglo-Saxon. I was his research assistant for a semester, and he gave me my second editing credit in the acknowledgements to his book on Chaucer. (I’m seeing a trend developing here: book acknowledgements and foreign languages). And he made me an official heir of his academic legacy by giving me a copy of Brights’ Anglo-Saxon Reader that had been given to him by a professor of his. He was my Honors Thesis advisor, and attended my wedding. I never got a chance to hear him play guitar though. Cheers to you, Dr. P.! Up there at cold and snowy Niagara. :)

Dr. Alice Sheppard

As a graduate student, I encountered a lot of different types of professors. Dr. Sheppard was the first prof I met. We had coffee. She asked a lot of direct questions. She intimidated the hell out of me. Her questions were hard, her expectations were high, but her enthusiasm and her drive zinged off of her and infected me with a similar energy. I worked with her in and out of several years. Anglio-Saxon lit. (there’s another language one), a slog through Beowulf, among other things (it’s funny to me that though the grad courses are my most recent, they run together and are the most difficult to tease out one from the other). When I thought I was making a bold move, she offered a kind of dual advice, providing insight into where I needed to be cautious and where I needed to jump head-first. She was my first choice for a dissertation advisor, though contemplation about my exact area of study, and deference to the power and influence of more established profs steered me elsewhere for a director. Like Mr. G., Alice did not laugh at my more bizarre ideas, but engaged the critical value and possibilities of the ideas with me.

This is the kind of teacher I wanted to be. Energetic, serious (with a liberal dash of fun), smart and intimidating but also accessible and not infallible. She was also the first among my profs to make me feel like academic work was sexy. There was something exciting about the power and the play of words and an engagment with them in a critical way. And also that our critical work didn’t have to stop at the edges of the page or the door of the classroom. Our critical tools gave us insight into the political and cultural structures around us, insight that could give us power and pleasure and understanding.

Though she has left academics to become a dancer, I have no doubt that Alice continues to be a thinker and critic of ideas and structures. And I have no doubt that she is still intimidating as hell. :) Cheers Alice!

Others

I had planned to continue to discuss specific inspirational teachers of the non-classroom type, but I’m clearly too babbly. Know though that all of you who have given me a way to understand the world in a different way, or who have given me a new skill, I appreciate you all as well. Oh there are knitters and farmers and teachers and dj’s and moms and family members and other professors that are worthy of admiration and praise.