My Favorite Holiday

Holidays are special. For most kids, three holidays stand out. Halloween stands out because of the costumes and the night-time candy adventure. Presents make Christmas (or one of its December alternatives) stand out. And finally Independence Day stands out thanks to the fireworks. Of these, my favorite holiday as a child was Independence Day, and it has remained my favorite holiday into adulthood.

Seeing A Movie at the Midnight Opening

The Hunger Games trilogy has caught on fire among teens, tweens and their mothers. About a week before the cinema release, Joshua and Debbie were at our house when Debbie exclaimed, “I’ve got a great idea! Let’s all go see the opening midnight showing together!” Something about her idea resonated.

An Emotionally-Healthy Non-Dating Friendship

It was morning break at Hermes Middle. As students exited their classrooms the campus quickly transformed from a quiet, serene set of buildings into an eruption of activity and movement. Chloe navigated from her classroom to her favorite break-time hang-out spot with kids walking in both directions. She walked forward as if on auto-pilot, saving her mental energy for the bantering that would be happening soon once she settled in her favorite spot with her friends.

Drivers of Short Term Contention

Gayle and Chloe have continued their friendship from the previous summer but the two have few close friendships in common. As such, Chloe continues to find herself at odds with Gayle’s more possessive friends like Britney. Recently, a girl named Natalie seemed to be the one wanting to put a wedge between Chloe and Gayle.

The Impact of an Allowance

Toward the end of fifth grade, a new girl named Robbie (which is short for Roberta) appeared in Chloe’s class. She quickly became friends with Chloe and Katherine. Over what remained of fifth grade, into summer and then into middle school Chloe and Katherine integrated Robbie into their friendship. One of their favorite shared activities has been watching horror movies. Chloe and I watched Chloe’s first R-Rated movie, The Exorcist over the course of a few evenings during the summer. From there Chloe’s enjoyment of horror movies has continued.

The Unmistakable Signs of Womanhood

Entering Middle School was one milestone for Chloe but it was quickly followed by another milestone. She had her first period. During the summer prior to middle school, she had started wearing a bra regularly. For Chloe, the migration into adolescence, including having her first boyfriend, all happened within a very short period of time. And fortunately, she is comfortable talking about it with her parents.

Adolescents and Sleep

Winter break is a two week affair in the Hermes School system and no doubt many school systems. For Philip and Chloe, winter break has meant they have the long-awaited control over their sleep. Or maybe it is sleep rather than their schedule that finally has control over them. Either way, the opportunity to stay up late and sleep in is almost more welcome than the wrapped gifts they were eyeing during the first week of winter break.

When the Power Goes Out

Growing up decades ago, power outages were normal occurrences. They typically happened three to five times every year. My mother had candles to light. And she had a special cooking set for power outages. The old furnace would continue to operate as long as the pilot light remained lit. Power outages were a part of my childhood. They were something that would happen during a storm. In the darkness and absence television, radio or any kind of lighting other than candes and battery-powered flashlights, my mother and I would listen to the wind howl and patiently wait until the power returned. What was always funny was that the telephone had a separate power supply, and I do not think we ever lost telephone service. During the power outages, we could call my grandmother and grandfather across town. We would ask them if they had lost their power or not and what they thought of the weather.

Talk or Leave Them Alone?

Adolescence is the time for kids to develop their independence. It is messy. In the ideal world parents would correctly identify how their adolescents should be independent over time, grant them that independence and be done with it. Usually the adolescents have other ideas.

We Now Discourage Our Daughter from Joining us for Church

The non-religious may not be able to relate to this story immediately. But in the end it is not about religion but about good parenting. For those adults who have embraced faith of any kind, it is a something we would like to pass onto our children as a true gift. For non-religious parents, I trust there are many who have embraced a set of values they would likewise want to confer as perhaps the greatest gift they can give to their children.

We Let Our Daughter Have a Boyfriend

It has been over five weeks since Lars and Chloe stole away to sit on the bleachers together during a morning break from classes and Lars asked Chloe, “Will you go out with me?”

Their private and special moment was immediately interrupted by Katherine who suddenly found them sitting alone together. Perhaps Katherine sensed the awkwardness because she left reasonably quickly after a quick exchange with Chloe. After what must have seemed like an eternity to Lars, Chloe turned her attention back to him, looked him in the eye and said “Yes” with a cute grin and nod of the head. The two shared a smile but held back any laughter that might have arisen out of Katherine’s untimely interruption before they had to head back to class. But they left morning break officially a couple.

Walking Between Classes with Boys

Hermes Middle School is probably very similar to thousands of middle schools across the country and across the world. The young adolescents like Chloe and her friends are given all kinds of cues to tell them they are older and more mature than they were just a few months back in elementary school.

There is no playground equipment. Instead the school has outdoor sports fields next to the campus and an indoor gymnasium with a full basketball court. The kids change classes for different subjects and see a different set of peers in each class. Teachers do not escort students like they did in elementary school, and in general the number of rules and the strictness of those rules have been greatly relaxed.

Disparenting’s Impact on Friends and Friendships

Both Amelia and I like Jasmine’s Mother Rita and Katherine’s Father Jerry. But we have ultimately concluded that both Rita and Jerry have critical flaws in the way they parent. These flaws work themselves out in what I have come to call disparenting. And as Jasmine and Katherine trudge forward into adolescence, the fruit of various disparenting practices is becoming ever more pronounced. Poor life skills often result in poor marriage choices and relationship skills which lead to divorce and single-parenting. The stress and difficulty of single-parenting amplifies the negative impact of poor life skills. And once the kids begin to act out, the amplification can accelerate in a vicious cycle.

Eagerly Anticipating Middle School

Chloe has enjoyed the summer. It has been filled with all kinds of special events. She hosted a great birthday-sleepover party shortly after the school year ended. Not long after Chloe spent a week as Gayle’s guest for her family vacation. Our family hosted plenty of guests for a barbeque and then a neighborhood view of the fireworks on Independence Day. Chloe’s cousin Joelle visited our family for a week. Ashley and her family also visited for a couple days. As summer drew to a close, Chloe and her brother Philip spent a week camping with Jasmine, Joshua, Debbie and Abby. Chloe has also gotten to spend lots of time with other friends, including Holly and Patty.

A Fun Place to Sleep When a Friend Visits

Unlike all Chloe’s other friends, Jasmine lives less than a five minute walk from our house. When we hear an unexpected knock on the door, we usually conclude it is Jasmine. In this manner, Chloe ends up spending a lot of time with Jasmine. Together Chloe and Jasmine walk into town for simple things like an ice cream or a candy bar. At other times they head off together to see a movie.

The Simple Joy of Family Television Time

The television is often portrayed as the enemy of family life and the relationship between parents and children in particular. It is “the boob tube” or “the one-eyed babysitter” when criticized in this manner. But recently, I have come to a different conclusion in my own mind.

An Extended Family Visit

Joelle is the oldest daughter of my wife Ameila’s cousin Tom. Growing up, Amelia and Tom were close, though they saw each other much less once the college years began. Joelle is just fourteen months older than Chloe. Tom, Joelle and their family live a long airplane flight away, but Tom has made it a point to visit our family whenever he has had an extended business visit to our part of the country.

The Season When Friendship Always Trumps the Social Hierarchy

Less than a month earlier, Britney was an ever-present nuisance when it came to Chloe’s efforts to spend time with Gayle. That was when school was still in session. But Chloe’s fortunes quickly changed once school was over. Summer vacation was not even ten days old when Chloe received an offer she would not have even thought possible back when school was in session. Chloe was Gayle’s choice as the friend to bring along on a family vacation to her grandparents’ home at a popular vacation destination.

This is Post One Hundred

Thirty-two months ago today, I published my first blog post. A little over a year into my writing I was honored to have the “Life Reflected” blog included as one of the now thirty-five blogs listed in the “Best of the Web” directory of blogs on the topic of parenting. With the arrival of this hundredth post, I have decided to make this a ten year blog with three posts each month until 2018 shortly after Chloe departs for college. I began writing for many reasons that were compelling to me then and remain compelling to me now.

Sometimes I’m Just a Big Kid

There are so many aspects to good parenting. The goal is ensure my kids become competent, successful adults. But I want the process to be fun and to include many great memories for them and for me. So there is a side benefit for me as a parent. I can partially re-enjoy things that make one’s formative years so enjoyable. Most of it is vicarious. But some of it involves simply being a big kid. With Philip or Chloe, I will watch youth-targeted television and movies, practice sports and sometimes even play games: both group and individual games. More recently, I’ve been playing two computer games. One is Silent Hunter and the other is Navy Field. Both mimic naval battles from World War II. I am particularly fond of submarine movies and my all time favorite movie is Das Boot. In both games, I have put myself in command of a German U-boat.

In Silent Hunter, I have no choice but to skipper a submarine. I end up sinking scores of Allied ships before I need to start over. My computer assumes the role of the not-very-well skippered Allied ships I manage to sink over the course of half an hour of play time. At this point, I know the game well enough that it is really just a shooting gallery with some excellent graphics. Rarely am I in danger of being sunk, even when facing four or more fresh Destroyers or Battleships.

In Navy Field, every ship is commanded by a real person somewhere in the world. The game includes small Frigates, Destroyers, Cruisers, Aircraft Carriers, Battleships and Submarines. As players become more experienced, Navy Field permits them to skipper progressively more powerful and diverse ships, and to fire progressively more powerful weapons with progressively more accuracy. A typical Navy Field battle involves twenty to thirty-five ships on each team and lasts ten to fifteen minutes. Normally, only five to ten ships survive a battle. There is a special rush associated with sneaking up on an enemy ship, firing off a torpedo, hopefully sinking or at least severely damaging the enemy and then scurrying off before depth charges take me out, or lack of air forces me to the surface in close range to angry enemy canons. There is a special thrill in advancing to qualify for a better submarine, better torpedoes or a better deck gun and then using the new item for the first time in mock combat. There is likewise a feeling of trepidation as I dive trying to avoid enemy fire or surface to unknown threats after diving. And there is a brief regret when my submarine is sunk and a sense of brief victory when I survive an entire battle. If I am not careful, I can let a lot of time pass while playing submarine commander on the computer.

But perhaps the best part of playing these games is sharing the experience with Philip. Philip does not play computer games nearly as much as his peers. And he greatly prefers shooting at virtual zombies or soldiers over battling virtual maritime vessels. But he has his own Navy Field account and borrows mine from time to time. He’ll even play Silent Hunter from time to time but he is not motivated to get good enough to survive an entire campaign. Sometimes he will simply watch me play. He always seems to enjoy having me recount a new or unusual experience I have on the virtual battlefield.

In contrast, Philip tends not to like me asking him about school, his homework, what he did with his friends or anything about his private world. For those things, he comes to me or we don’t talk about them at all. He’d rather hear about my day at work than answer my questions about his day at school.

But there is more to the submarine games and other things I do outside my age. I like stepping into Philip’s world. I like doing things that I would be doing if I were a teenager today rather than three decades ago. I like listening to the music Philip and Chloe like, as much as I like listening to the music from my teen years. Both allow me to revisit the formative years. I like being a fan of the Hermes High School sports teams, and I like reading the news of how my former high school’s sports teams are doing today. And more recently, I like playing submarine commander. Sometimes I’m just a big kid and every parent deserves to be a big kid from time to time.