How to help your kids help (A Friday; one piece of advice for parents, plus dangerous ponds and deadly costumes ).
5am
Can I watch PBS Kids? He asked, bedside in the dark dark.
Not yet, I said.
5.05am
Can I watch PBS Kids? He asked, bedside in the gray dark.
Not yet, I said.
What if…he asked…what if I fold laundry? Can I watch PBS Kids if I fold laundry while I’m watching?
5.25am
I came around the corner to the sound of Wild Kratts and the visual of two boys spreading out three thousand articles of clothing and towels on the floor as folded and stacked. Or rather…picked up, wadded up, and plopped into a different pile.
Their hearts are strong, their faces are sweet, and their strategy is admirable.
Before anyone woke up, there was 100% to fold. After their help, I would estimate there was 130% left to fold.
Calories for the body and mind
I read books while they ate breakfast.
Old Testament discussions
We talked about the end of Israel, about the relationship amongst Israel, Egypt, and Syria, and why Jews hated Samaritans.
How would you feel if you got kicked off your land, somebody else was brought in to live on it, and then later on you were supposed to be okay with the situation? That’s how problems get generational, and it puts a great historical context on The Good Samaritan story later in the Next Testament.
Chemistry
She worked on it and did not need my help. I looked over her shoulder, and was even more confused now than I was when I took it a quarter century ago.
I think her Chemistry teacher now is much stronger at helping students learn effectively than mine was at age 15. Me, not my old teacher.
Engineering and Art
They took a break from fort empire-building to create some sort of sculptural monument to rival the Great Pyramid. If I don’t know better, I would say it looks like 42 trillion pieces of LEGO stacked in a pile, and then sprawling out to all corners from the epicenter.
If I didn’t know better.
7th grade math
He diligently works away at the kitchen table, going back and forth between Chromebook, scratch paper, and assignment, working through a chapter titled 7.2.8 Using Equations to Solve Problems.
10th grade ELA
She kneels on her floor in a pose that looks not in the least comfortable to me, and goes back and forth between a 10-year old MacBook Pro and a sheet outlining the parameters of her next writing project.
I turn my camera on…
…and snap a picture of them through the windshield. Why? This is why.
This is why I take a picture of them before dropping them off anywhere.
Because I like them and I want to remember little details of what it is that makes each day unique at each stage.
More tangibly, because if anything was to happen, it gives me an ongoing record of what they were wearing. No parent ever wants to imagine their child will be involved in a mass shooting incident, or disappearance, or…anything awful. Those things happen to someone else. But they don’t. I hope so deeply these things never happen to our children. But you don’t know. You think ahead, you plan ahead, you educate and talk and consider ways to respond, and you grit your teeth and hope you never face that reality. But what if? I like to have an ongoing record of what they’re wearing and exactly what they look like every time I leave them somewhere I’m not. It’s not going to social media or blog or anywhere else. It’s just to have. My hope is that someday they’ll just be an ongoing collection of little memories where I said goodbye for little chunks at a time.
Naps, library, math
People fell asleep while I was driving. I did not. Because I was driving. But I did occasionally glance back with envy.
A short while later, I rudely roused them and set off across a wet parking lot to the public library. I currently have 41 books checked out, which is reasonable, considering that’s an average of under seven per person, when divided by six.
Other
It was pouring, so we went to a park, where a boy waded through three different ponds looking for ducks and salamanders. He was successful on both counts. He was not so successful at keeping water out of his boots.
We then took a trip to the grocery for some culinary supplies. It was narrated by young men with voluminous voices and hearty spirits.
Finally, the day began to wind down.
Post script
Just kidding. The day did not begin to wind down. Not at all. We joined their siblings for a costumed event, roaming and roaring through the halls of an educational institution and kindly demanding candy. There were bats, dinosaurs, knights, knaves, royalty of many types, some ghosts, scientists, and many others; the only common link being a general shared spirit of merriment, generosity, and shared candy in the rain.
We entered a gymnasium, where we were treated to a promotional rendition of a musical theater classic starring a certain precocious red head in a 1930s New York orphanage; an event which two of our children are involved with heavily. One was a dog, the other an orphan. They sang and danced with verve and pizzaz, and anticipation for the upcoming event soared.
It was a Friday. We got wet, read some books, dressed up, and learned a few things here and there.
