Category Archives: Community

Summer Days

The lull of summer has me reading a lot but writing little. This blog has become a pictorial daybook with a few quotes tossed in for spice. Well, I blame the summer, but evidence shows that this is the trend my life has taken for the past year. Somewhere along the way I feel I’ve lost my mind. Not in a mental-illness sense, but more in a “I’m a thinking person who has thoughts about what’s happening in the world and am capable of articulating them.” Yet unfortunately, I feel increasingly removed from it all, and apathetic; I rarely read news or listen to NPR anymore. It didn’t help the other day when I read an article about Sheryl Sandberg in the New Yorker. I’m so utterly unaccomplished, my ego tells me. I’m just a mother. Just a housewife (and not an exceptionally good one at that). Just nothing.

But aren’t we all nothing? Everything changes. Human endeavor fades and is forgotten. Eventually we all end up the same place. And there is freedom in knowing and accepting this. Freedom to pay attention to what matters right now, and to enjoy this moment. That’s my bit of insight for today, because it’s late, and I’ve just finished sweeping, mopping, folding, washing, changing sheets, and pilling the cat. Meanwhile, take a peek at what’s been happening.

Bean earned her princess bike because she graduated to being a big girl and uses the potty. Pedaling and steering take concentration!

She also had her first session of swim lessons and loved it, especially her teacher. She’ll have one more week, and then we’ll see.

I did a lot of cutting, gluing, and tying, but Bean decorated with glitter glue and stickers. It moves beautifully in the slightest breeze.

We did this craft awhile back, right after 4th of July!

Bean had me draw the rainbow and face, and she colored the rainbow and decided to use beads for flowers.

Neighborliness and Continuity

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While the spirit of neighborliness was important on the frontier because neighbors were so few, it is even more important now because our neighbors are so many.

-Lady Bird Johnson

One generation plants the trees; another gets the shade.

–Chinese proverb

More On Transformation

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I am standing upon the seashore.
A ship at my side spreads her white
sails to the morning breeze and starts
for the blue ocean.

She is an object of beauty and strength.
I stand and watch her until at length
she hangs like a speck of white cloud
just where the sea and sky come
to mingle with each other.

Then, someone at my side says;
“There, she is gone!”

“Gone where?”
Gone from my sight. That is all.
She is just as large in mast and hull
and spar as she was when she left my side
and she is just as able to bear her
load of living freight to her destined port.
Her diminished size is in me, not in her.

And just at the moment when someone
at my side says, “There, she is gone!”
There are other eyes watching her coming,
and other voices ready to take up the glad shout;
“Here she comes!”
And that is dying.

–Henry Van Dyke

We Are Always In Love

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Lift your arm. Let it fall onto your leg. Simple?

Is existence simple?

Consider that there are two massive objects: the earth — the whole big round rock of it — and your relaxed arm. The reality of the earth’s gravitational pull can be experienced in the heavy fall of your arm. Drop your arm again, cosmically this time.

OK, here is a less obvious thought: the mass of your arm is attracting the mass of the earth. Earth-arm force is just as reciprocal as earth-moon force, or in twin stars, star-star force. The earth is falling toward your arm as your arm is falling toward the earth. The attraction is mutual. It’s love.

There’s a binding force in nature, and gravity is its large-scale expression. Every time you drop your hand, or take a step, or hoe the garden, it is the experience of eternal love. Our bones and the earth are lovers; they embrace when we sleep, they mate when we die.

–W. A. Mathieu, The Listening Book: Discovering Your Own Music

Raising A Momma

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Mine, all mine!

At preschool, Bean had a tendency to hurtle into tears if a small thing didn’t go her way, or if she perceived some other child’s behavior as a slight. My response typically had been to croon, hug, and comfort. For instance, one day she brought a stuffed animal with her. In circle time we sing hello to everybody. When we sang hello to her and went on to the next child, she wanted us to sing hello to her animal. When we didn’t, she was more than crestfallen; she was crushed. She burst into sobs, got up, and came running to me.

Bean worried a lot about the other kids not liking her. She thought they might laugh at or make fun of her. (At this age, the kids are only just starting to play together, and she was worried about that?) She was moody. She wanted to control and direct the story of all the pretend play with other kids (and Mommy and Daddy). On the days I was working at the school, she wanted all of my attention. Especially when it came time for me to be in parent discussion.

I began to feel less like a mother and more like her pawn. The neediness in her was insatiable, and her behavior more like a tyrant. I talked with her teacher about it, and she suggested I back off a little. As an example, she talked about the day we didn’t sing hello to her animal. The teacher said, “Your response was to cuddle and reinforce the sadness. But another way to respond is to say, ‘That’s just not what we do here! We sing hello to the students, not all their toys!’ And to help her to lighten up and see it isn’t a big deal.”

And that’s when I realized something. I was teetering on the brink of overcompensating for my own childhood. Not every occasion of disappointment requires deep empathy. Part of my duty as a mother is to prepare Bean to ride with changes, to be flexible. I also had not realized how frightening it must be for Bean to have as much power over me as she did. When she was a baby, she needed all of me, and I gave it. What she needs now, as she moves into the world, is to need less of me. So I began to set more boundaries on what she could have of me. One day she forgot a toy in the car that she wanted for show and tell; it had been her task to remember. When I would not take her back to the car to retrieve it — since we’d gotten to class — Bean gave a world-class demonstration of temper. But I held firm, and she survived and learned a lesson about responsibility.

I continued to heed the teacher’s words that “what you pay attention to grows” and gave more attention to joy than sorrow. Remarkably, within a couple of weeks I, the teacher, and other parents noticed a significant change. Bean began to play with the kids more and less by herself. She participated more in circle time, singing and dancing. She didn’t intrude on me during discussion and instead after snack said, “Bye Mom!” and went outside to play for the last hour. She didn’t attempt to check on me, to get my attention or tell me “something important.”

To sleep, perchance…

When Bean turned three she attempted to stop napping. Her doctor expressed concern about this, because, she said, three-year-olds still really do need a nap. It was true. Bean only slept 9-10 hours at night, and I could see she benefitted from her naps. After a week of refusing to nap, Bean was falling over with exhaustion and emotionally explosive. She also got really sick with a high fever the day before we took a big trip.

Doctor suggested I offer incentives, e.g., “If you nap, you can watch a show after.” (Or whatever special treat might work for Bean.) The bribe of extra t.v. worked until it didn’t — about one week. I tried quiet time, during which she wouldn’t fall asleep but would rock and listen to music for an hour, but this still didn’t provide her the rest she needed. So I returned to the way we handled naps for the first seven months of her life. I rocked her, sang to her, and held her for the duration of the nap, dozing with her.

This worked well. We had preschool two afternoons a week and it was clear those took a toll, but over the school year her stamina increased. And with the steady increase of stamina came the resistance to nap again. I was able to override her refusal most of the time, sometimes by cajoling, other times by threatening (I’ll leave the room and close the door).

When I went away for my getaway weekend, Bean didn’t nap, of course. And when I returned, I allowed this to remain. She is adjusting. She is slightly more tired during the day than she used to be, but it seems a steady state. Her night sleep has increased somewhat, and the quiet hour rejuvenates us both. Best of all, a new world is opening up, the one where we can be unconcerned about “getting home in time” for the nap window. And rather than a two-hour semi-nap sitting up with a crick in my neck, I get one blessed hour to meditate and read while she rocks and listens to music.

So skinny she hula hoops with a cheerio

In April we took our cat to the vet for a blood test, and Bean happened to step on the huge dog scale for fun. The scale read her weight as 28 pounds. I was shocked. It couldn’t be right! She weighed 29 pounds at her annual visit last September!

I’d always fretted about Bean’s nutrition and eating habits. Except for bologna and hot dogs, she eschewed meat. She refuses all forms of milk: cow, soy, almond, flavored, regular, etc. She doesn’t eat much yogurt or cheese. She eats veggies, but only mostly raw. She eats fruit, but only a certain few. Meals involved me asking her what she wanted to eat and trying to please her. Dinners meant cooking something I knew she’d eat, but her whims changed. For awhile I even fed her separately.

Yet here she was weighing less. So we went to her doctor. I learned she had grown taller — 2.5 inches since last September, and since she hadn’t been gaining her growth curve was a little skewed. Her BMI is 13 (what I wouldn’t give for that). Overall, the doctor wasn’t worried because growth occurred. She suggested I take the PAMF Feeding Your Preschooler class for ideas I might use. I came away with a huge list of food Bean does eat and saw that for the most part she is eating well. I learned that my concept of portion sizes for kids was distorted. I learned that we’d be better served if I quit offering her snacks (even salad veggies) to eat while she watched PBS before dinner.

So I relaxed. We have all meals and snacks at table now. I established a firmer schedule and held to it; if she doesn’t eat snack when it’s snack time and decides she’s hungry before lunch/dinner, she just has to wait. I decide what to offer and she either eats or not. I sit with her for all meals (it’s no fun to eat by yourself). I’ve cooked more foods I like despite knowing she won’t probably eat them. Every meal now has bread on the table along with salad, so she’ll get something in her. And guess what has happened? Bean is trying more foods! She has decided she likes pepperoni pizza (previously only cheese would do), cherries, and breakfast sausage.

This combination of releasing the worry and desire to control and establishing parent-driven meal times and menus has freed us. I do my job: offer healthy foods at appropriate times. She does her job deciding whether and what to eat. Talk at mealtimes now focuses on topics other than food, and “encouragement” to eat more. I don’t think she’s gained weight so far, but I see now that I can relax and accept my little petite Bean and enjoy her. We enjoy each other and our meals more now.

The last step of toddlerhood

I want to keep potty-training stories to a minimum in consideration of Bean’s privacy. Suffice it to say that she’s been ready and resistant for some time, but in part her resistance reflected my own. There have been attempts to use the potty since she was two, but I didn’t push because I feared a power struggle. But last week Bean declared she wanted to wear panties (for the second month in a row, the first being April but she quit after a weekend). And I said okay, and that it meant the changing pad, diaper pail, and all Pull-ups were going away forever. (She hugged her changing pad good-bye.)

The first few days were rocky, and I despaired. But we have persisted, and I’ve devised a way to encourage and reward her daily for her effort and increasing competence. She knows she will be enrolled in swimming lessons now, and that after our trip east she’ll get a “princess bike” she yearns for. For shorter-term rewards, she’s getting smaller things. She wanted pink “tap shoes” (Mary Janes), and so this was her gift for completing one week of using the potty. She also lately pines for “princess bubble bath” and, of all things, an American flag, so her gift for the end of the second week will likely be those. They are small, tangible reinforcements of her success. Not too far in the future I see the sticker chart, small candies, and weekly prizes will fade as this function just becomes a routine in her life.

Momma is all grown up! At least for now, for this age and stage and minute. And Bean? Well, she jumps for joy!

Creeping Toward Commitment

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For much of my life I’ve wandered on a spiritual journey without knowing quite where to go. One of the paths I began to explore in the late 1990s was meditation. I took a Vipassana meditation class, read books, and occasionally pretended to be serious about it. In 2003 I began this blog in part because of this interest (and in part because I had a therapy practice), although in my “About This Blog” section I made it clear I was not a Buddhist, lest readers feel mislead or take issue with my less-than-Buddhist perspectives. Having plummeted down the path of conservative Christian fundamentalism twice in my life — and driven loved ones away in the process — I’ve been reluctant and cautious about further pursuits.

In 2006, out of nowhere (and everywhere) a woman contacted me after reading my blog. She had read about my attempts to get pregnant, the miscarriages, the misgivings. She had recently published a book and asked if I would be interested in a complimentary copy. I said yes, although I couldn’t bring myself to read it for quite awhile. Once I was pregnant with Bean, I did read it, devoured it with gratitude and gusto, and I repeatedly returned to that book for comfort and wisdom.

That woman’s name is Karen Maezen Miller. She is a Zen Buddhist priest, a wife, and a mother. I credit her with helping me remain sane and growing into motherhood. After Bean was born and began to exhibit colic, I was panicked and beside myself with agony. Bean wasn’t sleeping. Hub was doing his best but he wasn’t sleeping either. I was terrified I’d do something wrong. Many emails sailed between us — me writing laments, she responding with love. And even though we’d never met, Maezen offered a gift: to come up one weekend and help out with Bean so Hub and I could rest. We talked on the phone to discuss it, and it turned out that this was enough at the time; just knowing the offer was sincere and standing and hearing her voice in the wilderness helped.

I’d seen Maezen subsequently three times; in 2008 she and her daughter visited me and Bean briefly just before Bean’s first birthday; in 2009 at the Mother’s Symposium and 2010 at a one-day retreat. I read her second book. I pondered her thoughts about the importance of having a teacher. And finally, last weekend, I had my first weekend ever away from home and Bean. I drove to Sierra Madre to spend the weekend with Maezen and her family; I also attended a beginner’s meditation class and a dharma talk at Hazy Moon Zen Center. And there it dawned on me that I already have a teacher — Maezen! — and that without realizing it I’d become a student.

It is time to commit. It is time to practice. So I’d like to introduce my new best friend, the “cushion of kindness,” as Maezen calls it. The technical name is zafu. And when I sit on my zafu, this is called zazen. This is where the revolution takes place. Facing a blank wall, alone, silent, counting my breaths, and being awake.

I am not yet in a position of making a formal commitment. That will come when it comes. It is not lost on me that one of my favorite quotes, which I encountered in 1998, is by Hui-Neng, a Zen monastic from the 7th/8th century. “The secret is within your self.” It’s been there all along, waiting for me to look, and see.

The other watershed quote that inspired me to move from Syracuse to Austin in the early 90s was by Sir Edmund Hilary, organizer of a Mount Everest Expedition, and it too rings familiarly as I observe what is changing. The snippet that motivated me I have italicized, but the entire quote is priceless.

“Until one is committed there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his/her way. I learned a deep respect for one of Goethe’s couplets: What ever you can do, or dream you can; begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.”

My next trip to Sierra Madre will probably be later in the summer or fall, when they offer a three-day retreat at the center. So, hello world! My name is Kathryn and I am, at last, “abuddha” (awake).

Food Is Beautiful

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As is friendship.

I’m so grateful.

I assembled these soup and cookie mixes to donate to our preschool raffle, and to give to friends in gratitude for their practical care during my recent events.

Itchy and Scratchy

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I had my surgery Friday. My good neighbor watched Bean all day, and Hub took care of me at the SurgiCenter. PAMF staff continue to provide excellent care. I have relatively little pain, though the 2-inch scar and the deflated area of my breast makes me a little squeamish when I look at it. So I mostly don’t.

I’ll know the results next Friday.

It’s been a slow-mo weekend. I’m starting to feel the urge to scratch where the incision was, so healing has begun.

I’ve been nursing Bean through a cold this week, and watching with concern about the disaster in Japan.

Onward.

A Christmas Wish

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From Recuerda Mi Corazon, read The Perfect Scent of Pine — a lovely, heartfelt, poetic tribute to Christmas. I hope that when Bean is grown, I will be able to grace paper with words in a similar way.

Let there be light and joy in your heart; may you hear music that sends your soul afloat; and may your heart, as Rebecca says, be broken the way you want it to be broken.

A Day of Doing

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What a busy day we’ve had. First we began with an alphabet craft project, the letter L, for leaves and ladder.

Then we went and got haircuts. After that, we went to the grocery store with $5 of Bean’s money (from her aunt) to purchase food for the food bank. First Bean chose three bags of rice:

She tried to move the basket down the aisle, but it’s big and she had to choo-choo it:

Next she chose two bags of beans:

After the grocery store, we went to the mall to buy gifts for the Family Giving Tree. Bean wanted to choose two little girls her age. One wanted “anything princess” and the other wanted a child’s DVD.

We went to Target, where Bean demonstrated her penguin walk:

Then her eye was caught by a big pink box of temptation. I reminded her of our purpose for being in the store and said that pretty soon Santa would come, and other gifts would come from family members, and so to be patient. She selected Finding Nemo and a Beauty and the Beast Deluxe Bag (small dolls and dresses with a horse and carriage).

We purchased the items and brought them back to the tree, where they will be picked up tomorrow. All that shopping made us hungry, so Bean asked to go to Popeye’s for rice and beans and french fries. We used to eat there a lot when we lived close by; since we were near, we went. We had a leisurely lunch.

Then we went home, where I raked the leaves in the front yard. It was Bean’s first encounter with a pile of leaves, and she loved it! See the sheer joy:

And leaves in her pigtails:

This is all I had hoped for Bean’s childhood — the same joys I was privileged to encounter in my own:

She has now crashed for a late afternoon nap, and I’m savoring a quiet moment myself.

How We Get Here Part 1

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This is a rough and unrefined condensation of some of what I’m reading. I don’t claim to have answers but I will write without tenuousness. I’m not entirely sure of all the concepts and am not seeking debate. I’m just looking to sort it out for myself here.
———
I am going to die someday. Sooner or later, fast or slow, it will happen. I was raised in a religion that depicted heaven, purgatory, and hell, and I felt fear. I left that religion and in my early 30s was bound up in it again, until the absolutism of the dogma and some epiphanies in graduate school prompted me to part ways entirely. I’ve been inarticulate about dying and what happens since then.

I used to wonder what I was before I was born. An atheist will simply say that we just did not exist, and after we die, we just won’t exist. Aside from the terror my ego feels (how can I not exist? what happens to me?), I know there is something else beyond this life. But before I can get to that understanding for myself, I need to understand how I came to be where, what, and who I am now.

We start out within the Ground of Being. We are part of it. The Ground of Being is life, and it is non-life. It is consciousness and not-consciousness. It is energy, it is matter. As Douglas Adams titled his book, it is Life, the Universe, and Everything. Before we are born we are part of it. This is a pre-ego state, a state of preconsciousness, a state of undifferentiation and no individuation. We are raw material.

So how to we get to where we are, with identities and attachments and all that this life entails?

In Singh’s book, she writes:

As we emerge out of the Ground of Being and into the physical world as a separate life-in-form, “trailing clouds of glory,” we are in a preegoic, prepersonal state. At birth we are only minimally differentiated from the Ground of Being. Inner and outer realities remain somewhat fused initially, and all awareness lies inarticulate, still partially embedded in the Ground of Being.

We start out this way, and at first we are all body: hunger, fatigue, touch, instinct. If you’ve ever been with an infant you know this. Then the remarkable changes happen as the infant’s brain grows, as concept and words develop. We develop a sense of self: me, mine, and of other, not-me. Babies start out unaware of separation and then become a aware. The First Dualism emerges on the journey to the ego.

We develop a sense of space and what is and is not ours. We realize where we end and another begins, the gap between subject and object. Then the Second Dualism develops: the sense of time, an awareness of past, present, and future, life and death.

The First Dualism, the first boundary, separates us from the experience of wholeness. Anxiety appears, as does repression and defensiveness.

Primal repression is a psychological as well as physical posture that, inwardly, begins to seal off or repress pure, inpouring Energy, the animating power of the Ground of Being. The Ground of Being, with its enchantment and ability to engulf, begins to be perceived as threatening.

Thus in our early childhood we close off our connection to the Source from which we came. We continue to split ourselves in early to middle childhood by forging a distinction between mind and body, the Third Dualism. “We lose our deep integrity, the unity of body and mind, which is the unity of feeling and attention — the ability to be present.” Our mind is given more authority as a judge or filter of reality. And then the Fourth Dualism arises: The split between persona and shadow, that is, between the person we believe we are, that we accept, that we show the world, and all the other parts of us that we disown, dislike, judge, fear, and hide from ourselves and others.

And this, according to the Christian theology I grew up with, completes our ejection from the Garden of Eden. We are part of the garden (Ground of Being), we are born, then we taste knowledge (the Dualisms, development of ego), which separates us from unity with the Ground of Being. I just don’t buy the crap about Eve (woman) being the one who fell to the temptation first (does it really matter?), and I don’t think of the “fall” as really All That Bad. It is just what is, and it is part of our evolution, our journey, through the experience we are having in this form and function, in this physical world.

And now my child is calling from her nap, and I must dash.

Happy Halloween!

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Spirit

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Back in 2004, when my father-in-law was gravely ill, I happened across a book that I was compelled to buy: The Grace in Dying: How We Are Transformed Spiritually as We Die, by Kathleen D. Singh. I began to read it, and in the introduction the author suggested that if the reader was in the process of dying or reading this because a loved one is dying, to do the following: know that you are safe, all is well, and put the book down.

I took her advice. Four months later my father-in-law died, and I was with him for his last week nearly 24/7. It was a daunting, draining experience. I watched him take his last breath. In the process of his dying, it occurred to me that it seemed much like a labor. And having had a child since, I know it is indeed labor. But what, I wonder, is in the process of happening? Is dying just dying? The lights simply go out? What happens to the entity called “me, myself, or I”; is it really annihilated?

Or is it a transition, a birthing into something else?

I was raised religiously and have traversed a varied spiritual path. In recent years I’ve applied the term “atheist” to myself, though “agnostic” is probably more accurate. I do not need “god” as humans are able to articulate the term; I believe the universe is marvelous, and science is a way to explore it all, and isn’t that miracle enough? I am drawn to Buddhism, particularly Zen Buddhism, although I have not become a practitioner yet.

However, I did have a remarkable experience back in 1996 that at the time, I believed (as much as I could believe, which was really a process of trying to convince myself to believe) was the Holy Spirit. When I left the Christian religion (for the second time in my life), I categorized the experience as an anomaly, as an experience of self-hypnosis or psychological wish fulfillment.

I was a member of a conservative, bible-based, fundamental Christian church. The story behind the path that led me to that after years of atheism can be read here. Anyhow, one Saturday evening I remained after service. It was common for members to remain and pray with each other. This was a church where people sometimes experienced the “baptism of the Holy Spirit,” evidenced sometimes by people speaking in tongues (seeming to babble) and being filled with the Spirit, evidenced by joyous, continuous laughter. Not hysterics, not banshee laughing, just a robust laugh as one would do watching a funny show.

One evening a woman sat on the floor experiencing this laughter. I observed awhile, curious. Another woman came over and asked, “Would you like to join and be filled with the Holy Spirit?” I answered yes, but expressed a worry that it wouldn’t “take.” She said, “Just trust. Let thoughts and worries go and just be with whatever is.”

I sat next to the spirit-filled woman, put my hand on her arm, closed my eyes, and waited. To my wonder, I felt a tingling warmth from her enter my hand and flow up my right arm into my body. Whatever words I summon to describe the experience won’t do it justice, but here goes: As I was filled with this feeling, I felt light, both weightless and incandescent. I began to feel a laugh bubbling up in me. I allowed it to come forth. I sat for however long, bathed in this energy, laughing gently, feeling joy. At the same time, I also felt a part of me was still there, observing. I was not generating or creating this. Nothing was forced by me. At the same time, I did not feel “possessed” or taken over; I still felt I had agency. It was an experience unlike anything I’ve known before or since.

At some point I felt satiated, full, and decided I was done. I removed my hand from the woman’s arm and opened my eyes. I felt new. I felt connected, united with myself and with everything. As I walked, my feet connected in a way that felt like I was the earth and the earth was me. I had a feeling of well-being, life, and love. This feeling remained with me for many hours. After the night’s sleep, it had dissipated. I did not seek this encounter again, and one year later I came to terms that I did not agree with aspects of this church’s dogma and no longer wanted to pretend I did. But I remembered this experience and cherished it awhile.

Then life happened, and the incident faded. Whenever I thought about it, I lumped it in the “I’m not certain what that was but it probably wasn’t real” category. Except… it felt real, and it still resonates like an authentic experience, an encounter with the energy that makes up the universe. While I don’t believe in an anthropomorphic god, I do believe there is something that makes the universe go, something science does not explain completely yet, that it is real, we are made of it, and that we can access a connection with it. (As Carl Sagan said, “We are star stuff.”)

And now I have reopened Kathleen Singh’s book to face the question of dying, of what it’s about and what might follow. The experience I had in 1996 was a glimpse. My hunch is that this connection is possible, is accessible via meditation practice over many years, and that it is our destination at the moment the body dies. As I read her book I will process some of my reactions here.

The Test of Twelve

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I’m not a parent who buys into the “stranger danger” propaganda. By this, I mean that I’m not worried that a kidnapping or molestation of my child is just around every corner. I’m a big supporter of the Free-Range Kid movement. Occasionally strangers attempt to harm people, but the majority of harm done to children is usually by someone they know.

Bean has a collection of Pooh stories (not written by A.A. Milne) that she loves; one is called “Don’t Talk to Strangers, Pooh.” I dread when she asks it to be read to her, and I always re-word it as I read. I don’t want to instill a fear of strangers into my daughter. How is she to make friends in this world, or find her way, or ask for help when she needs it? I simply want her to understand never to go off anywhere with a stranger. I want her to learn this until she is of age — that is, a confident adult who can assess risks and listen to her intuitive signals.

When I was a child, my disposition and personality attracted bullies. I was a sentimental child with zero self-confidence. (I grew up into a depressed adult with zero self-confidence, but with enough gumption and drive to heal and overcome this.) I have vivid memories of being taunted:

a bully yanking a play necklace off me in kindergarten, watching the beads scatter everywhere, hearing him tell me I could not stand on the school porch and he would kill me if I did (thank you Mark S.);
an older child riding his bike around me in ever tighter circles as I walked to piano lessons a few blocks from home, threatening to run into me;
being choked (hands tight around the neck) by a boy in third grade when I would not give him a book that I had brought to school (thank you Tony F.) — fortunately the teacher was nearby and pried his hands from my throat;
being tormented throughout fourth and fifth grade by a “friend” who happened to be the local Presbyterian minister’s kid — she hid my belongings, said terrible things to and about me, ganged up with another girl against me (thanks Suzanne H.). I was so relieved when our fifth grade teacher told me she was moving away to Massachusetts that summer;
being punched in the stomach by a class bully (a girl no less) in fifth grade (thank you Colleen F.);
being exiled from my four friends with whom I shared a table (and locker) in sixth grade — all girls, who are great at emotional bullying.

That last incident was the first — and only — time I ever fought back. It began on a Wednesday, escalated into Thursday; that night, after being physically ill with fear and worry about what they would do next, I vowed the first one to harass me the next day would get kicked in the stomach. One of them approached me with a taunt, and I kicked. Then I fled, hysterical and sobbing, to the principal’s office. I asked to call my mother, and I begged her to come take me home. The principal intervened and said they’d figure out what was going on. I was terrified that I’d hurt the girl, that I was in big trouble, that I was hated by the entire sixth grade. I spent the day with the school counselor processing all this. He came with me when I went to apologize to the girl. This was a Friday. The principal called the other girls’ parents to tell them about the ostracism. The following Monday (I agonized all weekend about what might happen next), the girls came to apologize to me and make up, and I was accepted again. That was the day of the class picnic. Life was wonderful again, for the moment.

This was all exacerbated by the fact that from age 8 through 12, life at home was not placid and secure. In fact, throughout my teen years this was the case, but by the time I reached high school I had primarily withdrawn from school life and was mostly left alone. Oh, except for the nasty rumor that I was having an affair in 11th grade with my social studies teacher; I had a crush on him, but more importantly, he listened to me pour out my troubles and referred me to the school psychologist, whom I began to see and whom I credit with keeping me intact through graduation. I’m not at liberty to describe why my home life was as it was; it’s only important to know that the milieu, combined with my personality, combined in such a way as to make me a target.

I know that it’s an animal instinct to go for the jugular, to attack the weak one. I know that fearfulness, simpering, flinching, and crying triggers the meanness in others. I have felt that meanness in myself, been tempted by it, and have occasionally indulged it. When I grew up, I realized that if I had a daughter, I want to help her to know that it is perfectly all right to defend herself. Now, my daughter is not me — she has a differently personality and home life — and I’m careful not to project my past onto her. Still, there are things worth knowing.

When I was twelve, there was a carnival down the road at Taunton Corners. Every year it came for the Firemen’s Field Days. At that age, I was allowed to walk down there myself, about a mile away. The man running the duck game flirted with me. I was taken by the attention. I flirted back in the innocent way a 12-year-old does. Then he made a suggestion to me, that I should come back that evening when the carnival was closed to spend time with him. I was intrigued, and tempted, and scared, and unnerved. Something felt icky about the way he looked at me, about the suggestion. I felt uncomfortable, and I never went; I also never back to that game. That was a good decision. I listened to my intuition, and it did not guide me poorly.

I ignored my intuition when I was 31. I ended up sexually assaulted. Not that it was my fault. It’s just that, looking back, I see the signals that I ignored because I was trying to be “a nice person,” (such a strong cultural expectation for women). I remember my reluctance to fight back, to scream; my desperate attempt to reject what was happening.

So, how does one raise a child to be secure but not naive, savvy but not paranoid? There are two books filled good guidance to answer this question, both written by Gavin DeBecker. I am pulling an excerpt from one of his books below. It is a “test” of sorts, one which he suspects many adults would not “pass” if they asked themselves these questions.

I’m not advocating raising children to be violent, to be bullies, to be snots and brats. Yet in certain circumstances, it is vitally important to be able to know and do the following. The questions pertain to interactions children have with adults, but in some cases it may be useful to think of them in context with kids who are bigger and older than the child in question.

Do your children know…

How to honor their feelings – if someone makes them uncomfortable, that’s an important signal;

You (the parents) are strong enough to hear about any experience they’ve had, no matter how unpleasant;

It’s okay to rebuff and defy adults;

It’s okay to be assertive;

How to ask for assistance or help;

How to choose whom to ask;

How to describe their peril;

It’s okay to strike, even to injure, someone if they believe they are in danger, and that you’ll support any action they take as a result of feeling uncomfortable or afraid;

It’s okay to make noise, to scream, to yell, to run;

If someone even tries to force them to go somewhere, what they scream should include, “This is not my father” (because onlookers seeing a child scream or even struggle are likely to assume the adult is a parent);

If someone says, “Don’t yell,” the thing to do is yell (and the corollary: If someone says, “Don’t tell,” the thing to do is tell);

To fully resist ever going anywhere out of public view with someone they don’t know, and particularly to resist going anywhere with someone who tries to persuade them.

–Gavin DeBecker, Protecting the Gift: Keeping Children and Teenagers Safe (and Parents Sane)

Frugal Toy

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Yesterday Bean and I went to Happy Hollow Park and Zoo. We had lots of fun with the rides. One of the featured activities was Cardboard City. Visitors are encouraged to play and create a city of cardboard based on imagination in the Meadow, using old boxes and paint. And this gave me an idea.

I’ve been wanting to give Bean a barn to play with, but many of them are outrageously expensive. So I found an old box and, with a little cutting and taping and painting, ended up with a barn. Bean helped me paint the barn red. Then I took over with the roof and trim, and collaged the inside of the box. I’ve had the paint, paper, and tape on hand for years, so for a very minimal cost we have a toy barn! It may not last as long as a wooden one, but we had fun making it (especially me). Now all we need are some farm animals!