One Cobble at a Time

Yesterday was the US postal service’s busiest shipping day of the year. We here at Chez Tayler have been doing our part to add to the load. I’ve been shipping out 5-15 packages per day for the last week or so. This is not a surprise to us. In fact we’ve kind of been counting on it this year to help us make the ends meet until we can release the next Schlock book. In another week I’ll be able to do the math and see how much gap is left. I’ll also do the math to see how Christmas spending added to the gap.

I enjoy the Holiday shipping. It has a cheerful urgency to it. I love looking at the invoices and seeing when the billing address is different from the shipping address. Then I know what I’m sending is a gift. It is a gift to us as well. Every package we send is a gift to us from the Schlock readers out there who enjoy the comic enough to spend money. I sometimes wish I could thank them all. I put a Thank You post card into each order, but it hardly seems like enough.

Things do not always go smoothly. People email me with questions. This year I’ve had multiple inquiries about merchandise for which we’ve run out of stock. That makes me sad because I know the other person is disappointed. I am much happier when the problem is one I can solve by sending out a replacement or filling a special request. I know that the time will come when we are too busy to manage special requests, but that day has not yet arrived. The more I interact with customers, the more impressed I am with Schlock readers. They are courteous, patient, and understanding of our human errors. I even had one guy who replied with startlement that I was the one to answer his email personally. This amused me because I realized he did not know how small our operation really is.

Today I had to assemble more boxed sets to fill out the orders. Six year old Patch sat with me as I slid books into boxes. He’d wanted to help slide books into sleeves, but sometimes the books require coaxing to slide into place. Instead I handed him the note cards which are included in each set. As I finished each box, he would slide card into place. Then he lined the sets up very carefully. Eight year old Gleek was the one who helped with the shrink wrapping. She likes to run the heat gun which makes the plastic fit tightly over the sets. Then we cleared all of it off the kitchen table so that dinner and homework could take place.

As I restocked the shipping table in the unfinished storage room, I pondered once again the cottage industry we are running. In some ways what we have is the re-invention of the family farm. We have busy seasons and slow seasons. My kids measure their lives by these business seasons as much as they do by the seasonal weather outside. They remember the times that Mom and Dad are distracted and pushing to send a book off to print. They like book shipping because it provides work they get paid to do. Shipping season is also celebrated for the treat foods we eat because Mom and Dad are too busy to cook. Convention season is frequently hectic and often involves over night stays with friends and relatives. In our lives, business and family are all tied up together. I like it that way even if it is chaotic at times.

I sometimes wonder how my kids will look back on our family life. Will they consider it as an ideal to live up to, or will they take from it things that they do not want to replicate? I hope they’ll do both. For now we have orders to ship.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

Link came trudging toward the car after school, shoulders slumped, eyebrows fixed into a scowl. He met my eyes and for just a moment I saw the corner of his mouth quirk up. That was the only clue that all might not be as it appeared.

“Mom. I had a terrible day.” Link flopped himself into the seat next to me.

“Oh? I’m sorry to hear that. What happened.”

Link hunched over a little bit more. “I lost six teeth.”

This was nowhere on the list of probable causes for a bad day. Also, had I heard right? “What?”

“I lost six teeth.”

I looked over at my son. There was no sign of the slight smirk. He was looking at me, deadpan serious. Part of my brain was still convinced that I’d heard wrong. I knew he had a wiggly tooth. Losing a tooth would not be surprising, but six? Really? Then Link grinned at me. There were four teeth across the front surrounded on either side by huge gaps. Link also held up a little ziploc bag containing the teeth in question. Six teeth in one day.

A closer inspection showed that the new teeth are already showing through. Link won’t have the big gaps for very long. This is good, since he’s discovered that chewing is a bit of a challenge at the moment. Also he is very pleased with himself. Not only did he lose more teeth in one day than anyone else we’ve ever known, but he fooled his mom with the “I’m having a bad day” schtick.

Edited to add: The lost tooth count is up to seven. Link just pulled out one on the bottom. This one was not quite as ready to let go as the top teeth. Link was just enthusiastic. None of the rest are even remotely wiggly and I have commanded him to leave them alone. I guess he was just overdue on losing a bunch of teeth.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

The thought process goes like this:

Hmmm. I think I want some fudge.

I shall make fudge.

*cook stir pour wait*

Yay! I have fudge!

*Nom nom nom*

I have to stop eating this fudge.

Quick! Give away all the fudge.

Whew. Now my pants will continue to fit.

Hmmm. I think I want fudge.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

“I hate myself! I’m stupid!” Gleek shouted from her curled-into-a-ball spot on the corner of the couch. She was wet from the knees down and cold. I’d had to drag her indoors from the slushy snow because she refused to come in when I called. She had directly defied me and now was berating herself for it, but that did not change the fact that consequences still needed to be applied.

Among the things that parents don’t want to hear, an impassioned “I hate myself” ranks right under “I hate you.” My mind spins so many unpleasant futures from theses statements. People who truly hate themselves develop all sorts of self-destructive patterns. Most actions motivated by hatred are destructive. I want to argue with Gleek, but I’ve had that conversation before. It goes like this:
Me: “You don’t hate yourself. You’re just mad right now.”
Gleek: “Yes I do!”
Repetition only makes Gleek more upset and more firm in her determination that she hates herself. My attempts to pull her out of the mood drive her further into it instead. I don’t want to waste effort on that dead end tonight.

So sit on the stairs and look at my little girl. She sniffles and curls tightly around her pillowcase filled with blankets and stuffed animals. I can’t remember when she started using the pillowcase as a bag for her comfort objects. It was a while ago. She hides her face from me. She knows she was wrong and she feels terrible.

Howard suggested that her consequence for defiant disobedience could be being sent to bed and missing all the evening activities. It is a stricter consequence than we usually apply, but then this defiance was more direct as well. Perhaps they match. Perhaps the strict consequence will help her remember and avoid making the same choice again.

Upon hearing the suggestion, Gleek cries out “Just do it! I deserve it!”

I rub my face in my hands. If we send her to her room, she will curl into a ball in her bed. She will feel miserable, lonely, disassociated from the family, left out, and ostracized. These are all feelings I have been working to reduce in her mind and heart. She wants to feel these things because they give her reasons to hate herself and that is the mood of the moment.

I look over to Howard and I see that he realizes that his suggested consequence is not going to provide the resolution we hope for. I just wish I had an alternative to offer. So I sit on the stairs and throw a little prayer heavenward.

“Please help me see a way to apply consequences which makes her a stronger happier person instead of a more miserable one.”

There is no rush of inspiration, no answer becomes clear. But I can tell that I am waiting for something. I am like a person walking through the fog. I can see the lamp post ahead of me, but nothing beyond that. I just have to keep walking and trust that the next lamp post will be visible once I’ve passed this one.

Howard suggests that perhaps a chore would be a better consequence. That way Gleek could do something hard, but feel a sense of accomplishment about her work when she is done. It is a good suggestion, but I don’t see how to make it fit yet. So I keep sitting.

“I hate myself.” Gleek mumbles again.

I am tired, and I don’t have a better answer, so I say “Okay. So you hate yourself.”

Gleek’s head raises a little at my atypical response.

“So what are you going to do about it?” The words are spawned by the memory of a conversation I had with Gleek a week ago. We talked about how the only person you can change is yourself. “If you don’t like yourself, then it is your job to change yourself into a person you can like.”

As soon as the words are spoken, I can see the next lamp post. I know what the consequence should be.
“Gleek, you need to choose a consequence for yourself. Mom and Dad have to approve it, but you have to pick it. I’m pretty sure the consequence needs to be a chore of some kind. And you have to stay right here on the couch until you pick it.”

Gleek does not like this. She would much rather be exiled to her room. But the more she complains, the more I know the direction is right. We have given her power over her own destiny. We have put the responsibility into her hands. Now it is not Mom and Dad forcing her to stay on the couch. She can get up as soon as she chooses to take action rather than cuddle her misery. Suddenly she is no longer a victim and she does not like that.

The fog has cleared and I see the path. I get up off the stairs and go about my business. I have to give time for Gleek to think things through. She makes a cry of dismay as I leave the room. She does not want me to go. But alone with her thoughts and with the path we’ve set, she quickly chooses a chore.

The chore is done slowly and with much complaining, but the shape of the conflict has changed. Gleek tries to reclaim victimhood a time or two, but I just reiterate that she can be done as soon as she chooses to work. She finishes the job and the rest of the evening goes pleasantly.

I must remember this consequence structure. I’m sure it will be useful again.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

From For One More Day by Mitch Albom. The narrator had a 10 year career in minor league baseball:

“I hate my job,” I said.
“Well…” Miss Thelma shrugged. “Sometimes that happens. Cain’t be much worse than scrubbin’ your bathtub, can it?” She grinned. “You do what you gotta do to hold your family together. Ain’t that right, Posey?”
I watched them finish their routine. I thought about how many years Miss Thelma must have run vaccums or scrubbed tubs to feed her kids; how many shampoos or dye jobs my mother must have done to feed us. And me? I got to play a game for ten years–and I wanted twenty. I felt suddenly ashamed.
“What’s wrong with that job you got anyhow?” Miss Thelma said.
I pictured the sales office, the steel desks, the dim, fluorescent lights.
“I didn’t want to be ordinary.” I mumbled.

The “didn’t want to be ordinary” really hit home. Most of my life circles ordinary things, and I sometimes complain about that. I often feel the desire to be extraordinary, special. I write my blog and give presentations. Sometimes I feel that doing these things is the adult equivalent of the four year old child who shouts “Watch me!” while slipping down the slide.

I don’t want to be ordinary because ordinary feel like a synonym for boring. Only that isn’t true. The world is full of ordinary things that are amazing. Snow is everywhere. We stomp through it, slide on it, shovel it, and curse it. It blankets my yard right now. But if I get down close, I discover that this ordinary thing is not a single thing at all. It arrives as beautiful crystalline shapes. It transforms when it lands. It can be packed into snowballs, made into sculptures, or tracked into the house. It is completely ordinary and also amazing.

I am in favor of savoring the ordinary. Not because it lowers expectations and makes life easier, but because so much of what we consider ordinary is actually special. Terry Pratchett brilliantly pointed out that the most amazing capability that humanity possesses is the ability to be bored. Without it we would all sit around being perpetually stunned by the world we live in.

This is what Mitch Albom’s quote does for me. It reminds me that a life spent in the ordinary pursuit of a worthwhile goal will not be wasted. My efforts at house cleaning, or clothes washing, or package shipping, are not wasted. They each contribute to the benefit of our family. Being notable may or may not happen to anyone in life. What really matters is usually ordinary.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

The actual words were a bit different, but this was the gist of the conversation.

Howard: I’m going to need a list from you of things you want for Christmas.

Me: I’ll put together a list of suggestions for you to work from.

Howard: I don’t want ’suggestions’ I want ISBN numbers and specific instructions.

Me: But then it feels like I’m just handing you a shopping list, sending you to fetch the things that I have already picked out. I don’t care if things are not perfect. Opening things that are unexpected is part of the fun.

Howard: (sigh) okay.

I’m so glad that he puts up with me.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

It started with the telephone. I was going back to bed after getting the kids off to school. The head cold and the interrupted night’s sleep had rendered bed necessary. But if the phone rang, I did not want to have to get up, so I picked up the handset and carried it with me into the bedroom.

I also collected the portable DVD player. It had a half-watched movie in it and that would be a good follow-up activity to sleeping. Then I remembered that the first half of the movie had triggered some writing thoughts. If I was going to have writing thoughts, I needed my notebook. I retrieved that. Then I also retrieved a brand new notebook from downstairs because I’m almost out of pages in the first one. If I used the last page I didn’t want to have to get up for another notebook.

I carried these things to my room. Where I saw my laptop plugged in across the room from the bed. I might want to write straight to the laptop rather than just scribbling notes, but I didn’t want to have to get out of bed to retrieve it from the other side of the room. So I picked it up to carry it to the bedside table. Next to the laptop was the book I read yesterday. There were some quotations in the book that I wanted to blog about. In the same stack were my paper journal, and my scriptures, and the next book to read. I might as well carry them all to the bed.

At about this time I realized that some deep place in my brain had no intention of getting out of bed again. It planned to stay there all day and was nesting appropriately. The deep place of my brain was right. Other than getting kids from school and supervising some homework, I’ve been in bed. Often sleeping.

Howard laughed at my nesting, but he has taken good care of me. He fixed me both breakfast and lunch. He brought me extra blankets and he kept me company when I was awake.

The nesting was not futile. For some reason my half-asleep brain kept composing essays and blog entries. I kept trying to soothe it; petting it like a mother pets the head of a fretful child. I tried to convince my brain that we could let go of the thoughts, that they would be waiting for us on the other side of sleep. My brain was not convinced and could only be appeased by the copious scribbling of notes while laying down with one eye cracked open. Precious thoughts preserved, I was able to sleep. Viewed with a little more objectivity, some of those precious thoughts were…not so precious. But I find it encouraging that writer thoughts are so pervasive even when I am sick.

On a meta level it was amusing to watch myself this morning. I was aware that my thought processes were askew. My time sense certainly was. I am still a bit unfocused, but three hours of sleep made things somewhat better. More sleep is in my future. I also intend to summon pizza via the internet in order to supply dinner. Pizza sounds good. I still have that movie to watch. Today I am really glad that my kids are old enough to take care of themselves while I sleep.

(Yes this entire entry was written on the laptop while laying in bed.)

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

I once heard a radio program which was lamenting the negative savings rate in America. The guest was an author of a book about saving for retirement and naturally had lots of opinions on the subject. She gave tips from her book, telling listeners how to improve their financial situation and save money. Among the tips were:
Setting up an automatic debit from paycheck into savings account.
Only having one credit card.
Using cash to purchase whenever possible.
Impose a waiting period on purchases to avoid impulse spending.
Doing the math on a purchase to figure out the final price with interest.

All of the tips are good, but I’ve heard them all before in many different iterations. The media is full of similar tips and exhortations for people to save money. What none of these reports or books make clear is why people should save money. Well okay, they say “for retirement,” but retirement is only a concept. Without a concrete plan it is hard to feel that saving for it is important. Saving for retirement is much easier when you know what it looks like.

So ask yourself, what is your dream? If your dream is to own a farm in the countryside, figure out how much it will cost to buy and to run. Then save money hand-over-fist to make it happen. Set a goal that by age 60 you’ll be able to afford that farm and have enough money to keep it running for the rest of your life. If your dream is to take trip around the world, do some research. Figure how much it will cost and set a goal for when you’ll have that money saved. If your dream is to never having to work again, figure out how much money you need to have saved so that you can live on the interest. If you dream of making pottery and selling it, find out how much money you need to have saved so that you can live on it for two years while your pottery business gets off the ground. If you dream of owning a fancy car, research how much it will cost to buy it and maintain it, then save for that.

The key here is to plan ahead. When Howard and I got married we had several goals. We wanted Howard to be able to earn his living creatively. We wanted to own a house. We wanted to have several children. All of our spending was structured to accommodate those long-term goals. When Howard got a pay raise, we didn’t raise our standard of living much. We saved the extra against a planned goal. Even when we had the house and the kids, we still spent carefully because we had the dream of Howard being able to make a living as a cartoonist. We did spend some money on luxuries like nice furniture and new cars, but each of these purchases was balanced against the larger goal. Each time we carefully considered whether the expense added more value to our lives than having Howard work from home would. Eventually we reached the day when Howard quit Novell. That was scary and I confess I did some second guessing about some of the things on which we’d chosen to spend money. Particularly during the first 15 months when we supported ourselves on a few corporate cartooning contracts and our savings. We made it through thanks to the previous planning and saving.

Now we have reached the point where all our just-got-married dreams have come to pass. We have a house, four kids, and our income is from a comic strip which Howard draws and I make into books. We have not stopped saving. At the moment our monetary focus is on paying down debt and creating a financial buffer. We like our life style and want to be sure that we get to keep it. This is particularly important because we know that our current good health will not last forever. Beyond that, we have new dreams. We want to help pay the way for four kids to attend college. We want to travel interesting places. We want to remodel the house. We want to be able to employ others so that they can reach their dreams. We use these new long-term goals as guideposts to decide how to spend the money we have in our pockets today.

What we don’t do much of is stash money away for retirement. We don’t really plan to retire. We like to work and we plan to work as long as we are able. Instead we are constantly updating our financial plans to match our long-term goals. Frequently this means that we put off buying things that we want, but don’t particularly need. This process is much easier because I am able to picture what that money will be used for instead. This is why we save.

Edited to add: A couple of people have made excellent points about the need for saving against emergencies and the value of sheltering money from taxes via IRA accounts. Both of these have merit and really ought to be considered when making a long term financial plan. And we do think about them at our house, but somehow they slipped my mind while writing this post. I guess I was trying to introduce the concept of making saving specific and directed to those who don’t think much about savings. However I now see that this entry is an incomplete picture.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

This afternoon was calm. Homework was accomplished without battles, in part because the two kids who have been fighting me both decided to get most of it done while still at school. It makes me hopeful that we’re nearing the end of the swirling emotional chaos that I’ve been swimming in since school started. On the other hand, I’m a bit afraid to get my hopes up for fear that this calm will merely prove to be the eye of the storm.

Because of the calm I got to spend an hour drafting an essay. This one is longer than is usual for me, but it is within the word limit for the contest where I intend to submit it. I just need to figure out the last paragraph and it will be ready for first readers.

Howard and I were discussing our experience with publishing. It has been far from typical. We aren’t even typical for webcomics which publish books. Once again I was reminded what an incredible gift the Schlock readers give to us. We are truly honored by their loyalty and support.

I’m sitting on my bed composing this entry. Next to me sits a stuffed Opus wearing reindeer horns. (From Bloom County by Berke Breathed) The horns used to have ball ornaments hanging from them, but those have gone missing in the decade since I acquired him. Mostly Opus has spent his lifetime being pulled out as part of the Christmas decor. But in the past three years he has a new lease on life. He is our Christmas elf, an emblem of good works. It begins with a good deed. This year Link made my bed. Then he placed Opus on top as a sign that a good deed had been done. It was then my job to do a good deed for someone else. Then that person has to do a good deed and so on. In theory Opus should be hopping around regularly all month long. In reality he’s spent almost a week waiting in my room. It is not that I don’t do things for the kids. I do all the time, but Opus is supposed to go with something extra, something beyond the call of duty. Unfortunately I haven’t had much time for anything extra, so Opus waits. I really need to get my act together though. Patch keeps noticing that Opus hasn’t moved. He really wants the Christmas Opus to show up for him. He wants a turn at good-deed-doing. So tomorrow I need to find something nice to do for Patch.

Also, I need to help Gleek make more paper crafts to give to Kiki. That project fell off the radar over the weekend, but it needs to go back. Gleek needs it.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

Facebook Status:
Dear Children, Monday is not the best day for you to get sick, as your mother is too busy working to be very sympathetic. I suggest you select Thursday next time.

Schedule note:
There is no such thing as a “quick errand” when snow is falling and the snow plows are awol.

Observation:
When movies and video games are forbidden, two semi-sick kids will find ways to occupy themselves quietly by reading and writing stories. There will be a period of squabbling, but then they will break out the legos and spend nearly two hours experimenting with making and spinning lego tops.

In the category of miraculous occurrences:
Kiki cheerfully scheduled her afternoon and managed her homework sans drama. Perhaps the two hour long battle last Wednesday was worth it.

Note to floral department at Albertsons:
If you want to sell flowers in winter, try stocking brightly colored ones. The last thing I want is white flowers, which make me think of the six inches of slow I had to slog through just to arrive at the store.

Parental Judo at it’s best:
For family activity have a lesson on teamwork while the entire family cooperates to mix up a brownie fudge cake. Then use the baking time to split the family into teams and assign them rooms to clean up. The lesson on teamwork and the promise of a treat can get two rooms clean in less than 30 minutes.

Addendum: Now figure out how to make them excited about cleaning the rest of the house.

Additional house cleaning addendum: They might do better about keeping things clean if you offered a better example. Have you looked at your office or bedroom lately?

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

At our church Christmas party the children were taken in groups to participate in a little nativity play. The casting was very simple. To one side of the room was a bin full of multiple costumes for each part. Kids declared which part they wanted to play and the costumes were distributed. Then the costumed children then stood while a man read out an abbreviated version of the biblical account of the birth of Christ.

When it was my kids’ turn to participate, Joseph stepped forward with three Marys. They shuffled their way over to the single manger and then faced the logistical dilemma of placing three dolls in it. The resulting compromise was to stack the Baby Jesuses like cord wood. Next came a small herd of be-dish-toweled shepherds. Each carried a small stuffed sheep. The stuffed sheep proved to be excellent missiles for knocking the tinsel halos off of the angels. Last to shuffle forward were the two wise men. Apparently turbans and boxes are not as exciting as dish towels and sheep.

All the actors huddled around the manger with their backs to the audience. There was much nudging and shuffling as the story was read. Several angels ran to parents for halo replacement. From the middle of the crowd a sheep made a ballistic arc to land on the floor and then had to be retrieved. I pulled out a notebook and began to take notes. It was either that or give in to a fit of giggles. I pondered whether the whole affair was a tad sacrilegious. I mean Joseph looked like a polygamist standing up there with three Marys.

Then the program reached a point where everyone was invited to sing. By the second measure of Silent Night both the audience and actors had stilled. Suppressed giggles from the audience subsided and even the sheep stopped flying through the air. I watched as the youngest Mary reached out and tenderly touched the head of her Baby Jesus doll. For just a moment it was perfect and beautiful.

Then the song ended and chaos renewed. But the sheep didn’t fly quite as hard or as fast. The audience was still smiling, but less inclined to giggle. Despite the amusement it was a very good pageant indeed. No one was excluded or shoved into a role they didn’t want. Everyone had a chance to huddle close and contemplate the religious center of the Christmas season. I looked again at Joseph, and his three Marys, and the babies stacked in the manger. It was all just as it should be.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

I really want to take the title for this post and draw great big arrows pointing to it with exclamation marks. I can not remember the last time that Saturday was pleasant. I think it might have been sometime during the summer. Maybe. Mostly Saturdays have been chaotic and full of squabbling. By early afternoon I’m ready to flee from the house. Only I usually can’t because my house is full of neighbor children playing with my children.

But today was pleasant. Peaceful. I am trying to deconstruct where the difference lay so I can repeat the experience in future Saturdays. It wasn’t lack of neighbor children because those were here in abundance. Nor was it some edict from me about cleaning the house and banning video games. Our house is still cluttered and the sounds of repetitive game music abound. I can only find three things about today that are markedly different from other recent Saturdays.

1. Gleek was focused on playing nicely and being a good sister. This means that an accidental injury in the course of playing was met with sympathy and care rather than indignant protests that it was not her fault. Also she provoked no one and was accommodating to other people’s ideas.

2. I went to the gym. This got me out of the house and invigorated. I’ve exercised three times this week. I don’t think it is a coincidence that my mood has been better.

3. Kiki got herself out of bed. Then she proceeded to do her chores and get started on her homework without me commanding any of it.

All of these things are wonderful, but only #2 is in my control. So I’ll be getting myself to the gym more regularly and just cross my fingers that the kids will decide that being kind and responsible are more fun than the other options.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

Gleek has been wrestling with many complicated emotions. Her inner turmoil leads her to run fast, play hard, and be a bit demanding of her playmates. This frequently leads to conflict with those playmates, which creates more inner turmoil. There are brief windows of time when she is ready to talk about her feelings and sort through them. Usually these times happen inconveniently, when we’re headed out the door to school, or when it is already past bedtime and I’m trying to get her to lay down, or when three other kids are all needing things from me at the same time. I try to listen as best I can while still addressing the other tasks at hand. Her inner turmoil is comprised of loneliness, a feeling that something is missing, sadness, and a desire to be more connected with people. The times she is picking to try to discuss them with me are conducive to adding to the feelings rather than resolving them.

This evening she sat me down and very sadly told me that she doesn’t feel like Kiki loves her and that she feels like our family is breaking apart, like we’re not a real family. My first internal reaction was a tired frustration. I spend an awful lot of time trying to build family togetherness and relationships. Here was my child telling me that my efforts had been fruitless for her. A split-second later the frustration was followed by the knowledge that I just need to listen to Gleek. She feels what she feels. She feels it regardless of the things I have done which I think should make her feel differently. So I listened. I asked questions. I tried to get the full picture of what she felt was wrong. As I did, I also tried to think how I should handle this.

The “how should I handle this” question is one that I’ve been asking a lot. I’ve been presented with so many “thises” to handle of late. Just in the past 24 hours I’ve had 2 major (multi-hour) and at least 10 minor (30 min or less) behavioral problems to address. Right now peaceful play is rare. When the kids are at home, I am constantly helping, negotiating, and disciplining. I know this time is temporary. The kids are just simultaneously in developmental stages when they are challenging everything around them. The stages will pass. Things will settle down. But I can’t help feeling like the challenging developmental stages are like watershed moments in a child’s life. It sets the course for what comes next. So I put pressure on myself to get it right, to make sure that the necessary lessons are learned; the lessons which will serve the kids well in the future.

Gleek’s tale of woe wound to a close. I didn’t have a solution for her, so I simply asked what she thought she should do about it. I’ll admit that the question was stalling for time. But the moment it was out of my mouth, I realized that it was the answer. I elaborated for Gleek, explaining that we have no power to change other people, we can only change ourselves. If Gleek wants her relationships to be different, then she needs to do something different. I don’t think she liked the answer at first, but she listed a couple of changes she could make. Then we got talking about Kiki. Gleek suddenly came alight. She realized that she could do Secret Santa things for Kiki. She could make little crafts and leave them as surprises. Gleek jumped up and began with a paper snowflake. Then I was finally able to maneuver her into bed.

The more I think about this solution, the more I feel like it is the right one. I could run myself completely ragged trying to create events so that Gleek would feel like our family was strong. I could nudge and coerce all the other kids into doing nice things for her. The result would be a still-lonely Gleek and a newly-resentful set of other kids. We already do plenty of things as a family. Our family is strong, if a bit chaotic at the moment. The change needs to be inside Gleek so that she can see it. The best way I can think of for Gleek to feel loved is to teach her to show her love by serving others. When she is focused on helping others feel happy, she will find that she is happy.

This is going to mean more work for me, but I’d rather spend the time helping Gleek do service, than spend the same amount of time breaking up squabbles. I hope it works.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

Howard came home from the grocery store with a pile of fixings. He was in the mood for a really good hamburger. I was drawn into the kitchen to keep him company while he cooked. The shipping could wait for an hour and the kids were all at school. This was a chance for Howard and I to visit. Also, the hamburgers needed two sets of hands. I cleared the counter while Howard prepped the grill and cooking surfaces. As I worked and talked with Howard I was reminded of another occasion when we cooked hamburgers together. It was the week he quit Novell.

Howard had spent the preceding month on a whirlwind set of business trips. He’d come home exhausted and with the knowledge that it was time for him to be done working in that corporate environment. I knew it was past time. I’d watched him stretch himself thinner and thinner trying to keep his product going by sheer force of will. The company kept asking him to accomplish more while simultaneously removing resources. It was killing him and I could see it. I was so glad when he prayed and realized it was time for him to leave. I’d been praying for years that the time would come.

Howard announced his intention to leave and it was astonishing how quickly it came to pass. Within two days everything was tied up and he was done. He had a hard time saying goodbye to his work friends. He had an even harder time packing up his office. Eleven years of commitment and emotional effort had gone into Novell. Howard was besieged by doubts and fears. I was not. I kept calmly assuring him that everything would be okay; that the decision was the right one. He came home on that last day and it was as if a weight had lifted from his shoulders. He was happy, but wrung out.

Then next day was when I felt fear. I was suddenly very aware of the bills I would have to pay and the complete lack of income to pay them. There is no severance for people who leave of their own volition. We had savings. It would last us about three months. I remember laying on the couch and feeling the house all around me as if it was a physical weight that I somehow had to carry. I was so scared. It was scary to sit down with the kids and explain to them how our income had changed and what that meant for them. I cried with them that we could no longer afford chicken nuggets. That day it was Howard’s turn to reassure me that everything would be okay.

On the third day Howard made hamburgers. We sat down at the table together. We sat there together at lunch and for the first time I felt joy in the decision to quit. It was a peaceful moment, a promise that the new life we were embarking upon would be better that the one we had just let go.

I thought of that five-years-ago lunch as I ate today’s hamburger. Howard and I sat together at the table and laughed over small things, taking time to enjoy a moment of peace before we both head back to work. The time since that long ago lunch has not been stress-free. There have been tears and terrors aplenty. But I was right. This life has been better. We have been happier, even during the times when we have to scramble to keep all the ends together.

And the burgers are really good.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

I recently wrote a blog post in which I discussed the wonderful neighborhood community in which I live and how holiday celebrations enhance that community. There were several responses to the post, but one in particular struck me. The commenter expressed envy because she does not have a loving community and wishes that she did. Over the next weeks I kept thinking about that comment. I also spent time thinking about how communities are formed, how they thrive, how they can wither, and what can kill them. I combed through my experiences with communities of friends, Science Fiction convention attendees, writers, mothers, neighbors, church members, role playing gamers, Schlock fans, and youth leaders. My experiences with communities have taught me that communities and friendships are the result of nurturing and effort. Occasionally they spring into being effortlessly, but more often they are built and must be maintained. I fed all my observations into my analysis of the formation of community and I think that I have identified some conditions which can be used to nurture a community or even start one from scratch.

Communities are formed on commonalities. The commonality can be a location such as a town or neighborhood. It can be a school or church. It can be centered around a hobby or pursuit or aspiration. Whatever this hub for the community may be, it needs to be something that the community members care about. It needs to be part of their self identity. Getting people to emotionally invest in a community requires that they buy into the commonality and help form a shared identity

Communities thrive on proximity. The proximity can be either physical (as in a neighborhood) or virtual (as online) but the community members need to be able to bump into each other frequently. Lots of small contacts make people feel familiar much more quickly than widely spaced extended contacts. It is in the course of small contacts that people share the small details of their lives and which engage other people to respond, help, and care.

Communities require the cooperation of multiple people. One person can not create a community out of sheer force of will. If all the connections run to the community founder it is a contact chain, not a true community. Communities are like a mesh with connections running every direction. One person can do much to encourage the mesh to develop, but other people must also participate.

Community connections strengthen when members have multiple points of contact. This can be multiple settings or multiple conversational topics. All people are multi-faceted and they feel closer to people with whom they can share more than a single facet of who they are. This is a major reason why parties and celebrations can be so important to communities. The celebration takes the members outside their habitual spaces and encourages them to find atypical topics for conversation.

Communities based on acceptance and understanding have more durability. In theory a community can define itself by those it excludes, but exclusion introduces an element of fear. Community members must worry if they will one day also be excluded. Exclusion makes communities brittle and inclined to fracture. A community based on respect and acceptance allows the members to feel safe. People who feel safe are much more likely to emotionally invest in the community.

Communities have rules. The rules are important for defining how the community is to function. The rules may be very stringent or relaxed. They may be codified and set out clearly for all members to see. If rules are codified, communities flourish best if there is also a codified process for altering the rules as needed. Communities without codified rules have implied rules about how the members will treat one another.

Communities must police themselves. Sometimes a person enters a community and proceeds to behave in a way that creates contention or breaks rules. It may be open confrontation or it may be subversive and hidden. This person is the proverbial rotten apple which has the potential to spoil the whole barrel. In order to keep the community strong, this person must be managed. Ideally the person’s power to hurt the community is removed, while leaving open the option for the person to stay. Sometimes the contentious person must be evicted from the community in order to prevent further damage.

Communities prosper when the members work to build them. People are more emotionally invested where they have spent their effort. The fastest way to bond someone to a community is for them to feel needed in a community building job. Make work will not do it. The fastest way to become a part of a community is to volunteer. Spreading out the work among members also reduces the risk of members being overburdened or burned out.

Communities grow stronger when members are willing to take emotional risks. People can not feel connected when they are concerned with defending themselves from pain. When one community member is brave and opens up emotionally to share their life, other community members will respond in kind. Such opening up is always a risk, but when the risk is taken and responded to kindly, the community bonds strengthen. This risk does not have to be a huge baring of souls. It can be as simple as breaking the ice by introducing a topic of conversation.

Communities thrive when they don’t keep score. There is no problem with the community structure being built around a system that encourages people not to take advantage of others. But if the community spends too much energy make sure that the scales of cost and benefit are exactly even for each member, it introduces division and contention. Communities which encourage members to pay forward rather than back tend to be the longest lasting. Freeloaders should be addressed using the community policing policy.

Communities take time. They take time from each individual member who must spend it on community connections and events. They also take time to develop and grow. Occasionally communities form very quickly, but generally they grow slowly from few connections to many, from weak connections to strong. Trust in the community grows and traditions form. Over time the members begin to depend upon the community and turn to it in times of stress. Communities can also wane and die by the same passage of time. The growth or diminishment of a particular community is dependent upon the actions of its members.

Communities may or may not have a clear leader. Either way can work, but the presence of a community leader changes the internal dynamics of a community. If there is a leader, that person has great power over the community and a responsibility to act in ways that will help the community thrive.

Communities must allow for members to leave peacefully. People have only so much time and energy allotted to them. They must choose where best to spend it. Sometimes this means that people need to depart from communities. Other times conflict between members will precipitate a departure. If the departing member is let go peacefully, they are much more likely to return when the departure conditions have subsided. Additionally a peaceful departure process helps other members feel comfortable that they are not trapped in a place where only a major upheaval can get them out.

The list is not comprehensive and perhaps some of the points are arguable, but as a jumping off point for discussions about community I think this list serves well. It occurs to me that these same conditions can be applied to fostering a friendship with an individual. I’m interested in other people’s thoughts on community as well. What have you noticed that I haven’t listed here?

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

My facebook status this morning proclaimed that I had clawed my way through an enormous pile of email and was ready to tackle an enormous pile of shipping. The statement was accurate, but due to the short space requirements, incomplete. Also pending was a big pile of accounting, a big pile of laundry, and a big pile of dishes. Things do tend to stack up when I step outside my usual round of tasks for a holiday weekend.

Oddly this accumulation of things to do feels like an interesting challenge rather than a burdenous slog. My triumphant feeling about the email was repeated upon the completion of the shipping. That’s as far as I got before the kids got home and rearranged my priorities. The rest of today will be spend housekeeping and mommying. I just hope I can keep up this energetic streak so that I can tackle more piles tomorrow.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

There are some days where events fit together as part of a much larger picture.

The speaker in church talked much on personal revelation, that we each can receive inspiration to direct our actions and guide our lives. This is something I believe in strongly. I’ll admit that I was only giving the speaker half of my attention, as the rest of my attention was on Gleek’s artistic explorations into cross hatching. The kids require lots of encouragement to remain non-disruptive. But in the midst of showing Gleek the different effects that can be achieved by cross hatch density, I suddenly found myself listening with full attention. The speaker spoke of building life habits around seeking inspiration. This is something I’ve tried to do in my life. Because of it there have been times when I have felt clearly and strongly about things I needed to do or say. Lately it has all been a muddle. I haven’t felt strong or clear about anything. Mostly I’ve just been trusting that part of myself that says “do this next.” There hasn’t been time for quiet thoughts or big perspectives. What came to me while listening to the speaker is that the “do this next” voice can be every bit as inspired as the quiet, calm, perspective-driven decisions. I’ve trained myself to recognize and respond to that quiet inner voice. It makes sense that I would keep responding even when there isn’t much time for thought. I also realized that I miss having the larger perspective. If I want it back, I need to carve out some time for it to exist in. I resolved to do some quiet thinking during the rest of church while I was away from the kids.

Quiet thought during church was not to be. Instead I was asked to be a last minute substitute for the primary class that I used to teach. I agreed without a qualm. I love those kids and I know that they really need someone who understands the particular personalities involved. The class had gotten more challenging, not less. Later in the evening I spoke with my backyard neighbor who is their regular teacher. We got to compare notes and discuss the needs. The conversation was helpful in spinning ideas about how to help the kids in the class. It sparked ideas both in her and in me about things that could be done to further help. That conversation would not have happened without me being willing to drop my plan for quiet contemplation.

Directly after church our home teacher came to visit with us. Home teaching is one of the community building activities of our church. Men are paired up and assigned families to visit once per month. This builds friendships and also provides a conduit for information and help in times of need or crisis. We don’t often need much from our home teachers, so the visits tend to be a social visit with a lesson attached. The home teacher arrived and his lesson was tailored just for our family. He spoke about burdens and engaged all of the kids in the discussion. He touched on all the angles that Kiki needs when contemplating school. He gave Gleek direct attention and praise, which she needs. His lesson even let me share my story about the handful of meal and a little oil, that we can somehow give of ourselves and not turn up empty. It was a really good lesson that answered the needs of several family members. Only he had no idea of the needs he was answering. He had no idea how burdened I’ve felt of late, or how various things he said applied to the various situations of our family members.

So in one day I had an insight which has potential to make my life feel more peaceful. I was given the opportunity to answer a need. Then someone else unknowingly answered needs in our family. These are the times when I can sense the larger picture of which I am only a small piece. It has been a good sabbath.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

I was watching Firefly with six year old Patch snuggled up next to me. He loves to watch the space ships. Some of the other stuff in the show was a little scary to him, so I paused the show to explain how it is all pretend. He turned wide eyes to me in disbelief and said “You mean space ships aren’t real?!”

It was like someone had taken away Christmas. I had to explain to him that we do have real space ships, but that they don’t look like the ones in movies. So we googled some pictures of the space shuttle and I told him about it. I told him what I knew about space shuttles and how they work. I told him how my dad dragged us kids out of bed at four in the morning so we could watch space shuttle launches on live television. I told him about watching the space shuttles land at much more convenient west coast hours. I told about the time that the space shuttle was transported via plane over our house and I watched it fly by. I remember what an amazing miracle it was to have a space ship that could be used more than once.

My stories convinced Patch that all was not lost in the space ship department. I wanted to give him more to be excited about, so I went to netflix to find documentaries about space. The documentaries arrived only to disappoint. They were nostalgic and historical. There were images of space ships, but most of the screen time was old guys talking. These documentaries did nothing to make my son excited about real space ships.

This makes me sad, because the fact that human beings travel into space is a miracle. It has become one of those routine miracles that few people pay any attention to. We entertain ourselves with fantastical visions of futures filled with flying cars and space ships when high above us people are orbiting beyond the reach of gravity. If we want our future to include amazingly cool space ships, we need to be making kids excited about space. I wondered at the lack of documentaries explaining to kids what space exploration has done and why it is cool. I wondered at the lack of a Carl Sagan or a Bill Nye or an Adam from the myth Mythbusters to make space science accessible to kids.

Lacking an exciting documentary, I took matters into my own hands. Today we had a family outing to the Hill Air Force Base Aerospace Museum. This museum is devoted primarily to airplanes rather than space ships, but it is worth the trip. We got to walk right up next to hundreds of historical aircraft. The one Kiki loved was the 1948 era plane of the kind used by the “candy bomber” who dropped packages of candy to children during the Berlin airlift. Gleek was creeped out by the mock up of the first atom bomb. It was truly creepy looking even before reading the plaque. Patch was delighted by the whole experience. He would have been happy to wander for hours just looking at the airplanes. But the true joy of the trip for him was the hands on exhibit where he got to climb into a bomber cockpit simulator and play with all the switches. If he’d grinned any wider, his face would have split.

I was once again amazed at the marvel of airplane engineering. I was a little saddened that so much of it is devoted to ever better ways to commit violence. I think that is why the portions devoted to space travel were my favorite. Space ships are all about making sure that no one gets killed. I mused on all of this as I sat waiting for the kids to be ready to leave the hands-on exhibit area. Then I noticed that in the waiting area there was a video playing. It was taking the viewer step by step through a space shuttle launch and doing so interestingly. I asked one of the docents and she told me that the video was The Big Space Shuttle. I have now added that to our Christmas list. It is more similar to How It’s Made than to Bill Nye The Science Guy, but it is much better than the documentaries I found before.

The outing was a success. Patch even acquired a little pewter airplane that he has been playing with all evening. He cornered me to tell me all about it, including the fact that the plane had a giant laser on its back which no one could see, but which could blow up anything.

I don’t know that any of my kids will become scientists or engineers. I don’t know that they will ever work in an industry related to space. But I do know that they will some day vote, and I want them to have some idea of the marvelous accomplishments which have come from the space program. It would be sad to have manned spaceflight come to an end merely because the voting public considers the miracle too routine to be worth funding.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

Ship store orders: These have been stacking up in the last two days while I was eating turkey and then digesting it.

Answer email: Ditto

Wash children/clean house: It is time to vaccuum and clean up so that we can face the holidays in cleanliness

Take kids to Hill AFB Aerospace Museum: There’s a longer story involved here. I’ll tell it tomorrow when I can include scenes from the museum.

Pick up Link from BestFriend’s house: Conveniently near the Aerospace Museum

Make sure Kiki gets her homework done: Almost caught up. Almost.

Spend time with Gleek: She’s been feeling neglected lately with all the time I’ve been having to spend on homework for the oldest two.

Spend time with Patch: Ditto.

Put up Christmas tree: Not sure this will actually happen. It depends on how gung ho the kids are to get it done.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.

When I was little, Thanksgiving was all about the food and the company. My benchmark for “Good Thanksgiving” was set during the year that cousins came to visit and we had two tables packed with people. I loved sitting at the kid table with my cousins and friends. I think I was about eight and it was hard for follow up feasts to match that one. Then during my teen years we spent several Thanksgivings in a row at my great-grandmothers retirement trailer. I remember complaining about this. I remember that it didn’t even feel Thanksgivingingish because there was not room for us to sit around her tiny table. Instead we loaded paper plates and sat in whatever space we could find available. In hindsight, I am glad that we spent Thanksgiving with Great-Grandma. She did not live long after that. By about the third year I finally absorbed the fact that delighting an old woman was more important than sitting around a single table.

I still remember the Thanksgiving of my freshman year at college. There were three siblings at BYU so we met together in my empty kitchen, my roommates all off visiting relatives. The food was lacking, but we were together. Being together was even more important when the news came of the house fire in our childhood home. One pet died and much in the house was damaged beyond repair, but all the people were fine. We were very thankful that year.

The year I was dating Howard I learned the meaning of “big Thanksgiving.” I went with him to a relative’s house where they crammed five tables and at least thirty people into their front room. In later years the people were familiar and friendly, but that first year I only spoke to Howard and his brother. We had our own little pocket of fun in the crowded space.

When the kids arrived I had my own chance to shape Thanksgiving celebrations. I learned that none of my kids are fans of the southern cornbread dressing that I considered an essential part of the feast during my growing years. I also learned that kids will be mortally offended if I serve a roasted chicken instead of a turkey. It seemed logical at the time. There were so few of us to eat the bird. I only did it once, but to this day the kids double check to make sure that there will actually be turkey for Thanksgiving.

There have been small feasts and big feasts. There have been celebrations full of people and lonely ones. There have been sad events and happy ones. And yet somehow it is always Thanksgiving. A thread links through them and ties them together. I love that we have a day which celebrates gratitude. I love that we have a day to look around at our circumstances, whatever they may be, and find cause for joy. I am thankful for many things today, but among them I am thankful for Thanksgiving itself. Because the holiday is more than just the food and the company.

Mirrored from onecobble.com.