Politics Shmolitics

I don’t want to write about politics.

This blog is supposed to be about parenting (yes, among other things) and I have a small enough amount of readers as it is without publishing my political views on the internet. If the idea is to try to expand my reach, taking a political stand runs the risk of alienating some people. Of course, I also realize that, although I might not spell out my views explicitly, it’s probably not that hard to figure them out, especially if you consider my full-time occupation or follow me on social media.¹ But I’ll let you do that homework on your own, if you’re so inclined.

In the meantime, I’m not going to write about politics.

I don’t want to write about politics because it feels futile to do so. I am happy to engage in a debate about an issue that includes different points of view and involved a healthy exchange of ideas. We can go back and forth trading arguments, reasons for our opinions and pointing out the flaws in each other’s logic. I am perfectly fine not agreeing with you; if anything, a disagreement actually makes for a better discussion. In the best case scenario, one of us will make a point that the other hadn’t considered and we’ll each have to rethink our stances.

The problem is that these healthy exchanges seem to occur so rarely. The American political “debates” have become nothing more than candidates throwing insults back and forth at each other while the political issues get pushed to the side. No one makes any actual statements about their plans to fix the health care system or to reform education or about foreign policy. The debates are all platitudes and sound bites with no substance.²  Plus, have you seen what’s been going on in the House of Representatives this past week? I have to believe that the rest of the world takes the United States somewhat seriously only because of our military capabilities; there’s no way it has anything to do with diplomacy or our elected leaders demonstrating an ability to, you know, lead.

The other issue is that there do not seem to be any real forums for real political discussion. I have very little patience for politics on social media because of how splintered the landscape has become. People on the left hate-follow the right and share articles just to make fun of them and the right wing members do the same right back. And that assumes that people even bother to follow those who hold a different point of view; too often people will just follow those who espouse the same ideals and ignore any of the rhetoric coming from the other side of the aisle. I find that there is so little to gain by surrounding myself with people who agree with me because that means no one is challenging me to defend myself. The problem is that none of the people on either side seem interested in even listening to the other’s arguments in the first place.

Maybe I’m missing something. There may be some little-known, secluded, magical place of which I’m just not aware where people use logic and reason to defend their arguments rather than resorting to insults and mud-slinging. It’s also possible that I just don’t have the energy or the passion to do the research I think would be necessary to really engage in one of these conversations.³ I’d like to think that I would be able to muster up some more patience for this kind of a conversation if I could be assured that the other participant(s) were after the same objective: an exchange of ideas that does not necessarily need to end with a winner or a loser. Until then, I’ll keep doing my best to tolerate the actions of politicians and the “arguments” posed on the internet and keep most of my opinions to myself.

 

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^{1. If you haven’t already done so, please like the blog on Facebook and follow me on Twitter.↩}

^{2. And, lest you assume that this is all just directed at Donald Trump and the Republicans, I have felt very similarly about the State of the Union address over the past few years.↩}

^{3. Honestly, I’d rather watch baseball. Or, at least, read about it because, let’s be honest, when am I ever watching a baseball game these days?↩}

The Times, They Are A-Changin’

I was having a conversation with Eitan the other day when I realized it.

I don’t even remember what we were talking about. It could have been about something that happened at school or one of his new favorite television show characters or our upcoming move to a new apartment.¹ It could have been about his train tracks or his stuffed animals or about him singing one of his two new favorite songs, Etz Chayim (The Tree of Life) and The Beatles’ “Love Me Do.”

The truth is that it doesn’t really matter what we were talking about.

The point is that we were talking. We were having a real, actual conversation. I made a statement and Eitan responded and then I spoke again. Apparently we had left the days of interrogations behind and I had somehow missed it. Suddenly, I was sitting with a real person with real thoughts and ideas. Eitan wasn’t quoting Nietzche or commenting on the current state of American politics but he was thinking about situations, forming opinions and listening to my comments. Somewhere along the line I turned my back for a moment and Eitan became a real person.

I’ve been anticipating this day with both excitement and dread since before Eitan was born. I would think that every parent looks forward to the day when they can have the kind of conversation with their child that doesn’t involve asking a thousand questions in order to find out two small pieces of information. On the other hand, Eitan being able to form opinions means being able to decide that he doesn’t want to do something and explaining why, which means I’m quickly approaching the day when “Because I said so!” will no longer hold any weight.²

More importantly, though, is the fact that Eitan has a terrific grasp on the events unfolding around him. He can make associations – “Your name is Alex? There’s an Alex in the office at my school!” – and comparisons – “These cookies aren’t as big as the cookies at the bakery by Rara’s house.” He knows his role in contributing at home and he is constantly looking for ways to help out.³ He gets excited about assisting and is genuinely angry when there are no opportunities for him to pitch in. Annoying as it can be, at times, it’s a nice quality for him to have.

Trudy and I are looking forward to capitalizing on that quality when the new baby arrives.

Yes, Trudy is pregnant. She’s due in May, which means that by the time my birthday comes, we’ll be eyeballs deep in diapers, onesies and laundry once again. It’s also the biggest reason why we had to make sure we moved into an apartment with more space. Our one-bedroom place was spacious enough for the two of us and we made do with Eitan in our bedroom for three and a half years, believe it or not. But we had reached our limits, both in terms of ways that we could keep the space relatively organized and in terms of physical locations for Eitan’s toys. The new place has lots of space in the living room, a separate dining area and Eitan has his own room.⁴

It’s kind of hard to tell who’s more excited between Eitan, Trudy and me. Trudy and I are obviously thrilled to be having another baby, although I wonder if Trudy is looking forward more to being a mom again or just not having someone tap dancing on her bladder all day and night. I’m just excited to be a dad again, in general, though I feel a bit less jittery this time around. I’m hoping caring for an infant is sort of like riding a bike in that it’s not something you ever really forget once you learn how to do it. I’m sure there will be bumps here and there (including various sights, smells and stains), but I feel like it has to be a little easier the second time.

All that being said, Eitan is probably more excited than either of us. He keeps talking about how he’s going to help feed, change and bathe the baby and how he’s going to share his toys. We’ll see how long that lasts, obviously, especially once he realizes that the baby is encroaching on his territory, but Trudy and I are both pretty confident that he’ll get acclimated to the new arrival fairly smoothly. We’ve been talking with him about how things will be changing and what he can expect once the baby is here. He’s also handled all the other transitions in his life like a pro, from starting preschool to flying literally across the world to Singapore to moving into a new home, so we’re expecting more of the same from him.

It’s been a bit difficult really grasping the idea that we have a new baby coming, but most of that has to do with us being so busy that we haven’t had much time to really think about it. Now that we’re settled into the new place, though, it’s becoming a bit more real. At this point, we’re all just getting ready for the next part of the adventure.

 

“I’ve Been Promoted to Big Brother!”

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^{1. We actually moved into our new place last week, but we hadn’t moved yet when this conversation happened.↩}

^{2. On the other hand, “Because I said so” is a crutch phrase that parents rely on too often as it is. Toddlers may not have quite the same reasoning skills as adolescents but they can still sniff out poor justifications for doing things. If you can’t come up with a better reason than citing your position of authority, it may be worth questioning whether the argument is worth having in the first place.↩}

^{3. If you consider yourself a patient person, the ultimate test is allowing a toddler to help you with household chores. See just how patient you are when your child is folding laundry or using five scrubbing brushes to clean the toilet.↩}

^{4.That won’t last too long, since the plan is for the new baby to eventually join Eitan in his room, but he’ll be on his own for a little while.↩}

Under Better Circumstances

They say you can never go home again.

I suppose that’s true; just as you can never step into the same river twice, because the water is constantly moving, home will be different every time you come back. The people may be the same, or at least appear to be, but they are moving too. They are thinking, growing, spreading their wings. They are separating, searching for their own identities, their own callings. They’re coping, looking for handholds along the way, just as you are. Just as we all are. The people look the same, but they aren’t. And neither are you.

*****

Trudy, Eitan and I flew to Chicago last weekend. The details are more complicated – they always are – but let’s just say that there was a death in the family and we felt like we needed to be there. I’ve been back to Chicago a handful of times since my family moved to New York when I was eleven. We went back for a couple of family vacations; I went back in my senior year of high school; and then Trudy and I staffed a youth group trip to Chicago when we were in college. The city has been different every time, especially the neighborhood where I used to live. It’s more modern, and yet, still just the same. So many of the stores have been updated, while the homes look very similar to the way they did back then. It was familiar but strange, all at once.

We saw my father and his girlfriend, which was our main reason for making the trip. We met extended relatives, new to us but not to each other. Eitan met his baby cousin and gave her the presents we had brought with us. We saw family friends from my childhood and a friend Trudy and I knew from college. I even saw some of my old elementary school teachers when they came to visit during shiva.¹

Everyone I had known before looked the same to me. A little more grey here, another wrinkle or two there, but the faces and the smiles were all just as I had remembered them. They were thrilled to see me and to meet Trudy and Eitan, and I was just as excited to catch them up on what I had been up to over the past few years.

Still, something was off. The city felt so foreign to me. I remembered much of the geography and some landmarks here and there, but it wasn’t mine anymore. I didn’t have the same connection to the streets or the stores or the houses. The people, some of whom I’ve known for literally my entire life, had grown up or grown older or changed in some other way and I’d had no idea.

I’d come home, but it wasn’t home anymore.

*****

If there is any silver lining to losing a family member, it’s that it brings people together; it brought us to Chicago, after all. But throughout the trip, I kept coming back to that one thought. We brought Eitan to a museum, showed off the sights I’d remembered from my childhood, reinforced his Chicago sports roots. We ate deep dish pizza, spent badly needed quality time with my father, bonded with new family members. And underneath all of it was the terrible loss my relatives had suffered. The new relationships we were forming were all because of the relationship that would never be formed with the stepbrother I had never met.

The stepbrother I would never meet.

It’s still difficult for me to process the circumstances that brought Trudy, Eitan and me to Chicago last weekend. Honestly, I’m not sure I’ll ever really understand. People who have experienced a death tend to want to ask why, even though they know there isn’t a real answer.

The family and friends who came to visit kept saying, “Hopefully, next time we’ll meet under better circumstances.” I almost laughed every time I heard it; next time would have to be better because how could there ever be any worse situation than losing a family member?

And yet, I I understood the sentiment. It was an acknowledgement of a difficult, horrible time, while still expressing some hope for more positive times in the future. This, too, shall pass, as awful as it seems right now. We will all continue on as best we can; coping, growing, moving forward, somehow finding the strength to put one foot it front of the other. We will surround ourselves with the special people in our lives who offer support and guidance and distraction. We will use them to help restore structure, while still leaving the windows to the past and the future wide open.

They say you can never go home again. But they should have added that home is more about who you’re with than where you are.

 

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^{1. Sitting shiva is the Jewish tradition of accepting visitors when mourning a family member who has died. You can read more about it here. ↩}

Searching for Wisdom

My English teacher in my junior year of high school, Dr. Beller, looked like he had walked straight out of a Jack Kerouac novel. He was short, overweight and wore light brown glasses with thin frames. His skin had the leathery look of too much sun and cigarettes, but his eyes were soft and kind and they had a mischievous quality to them when he smiled. His voice was also gentle, with a slight gravelly tone to it and the hair he had left was always a little bit out of place.

Dr. Beller had been a college professor for most of his career as an educator before he came to my school. My junior year was his first year as a high school teacher and he had a bit of a rocky start. For a man who had spent most of his professional life lecturing to college students, most of whom were in his classes by choice, the transition to keeping high school students interested, plus the worlds of lesson planning and smaller, more frequent homework assignments, was difficult. I tended to zone out from time to time in English, as it was easily my strongest subject, and Dr. Beller’s early lectures made it easy for me to do so.

About halfway through the year, Dr. Beller asked to meet with me one-on-one to talk about the way I felt the class was going. I gave him some thoughts about getting the class more involved in the discussion to keep us more engaged, rather than lecturing at us. Then he asked me what I thought of the books we had worked on. I responded by saying that I had liked Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter but was much less impressed by Thoreau’s Walden. I don’t remember the third book we read that year but I think I said I had liked that one the most. Dr. Beller paused for a few seconds before answering, his lips pursed together above his brown-but-graying goatee. Then he spoke, softly, but firmly.

“Aaron, who the fuck do you think you are?”

I blinked. I was surprised but, somehow, not insulted. Dr. Beller clearly wanted to get my attention and he had succeeded. He went on to explain that the works we were reading had been determined to be classics by generations of literary critics and thinkers, with vastly more experience and knowledge than I had, so who was I, some punk teenager, to make a judgment about whether or not I “liked” a book?

Needless to say, from that moment on, Dr. Beller was one of my favorites. The best teachers are the ones who challenge and inspire us to move beyond our comfort zones¹ and cursing at me was definitely a challenge. I found myself making more of an effort to be open to Dr. Beller’s lessons; I decided that if Dr. Beller had the balls to curse openly at one of his students – not just around, but directly at – then I had probably underestimated him.

I’ve spent my life following people like Dr. Beller. There is a line in the rabbinic text, Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers), which says, “Make for yourself a teacher, acquire for yourself a friend and judge every person on the positive side.”² I was assigned to learn from my teachers in school, but it was my choice to make sure that I learned as much from them as I could. I continued that practice with my philosophy professors in college and I’ve made it a point to engage with people who seemed like they had something to offer.

It actually wasn’t until a couple of months ago, during an online exchange with a fellow dad blogger,³ that I finally realized that the thing I am always searching for is wisdom. I majored in philosophy because I believe that there is knowledge to be gained about the right way to live and to treat others. I have interacted so well with certain teachers not only because they challenged me, but also because I knew they had experience that could help me learn. I connect so often with people older than me because they have been places and seen and done things that I have not.

The hardest part is making sure that I take notice when these people come into my life. I never know where new lessons are going to come from or how they will affect me but I try to keep my mind open so I don’t miss anything. After all, new sources of wisdom are not always going to curse at me to get my attention.

 

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^{1. All three of my high school English teachers fit that description. I say three because my teacher from my freshman year, Mrs. Fisher, taught my senior class, as well.↩}

^{2. Find the whole text here.↩}

^{3. Bill Peebles has a lyrical, flowing writing style that makes me feel like I’ve known him for years.↩}

Dance Like No One’s Watching

I’m not a great dancer.

When we got married, Trudy and I took dance lessons in preparation for our first dance during the reception. It was a good thing we did, too; I knew nothing about the “proper” way to dance so I needed instruction on my posture, my hand placement and, of course, my footwork. Also, Trudy and I had agreed that we wanted the first dance to be special. It didn’t have to be some incredibly complicated routine, but neither of us were comfortable with just swaying from side to side like middle school kids at a bar mitzvah. So we took the lessons, learned the steps and, if I do say so myself, we looked pretty good doing it.

I remember having an image in my head of what I looked like while I was dancing. My steps were smooth and fluid. I was confident about where I was going. I didn’t trip once. Trudy and I moved together as one body throughout the song. Everything felt right (as it should have, considering it was our wedding). And then, when I saw the video a few months later, I was surprised that the video didn’t quite match the way I’d felt while I was dancing. I looked stiff and controlled. I was smiling – it was obvious that I was enjoying myself – but none of the moves seemed natural. I was calculating every step, planning every beat in advance, when I should have looked like I was losing myself in the music.

I was disappointed.

I had built up this image in my head of how I thought I looked and reality definitely did not measure up to my expectation. It also didn’t help when friends of ours got married a year or two later and, when we watched their first dance, I remember thinking to myself, “Now, that guy is graceful.” There was a moment when the groom danced his new wife across the dance floor, slowly, his steps matching the time and mood of the song perfectly, and I found myself wondering why I didn’t look like that when I danced.

We all do this, in one way or another. We measure our lives against those of the people around us to see who’s making the most progress, who’s the most successful, who’s farther ahead, as though we’re running some race. Social media, in particular, is terrible for this. We see our friends going on dates and vacations, getting promoted and married and having children and we think about how interesting and fun their lives are. Everyone else looks more content, more lively, more talented than we do. Everyone else is having a good time. Everyone else is happy.

It can be a dangerous thing to compare one’s self to others. Everything looks better on social media because nobody is going to purposely broadcast the negative aspects of their lives. We all want to put our best feet forward and present the best versions of ourselves to the world. For one thing, no one really wants to admit that they have flaws or that things are not always going well for them. For another, some people even believe that if they spend enough time and effort creating a more positive image, eventually it might become a reality.

The key is to remember that no one is perfect. Some people live more comfortably and may not have the same worries as others. Some people might smile a bit more; some people might have different body types; some people might look one way or another online. But everyone has their weaknesses, their vices, their guilt and their worries. Everyone has things that bother them.

I fall into these traps every once in a while, as I’m sure everyone does. And, whenever I do, I remind myself of all the things that I have going for me. I think of my family, my job and my home, of course, but I also remember that the things I see on social media are just projections. None of it is really real. Most importantly, though, I remember that looking outward is never going to make me feel as good as looking inward. I will always get more satisfaction out of focusing on my accomplishments, the people who have helped me get to where I am and planning for my family’s future than I will from thinking about what other people have going on in their lives.

It’s okay if I’m not the best dancer. The people I’m dancing with are more important than how I look.

(And they don’t care what I look like when I’m dancing anyway.)

A Tale of Two Cities

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.

On Friday night, my family and I attended a Shabbat dinner at our local synagogue. Shabbat – the Sabbath day – is observed on Friday night through Saturday evening in Judaism. It commemorates the seventh day of creation, when the Bible says that God rested after having spent the previous six days creating the world. Jews observe the day by taking a break from their regular, day-to-day activities to pray and spend time with family and friends.

The dinner was sponsored by the synagogue religious school and preschool and my wife happened to be one of the organizers for the event. Approximately forty families from the synagogue school community came together to pray, eat and enjoy each other’s company. The event started with the usual Friday evening prayer service and then led into the Shabbat meal. Parents shepherded their children into the synagogue ballroom, where tables had been prepared for the meal. The rabbi led the group in singing Shalom Aleichem,¹ recited the kiddush, the blessing over the wine, and helped all of the parents recite the ritual Shabbat blessings for their children.

The evening was beautiful. We got to spend time together, not only as a family of three, but as a community. My wife and I end up working into the evening so frequently that eating dinners together as a family are rare occurrences during the week. Shabbat, though, is a sacred time that we use to be together as a family. The dinner at the synagogue gave us the opportunity to reconnect, not only with each other, but also with our friends.

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.

On Friday evening, in Paris, France, at 9:20 PM, local time, two bombs exploded moments apart at Stade de France, a stadium where France was playing Germany in a soccer match.² Over the next half hour, terrorists carried out additional attacks using bombs, shrapnel and assault weapons at four different Paris restaurants and Bataclan, a small concert hall where the American band, Eagles of Death Metal, had been performing. By the time the terrorists had been subdued, 129 people had been killed and over 350 people had been wounded. The world watched as information began to emerge about the terrorists and the lengths to which they had gone to create fear and to publicize their messages of hate.

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.

Even though the attacks began around 4:20 PM Eastern Time, I had not heard anything about them until much later in the evening. I came home a bit early from work that afternoon so that I could spend some time with my wife and son before we had to leave to get to the synagogue to finish off the last-minute preparations for the dinner. In fact, it was not until at least halfway through the actual dinner – probably around 8:00 or so – that I heard anything about the attacks.

It was a flashbulb memory, to be sure. I know that, years later, I will be able to remember the exact spot where I had been sitting when Trudy told me about the tragedy that had taken place in Paris earlier that day. I will be able to feel my elbows leaning on the table and my chin resting on my fists as my eyes, tired from the week of work that had just finished, stared lazily into space and then suddenly became laser focused.

I’ll remember the feeling of ease and relaxation that I always appreciate so much during the singing of the Shabbat evening prayer services. I’ll remember the connection between Trudy, Eitan and me as Trudy and I placed our hands on Eitan’s head to give him his weekly blessing. And I’ll remember the way my shoulders suddenly tightened and my heart sank as I heard the news.

I’ll remember wondering how it was possible that people could be inflicting such terrible pain at the same time as such wonderful experiences were being created. I’ll remember wondering how people could perpetrate such terrible acts at all. I’ll remember feeling utter sadness as I realized that I was starting to feel somewhat numb to the idea of this type of a tragedy, since I had already lost count of the violent acts that had been carried out in the few years since Eitan was born.

Most importantly, though, I’ll remember the silent determination, the internal resolution, to keep teaching Eitan about love and respect for other people, no matter what evil they might try to carry out against him or anyone else. I’ll remember that Eitan has a pure, empathetic heart that is destined to make the world a better place. I’ll remember how thankful I am to have my family and my friends around to help me try to make sense of the circumstances that some people face on a daily basis.

I’ll remember reinforcing my decision to help Eitan see the best of times, even when it feels like the worst of times.

 

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^{1. Shalom Aleichem is a Hebrew song that portrays the singers welcoming angels into their midst to celebrate the arrival of Shabbat.↩}

^{2. My notes about the timeline of the attacks came from here.↩}

Torah Reading and No-Hitters (and Vomit)

This past weekend, Trudy, Eitan and I drove down to Philadelphia to visit my grandparents for a long weekend. They live in a great location; a block away from the funky South Street shops and a short walk from Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell. It’s obviously always a pleasure getting the chance to spend time with them, but being able to walk around the neighborhood and live the “city life” (albeit, on a smaller scale than New York) has a real allure, as well.

I’m not going to write about our time in the city, though. For one thing, we didn’t do anything particularly touristy while we were there. Also, this isn’t a travel blog; I’m assuming you didn’t come to my site to read about our walk around the city or how South Street seems to have changed from stores with personality and charm to a string of street food restaurants and sex toy stores.¹ For another thing, I think our time together as a family makes for better reading. Yes, even including the moment during lunch at the synagogue on Saturday when Eitan complained that his mouth was hurting after he drank some lemonade and then vomited all over me.²

I’m going to write about what happened on Sunday night. My Saba³ is a baseball fan. Baseball was the medium through which he was able to meet people and form connections when he first came to the United States. My grandparents have been living in Philadelphia since the mid-1960s and my grandfather has been a Phillies fan ever since. It was no surprise to me, then, on Sunday evening during dinner, when he mentioned to me that the Cubs game would be on television later that night. He knows that I’ve been a Cubs fan since I was little and it would have been nice to watch the game together. I said a lot would depend on the time that Eitan ended up going to bed but agreed that it would be nice to watch.

As it turned out, Eitan was asleep before 8:30 and Trudy and I were back downstairs before the end of the third inning. The Cubs were up 2-0 against the LA Dodgers, which was encouraging, considering the fact that the Cubs had just lost four straight games. Despite the positive start, though, my grandfather turned off the television when Trudy and I sat down. I had mentioned to him earlier in the day that I wanted to go over Torah trope⁴ as a refresher and, for Saba, there’s nothing more enjoyable than Torah study. So the television went off and Saba, Savta, Trudy and I talked about trope and the different styles of reading Torah. The discussion went on to focus on modern religious school education, what it’s like working as a rabbi and the kind of a rabbi I would have been, had I not decided to become a social worker. We talked for almost two hours and I had completely forgotten about the baseball game.

Later in the evening, as I was lying in bed, I got a text message from my youngest brother: “Did either of you stay up to watch Cubs/Dodgers?” I said that I hadn’t because I was still at Saba and Savta’s house and everyone had gone to bed much earlier. Our other brother responded, “YES!!!!!!” I didn’t think too much of it in the moment; I assumed the Cubs had won and figured that maybe it had been in dramatic fashion. I didn’t even bother to check the score. But then I got an email from a friend with the subject line, “Congrats on Arrieta’s no-no.”

Cubs pitcher, Jake Arrieta, who has been the anchor of their pitching staff all year, had thrown a no-hitter. And I missed it.

I’ve written before about missing important Chicago sports moments. I’ll admit, when I first realized that I’d missed the game, I was angry. No-hitters don’t happen very often and, since I have so few opportunities to watch sports as it is, it was a little upsetting that I’d missed out. As I thought about it more, though, I realized I wouldn’t have traded my conversation with my grandparents for the chance to see the game, no matter how important it turned out to be. I loved talking with them and our conversation wouldn’t have happened if the game had been on. One of the nice things about sports is that there’s always the next game, the next series, the next season. Time with our loved ones is much more finite. Yes, it would have been amazing to watch Arrieta reach a personal milestone that also happened to be meaningful for my favorite team. But when the game gets brought up in the future, instead of thinking about a fleeting moment watching television, I’ll be able to picture listening to my grandfather chant the Torah trope that link me to my ancestors. I’ll picture his smile as I remind him how he told me not to grow up to become a rabbi when I was twelve. I’ll even hear his incredulous laugh from the next morning when I told him we missed the no-hitter.

The Cubs will always have a special place in my heart, but they’re never going to mean more to me than spending time with my family.

 

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^{1. Incidentally, if you are looking to read a travel blog, I cannot recommend The Everywhereist strongly enough. Geraldine is thoughtful and hilarious and tells a great story.↩}

^{2. Eitan had been crying for a couple of minutes and Trudy and I were completely unable to calm him down. He gagged once and then left my pants soaking wet and smelling awful. Then, no more than ten seconds later, still crying and tears still streaming down his face, Eitan said, “I’m feeling better!”↩}

^{3. Hebrew for grandfather. “Savta” is the word for grandmother.↩}

^{4. When Jews read from the Torah (Old Testament) during prayer services, there are specific markings that indicate the tune that should be used to sing each word. The tunes are different depending on the part of the world. Many American Jews use the tunes from Eastern Europe; since my mother’s side of the family is from India, our tunes are very different.↩}

Riding Like the Wind

I rode my bike all the time when I was younger.

I rode a fair amount when I was 9 and 10, but the neighborhood where we lived in Chicago was laid out as a grid, so I never really had to worry about getting lost. I was also fairly young, so I wasn’t going to venture too far away from home. I would usually ride up to the park a couple blocks away and then circle back around, although I do remember widening my radius gradually around the time I turned 11. A month after my birthday, though, my family moved to Long Island, New York, which was a more typical suburban neighborhood. We had left the grid behind; our new home was in an area with winding streets and lush green lawns. Everything was new for me, from the strip malls and diners to the stand-alone houses and the people with their “Lon-Giland” accents. I didn’t meet a lot of other kids right away, so I spent a lot of time on my bike.

I rode everywhere. I rode farther and farther away from home, spending hours exploring my new surroundings. Once school started, I paid attention to my bus route and rode my bike past the other kid’s houses. I found elevated breaks in the sidewalk and raced over them so that I went airborne. I walked up hills so high that the air screamed in my ears when I rode back down. My bike was my independence and my sanctuary. It was my space to think and to not think. It was more than just transportation; it was freedom.

I rarely ride any more. Part of it is that I’m so busy with my different jobs and other adult responsibilities that I don’t have much time to ride. Part of it is that there isn’t really much space left in our one-bedroom apartment, let alone enough to keep a bicycle there. Most of it, though, is that I would usually rather spend my free time with my wife and son, rather than off by myself. I spend enough time on my own during the week, either commuting to and from work or traveling to and from home visits. A lot of that independence I used to cherish is now already built into my week. By the time I get home, I may be exhausted, but I’m ready to be exhausted with my family.

This past weekend, though, I did get to ride again. Trudy, Eitan and I made the trip into Manhattan and took the ferry over to Governor’s Island, where we rented two bicycles and spent a few hours riding around the island. Eitan relaxed in a seat on the back of my bike, while he took in the sights. We stopped at the Play Lawn, where we saw the art sculptures, playground and miniature golf course, which was particularly impressive, given the quality and artistic nature of the course and the fact that it is maintained entirely on the basis of donations. We grabbed lunch at the food trucks nearby and Eitan got to sip a milkshake from Mr. Softee when we started riding again. In the afternoon, we checked out the Urban Farm, where they grow different flowers, herbs and vegetables and raise chickens and goats. Eitan also got to see the Statue of Liberty from a distance and enjoyed showing us how he holds up his torch:

The best part, though, was the bike ride. Of course, the stops we made were interesting and fun and kept Eitan engaged, which helped him continue to enjoy the day. For me, though, the key was the return of that feeling of freedom that I had remembered. The breeze rushed by my face, my legs pumped as I pedaled along and I couldn’t help but pick up a little more speed when the road opened up in front of me. The difference was that, this time, I wasn’t alone. The sanctuary of independence that I had sought as an adolescent had been replaced by the company of my wife and son. The quiet opportunities to process my thoughts were now occupied by my wife’s comments about how relaxed she felt and by Eitan pointing out the boats, buoys and other objects by the waterside. I recognized the sense of calm, the acceptance of the world around me and the release of tension from my body. And I realized that, at that moment, I was exactly where I wanted to be.

The sanctuary looked different; but I wouldn’t have changed it for anything.

Keep Up the Chatter

This post was originally published on the Huffington Post’s sports blog, The Tackle. The same post is below, but if you’d like to see my name and head-shot on a big-time professional website, feel free to take a gander with this link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/aaron-yavelberg/keep-up-the-chatter-youth_b_6865492.html?utm_hp_ref=the-tackle

Enjoy!

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I played a number of sports when I was younger. I played for my middle school basketball and baseball teams and I was the starting goalie for my high school floor hockey team. I’ll be the first to admit that I was never the star. I could box out well enough to get my share of rebounds, but my shooting stroke and ball-handling skills left much to be desired. I could hit for average and I had good speed on the base paths but no consistent power. I had ups and downs as a goalie but made consistent progress as we moved forward. I was never the scoring leader, but I found ways to contribute to help the team win.

I didn’t mind my role player status. I knew that my talents had limits and, to be honest, I simply wasn’t driven to work hard enough to become a highlight-reel player. But I also knew that our team didn’t need me to be the star; they needed me to be the goalie. My job was fairly simple: keep the puck out of the net. There were nuances, of course, such as blocking shooting angles, hugging the post and keeping my glove hand up, but the key part of preventing the other team from scoring had much less to do with physical athleticism and more to do with communication.

I had to tell my defenders when the pressure from the other team was coming and whether or not my vision was being screened. I had to make sure my teammates knew when I needed help and I needed to provide that last line of defense from our opponents’ attackers. Goalies may have a reputation for being quirky and isolated, not unlike certain starting pitchers in baseball, but the avenue for reaching the team’s objective remains the same: teammates need to talk to each other in order to accomplish a task.

It wasn’t until I became an adult that I realized that effective communication skills are a critical piece of social development. The ability to formulate an idea and articulate it in such a way that people from varied backgrounds can understand it is essential, not just for achieving professional or academic success, but for simply being able to interact with people on a daily basis. Whether I am speaking with my wife, my two-year-old son or the families that I work with as a social worker in the mental health field, I have to find the right words to be able to express my thoughts to my audience so that they will be able to internalize the message.

My son has to learn to ask for things that he wants calmly and respectfully if he wants people to respond to him in a positive way, as opposed to pointing and demanding to be waited on. In addition, if he does not get what he wants, he needs to find a way to handle disappointment without crying and throwing his toys. Parents and children who are experiencing conflicts often need to modify the language that they use in order to get better behavioral results from each other. In both cases, I have to make sure I model the correct language and behavior to help the people I’m speaking with become prepared to make changes in themselves.

I am not arguing that playing sports will necessarily improve a child’s communication skills. On the contrary, there are plenty of examples of professional athletes who have difficulty expressing themselves articulately. There is also a significant difference between explaining the implications of a mental health diagnosis to a concerned parent and shouting “Man on!” to tell a teammate to pay attention to an approaching opponent. On the other hand, sports do provide a mechanism for helping children to understand the need for effective communication.

Children need to learn that if they keep their teammates involved, the team is more likely to win. If everyone works in silos and only looks out for their own statistics, the team will falter.

Furthermore, children who play sports learn to express their feelings of disappointment when the team does lose, a vital skill for developing resiliency. Sports give children the opportunity to learn to work together with others toward a common goal and a framework for developing the skills they will need later in life to achieve those goals. Whether children are learning ways to support their teammates during a game or expressing an opinion during a debate, sports provide the medium for developing the ability to communicate their ideas clearly. The communication styles may be different depending on the sport or the level, but a child who learns to articulate their ideas effectively will end up winning, regardless of the competition or the opponent.

Something About This Other Place

My family and I recently traveled to Singapore to visit family. I decided to write about the trip, both to tell our friends and relatives how the trip was going and to give us another way to remember the trip after it’s done. We’ve since returned home, but I had a couple more blog posts in mind, so they’re still going to be coming out here. Enjoy!

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Contrast.

That was the word that kept coming to mind during our vacation-within-a-vacation, our trip to the Indonesian island of Bali. The dichotomies were everywhere, from the broader scales of the types of government to the individual differences between the people living in different parts of the island.

The city-state of Singapore is known as “Asia Lite” because of the wide range of people who live there. We visited Little India, Chinatown and the Arab Quarter all in one day, essentially getting tastes from Mumbai, Beijing and Istanbul within the span of a few miles. Singapore prides itself on being a diverse country¹ and some have said that one of their favorite things about living there is that they can get the feeling of being in a place like the markets of New Delhi, for example, without having to deal with the smells of human waste or the potentially toxic water systems. As I mentioned in my earlier post, one individual street includes houses of worship for no fewer than four different religions. It’s an urban environment, to be sure, with an industrial sector filled with factories, a downtown area filled with financial offices and a busy night-life scene. In fact, if you were to add in some litter and a few more police and ambulance sirens, we might as well have still been at home.

Bali was a completely different experience. For every store advertising Polo Ralph Lauren or Oakley sunglasses there was a building whose roof had caved in or a structure whose front wall had somehow gone missing. Outside of a handful of nicer restaurants, the night life in Bali consists of wandering from shop to shop as the store-owners sit outside on milk crates or the curb and beg you to come in to inspect their wares. I mean “beg” in the literal sense of, “Yes, lady, you’re looking for dresses? Shirts? Please, come have-a-look,² I find something for you. You buy from me, give me good luck.” Their water is also tainted; it’s been almost a week since we left Bali and I still think about how nice it is to be able to brush my teeth with water from the faucet, rather than a bottle. The Indonesian rupiah is in such bad shape that the smallest bill is worth 1000 rupiah; the rule-of-thumb conversion I kept in my head was that 100,000 rupiah equals about eight bucks.

The most striking difference was the transition between the town and the resort area. We spent the first night in Nusa Dua, a small village on the southern end of the island. Our hotel was in the same general area as a few others. In order to get into the resort “community,” cars have to drive along a small, four-lane road that splits in the middle. The two lanes coming out of the community stand alone, while the two entering the area go through a tunnel that houses a security checkpoint. On the outside, we saw the structures of a poverty-stricken village, marked by Hindu architecture in disrepair and crumbling buildings. After the security guards opened all the doors to make sure no one was hiding inside and checked both the hood and the trunk with a bomb-sniffing dog, we were allowed to pass through the tunnel.

The resort community was a different world. The road passed by lush green lawns, marked by newly painted statues of smiling animals by each fire hydrant and the shade of full, leafy trees. The hill in front of our hotel proudly displayed an elaborate fountain in the shape of a terrace farm with elderly women gathering water. There were no beggars here. There were no faded advertisements or piles of rubble or people walking around barefoot (unless you count the people wading in the pool). Our other hotel – in Legian, a more urban area across the street from a public beach – was less separated from the surrounding community but still maintained a distinct boundary between the paradise inside and the poverty that lay outside. I couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable at the idea that I was able to enjoy such luxuries as a heated pool, a bed with clean sheets or a pulsing showerhead while the people who were living just down the street were competing just for the attention of the tourists, let alone the possibility that someone might actually buy something. I know that I work hard to support my family and that we earned the opportunity to take a significant vacation like this. But something still felt… off.

I don’t mean to sound depressed about this part of the vacation. Please don’t misunderstand me: we really enjoyed Bali, especially once we got to Legian. We sat by the pool, played in the water and ate delicious food.³ I don’t even mean to sound like this trip was some sort of revelation for me about white privilege or the fact that other countries of the world are worse off than we are as Americans. All the same, however, I felt it would be disingenuous to just write about the great time we had, while not acknowledging the other important social aspects of the trip. If nothing else, it has been a reminder to me over the last week to really appreciate the things that I have and the lot that I’ve been dealt in life. It might not always be the most pleasant way of thinking about the world, but it’s true that things could always be worse.

 

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^{1. You can be jailed for making racist comments.↩}

^{2. “Have-a-look” was one word.↩}

^{3. We also took the absolute creepiest cab ride ever and Trudy and I genuinely feared for our lives for a few minutes. But everything was fine and that’s a different story.↩}