Changing The Steps

Eitan and I have been arguing a lot lately.

It’s hard to really call them arguments. Real arguments involve the presentation of an opinion, evidence to support one’s point of view and an exchange of ideas and information designed to convince one’s audience. The arguments between Eitan and me are much less sophisticated. Our spats usually involve me asking Eitan to stop doing something and Eitan saying no and continuing his activity. I keep pushing, Eitan keeps resisting, one or both of us ends up yelling, Eitan starts crying and we both end up frustrated.

The arguments can be about anything. Eitan, it’s time to turn off the television. Eitan, please stop splashing water on me during your bath. No, Eitan, I can’t carry you right now. Eitan, please stop swinging your lightsaber around the living room. Eitan would you please finish your breakfast so we can leave? The subject matter doesn’t make a difference; the ending is always the same.

The hardest part for me is that I thought I had been approaching these situations in the right way. I work with children and families for a living; I have experience navigating family dynamics and child behavior. I know how I’m supposed to interact with a young child in order to get what I want. I kneel down to get on Eitan’s level. I speak in a soft tone of voice. I say please. I explain why I’m giving a certain direction or making a request. I avoid yelling whenever I can and I encourage Eitan to speak to me, rather than screaming and crying. But still, Eitan and I end up doing the same dance every time.

I’ve used the dance metaphor a few times with some of the families with whom I’ve worked who have found themselves constantly getting sucked into these battles.¹ I illustrate how each person’s behavior represents some of the steps in the dance. The child moves here, the parent moves a different way in response, the child follows up with another move, and so on. They’re dancing together and the steps are always the same.

My advice, usually to the parents, is to find a way to change the steps. If one side disrupts the rhythm or makes a different move, the other side has to move differently to adapt. If the child starts yelling, I suggest that the parent try remaining silent, rather than yelling back, as they have been. If the knee-jerk reaction is to use the phrase, “Because I said so,” I help the parent find a way to give a more substantive explanation for their request. If the parent usually jumps to say no, we work to find a different response that is more open to compromise. The idea is to move toward a point of collaboration, rather than confrontation.

This all sounds great, in theory. The difficulty is in remembering to alter one’s behavior when they’re in the middle of an argument that has happened hundreds of times. I’ll be the first to admit that I have forgotten my own advice plenty of times over the past few weeks by allowing Eitan to draw me into the same power struggles. He and I have been like oil and water, bickering about things as serious as him chucking his basketball across the living room and as insignificant as whether or not he should be allowed to put his shoes on without socks. I realize that it is ridiculous for me, a grown man, to be screaming back and forth with a three-year-old about whether he should be allowed to pour his own juice or play with certain toys. But I’m a creature of routine, as most humans are, and when I feel like Eitan is doing something he should not be, my impulse is to stop him.

That’s really where the solution lies for me. The first word out of my mouth has always been “No,” which immediately creates a standoff. “No” does not allow for other options or conversation; it simply ends. Rather than trying to stop what Eitan is doing, I should be finding ways to either redirect him or negotiate ways for him to continue his activity in a different way. (Maybe we can roll the ball back and forth instead of throwing it across the room. How about we set a timer and when it goes off, then we stop playing and go take a bath?) I also need to do a better job of realizing when certain battles are just not worth having. Nobody is really getting hurt if Eitan squeezes out too much lotion after his bath or if he plays on his Kindle for a few minutes in the morning or if he takes a pot to put on his pretend stove. Learning to say “Yes” once in a while for minor things can work wonders.

One of the hardest things about being a parent is having to face challenges every day. On the other hand, every new day gives me a new opportunity to learn from my mistakes, break the routine and change the steps.

 

---

^{1. I know, this is two posts in a row where I’ve written about dancing. Here was the first one, in case you missed it.↩}

Brushing Up on Color and Gender

It was a year and a half ago, just before Eitan’s second birthday, that I first wrote about color and gender. That post was a bit of a manifesto about gender bias coming through in clothing and toys that are marketed to young children. I took exception to the Spider-Man toys that were being given out at McDonald’s along with kids’ Happy Meals and to the way Party City had divided up the merchandise for kids’ birthday parties. I re-read it before sitting down to write this post and I’m still pretty proud of it, especially considering the fact that I was still fairly new to blogging at that point.

The reason I’m bringing it up again is that the concept of certain colors being associated with gender came up for us recently regarding Eitan’s toothpaste.

Eitan has moved beyond the fluoride-free, training toothpaste and is now using the junior version of “real” toothpaste. The idea is that, once the child knows how to keep the toothpaste in his mouth instead of swallowing it, it’s safe to start using the toothpaste with fluoride because you don’t have to worry about the child poisoning himself. The first tube of this toothpaste that we bought happened to have characters from the Disney movie, Cars, on it, and the toothpaste itself was blue. Eitan liked it and was using it properly so I never thought much of it.

Then, one weekend, we spent a night at Trudy’s parent’s house. We bought an extra tube of toothpaste for Eitan so that we could leave one with Trudy’s parents so it would be one less toiletry to remember to bring if we knew we were going to stay there or, at least, be there late into the evening. The store had the brand that we had been using, but the only kind they had was pink and had the Disney princesses on it. We bought it anyway, brought the pink toothpaste home with us and left the blue one with Trudy’s parents.

The next night, when I went to brush Eitan’s teeth, I took out the new toothpaste and we had the following exchange:

Eitan: That’s not my toothpaste. Maybe Brooke left her toothpaste here. (Brooke is a friend of Eitan’s.)

Me: It’s not Brooke’s toothpaste; it’s yours. It’s the same, it’s just in a different tube.

E: But it’s pink. My toothpaste was blue.

Me: That’s true, it is pink. And who’s on the tube?

E: Ariel and Cinderella and… I don’t know who that is.

Me: That’s Sleeping Beauty. I think her name is Aurora.

E: I think that toothpaste is for girls.

Me: What makes you think so?

E: It’s pink and there are girls on the tube.

Me: Is pink only for girls or can boys use it too?

E: (thinks for a second) I don’t know.

Me: Don’t you like Ariel and Cinderella?

E: Yeah.

Me: And don’t you sometimes use a pink bowl and a pink plate and a pink fork and spoon?

E: Yeah.

Me: So can you use this toothpaste even though it’s pink?

E: Umm… okay.

We ended up having a similar exchange for the next three or four nights. Eitan kept questioning the use of the toothpaste on the basis that it was for girls and I kept convincing him that the color didn’t matter because the toothpaste works the same way as the blue one. After using the pink toothpaste for the first time, Eitan also exclaimed that it tasted even better than the blue one. Now, he barely even notices the princesses on the tube and just refers to it as his “pink bubble gum toothpaste.”

This was a pretty easy win for me. Toothpaste is a pretty minor thing, especially since it’s used in the privacy of our home and no one else is watching when I help Eitan brush his teeth. I work hard to steer Eitan away from the typical gendered associations with colors. That’s why I rotate the different colored bowls for his cereal each morning and why I let Eitan tell me which dolls we should play with in his doll house. It’s why I’m proud of him for sending tennis balls over the fence in the backyard and also for feeling comfortable putting on a princess costume with his friends.

Even so, I’m still thinking about what will happen if Eitan says that he wants to go against the typical gender norms in public. I know it doesn’t bother me if Eitan decides that he likes a pink shirt or wants to wear a tiara at an amusement park or even if he wants to have a princess-themed birthday party. Eitan likes what he likes and it’s not up to me to steer him one way or the other.¹ I can’t help but wonder, though, how other people would react to some of those circumstances and how that would affect Eitan. Even if I know that I would stand up for Eitan’s right to wear what he wants and play how he wants, I could see another parent telling their child not to play with Eitan because of something as insignificant as a wardrobe choice. And I would hate having to tell Eitan that his friend can’t play with him because Eitan was just wearing or playing with something that he liked.

It’s possible that I’m building up this potential scenario in my head and that nothing of the sort is ever really going to come about. Parents want to protect their children, so we come up with these scenarios so we can plan accordingly. And, let’s be honest, the most likely scenario is that Eitan continues to internalize gender norms with regard to color and just falls in line with what he sees from the world around him. Either way, I just want Eitan to feel like he is making his own choices. If he chooses to wear the typically male greens and blues, that’s fine. If he wants to wear the typically female pinks and purples, that’s fine too. But I would hate for him to want to wear pink and feel like he has to wear blue because the world tells him so or for his peers to treat him differently because of his color preferences. I guess I’ll just have to cross that bridge when I come to it. In the meantime, we’ll just keep focusing on toothpaste and on letting Eitan play however he wants to.

Because Eitan having fun is really all that matters.

 

---

^{1. Except the Yankees. Eitan, I’ve told you before and I’ll tell you again: you are not allowed to become a Yankee fan.↩}

Eitan the Celebrity

My family and I are currently in Singapore visiting family. I decided I’m going to write about the trip, both to tell our friends and relatives how the trip is going and to give us another way to remember the trip after it’s done. Today’s post was actually written by my wife who has also posted a number of times before. Enjoy!

---

 

My mother always told me not to point and stare. If I saw someone who looked “different,” my parents always explained to me that it is not polite to point and stare. Instead, I should ask them or the person questions about what I had seen. I know that there are different times when people stare at others and, sure, I’m guilty of doing it too. But coming to Singapore has left me with a new feeling about pointing out a child who is cute or drawing attention to someone in public. In almost every place we have gone, Eitan, our little blonde-haired, hazel-eyed American boy, has been smiled at, waved at, petted on the head, taken by the hand, and then talked about in a different language.¹

I am usually one of the first people to comment about a cute baby passing by or about someone’s clothes that I think are nice. But since we have been on this trip, I believe that I will hesitate before I do such a thing in the future. I believe that most of the praise that Eitan receives is sincere, but I have been feeling ambivalent about the attention that he has been receiving from complete strangers.

Singapore is a very different place than New York. Kids play freely with minimal supervision in courtyards and sidewalks. People leave personal items outside their doors unattended (shoes, balls, bikes, etc.). We brought Eitan to get his hair cut a few days after we arrived and the receptionist left us alone in the barber shop – with full access to the cash register and MacBook – while she went to the store next door to get the barber.² The ground is clean and I can count the number of pieces of litter we’ve seen on one hand. It seems that people really do live apart from any sort of crime. It’s almost as though we are living in the Twilight Zone. We have yet to see a police officer or hear a fire truck or ambulance siren, which is a stark contrast to the sounds we are accustomed to in New York City. People really seem to live without worry here, whereas in New York, someone pointing and speaking out in public often means that a dangerous situation is brewing. We always talk about how we wonder what our children’s lives will be like years from now based on the increases in gun violence, acts of terrorism and global climate change, but Singapore seems to be living serenely.

I suppose that living in the U.S. – particularly in New York City – has forced me to put up my guard to protect myself and my family. I should clarify that all of the attention that Eitan has received has been positive. He has been encouraged to interact with everyone, including flight attendants, wait staff, taxi drivers and other local residents. The people here have been critical in helping him to become more comfortable in his new surroundings. However, in spite of his apparent celebrity status, I think that when I arrive back home, I will be more conscious of any extra attention I pay to people or things that I see that are out of the ordinary. Aaron and I know that Eitan is cute – yes, we’re biased to some degree, but still – and that he is going to attract some smiles and some comments here and there because of his age. But in spite of the flattery, the amount of attention that people have been paying to Eitan has made me a bit uncomfortable and I would not want to put another parent in a similar position. So I will be keeping my index finger by my side and my comments to myself, even if they are intended to give compliments.

As for Eitan, we’re just hoping the extra attention doesn’t go to his head.

 

---

^{1. I’m assuming they were talking about him be cause they were still pointing and smiling. Also, the only people who took him by the hand were waiters and waitresses who were bringing Eitan to see the food that was about to be cooked for us. He never left our sight.↩}

^{2. Seriously. We were completely alone in the store and she didn’t even seem to think twice about leaving us there.↩}

Are We There Yet?

As you’ll read shortly, my family and I are currently in Singapore visiting my father. I decided I’m going to write about the trip, both to tell our friends and relatives how the trip is going and to give us another way to remember the trip after it’s done. I haven’t quite decided yet what the frequency of posts will be, but I’ll try to put up a few while we’re here and then maybe there will be some more afterward. Enjoy!

---

 

I’ve always been interested in the whole concept of time. The idea that it just keeps going, on and on, forever, is one of those things that tends to give me a headache if I let myself think about it too long. It’s a dangerous rabbit hole, sort of like when I start wondering about the size of the universe and how incredibly miniscule we are and whether or not we really have a purpose in our lives. Once I let myself start thinking about that kind of thing, I usually have to distract myself fairly quickly or my thoughts start snowballing and I have to go looking for Tylenol.

Anyway, the reason why I’m thinking about such heady stuff is because Trudy, Eitan and I are currently sitting in a gigantic metal box that is flying literally to the other side of the planet.  We’re on the second leg of our trip from New York to Singapore to visit my father, who is living in Singapore for work for two years, and, at this point, we’re about two-thirds of the way there. We’ve been inside this airplane for about sixteen of the past seventeen hours: we boarded at around 8:00 PM on Wednesday evening, waited through a two-hour delay while engineers fixed an air valve, took the seven-hour flight from New York to Frankfurt, spent an hour wandering through the Frankfurt airport,¹ then got back on the plane to finish the trip to Singapore.

It was around noon when we disembarked in Germany, even though it felt like 6:00 AM to us. And not your usual 6:00 AM where you get up, shower and start getting ready for work, by the way. This was the 6:00 AM you saw once in a while in college when you and your friends partied really late into the night and you can’t really remember everything that went down. All you know is that your muscles ache, the armchair you tried to sleep in definitely wasn’t big enough, everyone sort of smells a little and you’re pretty sure someone in your group slept in the bathtub. Oh, and instead of being lazy and wandering through the hallways while you get your bearings, you’re navigating the crowds of people who speak a different langauge and are all wide awake because it’s actually noon and they’ve been up for hours.

Look, truthfully, the trip hasn’t been that bad. I know some of you are cringing at the idea of ending that much time on a plane with a two-year-old – and believe me, so did we – but, all things considered, Eitan has been great. He slept through about half of the first flight, and he’s sleeping now too. Even when he’s been awake, he’s played with the Kindle, watched some kids shows on the airplane television, and, of course, became great friends with the flight attendants.² But even with Eitan being on his best behavior through 90% of the trip so far, time is still messing with us and is a bit difficult to adjust to. Trudy and I keep having to do math to figure out what time it “really is” and it’s been tough to keep track of how much sleep we’ve gotten. Plus, we also realized the hard way that everything really is relative: when we got on the plane for the second flight, Trudy and I were both pretty excited to see an estimated travel time of eleven and a half hours, since we had been expecting 14 or 15 hours. That excitement faded quickly, though, when Eitan hit his second wave of “OhmyGodIwanttotoucheverythingandIjustcan’tstopmovingbecauseI’msoovertired” about two hours in and Trudy and I each came to the dreaded realization that we still had nine more hours to go. But he did eventually get to sleep, so we’re doing all right. Honestly, the only real significant issue with the trip has been the four-year-old in the row in front of us who keeps looking over the top of the seats at us and coughing into our row and using Trudy’s armrest for balance while he jumps in the aisle. I can think of a few friends in Forest Hills who would love to have the chance to teach this kid a lesson.

The flight map says six more hours…

 

---

^{1.  The feelings Trudy and I were having during our first time in Germany, even if it was just the airport, may turn into its own blog post too. I haven’t decided yet.↩}

^{2. Quick shout-out to the Singapore Airlines staff – everyone has been unbelievable, from the grounds crews to the flight attendants all the way through. They’ve been attentive and helpful and on top of everything.↩}

Tonight I Failed You

Dear Eitan,

I owe you an apology.

Today was rough for me. The details are not really important; suffice it to say that I struggled with a number of things throughout the day. I struggled so much, in fact, that I apparently did a very poor job of hiding the anger and frustration that I was feeling. I say “apparently” because a number of coworkers asked me how I was doing and what was wrong. Keeping a calm exterior, regardless of how I’m feeling inside, is a skill at which I’m usually fairly adept,¹ so I think I caught my peers somewhat off guard when my fingers kept drumming on my desk and when I kept getting up to wander around the room or down the hallway to the conference table. The usually light-hearted quips for which I’ve become known were nowhere to be found. Half-smiles and annoyed sarcasm had taken their place and would not give up their new positions. I was still fairly quiet, as I usually am, but my pursed lips and constant fidgeting hinted at the discomfort I was feeling inside.

By the time I got home, I was wound up and spent, hyper and drained. Even the few genuine laughs I had managed while listening to a podcast on the way home had done little to truly relax the stress my body had accumulated through the day. In short, I was in no state of mind to be a good father.

I hope you don’t misunderstand me; I was happy to see you when I got home. I’m always happy to see you when I get home. Whether you totally ignore me when I open the door because you’re so engrossed in whatever toys you’re playing with or whether you’re waiting in the hallway for me to come off the elevator,² you always make me smile. You could be running around in your underwear, throwing your toys across the room and about to unleash the mother of all tantrums and I’ll still smile when I walk in.

I don’t even think there was anything remarkable about the apartment when I got home tonight. Some of your toys were spread out in the living room, you were mostly clothed and your mom, being the saint that she is, had finished making dinner. You came running over when I opened the door and said, “Hi!” You held the vowel a bit and your tone dropped at the end of the word, as though you were trying to mimic my exact inflections when I say hi to you when I come home. I smiled, returned the greeting and put away my coat and bag. We all sat down for dinner and we ate together, though your mother and I stayed at the table a bit longer than you did. When the meal was finished, I brought you into the bathroom to bathe you and get you ready for bed.

You’re weird about your bath. There was a time when bathing you was purely my domain. I missed so much time with you while I was at work that bath time became one of my chances to reconnect with you and find out all the mischief you caused during the day. Then, at some point, you suddenly decided that bath time was not always going to be straightforward. Sometimes you were going to brush your teeth and sometimes you weren’t. Sometimes you were going to listen to me and let me wash away the dirt and sweat that comes from a hard day of playing at home and at school and sometimes you would refuse to switch positions or sit still for me to rub in the shampoo. Sometimes you would start screaming until your mom came in to give the bath instead.

Tonight was a night where you let me bathe you but you didn’t feel like listening right away. You felt like playing. You wanted to sit or stand or lie down all on your own terms and it did not matter to you whether I was trying to brush your teeth or wash your body or dry your hair after you’d come out. And I, having dealt with many situations throughout the day that were out of my control, was not going to allow you to add “parenting” to that list. So I spoke sternly at you, I yelled when you didn’t move the way I wanted you to and I tossed books onto the bed without asking you what you wanted to read. I could hear the voice in my head telling me the entire time that it was silly for me to be getting so upset with you. I knew you were just trying to play with me and that you have a lot of energy because – oh right! – you’re a toddler. I knew that it was no use for me to get so angry and that I should have stepped back, taken a deep breath and tried to approach you differently. But I kept yelling because I was frustrated and stubborn and I was going to exert my will over something today, damn it.

So tonight I failed you. You deserved better from me and I didn’t deliver. I needed to do a better job of separating my frustrations about work from my ability to be emotionally available for you. I should not have let my external stress jeopardize my opportunity to enjoy some quality dad-son bonding time with you.

Fortunately for me, one of the nice things about being a parent³ is that every day is a new chance to do things better than the day before. You’re also young, so the odds are that you won’t remember one random night when I yelled at you for not opening your mouth wide enough so I could brush your teeth. And considering the way I felt about how I spoke to you tonight, that’s actually a pretty nice consolation prize.

So I’m sorry for the way I acted tonight. I can’t promise I won’t make the same mistake again, but I do promise to work harder to avoid getting into that situation. Either way, I hope you remember that, no matter what I say or how foolishly I act, I promise that I will always love you, I will always be there for you and I will always be happy to see you when I get home from work.

Love,

Daddy

 

---

^{1. Believe it or not, this is not always a good thing. In social work, it usually is because it’s usually better to portray impartiality. In relationships, though, it has its drawbacks, like your partner not being able to have any clue what you’re thinking or feeling. And, since the strongest relationships are supposed to be built on communication, it’s helpful for the other person to know what’s going through your head.↩}

^{2. The first case is rare. You usually hear my key in the door and come running before I’ve even made it inside.↩}

^{3. This is applicable to just about any title. Parent, spouse, co-worker, sibling, etc.↩}

Bedtime

The room is dark.

The lamps on the street below cast vague shadows onto the walls of the room. The windows from the building across the street reflect the alternating red, yellow and green from the traffic light at the corner, while the white security light shines brightly on the sidewalk. The bushes in front of the building still blink with tiny dots of orange Christmas lights even though it is the middle of January. A car’s headlights throw shapes onto the wall that move across the room as it drives by.

The stillness is broken only by the subtle sucking noise of your fingers in your mouth. Your eyes remain closed as you drift off to sleep, lulled into security by the soft lullabies your mother and I have just finished singing. With a deep breath you extract your fingers and return your arm to your side. Your mouth closes and your chest continues to rise slowly. Your mother puts her lips to the back of your head, kissing your hair that has been steadily darkening since your first birthday. She whispers a quick “Sweet dreams, baby boy,” gives you another kiss and leans back.

I get up from the bed as quietly as I can, wincing as the floorboards creak loudly under the weight of my feet. I put one knee back on the bed, slip my hands under your neck and back and pick you up, cradling your head in the crook of my arm. Your legs hang over my other arm, your feet dangling in the cool air. The weight of your sleeping body startles me, for some reason, as though I haven’t realized just how much you’ve grown over the past two and a half years. Your legs sway as I start to move towards your crib and I suddenly become particularly aware of the pressure of your head on my arm and the warmth of your cheek against my bicep.

I lift you higher, bringing your head nearer to mine. I whisper, “I love you,” and kiss your forehead, a counterpart to your mother’s. I picture two faint balls of light where the kisses were placed, circling above your head and around your body, partnering to keep watch, to stand guard, to shield you through the night from frightening dreams and the dangers of the waking world. I lower you slowly into your crib, resting your head on your pillow, whose case shows a sky blue cut by wispy cirrus clouds. You lie motionless and peaceful between your stuffed animals, your chest still breathing deeply. I spread your blanket over you and the eternally happy face of Frozen’s Olaf gazes up at me, causing my lips to stretch into a smile. I turn your music machine on quietly, another protective measure against your suffering, and allow myself another moment to watch you sleep. Your mother rises from the bed and we leave together to let go of our own tension built up during the day, all the while, keeping watch ourselves.

Let the Potty Training Commence

Peer pressure is a wonderful thing.

Okay, fine; most of the time it’s not. Usually peer pressure is associated with the “bad” kids in school egging on one of the “good” kids to do a “bad” thing. They’re trying to get him to cut class or drink alcohol or smoke pot or break into the teacher’s desk or a host of other “bad” things. In those cases, peer pressure is not wonderful; it’s harmful and, usually, dangerous for at least one of the people involved.

Thankfully, Eitan is only two and a half, so we don’t have to worry about that stuff just yet. Which is why, in our case, peer pressure is a wonderful thing.

Over the past few months, we have been getting together with some of the families in our neighborhood on some Friday nights for Shabbat dinner. The kids are all right around Eitan’s age, so they’ve all been hitting the same milestones around the same time. As parents, we’ve shared experiences and advice about everything from the kinds of diapers to use to the most effective methods of sleep training. The dinners have given us an opportunity to spend time together while our kids play nearby. And, since it’s all happening in one enclosed space, it also means we don’t usually have to use the same hawk-like supervision when looking after the kids, which gives us the chance to actually relax a bit.

Last week, we had dinner at the apartment of one of the other families. When we got there, I found out that most of the other parents had already started potty training their kids.¹ Some of the kids were wearing Pull-Ups and some were wearing underwear but nearly all of them had been using the potty on a somewhat consistent basis for some time already. We have a potty at home for Eitan (two, in fact), and he has used it a number of times, but not with any sort of regularity. Trudy and I had been talking about how we were going to potty train Eitan and we’d set up a plan, but we hadn’t started implementing it yet. But then, at dinner, when we were talking with the other parents and the kids were playing together, Eitan suddenly came running up to us and yelled, “I have to go pee!” We laughed and asked, “Do you want to use the potty?” And he exclaimed, “Yes!”

So we took him to the bathroom, took off his (dry) diaper, and he went on the potty. Trudy and I cheered, told him how proud we were and what a good job he’d done. Eitan beamed with pride.²

Almost all the kids used the potty at some point or another during the evening, and their parents all played cheerleader at least once, as well. One of the kids even went into the bathroom while his friend was on the potty to tell him he was doing a good job. Eitan used the potty more than once during the evening and that night gave us the perfect opportunity to start potty training for real. Eitan has been using his potty at home and even went on his travel potty a few times yesterday while we were out shopping. There have only really been two accidents, but both happened at home and were cleaned pretty easily³ so things seem to be going very well. He’s gotten a reward every time he has gone and he has caught on to the concept of earning prizes fairly quickly.

I know I won’t always want Eitan to do something just because everyone else is doing it. Trust me, I’m incredibly thankful he’s still a toddler. In this case, though, I’m certainly not complaining.

(Also, Happy New Year, everybody!)

 

---

^{1. Trudy knew this already. The moms talk a lot more often than the dads do. Or maybe the moms just talk more about the kids and the dads talk more about sports. I’m not trying to be stereotypical here; I’m just thinking about the conversations Trudy usually has with the moms and the ones I usually have with the dads. That’s just how it’s happened.↩}

^{2. For the record, cheering someone on while they’re doing their business is just one of the ridiculous things that parents end up doing for their kids. I’m not sure I can imagine giving someone a high five every time I pee, let alone getting a standing ovation whenever I poop.↩}

^{3. The underwear was easily cleaned, but I’m not sure the same can be said for Mr. Incredible’s memory. He may never get past that trauma.↩}

The Toy Takeover

Our apartment is getting smaller by the day.

I’m speaking metaphorically, of course. The walls aren’t actually closing in little by little but it feels like Eitan’s toys are occupying more space in our living room than ever before. Even when the room is clean and everything is put where it’s supposed to be, I can see that there is less and less floor space showing between the rug and the row of toys against the wall. Last night we were sitting and watching television and I could have sworn I saw Elmo smirking at me.  I could practically hear him whispering, “Don’t let Elmo’s cute face and high voice fool Aaron. Elmo wants Aaron’s apartment and Elmo will use force if necessary.”

There are just so many things. The kitchen and the trucks and the Little People. The food for the kitchen. The toolbox and all of the tools. The three-car garage from IKEA. The puzzles and the blocks and the basketball hoop. Thomas and his friends and all of their train tracks. The other day Eitan saw us transferring one of his Hanukkah presents into the car and stated, very matter-of-factly, “Eitan want that toy.” We certainly could have put our feet down and said that he couldn’t have it at that moment and tried to make him wait but we decided the tantrum was not worth it. So, now we also have the three-foot-tall City Skyway sitting in the corner, which will come in handy if King Kong ever stops by our apartment.

 

Giving Eitan the toy early was worth it for this amazing shot of Eitan demonstrating pure amazement and excitement. And yes, I’m wearing heart pajama pants.

 

To Eitan’s credit, he plays with most of his toys on a fairly regular basis. He does have some preferences; more often than not, it’s either the food or the tools that get scattered all over the floor, and the collection of sports balls make frequent appearances, as well. But on any given day, Eitan will play with the cars and take out the train tracks and start building towers with the Mega Blox. Sometimes he’ll pick one toy and stick with it for an extended period of time and sometimes he’ll drift from toy to toy as it suits him. And, once in a while, he will go into his toy box and pull out toys we haven’t seen in months and assumed had gotten lost as time has gone on.¹ And I really do like the fact that he still shows interest in all of his toys, even if it means that we end up with scenes like these:

I hope it doesn’t sound like I’m complaining. I realize that Trudy and I are really fortunate to be able to buy toys for Eitan in the first place, as well as having friends and relatives who can do the same.² I try to make sure that I remember that, especially since Thanksgiving just passed. It does get frustrating, though, when Trudy and I have to crawl around on our hands and knees to restore a sense of civility after it looks like the toddler section of Toys R Us has thrown up on our living room floor for the fifteenth straight night.³ That being said, Eitan usually helps clean up, which makes things somewhat easier, even if we have to ask him to “just pick up the red blocks” or just put the tools away while we do everything else. The key, obviously, is that he’s having fun when he’s playing; I’ll take cleaning up his toys over handling a tantrum every day of the week.

 

---

^{1. Trudy and I also may or may not have “lost” certain toys at the bottom of that toy box on purpose.↩}

^{2. We’re also eternally grateful to Trudy’s cousins, who have given Eitan fantastic hand-me-down toys now that their sons have outgrown them.↩}

^{3. I’m exaggerating. It hasn’t been more than eight.↩}

Happy Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is a weird holiday.

The story goes like this. A group of people left their homes and got on a boat to brave the open sea in order to find religious freedom. On the way, a few of them died, a few caught diseases (and then died later) and everyone had a generally miserable time. Then they made it to Plymouth Rock and had to fend for themselves against the animals and elements in wholly unfamiliar territory. Somewhere along the line, we’re told, the people who had been living there all along welcomed the newcomers, showed them how to grow maize and gave them other hints for staying alive in their new environment. Oh, and everybody got together on Thursday to kill a turkey, eat themselves into food comas and watch the Detroit Lions lose a bunch of football.

I’m not sure how much I buy of the Thanksgiving story that we were all told in grade school. I believe there was a group of pilgrims who sailed to North America on a ship called the Mayflower. I believe that there was a tribe of people already living here and that they interacted with said pilgrims. I’m even willing to believe that most of the interactions were fairly peaceful, though I haven’t quite decided if I think that peace came before or after one of the tribe members was killed by a pilgrim’s musket shot.¹ What I’m not willing to believe is that a group of people who had been living in one place for hundreds of years saw a new group of people show up one day and automatically offered them food and shelter. I’m sorry if that sounds overly cynical, but I think the alternative sounds too rosy to be believed.

If we put aside the flaws in the retelling of history that we’ve received, though, we’re still left with a holiday that is supposed to be about identifying the parts of our lives that make us happy and trying not to take them for granted. We should probably be doing this every day, in theory, but in the midst of jobs, errands and the demands of parenting, it’s understandable that we sometimes lose sight of the bigger picture. In honor of the upcoming holiday, I figured I would devote this week’s post to five things for which I’m thankful. Some of the entries in the list are to be expected, but I tried to focus on some more specific and non-traditional ways of looking at things.

1. My wife’s organizational skills

I once watched a video of Mark Gungor, a pastor who does a lot of work regarding relationships and marriages, explaining the differences between men’s and women’s brains and how their thought processes work. I recommend watching the video, especially since I won’t explain it as well, but the bottom line for me was the difference between the brain’s resting states. A man’s brain at rest is essentially empty. It wakes up in order to access information or to complete a task but when the task is finished, it goes back to its blank state. A woman’s brain, though, is constantly moving, thinking about work, upcoming events, children, errands and anything else that one might think of. Trudy and I fit these descriptions perfectly. Trudy’s brain is constantly juggling scheduling issues, shopping lists, activity ideas, family obligations and anything else that a person would have to think about on a given day. I put information in my calendar or my address book or my to-do list and then promptly forget about it because I assume I’ll look at the list later on and remember.² I’m pretty sure I’m on top of things more than I’m not, but Trudy is the master.

2. Toddler enthusiasm

Kids can be really easily influenced. They learn, as they get older, but when they’re young, you can pretty much get them to do anything you want as long as you frame it the right way. My father has often told stories about how, when I was little, all it took was a little inflection to get me excited about something. His eyes would go wide and he would ask me, “Hey, Aaron, you want to go to Walgreens?” My face would light up and I would respond with an emphatic “Yeah!” Just this past weekend, Trudy and I got Eitan really amped up about going food shopping for Thanksgiving dinner, one of the most awful activities ever imagined. And don’t even get me started about how excited my youngest brother used to get when his older siblings told him it would be fun for him to pretend to be a dog and play “Fetch.”

3. Sesame Street

Let me start by saying that I’m not a big fan of using television as a babysitting service. Kids, especially toddlers, need face to face interaction in order to stimulate language and social skills development. That being said, we all know that parents need breaks and parents need to get things done. When Eitan first wakes up in the morning, he’s not quite ready to play or eat or actually do anything (just like most people when they first wake up). So I have no problem turning on an episode of Sesame Street to occupy him for a little while if it means I can get ready for work in peace. Plus, there have been times when Eitan has made associations with letters and numbers, so apparently he’s learning from what he’s watching.³

4. Toddler language

Speaking of language development, there are few things funnier than watching kids learning to use their words. I don’t necessarily mean when young children start echoing the curse words they hear their parents using, although those cases are often hilarious.⁴ I’m talking about when kids realize that they can use words to express everything they see or to negotiate to get what they want. Last weekend, for instance, Eitan asked me if he could watch one of his shows on television and, when I said no, he changed his tactic and asked if we could watch football instead. I still said no, but I’ll admit I thought about it for a minute.

5. Everything else

I’m thankful for: my wife, our son, our relatives and our friends. Everyone’s health. My home. My education. Gainful employment. My coworkers. The dad blogger community. Chicago sports, including two Stanley Cups in four years, six NBA titles under His Airness, a Super Bowl appearance in the 2006 season and a promising future for the “Cuuuu-BEES!” I’m thankful for this blog, for the people it’s allowed me to meet and the ability to create something for Eitan to look back on when he’s older. And I’m thankful for you, for reading it.

Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.

 

---

^{1. I’m not saying it was on purpose, I’m just saying a show of force might have been a motivating factor for the tribe members to help out their new neighbors. Also, I’m avoiding using words like “Indians” or “Native Americans” on purpose. I realize it can be a little cumbersome, but it has to do with avoiding the use of imperialist language while respecting a person’s right to identify themselves as they choose, so I’m leaving it out altogether.↩}

^{2. This, by the way, is fairly typical of men’s brains. Watch the video.↩}

^{3. Also, I love Cookie Monster. The contrarian in me always felt drawn to Oscar, but as I’ve actually started listening to more of the characters’ lines, I’ve come to appreciate Cookie Monster’s adult-targeted comments much more.↩}

^{4. When someone I know (who will remain nameless for her mother’s sake more than anything) was little, she saw her mom drop her keys and asked, “Shit, Mommy?” And, when they were in the car and someone cut them off, the young girl yelled from her car seat, “Beep beep, schmuck!” Meanwhile, Trudy and I have reached the point where anytime I mutter the name Jesus, Eitan answers, “Christ!”↩}

What, Me Worry?

I’m worried about my son.

He’s fine, first of all. He’s totally healthy, hitting all his developmental milestones on time and growing up way too fast. He’s not violent or oppositional or hard to manage. He throws tantrums here and there when he gets upset, just like any typical two-year-old would, but even those instances are just because he’s still learning how to cope with the tragedies of not getting his way.

 

Oh, look: a minor inconvenience. Let’s scream about it like we’re dying. –children

— That’s Parenting (@ThatsParenting) November 13, 2014

 

And yet, even though everything is pretty much going the way it’s supposed to, I’m worried.

I worry about what it’s going to be like when Eitan finishes preschool and starts going to a regular school. I hear stories about kids getting assigned three hours of homework every night – in elementary school! – and I shudder. I speak to middle school students who tell me about navigating the usual social pressures of puberty and first relationships, except that their struggles are plastered all over Facebook and Instagram for the entire world to see. I read about high school students who are forced to become captains of sports teams and do volunteer work and learn a musical instrument and somehow fit in five hours of homework every night if they are to have any hope of being considered for the college of their choice.

I worry about the fact that kids today are forced to contend with so many different messages about the kinds of people they’re supposed to be that they can’t think straight. Kids need to be smart and athletic and good-looking and get good grades all at the same time. They need to be everything because, if they don’t, they’re considered failures. No wonder cases of depression and substance abuse in teens and adolescents have skyrocketed in recent years. I get stressed just thinking about having to deal with one of those challenges, let alone all of them at once.

And for what?

I’ve heard the familiar refrains about living in the world of “What if?” What if I don’t get an A? What if I don’t get into the right high school? What if I can’t get into college? What if I can’t get a job? They are really just covers for the true underlying question:

What if I’m not good enough?

We all ask that question every day, whether we realize it or not. The only thing anyone is really searching for is the knowledge that they’re doing okay and that they’re on the right track. We’re all just looking for approval, whether it’s from our parents, our spouses, our co-workers, friends or even our children. We all want to know, “If I’m not good enough, will anyone still care about me? Will anyone still love me if I don’t measure up?” Hopefully, we have someone who can reassure us that we’re valued, no matter what mistakes we make.

But as hard as it might be for adults to feel like they’ve found someone to answer that question in the affirmative for them, it’s even harder for kids. That’s why they pore over textbooks until their eyes glaze over and pour the rest of their energy into extra-curricular activities. They freak out over every quiz and test because everything holds so much weight. When their report cards and progress reports show all A’s, they feel more relief than pride. Good grades don’t just mean that they’re still on the track for success in terms of college and a good job; good grades mean that they’re still worthy of love.

I know that my wife and I hold more influence than anyone else over the ways that Eitan will approach his schoolwork and the ideas he’ll have about his future as he grows up. I know that it is up to us to continue reminding him of the importance of staying true to himself and the fact that we will both be there for him, no matter what happens. But even though I know how much power my wife and I have in helping him to develop coping skills for handling these pressures, I can’t help wondering if the weights of school, college and employment prospects will become too overwhelming for him. I tell myself that he will be fine; his mother and I certainly turned out pretty well, so I would imagine that he will too. We can pass on the wisdom that we’ve gained through the years to prepare him for the different obstacles he is about to face and continue to be his cheerleaders as he grows. And yet, even though I know all that…

I worry.