Sucker Punched

Last Thursday my training wheels were removed and I got to sub for Superteacher ALL BY SELF! (After 1 quarter of student teaching we have the option of a conditional intern teaching certificate to sub for our master teacher during our 2nd quarter of student teaching and get paid. I took the option!) She was at a conference Thursday and Friday so I flew solo. It went very well, I tried something new that ended up not going super well purely because our classroom is too small, and the kids were great if a little chattier than usual.

At 3 Thursday afternoon Husband was en-route to Seatac Airport for a guys weekend in Vegas and I was on my way to the district office to meet with the HR lady and fill out EMPLOYMENT paperwork. (Woot Woot!) I called Husband to say goodbye and have fun and he filled me in on the Thing 2 drama that had transpired while I was wrangling seventh graders.

A boy had slammed Thing 2's head down on his desk during the first couple minutes of 5th period. It was a sucker punch, Thing 2's back was to the kid and he had no idea it was coming. The nurse called Husband to let him know that he seemed ok but they were checking him out just in case and an 'incident' form was coming home with him. Two seconds after Husband got off the phone with the school, Daughter called him and said all in one breath, "Thing 2 got beat up and I'm gonna go find the punk-ass snot that did it and kill him."

He was so proud of her. Just when we're afraid that our kids will never ever ever get along and be friends, they shock the shit out of us. However, he did tell her not to do that because then she would get in trouble. ("Wait until after school when you're off school grounds" may or may not have been what he said. Heh.)

The funniest thing of all were the facebook posts. I don't care what anyone says, I LOVE facebook and this is why:

THING 2: "Dumb Student punched me in he head while my back was turned in 5th period. He hits like an undernourished teletubby with a muscular disease. Last I saw of him, Mr. Math Teacher was tossing him out of the room like he would with a bag of marshmallows that just insulted his mother."

GOD I LOVE THAT KID! "Hits like an undernourished teletubby with a muscular disease"? That right there is a golden insult!!!

Ten minutes later on Facebook:

DAUGHTER: "So some punk sophomore thinks he can hit my little brother? I think I'd better have a talk with this kid."

Then her friends go on to tell her exactly how obnoxious this kid is, how his girlfriend - who loves to needle Thing 2 until she gets a reaction out of him - manipulated the whole thing and then taunted Thing 2 about it, and how they will all help her get revenge.

The rest of my afternoon was spent getting the entire story out of Thing 2 and Daughter's friends that witnessed the whole thing and emailing back and forth with the Dean of Students who initially was going to punish Thing 2 for calling the boys girlfriend an asshole which apparently started the whole thing. And watching Thing 2 to make sure he didn't have a concussion as per the nurse's instructions. Thing 2 said it really wasn't bad but apparently it LOOKED really bad because Mr. Math Teacher wanted to call an aid car. And Husband was on his way to Vegas so I got to deal with it ALL BY SELF. Well, with a little help from my good friend Red Wine.

Don't worry, the kid got suspended for 5 days and since the school is treating it as an assault may end up with further consequences, and I won't let my kids and their friends hurt him. Much.

My life - it is never boring.

Teachers Make Too Much Money

By Sarasota Values Education on Friday, February 18, 2011 at 8:32pm

Are you sick of high paid teachers? Teachers’ hefty salaries are driving up taxes, and they only work 9 or 10 months a year! It’s time we put things in perspective and pay them for what they do - baby sit! We can get that for less than minimum wage.

That’s right. Let’s give them $3.00 an hour and only the hours they worked; not any of that silly planning time, or any time they spend before or after school. That would be $19.50 a day (7:45 to 3:00 PM with 45 min. off for lunch and plan — that equals 6 1/2 hours).

Each parent should pay $19.50 a day for these teachers to baby-sit their children.

Now how many do they teach in day…maybe 30? So that’s $19.50 x 30 = $585.00 a day. However, remember they only work 180 days a year!!! I am not going to pay them for any vacations.

LET’S SEE…. That’s $585 X 180= $105,300 per year. (Hold on! My calculator needs new batteries).

What about those special education teachers and the ones with Master’s degrees? Well, we could pay them minimum wage ($7.75), and just to be fair, round it off to $8.00 an hour. That would be $8 X 6 1/2 hours X 30 childrenX 180 days = $280,800 per year.

Wait a minute — there’s something wrong here! There sure is!

The average teacher’s salary (nation wide) is $50,000. $50,000/180 days = $277.77/per day/30 students=$9.25/6.5 hours = $1.42 per hour per student–a very inexpensive baby-sitter and they even EDUCATE your kids!

WHAT A DEAL!!!!

(I lifted this from ChiTown Girl who lifted it from Ricochet - thanks for sharing, I think this is something everyone should be required to read.)

Things I've Learned Recently

The threat of No. Christmas. Gifts. is more effective on teenagers who ask for expensive things and have seen you return gifts already purchased.

Said threatened teenagers can clean/pick up/organize around the house much more effectively than they let on during the rest of the year.

Teeny-tiny puppies are harder to potty train than golden-retriever sized puppies.

It is possible to tire out a golden retriever after all - you just need a teeny tiny puppy to play with her.

Being self-employed really sucks when you ARE the boss and can't just ask for time off.

Internet shopping is the best invention ever. Bar none. Full stop.

Research and development funding would be better spent on developing everything the Jetson's have in their house than on sending us to Mars.

Some puppies eat their own poop - I will never be the same after finding out this particular little tidbit.

Whatever the electricity worker guys that fix our power when it goes out make is not enough, they all deserve a raise and a pony.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, Whoop it Up!!!

Spoiling the Children

Before I became a parent it never occurred to me that I'd have to guard against spoiling my kids. Spoiled brats are a pain in the ass and no one wants to be around them. I didn't want to live with any or raise any. We all know that one person who was obviously spoiled rotten as a child and as a result believe that the world revolves around what they want, what they think, what they feel, and what they believe. It's really hard to resist the urge to bash their teeth in isn't it?

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But as my kids get older, I find myself wanting to spoil them. WTF is up with that? I would absolutely love love LOVE to buy daughter a car for her upcoming sixteenth birthday and for the Things when they turn sixteen. Of course I'm not going to because I have a brain but what I want to know is where is that urge coming from?

Husband came home last month with an iPhone for daughter. The Things both have cell phones too. They are a huge convenience for me because all three of the kids are involved in school activities now so it makes it a hell of a lot easier for who needs a ride home when and where the hell are you I'm waiting right in front of the damn school! But they don't really NEED phones.

We're instituting a new policy for Daughter a.k.a. the SLOB and her room needs to be picked up every day (by her) and vacuumed every weekend (by her) or she doesn't get to go out with her friends or have friends over. In helping her get organized I realized she has more clothes than she has places to put them. Why does she have so many damn clothes? Oh. Yeah. I bought them for her. Dumbass.

So now I'm on restriction. I've put myself there. If I don't stop spoiling her - the Things don't have nearly as much stuff simply because they hate shopping - she's never gonna learn to take care of what she has. And that shit won't fly because I will not support a thirty-something year old adult. No more shopping trips with her. Which sucks because I love to shop too and we always have a really good time. No more doing the kids chores for them instead of making them do them. Over and over. Until they're done CORRECTLY. (Side note - Why are they incapable of seeing the dog hair on the stairs that they supposedly just swept?)

Good parents don't spoil their children. So why do I want to?

Maybe it's because they are really good kids. When I hear about their peers doing drugs, drinking, skipping class, getting or getting someone pregnant, having unprotected sex or telling their teachers to fuck off, I know just how lucky we are to have such great kids.

But they still need to learn how to clean the bathroom and do laundry before they go to college.

Letting my Baby Leave the Nest

Daughter spent last weekend - Friday afternoon to Sunday afternoon - at "Jesus Camp" as she put it.  Or Youth Group Church Camp as I referred to it.  Until she said Jesus Camp.  Now that's what I call it.  I let my kid go to Jesus Camp.  And she's been going to Youth Group on Wednesday evenings for a few weeks now.  

I can't blame her for enjoying it, I did the same thing at her age and it's hanging out with a bunch of her friends playing games, listening to music (the church has a real live band that actually isn't awful) and talking.  Because there is only one high school in our district, the kids all know each other and really enjoy spending time together outside of school.  And after all, it's CHURCH for pete's sake.  It's not like she's hanging out at a local crack house getting high and turning tricks.

So what is my problem?  Why would this bother me just a little bit?

Things like this, and this, and this.  

Thanks to Dan Savage's Youth Pastor Watch on Slog for digging these stories up and making sure attention is paid to them.  We cannot ever again allow a systematic cover up of the sexual abuse of children.

The issue of sexual abuse and manipulation of children and young people by their religious leader is not something that is just a series of news stories for me.  It's personal.  As a kindergartner I attended a neighborhood church with Grandmother and absolutely LOVED the minister.  We moved away and I didn't go back to that church again until I was a teenager.  The same minister was there and I was ecstatic to get to spend time with him again.  I went on a youth group trip to Purdue University at 13, participated in church activities and really enjoyed it.  I still loved the minister - he was a big, teddy bear kind of guy, grandfatherly, generous with hugs and he simply radiated love and kindness.  He did a children's sermon every Sunday using some of his huge collection of hand puppets and did different voices for each of them.  Every kid in the church loved him and looked up to him.

Then he was gone.

I don't remember how it all went down exactly, I was older and working in addition to being a high school student and wasn't as regular about going to church and youth group.  But there was gossip, a lot of the adults were upset including Marvelous Mom and Stepdan (maybe they were just dating then?) and I wanted to know what happened.  I loved this guy and couldn't believe that he did anything wrong.

So Mom arranged for the interim minister to come to the house and explain the whole situation to me.  The minister I loved, who I had known since I was a little girl, had an affair with a young man who was a member of the church.  I don't think he was young enough to be jail-bait but I don't think he was 18 yet when the affair became sexual.  He was also in a fragile mental state and under the care of a psychiatrist for a mental illness.  The boys mother had asked the minister to talk to him, counsel him - and instead he seduced him.  The minister I loved had shown porn to young people from the church in his home, not just the boy who he had an affair with but others also.  His wife, who I also loved, had known about it.  It was not a one-time thing, it was ongoing and lengthy.  It must not have been anything technically illegal because I don't think he ever went to jail or even faced charges, but it was a massive and brutal violation of trust that the church members placed in him.  He resigned and has never worked in ministry again as far as I know.

I fell apart.  The poor interim minister - who is an awesome guy and I will always appreciate for telling me the unvarnished truth and treating me as a thinking, intelligent individual - and my Mom were a little shocked at my reaction.  I don't remember all the specifics of the conversation (obviously - if I've gotten the details wrong I hope Marvelous Mom will correct me so I can fix them) but I remember crying and crying and wondering how I could have been so stupid for loving someone who would take advantage of his position and influence over a boy who was young and in need of help, not sex.  This man who I looked up to and admired, fell off the pedestal I had put him on with a thud that hurt my heart.

After that I never went to church regularly again and became very suspicious of organized religion.  Now that I'm older there are other reasons for my suspicions but the experience in my childhood has forever tainted my trust in people, especially church leaders.  I let the kids go to church - the same church - with Marvelous Mom and Stepdan when they spend the night with them because my folks are both very active in the church and its leadership and know everyone better than we did back when the evil minister was in charge.  I know that there are precautions in place within that specific church community because there are still members who bear the scars from the events of 20 years ago.  And I know the church is inclusive of all types of people including gays, minorities and the children of Muslim-raised fathers like my children.  My kids will not hear hate-filled speech or radical fundamentalist intolerance.  But we don't go regularly.  I don't think I will ever go to church regularly again.

Now daughter has a fabulous group of friends, really great kids that I like a lot, who go to youth group at a church in our community.  Of course she wants to go and we let her.  I have talked to the youth pastor at the church, I know their basic values, and daughters 6th grade teacher who I respect and trust is a member of the church.  But its still a church full of people I don't know well.  

We let her go.  I talk to her about my past and my concerns regularly, she knows about the minister I loved who hurt so many people and she knows our feelings about fundamentalism and intolerance.  I trust her to know what is right, to be able to protect herself, and to grow up and go out into the world without me.

And while she is gone, I wait by the phone with a knot in my stomach

Costumed

With all the ads out for the Watchmen movie, the Things have become re-obsessed with superheroes and costumes.

This is Thing Two's interpretation of the perfect superhero.

At first I thought he was going for the Rorschach look, after all that's the latest face covered superhero, but now that I think about it he looks more like the Invisible Man.  Only shorter.

He demolished his Darth Vader hooded cape to make the face cover and even got into my sewing basket to sew up the back of it.  The goggles are daughters snowboarding goggles, the hat is Thing One's and the coat is the only piece of designer clothing I own.

After I took the picture I made him hang the coat back up in my closet and told him if he ever touched it again I would rip his lips off with the hedge clippers.

The top item on his birthday list is a trench coat.

So Cute I Think I Might Vomit

Thing two is doing amazingly well in his new school.  He's made some friends, hasn't gotten sent to the Principal's office once and is cheerful and happy to head out the door every morning.  His new BEST friend is a little girl his age who also takes the shuttle to the YMCA after school to stay until her parents pick her up after work.  Thing 2 doesn't want to go to the Y unless Best Friend is there too and when she is there he doesn't want to leave.  He called me this afternoon when he got to the Y to ask if he could stay until 5:00pm so they could play.  She enjoys the same video games, computer games and comics that he does and I suspect she can relate to him when it comes to not having many friends.  They are two peas in a pod and she is a very nice little girl.

Today when I picked him up she gave him a big hug goodbye and I thought it was So. Cute.  In the car on the way home he informed me that the two of them have decided they like LIKE one another but they aren't going to "go out" until they are in high school because they are too young right now.

I almost ran the car off the road.

Helicopter Parenting

If I was a "cool" blogger I would probably get into trouble for linking to this site but since I'm not cool and I'm not afraid of pissing people off, I will go ahead and link to this post about "negative child fear mongering" because I think it raises some interesting questions.  

V is not someone I always agree with but I like her blunt, even shocking, in your face way of putting things and sometimes she comes up with a topic like this that makes me want to consider my own view on the subject.

Plus she makes me laugh, I am THAT sick and twisted.  So shoot me.

I let my kids ride around our neighborhood on their bikes, daughter hangs out with the neighborhood kids at "the jumps" and they all can walk to the gas station/convenience store to get a soda or a treat (or milk if I have forgotten to stop at the grocery store on my way home from school) which is maybe a mile from our house but you have to walk on a street that takes a 90 degree turn with no sidewalks.  Daughter even hangs out with some kids in our neighborhood that smoke cigarettes and pot.  She is very honest with me and told me when she tried cigarettes ("it was SO GROSS Mom, I don't know how they do that all the time on PURPOSE!") and asked me what pot was like when one of her friends got into trouble for trying it.  I told her what it felt like to get high and gave her vivid and real examples from our family about why she should NOT smoke pot but ultimately it is her decision and all I can do is give her guidance.  I am quite sure, from personal experience, that if you just say DON'T DO THIS then they are absolutely 100% sure to DO IT and make sure you don't know.  But if you have an ongoing conversation they will ask questions and talk to you about things.  I would rather this start now, when they are in our house and we are still in control over their day to day activities than have their first experiences making decisions when they are in college.  Kids who live under their parents thumbs throughout high school go absolutely APESHIT in college and get into a lot of trouble.

My kids walked to elementary school by themselves in 1st grade.  Well, they weren't ALONE, they walked with each other and the rest of the neighborhood kids but I didn't walk with them.  Or drive them.

In the summer I have been known to send them outside to play with strict instructions not to come back until lunch.  The boys are homebodies and usually just play in the yard but daughter has friends all over the place and it can be all day until I see her.  Granted, she has her own cell phone so I can call her, but she is out of my sight for hours at a time in the summertime and on the weekends.

12 was the magic age for being old enough to be dropped off at the movies with a friend or sibling and we let daughter fly alone to Vegas at 12 to visit my Dad and Stepmonster.  (We are going to send thing 1 to Vegas for an extended visit with them next week.  Until he is 18.  They don't know yet.)  

We followed the law and didn't let them stay home alone until they were 10 or to be at home alone in charge of younger kids until they were 12 but I probably would have let them do that at a younger age were it not for the laws in Washington state.  (And the fact that daughter would have killed her brothers and buried the bodies but I digress...)

When I was a kid I rode public busses in my neighborhood and into Seattle alone in elementary school but there are parents of my kids friends who are horrified at the thought of letting their middle and high schoolers ride public transportation alone.  Many of their friends have never been to the movies without a grownup or ridden their bikes to a friends house unaccompanied.  I let the kids walk to the bookstore while I shop at Target or the grocery store and some of my friends ask if I'm worried about them "wandering around alone".  No, they're 12 and 14 years old for god's sake!  Daughter does her own laundry, they all have chores they have to do every day and the boys are getting really good at dishes!  I try not to be a helicopter parent but compared to my peers I am practically neglectful.  My whole goal at this point is to have them learn everything they need to know to get the hell out of my house and live successfully on their own!  If I don't teach them that, they will NEVER LEAVE.  And that would fuck up my plans in a very big way!

So what do you do?  When is it necessary to let them out of your sight and learn things the hard way?  We can't protect them from the real world forever and I think that not preparing them for reality is a subtle form of neglect.

Privacy and Blogging

Mid-Century Modern Moms has a thought-provoking post up today.  Sylvia Wrigley says, "children of the future may be searching on each others photographs, matching based on facial features in a way we can't conceive of now.  Perhaps you'll see google searches matching based on the IP address from which the blog files were uploaded.  It's not that I was foolish enough to use his real name, it's that I couldn't second guess how things were going to move on."

Joining blogmanity late in the game, I thought long and hard about how to make this blog mine without sacrificing my children's privacy on the alter of the internet.  My kids are old enough to know what a blog is (two of them have their own blogs) and to realize the repercussions of having just anything out there on the www for anyone to see.  So I don't use full names, not even mine and I check google regularly to make sure this site doesn't come up attached to my name.  But I do post pictures because my main reason for starting a blog is so that people we love who live far far away can see the kids and how they're doing.

My biggest decision was to allow the kids to read my blog.  They don't read it often and we talk about it when they do read it but it keeps me from posting things in anger and the heat of the moment that I might regret later.  I talk about some of my frustrations here but always things that I have already talked about with them and the posts that directly relate to them, I let them read before I post.  And I always keep in mind that this is not a journal, it is completely public and wide open to everyone and as much as I try to keep it private, it may come back to me in the future.  Remembering this with every post has - so far - kept me from making a total and complete fool out of myself.  (I'm ok with being a partial fool.)

So anyone else out there struggle with this issue?

A Different Start to the School Year

Daughter started public high school this year - 9th grade - she loves it and we're dealing.

Thing One is in 7th grade and returning to the public middle school he attended last year. I'm thankful he doesn't have any weird transitions to make because change is not his favorite thing and he was and continues to be very successful at this wonderful school. He's in honors humanities, 8th grade math, loves band and is looking forward to being in the drama club again. Word on the street is that the production this year will be The Music Man. Last year they did Pirates of Penzance.

Thing Two is going to 7th grade at home. He is enrolled in a "Virtual Academy" in Washington State that is an online school. For the past 7 years he has gone to the same public elementary and middle school as his brother and sister do/did but has struggled with his interactions with his peers.

When the boys were nine I finally copped to the fact that they were not your average kids and maybe some medical detective work was in order to see what we could do to help them out. They went through extensive testing, evaluations with neuro-docs and psychiatrists, yadda yadda yadda and the end diagnosis was Asperger's Syndrome. But the neurologist saw something more in Thing Two and he got a couple of extra diagnosis (diagnosi?) in addition to AS. With two years of seeing a psychologist weekly, the care of a psychiatrist and medication as well as husband and I learning a whole new way of parenting these two unusual kids, they are doing wonderfully well and thriving. Except Thing Two, at school, with the kids he has grown up with.

The years of diagnosis and therapy were hell for him and school was not a great place to be. I pretty much went to all of fourth grade with him to help him with appropriate reactions and behaviors but he was suspended for the first time that year and many many more suspensions followed. It wasn't the school's fault, they did the best they could, and it wasn't Thing Two's fault, he just had a lot of things he needed to learn to deal and cope with. We all did our best and have come out the other side better for it. But those kids at school that saw him at his worst - they haven't forgotten. And he has become stuck in a pattern of behavior and reactions with them. They expect him to behave like he did at his worst, even now when he is doing so SO well, and he reacts to him in that same old way because they expect it. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy from hell.

So to break the pattern, we've pulled him from school. He still has teachers, a curriculum and books that are provided for us, and will be keeping up with his brother in his studies. But he will not be at school. I am willing to try anything once and we have learned in the past that creative parenting and problem solving is the way to go with this kid. He is not an average 12 year old so we can't treat him like one.

He is a dedicated gamer and has a group he plays D&D with on a regular basis, he is deciding on some extra-curricular activities such as 4-H and fencing (???) so he will still be hanging out with other kids, just not the same kids he has spent so much time with up until now. In watching him this summer, he made instant friends everywhere we went. I know he can have successful relationships with his peers, just not the ones that expect the OLD behavior from him.

I'm excited for this school year and also a little nervous. My role will be completely different and I have new things to learn. But if it means Thing Two can finally find his niche and enjoy school and other kids, it will all be worth it.

I Love the Library

Daughter is in tutoring three afternoons a week because of her abysmal grade in Algebra 1 last year.  So three times a week I drop her off at 3pm and pick her up at 5.  It's too far away to go home so my laptop and I go to the library and make out like horny teenagers.  Sometimes I cheat on my laptop with a book or a few magazines, don't tell.

Now that motherinlaw is here, those three days are keeping me relaxed and sane.

I heart the library.

Broken Kid

Having a kid in a cast that goes from his toes to his crotch has made me realize that our decision to stop breeding after the twins were born was the 100% correct one.  I didn't get an unbroken night of sleep for three and a half weeks after he fractured his leg and I'm back to serving breakfast, lunch and dinner to him along with numerous snacks throughout the day.  Bathing him is an exercise involving plastic bags, duct tape and strategically placed washcloths to prevent my eyes from accidentally seeing his junk.  (The same junk I wiped and diapered for three and a half years and that he was happy to waggle around in the fresh air for God and everyone to see for days at a time during the nudist years of three to five but will now apparently wither up and fall off if it comes into my line of vision.)

I'm tired and cranky and can't wait for him to be able to get himself to the bathroom and bathe the stinky 12 year old smell off himself properly.

Of course the broken kid is the one who asked his father to teach him how to make coffee and how I like mine fixed so he could bring me coffee in bed on Saturday mornings.  (Is my kid awesome or what?  He knows how to ensure the weekend is a good one!)  Saturday just isn't the same with him broken.

Nope, no more newborns for us.  I like self-sufficient 12 and 13 year olds.  Is it selfish of me to feel sorry for myself when it's my kid who has a broken leg?

Whatever.