Tagged: parenting
Because You’re Not a Moron
Thinking about any one child of mine (see earlier post today) naturally causes my thoughts to return to H-.
Want to know what some folks advise? I wish I was kidding. There are, supposedly, well-educated and well-trained men and women in the business of divorce that suggest, “Send cards and letters over the next 5 years or so at least for birthdays and holidays etc. That way, when she is 18 and maybe thinks differently and is free to do as she pleases, she won’t be able to (fact-check-proof) say, ‘You never even…’”
As I receive this advice, I always poo poo it, saying agreeably, “Yeah. I know. Of course I will.” But that’s a lie. Not the part about whether or not I will use the USPS to attempt to parent, but the part about my belief that it somehow works. My kid, H-, would have to be some kind of moron to think, “Oh, he actually did love me,” because she received some one dozen articles of mail each year for five years.
Seriously, can you imagine an adult woman falling in love with a man who did the same?
“But he sent me a Hallmark card every major holiday!!” the imaginary imbecile woman’s response to friends, after they chide her for ever having confessed that she nursed a dream of real relationship with a pen pal.
That woman would be a moron!!
And so would H- if the greeting card thing had any effect, by my thinking. And I’m not looking to raise morons here. Marry them? Yup. Divorce them? Yup. Produce them? Nope.
I have far too much hope placed on H-’s inborn ability to get to the bottom of the situation before she turns 18 (or after, for that matter) to waste any on the experts’ advice.
No, to be clear, the truth still lay where it always has.
After 12+ years of rocky, but never hopeless co-parenting (and more money transfers than sanity permits to reckon, both in total dollars and percentage of income), H- has recently been kidnapped by her mom (and any others over there who don’t actively work for H-’s freedom). Right now she has developed Stockholm Syndrome, which, when put plainly as if for 14 yr olds, means: she prefers the company and agenda of her kidnapper—despite the crime—than the terror that she now surely believes, wrongly, comes with freedom and knowing the truth.
Oh. And her mom is a money-grubbing whore. Always has been and always will be. The future for H- will include a realization of all this, followed by a tepid-at-first, then common-to-perhaps-loving-even return to me (including apologizing for ever doubting), plus a daily and disastrous relationship with her mother that is anything but encouraged by little ol’ me after said realization. Then, maybe later, the two will talk it out through the glass on those phones at a prison—as her mom is locked up for the what is illegal in the future—the general crime of allowing a heart of absolute moral blackness to continue to pump blood throughout her body.
(The fantasy sustains me; what do you want me to say?)
****
Post recap: Don’t be a moron. Cards and gifts alone could only ever serve as “Exhibit A” of the dysfunction and moral crimes you live under.
She Wanted to Be Caught!
To the toddler, the crack of their door at night is more precious than all the gold and silver in the world. Shut the door and they cry and cry. But open it just a crack and they sleep restfully.
So what happened last night? I still don’t know. But I do know that the non-toddler family members were watching the latest Mission Impossible—the one, like all its predecessors, which always had the team simultaneously realizing and then stating aloud, “He wanted to be caught!”
The toddlers went down pretty easy—door was cracked. My hearing is the best out of the three of us, and so I was the first to hear some noises from their room and eventually paused the flick and rounded the corner to see that A- had climbed out of bed and turned on the hall light. Door was now wide open. J- was standing in his crib and now had Paddington—a gift from his older sister, I had to assume. As I laid him back down, he was in the mood to play, but I wasn’t, so I just covered him and turned my attention to A-.
“Gotta stay in bed, A-. It’s bed time.”
She put her arms out for a hug.
After the hug, I whispered to the dark room, “I love you. Goodnight.” Then I closed the door to just a crack and turned off the hall light as I went back to the movie.
A few minutes later, and I could hear more toddler shenanigans. Pretty much the same scene, but J- may have been closer to sleep than I would’ve guessed. Turning my attention to A-, I softly threatened, “It’s time for bed, A- If you get up again, I will shut the door.” She nodded like the perfect little angel that she is.
Back to the movie.
A few minutes later, back up stairs.
I left A-, saying, “I am closing the door. I told you this would happen.”
That was odd, I thought, as she didn’t make a peep of protest as I shut the door.
Back to the movie.
I just wanted to make it through the car chase scene, which I knew was about 10 minutes, and was sure to begin soon.
“Fart!” I suddenly had a sinking feeling. “She wants to be in the room with the door shut!”
Hitting pause once again, I went up the stairs to check on the two of them.
“No hall light on. Good,” I noticed as I turned the corner. Looking at the crack under the door, I saw the bedroom light was still off too. “That’s gotta be a good sign,” I thought. But in the movies the bad guys are always one step ahead of us good guys. So I did the unthinkable. I slowly turned the handle—so slowly. And then I opened the door a crack, and without the crack sound. As I continued in, I found little A- in some level of pre-sleep that was happy to be tucked in once again, but absolutely void of any contest. J- was out like a light.
Back downstairs we were able to finish the film without trouble. And I secretly acknowledged, with joy and anticipation, that the toddlers might actually allow me to sleep in a bit in the morning, given all these post-bedtime antics.
I was right.
Well, not about A- wanting to get shut in. But they did sleep in a bit.
USAFA Hoops vs. All Socks
I surprised the family and took them to the Air Force Academy Men’s Basketball game the other night. The Academy puts on a good show in all the ways they can plan and perfect (sound and lights etc.), and then everyone knows that the basketball skill just isn’t going to be there because it is a military academy. But the game was fun to be at and I have to admit this was my first time back on an Air Force base/installation since I separated over 11 years ago and it felt kinda awesome to be around like-minded folks. The highlight of that like-mindedness was when the grandpa-type guy behind us saw A- light up when she saw his popcorn and he just offered her some straight out of the red pin-striped box. It was more than wonderful moment.
Also the other day, I did the toddlers’ laundry and when I folded their clothes, I found that all the socks still had their pair. That too was a moment covered with awesomeness.
Which moment felt better? Hard to say. But it’s been a good week, that’s for sure.
Never Incentivize the Female’s Fantasy—Divorce Must Actually Devastate Her
So I just learned of an old friend’s divorce. Like many other friends of mine this man just retired from the military, and only when this was clear did the evil cunt announce her intentions. To make matters worse, their last duty station was in Europe, and for the common, internationally known reasons, this first grade teacher has decided to keep the kids over there with her.
First, don’t even start if you’re going to take one step towards suggesting that anything about the situation is the natural result of their daily, twenty plus year relationship. This move is so low, and happens so frequently to retired military men that there is never anything about the actual personalities involved, no. The only two factors or variables at play are the fact that divorce is incentivized and the female (no “woman” as such would even consider accepting a dime more or a minute more from her ex), the female, as a creature, is the most depressed and despicable entity on the earth. You will never find another—no murderer, no rapist, no genocidal maniac—who can even tread water next to a female.
Unreal and uncouth, one must never incentivize, these, their fantasies. If this time-honored dictum is ignored, then children, men, and eventually a nation will be destroyed. They will all be destroyed because these mentally incapable females possess unbounded imagination. This results in one of two outcomes. The first possible outcome might best be embodied by the legendary George Washington. The second outcome is best embodied by the current population of the American penal system—fatherless males.
The female—as part of her growth into womanhood—must have her imagination bounded. She must have restrictions. Life cannot possibly appear to keep getting better and better and always improve and never disappoint. These fantasies must remain on the pages and stages.
No, the female must have a very concrete and inescapable situation staring at her to perform. This is how to bring her womanly character to the surface. She must see the limits to her life daily and she must, daily, face the fact that without her man, she will certainly face abject poverty and lose her children. This is the only way.
It seems that the male alone, for reasons known only to the LORD God himself, comes into the world designed to absorb the apparently latent happiness available within each breath of air. The female, on the other hand, hates the air, hates the sun—hates the very day. The female, on the other hand, listens to every lie, believes every instinct, and obeys every passion. I write this in the hopes that someday my two daughters read it.
3 Reasons Youth Basketball Is Better Than Church
I am kinda the last Boy Scout. I am definitely one of the last pilots of the last male-only squadron of the USAF. And I think my generation was the last one which didn’t turn youth sports into the all-consuming beast that it is.
I’ve mentioned how easily my own 12 year old went from 2 practices a week and five tournaments in 12 weeks, to Mon-Fri practices/games, in addition to the 5 weekend tournaments. It’s been crazy.
I’ve also mentioned how my attempts to join a church have been actively rebuffed. One church’s staff member actually told me I could watch but not speak at their Wednesday night youth service. Another church’s head deacon invited me to coffee to suggest now isn’t the time to join his church.
Keep in mind that I have a “Graduate Certificate In Biblical Studies” which means that I certainly care and also that I certainly have studied the Bible and Christian History (history and philosophy in general too) more than any rural Christian member (or Pastor) ever could dream to have. (Only slight hyperbole.)
I have done light internet research into the topic, “Youth Sports are better than church” and the only or main results are articles written by Christians which offer tips on how to navigate the two worlds.
That said, it’s time someone tell the truth.
Here are three reasons youth basketball is better than church.
1. Basketball is fun.
Attend any youth or children’s activity at a protestant Christian church and you’ll find adults trying to make said activity fun. Well, with basketball, it is fun.
2. Basketball, win or lose, instills youths with desirable life skills.
Attend any youth or children’s activity at a protestant Christian church and you’ll find adults trying to persuade kids that the Bible has eternal life skills within it. Well, with basketball, life skills (perseverance, growth, not to mention hand-eye coordination) appear like wetness with water. No advocate needed.
3. Basketball games provide a perfectly indirect (safe) way to make new friends, both for kids and parents (me).
Attend any youth or children’s activity at a protestant church and you will not find parents. If any parents are there, they are too occupied to talk, what with making speeches to kids that church is fun, and that church will endow them with life skills.
Put simply, as a Christian man and parent, now that I’m involved, honestly, I am not afraid to report that youth basketball is better than church. Sometimes the games are on Sundays. Sometimes not. I’m not recanting my faith; Jesus Christ is Lord forever and ever and ever. Glory. Hallelujah. Amen.
But I won’t ever feel guilty for recognizing that basketball is the better activity for my kids and I and skipping church.
Our Little Exvangelical
Of all the annoying words that unfortunately carry usefully definite meaning, I have to say “exvangelical” is my least favorite. But I just listened to the “Rise and Fall of Mars Hill” podcast and so it is now in my lexicon.
In any case, this is a word which upon one hearing the meaning is clear. Or rather, in one use we can tell what it does not mean. It isn’t denoting apostasy from Christianity, it is just expressing that the tenets of evangelical Christianity are too much too bear.
Well, tonight I discovered the exvangelical roll has an additional name.
My step-son, A-, is twelve, as I have mentioned. That’s seventh grade.
He is playing traveling basketball, which here in rural Minnesota is not quite insane or indicative of his abilities or desires. It’s just what they call the most base level of youth basketball. Two practices a week. A few three-game tournaments.
Traveling basketball as a term is also useful because, we have learned, there is another kind of youth basketball being played in the winter months—school ball.
Long story short, since hearing that there is such a thing as school ball, A- is now practicing or playing basketball 6 days a week. What can I say? Basketball is something A- enjoys. I’d rather see him do something he enjoys than yell at him for being (fill in the blank with undesirable qualities) all day and night.
For my part, too, I have been fascinated at comparing my youth basketball experience with my local church experience.
Remember my, “Guests cannot speak. Not even me.” post? That was church world. Now, in youth sports, as of a few weeks ago, I am coach of the B Team.
Why did they let me? What are my qualifications? Did I go to the equivalent of seminary for basketball, you may ask?
I simply had to display interest and availability.
Next thing I knew, I was choosing tournaments and directing where the money should be sent.
Back to our little (and new) exvangelical.
Tonight at dinner, keep in mind it is Wednesday night, I said to A-, are we still aiming to make YTH tonight? (Out loud you would’ve heard “youth”, but the trendy multi-site Assemblies church calls it YTH.)
“Oh,” he says sheepishly. “I kinda forgot about that.”
I then said, chuckling, “Well, now you know what it feels like for every other Christian in America.”
Trying To Help Somalis At Open Gym
So I took A- (12 year old step-son, immigrated to America at 8–not my 2 year old daughter of the same initial letter) to the community center earlier today so he could horse around playing basketball.
Being the overbearing, meaning perfect, step-dad that I am, I initially wanted to work on his individual skills—like last Saturday—but he clearly indicated that he just wanted to be a kid today. Whatever.
While there, I witnessed the typical community center basketball court open gym scene. One of the two courts had a 5-on-5 pickup game going. The other two hoops had free shooting. Oh, and big dreams could be seen every time a kid made a basket.
Next, two Somali kids barged in with a decently loud presence. They headed to the wall where some gymnastic pads were hanging and it soon became clear that some sort of mischief is afoot. Behind the mats, emergency exit doors. Two Somalis soon grew to four. Isn’t that always the case, Minnesota?
(Switching to present tense, for effect.)
I yell out, “Hey. Why don’t you just pay?” (It’s $3.)
“What?”
“Why don’t you just pay?”
I live for these moments. Everyone has to decide what’s appropriate. Escalate? De-escalate? Either choice requires a decision that the entire world witnesses.
The kid says, playing it cool, “We don’t have the money.”
I shake my head. They walk away knowing I’m watching them. For a second I feel unresolved. I’m not interested to get them in trouble. I’m interested to get them to improve. At this moment, I’ve lost. But I won’t give up hope. What can I do? What options do I still have to achieve my goal?
I walk over to the bench where the future inmates are getting their shoes on etc. I say, “Hey, where are the two guys? I’ll pay for them.”
“Huh?”
I take out some cash like a big shot.
“It’s only six bucks. I’ll pay. Let’s go up to the front.”
Only one of the criminals follows me. That’s enough for my purposes, I figure. The entire mosque will know who I am soon enough. These illiterate people have a knack for oral histories, I hear.
He patiently waits as I explain the situation to the young ladies at the desk.
He even said, “Thank you.”
*****
What do you think, dear citizen? Did I waste my hard-earned money? Did I buy a jihad? Or was this the best path imaginable? Is Jesus knocking at their hearts? Maybe something in between?
Eagle Eyes
“Nose?”
“Yes, A-, that’s your nose,” I responded, unsure what prompted this resumption of the body parts game.
“Nose?”
“Yes. You’re right. Good job. That’s your nose,” I answered loquaciously, aiming for victory.
She took off running towards the open door.
“Hey!-” I started, futilely. “Why do they always need to go where they’re not allowed?”
She came back with a tissue at her nose and as I met her, I saw the box of tissue all the way in the far corner of our bedroom, on the nightstand.
I shook my head.
“H-!” I called to my older daughter. “You’re not gonna believe what A- just did. She saw the tissue box all the way from across the room and that’s why she started saying, ‘Nose? Nose?’ Ha. This kid has eagle eyes-”
“Watch out, A-!”
Before I could finish a father’s proud, ocular appellation, certain death in the form of unkempt toddler toys, almost met our far-sighted easy-breather.
Luck or Consequence?
You should remember that I have a step-son, A-. He’s now 12, and he has been in my house for over two years. For right or wrong, most nights, as my wife (his mother) and I lay in bed, about to fall asleep, I recount, let’s say, “areas for improvement” in his day. So many lies, so much disobedience, so much unthinkingness. He’s not hell-bent, but he has severe low self-esteem and until me, has never apparently had an adult teach him anything, let alone the big things. Making matters worse, he’s been guessing wrong and drawing wrong conclusions with his own brain—itself a testament to how incapable a human is to just “get it” without proper breeding.
Anyhow, as you also know, I fly helicopters professionally and of the EMS sort. Recently, I was able to attend a drag racing event as the “on duty”, “fly out the injured driver or fan” pilot. Well, one of the perks of this event was I got to go down to the start line and be as close to the car as anyone, well, anyone except the driver.
I’m telling you, it was like a bomb went off when the lights turned green. I feared for my own life.
In other words, it was awesome.
Later that shift, I flew an actual patient of a bicyclist vs. car event and then I had a long drive home. Long day.
Pretty much went directly to bed. And while there, I’m showing the wife videos of the crazy races and explaining the unimaginable experience of being right there (and having flown in to the event, all while being on the clock) and, because she she knows I like Nascar among other reasons, she says, “Lucky you.”
Full stop.
Lucky me? I’m at the race and being teated as VIP because I’m fortunate?
Sorry, my wife. Maybe it’s fortunate that that shift was open and I was able to fill it. Maybe it’s fortunate that the other helicopter that was supposed to be there was weathered in and we were sent until they could replace us. But the reason that pilots get these uncommon opportunities is pure consequence of consistent application of self-control, obedience, perseverance, attention to detail, service, and the list goes on.
The moment sticks in my craw because of my step-son. I’m the only adult in his life that holds him accountable, that gives him consequences, that tells him unrelentingly that “this behavior caused this consequence” and this means that I’ve created in him a fight. He has all the rest of you just neglecting him, just letting him believe in some bastardized version of “fortune” when it comes to how life unfolds in one corner. And he has me, in the other. I’m strict. I’m probably terrifying. And I talk to him more than anyone he knows. But I’m also alone. Me and my helicopter and my videos of cars exploding off the planet. 9 years of everyone, followed by 2+ years of everyone vs. one man who seems lucky. What do you think? Who’s he gonna choose to stick with?
Good things happen as consequences, and nominal and bad things happen as consequences.
Bear in mind, I’m not saying, I, Captain Pete, deserve good things, deserve good consequences. I am saying that when they happen, it is definitely and certainly due to past performance.
I saw the same images of who gets to be where at sporting events as I grew up that you all saw too. Celebrities and the wealthy have their places in the arena, and so do those of us who prepare for the worst, while hoping for the best.
But enough. I wrote this as a conversation piece. I’m curious, what do you think? Is my wife right? Am I just lucky? Or am I right? Was my front row experience the consequence of past behavior.
Lastly, help a brotha’ out. Give the kids in your, ahem, “sphere of influence” consequences.
The World Does Not Need More Children’s Books By Minority Authors
I saw a headline the other day about LatinX and other minority authors. It went on about how, while they are publishing some children’s books, there is still a great deficit and a need for more. Let me be clear: that’s simply not true. The world does not need more children’s books by minority authors.
I’ve mentioned on this blog before, more than once, that I attended an evangelical seminary for three years. It was a fairly robust graduate program, so far as I could tell—though I did not decide to obtain a master’s degree. Why not? Because I’m a man of action. And my professor and advisor could not answer the following question satisfactorily: “I’m a pilot. I wasn’t born a pilot; I had to learn how to fly. Likewise, I want to know what skill I will have by working so hard to get the degree. What skill, that I don’t already possess, will I have?”
He couldn’t answer it. I remember he tried; I remember he talked a lot in the space that naturally followed my question. But I also remember that he seemed to almost be speaking gibberish. There was some kind of mental block or other in that interaction.
Over a year later or so, I finally figured out “the academy”. So I emailed the advisor (I was no longer a student) and told him as much. In short, I said, “Higher education is all about writing the primer for the field. In this case, it’s the Bible. You all want to get on the translation committee of the best-selling Bible. In other fields it’s the History 101 text or the Biology 101 text that is taught at Harvard or wherever is most elite.”
My advisor replied, “So are you ready to come back and finish your degree?”
This is why I maintain and declare that the world does not need more children’s books written by minority authors. It just doesn’t. As always, minority authors have nothing to say. And if they did, they certainly wouldn’t need support from the majority. And if the majority, people like me and my old advisor, get them to quit writing, that means they certainly have nothing to say.
I haven’t gone back to finish my degree and I won’t. Like I said, I’m a man of action. I can already do everything those folks can do. But I do not care to write the primer for any field. Except maybe “Bravery”. Yeah. Maybe I’d like to write a book on Bravery.
Here’s my Bravery primer: If you really have something to write, then I wouldn’t be able to stop you no matter how hard I tried.
