Back to School, Jiggity Jig

Thanks to bookending weekends plus one 'budget' day, Thanksgiving break stretched to a record-breaking 10 days around these parts. It was with a huge smile that I waved two little boys to the bus stop this morning.

But they have a school to go to (even if it seems it's rarely in session). A school with electricity and heat and running water and paid instructors. And art supplies and plenty of paper and a music program (downsized) and a roof over their heads.

And before I became involved in American Assistance for Cambodia (AAfC), I took all of that for granted (and even did my share of complaining). But the truth is, I should take it for granted. My kids should have a safe, positive place to learn and grow as a basic human right, as should kids everywhere.

But we all know that many, many kids do not, which is where organizations like American Assistance for Cambodia come in. AAfC funds the Rural Schools Project, which has helped build over 400 enriched primary and lower secondary schools in rural Cambodia since 1999. It's helped these kids:

And these:

Because they deserve to have a place for learning just for them. They deserve to reserve a number of hours each day for instruction, expression, and growth.

And don't Cambodian mothers deserve the satisfaction of waving to their children as they depart for school each morning, too? Let's think of the mothers!

But in all seriousness, this is where a fund raising effort called Passports with Purpose comes in. If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook, or follow my travel site, Pitstops for Kids, you may already be familiar with what we're doing this holiday season. If not, I invite you to go find out. It's based on the belief that as travel writers, we have the responsibility to try to make the world we write about a better place. Because travel in and of itself is a luxury. And yeah, we're asking for donations (it's how money is raised, after all), but there's a fun twist. For every $10 you donate, you'll have the opportunity to bid on some really awesome prizes procured by travel writers around the world and maybe get some Christmas shopping done. For instance, Pitstops for Kids has donated a Prism portable travel TV!

So go check it out. I guarantee that while you're reading more about AAfC, you'll feel extra-thankful that your kids are in school...a safe, warm, well-constructed school.

For more Wordful Wednesday posts, visit Seven Clown Circus.

Road Rash

This Thanksgiving, I’m thankful…

to be back home.

I should have known we were doomed to failure before we even left. Tuesday afternoon I still had a head cold, and looked so tired and sick and pitiful, my friend and neighbor (and new pharmaceutical rep) pressed two Tylenol Cold PMs into the palm of my hand and closed my fingers around them, whispering, “Don’t leave tomorrow without at least one good night’s sleep.”

She was right.

Sadly, the residual benefits didn’t last long. Our three-day trip (which ended up being a whirlwind two days) was a string of disasters with a few gems in-between. No one’s fault. Sometimes it just ends up that way, traveling with kids. Through mountains. In November. In an imperfect world. But with a perfect spouse. (I’ll get to that.)

On the plus side, we had a lovely stay in a luxury hotel, caught up with friends (one of whom decided it‘d be fun to take me to an exercise class that would have had Jillian Michaels begging for mercy…and she was right…it was fun), and Charlie’s family hosted a delicious dinner. There’s something truly satisfying and joyful and simply soulful about filling a hall with thirty-plus relatives who are all talking and cooking and laughing and playing and beating each other at ping-pong and pool, while kids run underfoot and spill sparkling cider and sneak olives off the table.

But we had to leave early, and to explain why, I have to backtrack to the day before: we hadn't reached our first bathroom break on the drive down when Charlie’s work texted him with the message that he needed to be present and accounted for early Friday morning. Which meant driving five+ hours on Wednesday then jumping back in the car to do it all over again right after eating dinner the next day. Doable, but not ideal.

But we hadn’t had long to mull this over, because before we’d reached our second bathroom break, we had something to distract us. Calvin had a rash. It had started out looking like a pimple on his cheek before we left, but by the time we’d pulled into Reno Nevada, it looked more like he’d engaged a swarm of angry wasps and lost. Seriously.

We tried to ignore it. In our defense, this kid is prone to breaking out, whether it be hives or allergic reactions or what have you; we’re used to shrugging at these mysterious afflictions. So we applied hydrocortisone cream and hoped for the best.

It got worse.

He tossed and turned that night, it itched so terribly. The cream wasn’t working. Neither was Aloe Vera gel. We debated running out to buy a pair of those tiny mittens they put on newborns to prevent them from scratching their little faces, and if Babies R Us had been open at 2 am, we might have.

So no one slept.

By the time we’d joined all these thirty-plus relatives, his face was a swollen, angry red and the rash had spread to his neck, his arms, and his legs. And it still itched. Even more terribly. And so he scratched it more, despite our begging him not to, making it redder and angrier.

On a shallow note (because I am shallow, ultimately), I can’t tell you how enjoyable it was to greet people we haven’t seen in years with a kid in tow who looks like an extra from Outbreak. We got a lot of “Hi! How are you all--OH! My!” reactions.

Followed by a swift step backward.

No, actually everyone was very nice about it, as family has to be. And Calvin really enjoyed everyone staring at his face, asking him to turn left, then right, then tilt his head into the light as they made their best guesses as to what the hell was wrong with him. (That’s sarcasm, people.) But it was as good a parlor game as any. Likewise, I’m sure the older kids (and some adults) thoroughly appreciated the trips down memory lane as older relatives remembered past afflictions and illnesses. “Remember when Danny* had that thing on his face? What was that? Didn’t that last all through 8th grade, Danny?”

Meanwhile, Danny is trying to disappear into the couch cushions while giving his grandmother a searing look.

But wait, it gets better (or worse). We ate dinner and said our goodbyes, putting the kids into pajamas and tearing them away from their cousins and second-cousins (or whatever the kids of our cousins are to them).

We pulled out at about 7 pm with our five hour drive ahead of us. With no sleep the night before, remember. And Cal itching. And myself coughing. And Charlie stoically driving.

But the kids fell asleep in the car hard and fast, sleeping bags tucked around their seat belts, the glow of the dashboard casting the only light. And we love driving at night. Talking, listening to music, ghosting through the darkness.

It began to rain. And we continued down the remote highways, passing through familiar mountains, pine trees lining the road, small towns all quiet and sleeping off turkey dinners. And Charlie slowed down, saying, “If we’re going to see deer, it’s going to be now.”

But we didn’t. And then we finally merged onto I-5 with its better lighting and larger towns, and Charlie sped back up.

And we hit a deer.

As with all deer, it was not there, and then it was there, directly in front of us. And we collided with it dead on, without time to even think of braking.

And it’s like hitting a boulder. If you’ve hit a deer, you know what I mean. The whole car shook with the heavy BAM of impact, and then it was still shaking…as our entire fender dragged along the road.

And so we stopped and assessed the damage. The deer? Definitely dead. The car? Not dead, but not looking good, either. And we had 50 more miles to go.

And then we get to the part where we regretted not having a better tool kit in the car. Flashlight? Where was that thing? Screwdriver to remove the last of the fender? Nah, but we did find Nate’s souvenir pocket knife we’d bought at the Grand Canyon for $1.99. It totally saved the day.

We got the scrap metal removed from the car, but one sharp shard was still digging into the front right tire on each rotation of the wheel. Not great news, considering that we didn’t have a spare in the car. I know. We’re cheap. And always strapped for cash. And just plain wrong, and we’ll remedy that. Probably around the same time we get a new tool kit.

So we needed to find a store that was open (at 11 pm on Thanksgiving night in a small town), so we could get some wire to tie up the shard we couldn’t remove with the $1.99 pocket knife or our bare hands. (This development may have caused my mind to wander briefly to a certain immortal who could simply pop dents with his bare hands, but I didn’t think articulating this thought would have been considered helpful. It may have even been considered hostile.)

We finally found a Chevron gas station open. Did I mention it is now 11 pm on Thanksgiving night? Yes? And still raining? Hard? And that now the children are stirring in their upright sleeping bag beds? And Toby is plaintively crying because why is the dome light on and where is he? And Calvin has commenced itching?

But this is where Charlie totally rose to the occasion. Because had he not been there (as he fairly often is not while I travel with the kids, so it bore consideration), I would have held my breath, put the car in Drive, and prayed the tire made it the final 50 miles. And it probably would not have. But Charlie used what he had at his disposal at the gas station, which, it turns out, was only duct tape. He taped the front bumper together, in the pouring rain, while I shushed the kids and kept my hands warm in the front seat. He then drove the rest of the way home never once griping about the unexpected deductible we now had to face or the fact that he’d spend the first few hours of his work day the next morning taking care of insurance and dealing with body shops and car rental companies. He’s not one to cry over spilled milk, and that’s a very nice quality to have in a spouse. It comes in especially handy on the side of the road in the rain and the dark with a shredded fender and a sick son.

And so we made it home, and laid the kids--sleeping again--in their beds, and the next morning, they awoke and looked at the car in surprise and said, “What happened?!”

It’s good to be a kid.

(But not good to be Calvin. We finally got him into the pediatrician late yesterday: it’s poison oak. Where he found it, especially at this time of year, I have no idea. His face still looks like it sports a rosy-red map of Asia, but we’ve been assured that it will be cleared up by the time he returns to school on Tuesday.)


*Names have been changed to protect the innocent.

If All the World Were Made of Sugar...

and very, very tiny...

I think I'd like to live here, in this Bravarian village:

Because I'm a sucker for things in miniature. Mini-doughnuts, mini-golf, mini-muffins, miniature cities at Legoland, miniature battles set up in museums, mini-cameras I can hold in the palm of my hand. Bring it. I don't know why this is, but it's been a lifelong affair. When I was about 12, I went to a dollhouse show (random, yes?) and became enamored with all the tiny little teapots set on the tiny little tables in the tiny little kitchens of the tiny little people. And the tiny little curtains in the tiny little windows and the tiny little quilts on the tiny little beds. You get the picture. Tiny. Of course, I have the patience of a kid on Christmas Eve combined with the grace of Harry Potter's Grawp, so building my own dollhouse full of tiny food and tiny furniture didn't quite work out.

Ahem. Anyway. This is all to explain why I have a soft spot for our annual Gingerbread Jubilee. Everything you see is made of 100% edible items. And most of them are made by (patient) children. Just one rule: no touching. Also, no sniffing so closely that you accidentally touch. You know, with your nose. We forgot that one a couple times.

Some of you gourmet fruit gurus may recognize the Harry and David truck lurking behind Toby.

Yes, we live in Harry and David country.

Penguins. Always a crowd pleaser. The igloo? Frosted Mini-Wheats.

Santa's Village. Note the powered sugar rooftops. I didn't capture this in the photo, but the reindeer to the far left is holding a sign that reads, "Marry me." Why? We don't know. There's a backstory there, but we're not privy to it.

Sledding. Into an ice cream cone tree.

Exterior view of a country schoolhouse. Note the tiny little garlands.

Ariel view of the interior. Farm animals seem to be seated at the desks.

Another entry with exposition left wanting.

The Up house! It was much more impressive in person.

Snowmen roasting marshmallows. The roof is lined with Twizzlers.

As Liz Lemon would say, "I want to go to there."

Have a good Thanksgiving! Be sure to check out other photo entries at Wordful Wednesday hosted by Seven Clown Circus!

Pen to Paper

I’m staring longingly at my newly created Christmas card. That’s right…completed before Thanksgiving. BooYAH. But I’m not out of the woods yet, because I’m staring at it in jpeg format on my laptop, which, incidentally, is the only format it’s in, thus far. And I’m staring at it longingly because I’m asking myself the question I’ve asked every Christmas season since about 2004:

Would it be very, very wrong to email my Christmas cards out this year?

With just one, tiny, painless Send?

Have we delved far enough into the digital age that this practice would now be acceptable? Would it be just terrible of me to save in printing, paper, envelopes, and postage costs and save you a trip to the mailbox? Would it really? Still?

Sigh. Alright then. But just for the record, I really, really want to.

Again.

You should know: I’m not anti-paper (despite the fact that it’s no secret I want a Kindle for Christmas). No, really, I’ve made sure everyone in my life knows this. But I’m not pro-technology at the expense of the lost art of letter writing. While I’m not exactly your traditional romantic, I do have a love affair with the written word, and no where does it look better--no where does it flow with a more poetic grace--than from pen to parchment. Or at very least, from Kodak to your doorstep.

In a drawer in my bedroom, fifteen volumes of journals still reside in uneven stacks--testimony of years 8-28 of my life (after that, my confessions switched to .doc form). There are entries written on school buses (you can tell from the lurch of the words across the ruled lines). There are entries marred by tears. (Hey, clichés exist for a reason.) There are love letters. There are starts to dozens of different stories of who I was, who I wanted to be, who I was afraid to be…at 12, at 19, at 22, at 26. Births are recorded. Mothers Days and birthdays and best days and really, really bad days are preserved for as long as the ink will last. Reading through them is akin to reading a color-coded line graph of my life…all spikes and dips spanning a range of moods.

Next to these journals are years’ worth of cards and letters. Letters from me to my husband, before he was my husband. Before we were out of high school, even. (Yeah, we were one of those.) Letters from him to me. Notes worn at the folds. Photos slipped from envelopes. Preschool drawings from my children. Little handprints, flaking purple tempera paint all over everything else.

And yeah, they’re all shoved into the back drawer at the back of my life, and all the emails that have made me laugh or made me cry or made me spit out coffee doing both at once are stored deep in the archives of gmail, buried too, but on rainy days, when I take the time to dig them out and remember, that act of uncovering--of slowly sorting and opening and unfolding and inhaling the sharp permeation of twenty-year-old paper--is a holy thing.

So I get it, I really do. I, too, like to hold a thick envelope in my hand and feel the weight of it. I like sliding it open to find a photograph of people I love, or people I miss, or people I’ve lost track of and wish I hadn’t. I like knowing that by virtue of receiving said envelope, its sender has made a statement: you are worth the price of a postage stamp.

It’s a small thing, but it matters. I’m sure everyone on your holiday card list feels this way already, and dammit, I don’t want anyone who receives mine to be any different.

So as much as it pains me to say it, I’m off to buy some stamps.

Almost One Year Ago Today: Pink is for Panthers

If you think you've read this before, no, you're not crazy...this is my post from November 19, 2008, reposted today for a fun little project called Flashback Friday hosted by Who Put Me in Charge of These People?. It falls on a day I'm way too busy to be bothered with an original post, so hey, I'm in. All in. Interesting side note: not much has changed in one year. Toby's talking my ear off about ninjas battling bugs at this precise moment.

Toby is playing the Wii.

To tell the truth, if he had his way, Toby would always be playing the Wii. To be completely honest, there are days when if I had my way, Toby would always be playing the Wii as well.

Because it’s so quiet right now.

When Toby is not playing the Wii, he’s talking. And when I say talking, I’m not referring to casual chatting. I mean intense, nonstop, never-taking-a-breath type of talking. About everything. And anything. Like the Smurfs, which the kids discovered lately on some sort of retro cartoon channel, and which one he is and which one I am and how he doesn’t like the cat and what is the cat’s name and why does the cat live with that bad guy and did I know that our cat is a boy but he’s not gray like that cat and now he’s going to be a baby Smurf and I am the Papa Smurf but that’s silly because I can’t be the Papa Smurf because I am a girl.

And to think this was the child for whom we forked over at least $1000 for speech therapy, worried he was never going to start talking. Ah, irony. You’re a barrel of laughs.

I’m not terribly surprised Toby is so caught up on the sex of the cat, Papa Smurf, or me, for that matter. Gender identity and how it should be defined is very big in this house these days. I’ve been in turns intrigued and horrified by the varying opinions presented on the subject, and my eyes have grown wide with incredulous dismay more than once at the blatant misinformation parlayed back and forth between 4th and 2nd grade boys. For instance, were you aware that girls can’t kick a ball? And can only giggle? Or that boys can’t sing?

In their goofier moments, Nate and Calvin imitate girls, with Toby taking in every word, of course. Almost always, their interpretation involves an imaginary phone conversation in which they discuss hair, nails, and boys in frightening cliched teen-speak. It goes something like this:

“Hello, girlfriend! Did you see my boyfriend today?”

“Oh my gosh, girl, he is so hawt.”

At this point, they place a hand exaggeratedly on one hip and bat their eyelids. (I notice they giggle a lot.)

Where are they getting this? Surely I am still the most influential female in their lives, and I haven’t batted my eyelids since, well…ever? Being the good feminist I am, I have always made a point of dispelling gender stereotypes, starting from their earliest days. “Say hi to the police woman,” I’ll suggest. Or: “That’s not a garbageman. That’s a garbage collector.” It's a tiresome practice, sure, but a necessary one, I've always maintained, in the process of raising boys. To drive home my point, I rarely wear make-up, ensure that I burn at least most dinners, and challenge them in footraces at every opportunity. If nothing else, I can say with fair certainty that I don’t make it a habit to chat on the phone about hawt boys. I mean, not within earshot, anyway.

In a somewhat surprising sidenote to this newfound awareness of gender, however, Calvin has decided he loves pink. I can’t yet determine if the color genuinely appeals to him, or if he’s trying to prove a point. (What that point might be, however, remains fuzzy.) For his own part, Toby is baffled by this development. “Pink is for girls,” he tells Calvin firmly. He may only be three, but this he knows. “Or panthers,” he adds as an afterthought. (Retro cartoon network, remember?)

Despite this sibling disapproval, I recently find myself buying more pink at Calvin’s insistence, including a pink shirt and pink pajamas which he actually pulls off quite well (must be a combination of macho strutting and his olive complexion). Calvin manages to get away with things like this. He’s a trendsetter. He falls into the category of people who can wear hats and come off looking adorable instead of dorky.

In contrast, it’s recently been proven that Nate shouldn’t be caught dead in pink. At least not full-body pink lycra. Let me explain. Last week we’re in our local ski shop, trying to find him a downhill race suit for the upcoming race season. (For those of you not indulging in the craziness that is downhill skiing, a race suit looks disturbingly similar to a wetsuit.) The only suit they have in his size is bright pink, and, needing to know if this particular style fits him, I don’t hesitate to pull it off the rack, thrust it into his arms, and point him in the direction of the fitting room.

He physically blanches. Have I mentioned that my oldest is growing up?

After promising him that I only need him to try it on for sizing purposes, and that I’ll then order it for him in a very manly shade of blue, he complies.

When I call to him from the other side of the fitting room door a few minutes later, however, he informs me in no uncertain terms that he will not be coming out. I finally convince him to open the door for me; I hear him dart across the approximate eight feet of floor space to slide the latch over, then retreat instantly to the corner of the tiny room, where I find him cowering, gangly knees drawn protectively to his chest, as though this position can actually hide the fact that he’s wearing skin-tight, florescent pink from head to foot. One glance is all I need to determine the suit is at least one size too small for him. He looks at me desperately. “I can’t get it off.”

Pitiful, pink boy.

I coax him up, and once he's standing on the built-in bench, we peel it from his tall frame together in the soft-lighted privacy of the fitting room. In one of those increasingly frequent moments when we catch each other’s eye and seem to be, just for an instant, on the same level, he smiles at me self-depreciatively. “This stays between you and me, Mom.”

“Sure honey. You and me…and the whole internet. Deal?”

To my amazement, it’s a deal...on the condition that none of the girls in his class find out. The kid must be pretty confident in his manhood, after all.

And the Mom of the Year Award Goes to...

Probably not my friend Laura. At least not on this particular day.

But all the same: is this not the best photo you've seen in a long, long time?

Now, you should know two things. Firstly, this photo has been used with her permission (although you'll  notice I'm not using last names). Secondly, I can vouch for the fact that Laura is an excellent mother and an all round rocking person. (Laura's darling daughter is currently undecided.)

But this could happen to anyone.

No really, it could. Anyone. In fact, I'd be willing to bet it's happened to you. I know it's happened to me. I can distinctly remember trying to coax my 18-month-old into a public swimming pool for swim lessons so that we could do the Mommy and Me Tug Boat Class together while he screamed in protest. My 18-month-old. And my only defense was that at the time, I was sure he'd love it, if only he'd allow me to submerge him baptismal style and learn to blow bubbles like a fishy.

And that sounds insane, and I know it does. But you know exactly what I'm talking about, don't you? Because we have this awesome responsibility as parents, and it makes us go a little batty. For the first handful of years of our children's lives, we are, essentially, their window to the world. (Even when, arguably, we should more often be the gatekeepers.) Every single day, we shoulder the task of introducing them to the culture, religion, and refinement that we hold in our esteem. And so if they're going to experience something, like say, the joy of Bert and Ernie, it's up to us to provide it.

So kids? You're welcome. 

This post was inspired by Wordful Wednesday at Seven Clown Circus.