Get Off The Ground

Thursday, November 26, 2020

A Grateful Tree

I want to be a grateful tree

with branches high

that reach skyward

like all arms wide to

welcome the sun and moon

and heavens above

I want to be a grateful tree

with roots so deep

that reach downward

like arterial thrive

to feed its heart and soul

and heavens below

I want to be a grateful tree

a home to all

that fly and crawl

and scurry and pounce

in a welcome safe-haven

where no one is without

I want to be a grateful tree

unending love

for all who pass

to stop and smile

and then after awhile

embrace their grace within

--Kevin Grossman, #BhivePower

Sunday, November 22, 2020

It's This Moment That Matters

"Static on your frequency
Electrical storm in your veins
Raging at unreachable glory
Straining at invisible chains..."

–Rush, The Pass

The wheels came off my senior year in high school. Riddled with anxiety and daily panic attacks, I began to skip classes. My grades suffered. What had usually been somewhat effortless for me since I could remember, completing all my work and getting mostly straight A's with math and English being my best subjects, it all became a Sisyphean task for me. Something I had always done easily felt fruitless, pointless, even painful.

This continued into my first two years of college. And then one year at a time after that, I began ease off pushing that horrid boulder up the hill, until I finally arrived at one day on the beach.

When I think about all those years, I try to imagine any of them, especially the end of high school, being stuck in the middle of a global pandemic. If that would've happened back then, what would've then happened back then? Would we have gone to distance learning? Would that have helped ease my panic attack, being put into much fewer social situations? Not having to go to class in person? Although the reality is the technology didn't exist back then like it does today to go to all virtual classes. There probably still would've been back and forth to school to pick up school work, and that would've been too stressful for me.

Ugh. None of that matters though, because that's not what happened. Not even close. Today we are most certainly in a world in the middle of a global pandemic, and like millions of other parents, we're helping our two daughters traverse distance learning and limited social situations with friends and the pods we hang with.

But unlike me growing up, our oldest Beatrice struggles with math and reading (except when it comes to saving, giving and spending her allowance). My wife Amy works with her a lot, and so do I in between work, reading with her and helping where I can. Our youngest Bryce does not struggle with any subjects, but we help her as needed as well. However, for both, it's been quite the transition going to distance learning last spring and staying in it all of this fall. They're pretty resilient, though, and we're so grateful for that. We just want them to study, to learn and to do the best they can. To try, no matter how much Bea despises math (and she's quite vocal about that). They may even get the opportunity to go back to school two days per week in the spring, if and only if COVID-19 doesn't surge again in our county (which it has of late, and everywhere for that matter).

Unfortunately there are too many students falling behind everywhere, struggling with distance learning, with some students not even attending online school. It's been difficult for all involved -- students, parents, teachers, administrators -- everyone. We all just want things to go back to the way they were, but until we're mostly vaccinated and infection rates go down with the virus under control, there will be more distance learning and hybrid school models, and more students falling behind.

It sucks. Plus, we just had another Friday the 13th in November. Now, 13 is my lucky number, and yet, Friday the 13th is always associated with bad luck. At dinner one night the week of November 13, Bryce became quite animated and told us that because the last day of in-person school was Friday the 13th in March, when we wake up on Friday the 13th in November we should say "Jumanji" and everything would go back to pre-covid normal.

That didn't happen (even I hoped it would), and it will never happen, but the girls' fall semester grades did happen. For Bryce's grade school, there are no letter grades, but she had high marks overall. For Beatrice, we couldn't be prouder, because she got straight A's. It may not always look like this, but that doesn't matter. It's this moment that matters. And the next one. And the next.

Other "Days of Coronavirus" posts:

The Bank of Mom and Dad

Something to Celebrate

Sunday, November 15, 2020

The Bank of Mom and Dad

We have way too many devices. Big devices. Small devices. Medium-sized devices. Laptops, iPads, iPhones and old iPhones that are now iPods for our daughters. Most are still in pretty good shape, even if they're a few years old, and only one is a PC. Thank goodness for that (a vendor gift from a conference a few years ago). We prefer the Apples.

Of course we're grateful that we can have all these devices, even with the double-edged sword of managing device time with our daughters. However, as operating systems, applications and games evolve, older devices begin to show their age. They're just not supported anymore, and our girls can't play the games they love anymore. It's a racket, a scam, and it drives us a little bonkers. Damn those Apples.

I'm the gadget guy in our house, and yes, I upgrade my phone every other year, and upgrade my work computer every other year as well. My wife Amy doesn't care about the new gadgets like I do and still uses my old MacBook Pro that's at least five years old (it has had one major repair to date), and uses an iPhone 7.

But Beatrice, our oldest, has been asking for a new iPad for months now. We told her we weren't buying her a new one and she'd have to keep using the older one she has (one of our older ones). She kept asking, and we kept saying no.

And then we started talking to her about buying one with her own money. She did save over $100 of the "spend" part of her weekly allowance for a Nintendo Switch that we ended up buying from a friend. So, she began to consider saving her money again and buying a new iPad.

But that would take her quite a while to save for even the cheapest newish iPad available today. Instead, we offered her a line of credit from the Mom and Dad bank. She was intrigued. We told her that, with no money down, if she paid us at least $5 per week from her allowance for 72 weeks ($20 per month for 18 months), then we would buy her the iPad. All of this contingent on her doing her weekly chores she does for her weekly allowance, which she always does.

She said she wanted to think about it. We said that's great. Buying something on credit you may or may not want to afford, or shouldn't afford, or can't afford, is a new lesson for our daughters to learn. Beatrice thought about it, asked questions, thought about it some more, asked more questions, and then finally decided she wanted to do it.

I said she'd need to sign an agreement to make it official. Mom didn't think it was necessary, but let me do it anyway. I just wanted her to understand that this is something she'll have to do later in life and that when you agree to credit, you'll have to pay up or negative consequences will come. I didn't go into any detail on that yet, because she is only 12.

It's enough of a lesson for Beatrice to understand that you can buy things on credit (hopefully within reason) even if you don't have the money saved to do so. Every week Bea and her sister Bryce work for their allowance and then put money into three buckets: spend, save and give. This means money to spend, money to save and money to give to others, charities, etc.

Bea loves her new iPad. We did cover the extended warranty and buy her a cover, but she's already paid two installments on her shiny gold device.

When I had her sign her credit agreement, she said, "Really?" And I said, "Yes." She signed it.

She's in good hands, though. The Bank of Mom and Dad is a compassionate and forgiving creditor.

Other "Days of Coronavirus" posts:

Something to Celebrate

Sunday, November 8, 2020

Something To Celebrate

Beatrice keeps using the word in the wrong way. In her defense, she does think she's kidding, so I get that. I'll ask her to clean up her clothes or a mess she's made, and she'll say, "Dad, stop bullying me."

We know she understands the difference; she's had enough Kidpower in her life to never get that one wrong. That's the organization my wife Amy works for that helps kids, teens and adults build healthy relationships and protect people from bullying, child abuse, kidnapping, prejudice, dating/domestic violence, and sexual assault.

But when Bea uses the word "bullying" in that context, I get uneasy. The fact is, bullying, harassment, intimate partner violence (domestic violence) and sexual assault are all to alive and well in 2020. Thankfully both her and her younger sister Bryce have the safety skills to protect themselves from all of the above, and we'll continue to reinforce them.

Because all of the above continues:

Lots of work to do here. Plus, divisive anger, fear, hate and general toxicity have thrived this year, just more of the same from the past decade, except now we're in a global pandemic and another election year. It's never been harder for so many of us to find common ground.

So, I'll try find some common ground here for those of us with children. Daughters in particular since that's Amy's and my world today. We all want our daughters to be safe. I don't think anyone would disagree with that.

Check.

We all want our daughters to be empowered with safety skills and to always be aware, calm and confident.

Check.

We don't want our daughters to be in toxic relationships of any kind, or support toxicity of any kind from others, whether those be friends, boyfriends, girlfriends, other adults, future bosses, future leaders, etc., and to not be a bystander as well -- to call it out when they see it.

Check.

And if they are in toxic relationships, for whatever reasons, we support them and help them to get out, not just tell them to deal with it.

Check.

We want them to have healthy, loving relationships, and healthy boundaries, and have empathy for others regardless of physical appearance, race/ethnicity, gender, disability, religion, political ideology or sexual orientation.

Check. (Although that's always a hard one for some of us.)

Because we want to be proud of our children no matter what they end up doing with their lives, and for them to lift others up instead of tearing them down. Today we can imagine that one day our daughters could be an astronaut, or an author, or an artist, or an actor, based on what they've told us to date. To have the freedom and support to make their own way regardless of where it leads, and to be safe along the way.

My God, one of them could someday be the vice president, or even the president. Can you imagine that? How amazing would that be?

Definitely something to celebrate!

Other "Days of Coronavirus" posts: