A Summer of B-hive Thrive

We didn’t realize our youngest struggled, too. The sounding out phonetically. The reading from left to right consistently. The transposing of letters in same-sounding words. The writing of numbers and letters backward so that if you placed them in front of a mirror, they’d read correctly.

We didn’t realize she struggled. But not exactly for the same reasons as her older sister. At least, not that we know of. With Beatrice, it was most likely the auditory processing disorder from early on that continues to cause some delays with her reading comprehension (although academically overall she’s doing pretty well). Bea’s spelling is solid, too. Just the reading skills and comprehension lag.

The Mama (what I lovingly call my wife) had noticed something was up with Bryce, since she does most of the daily reading with both the girls outside of school, although I had noticed the writing of letters and numbers backward as well. But it wasn’t until her kindergarten/1st grade teacher pointed out Bryce was behind with her reading skills based on the new state standards. That’s when we realized at least some kind of delay was in play. Possibly. We don’t know what we don’t know yet.

What’s interesting to me is that with Bea, the ability for her to filter what she heard early on was like a radio trying to tune into a station; she never really got there so translating what she heard and the appropriate comprehension and reaction was more difficult that other kids. She’s come a long way, that’s for sure.

Bryce never exhibited that behavior. Socially and even early on academically she's been doing fine. However, her speech was difficult to understand, almost muddied, with “r’s” and “l’s” soft and muted. It’s improved since preschool and now kindergarten, but her teachers had never noticed anything significant to highlight. Now, with the awareness of this possible reading delay, it’s time for us to get in front of it.

Again, we don’t know what we don’t know yet. The word dyslexia has never come up in any teacher meeting with either girl, or occupational or speech therapy session with Beatrice. It’s possible now that there’s a learning disorder present, one characterized by difficulty reading due to problems identifying speech sounds and learning how they relate to letters and words.

Possibly. When your child struggles with anything, you run yourself through the wringer thinking about why, and if it was something you did, or didn’t do. Did you let them watch too much TV? Let them play games too much on their iPads? Didn't work with them enough on their homework and all their basic academic skills? Why are some kids the same age reading Harry Potter and yours are reading Captain Underpants? Do you give them enough attention in between all the work and life stuff you’re doing as adults? (And yet, they're constantly inventing things, writing stories and illustrating them -- and right now they're in the backyard creating a sushi machine. Right on.)

Or do you blame their schools and their teachers? That they aren’t doing enough for your children? That the latest curriculum is just friggin' crazy?

Of course there’s been a little second-guessing with us and what we’re doing and how we’re parenting. We’re human. For any parent who's ever struggled with parenthood and working and volunteering and investing in other endeavors alongside raising your children, and feeling guilty about not spending enough with them, I recommend listening to a recent Startup podcast from Gimlet Media. Being straight with your kids, nurturing their voice and giving them the tools to thrive are key.

On the other hand, we could sit around a Kumbaya campfire and sing the praises, or the lack thereof, of public versus charter versus private versus common core versus current standards versus Godzilla.

Instead, we will continue to do whatever we can to help them breakthrough and build their confidence to tackle anything. To bridge the gaps and instill adaptation skills in both girls, working within the confines and the opportunities of a public school system we still believe in. Ultimately there may be walls they hit in school and in life no matter the intervention we provide and/or facilitate.

None of that matters in the moment, though. We're in it for the all of them and are planning a summer of B-hive thrive, to read with them more frequently (me included), and to help sound out the words and improve comprehension of what they just read.

Wait, a sushi machine?

The only idea I have is in what I know

Emotional paralysis doesn't have to mean helplessness, but it's paralysis nonetheless, however fleeting, thankfully mine no longer tainted with any guilt or resentment of old. Even in the moment of hesitation, the decision has already been made; the heart and mind united along the beachhead shoring up any breaches: the money to get there and back, the lost work time, the being away from my girls and the Mama.

"I have to go," I said.

"I know," she said. "We love you and we love them."

"I know," I said. "I love you."

But admittedly, there is helplessness in the helping, an oppressive feeling as if buried up to your neck in sand with the tide coming in. I arrived Wednesday night in Oregon to be with my tired, sick parents. Dad finishing his fifth week of radiation treatment for stage 3 melanoma, and Mom always struggling with a lifetime of auto-immune disorder as well as myriad of interrelated illnesses.


I watch them hold one another and I see the Titanic movie scene where the old couple lays together inside the sinking Titanic, about to go down with the ship. (This was actually based on the real characters Ida and Isador Strauss, who was the co-owner of Macy's department store. Both were offered a place on the lifeboat but Isador refused to go as long as there were still women aboard. His faithful wife refused to leave his side. The couple wasn't actually in bed when the ship went down, but rather on a pair of deck chairs.)

Whatever the story, the metaphor isn't lost on me and I again imagine us as them now; they will go down with their ship together just as the Mama and me have pledged to do, with nothing less than honor and timeless love.

I do know my being here for any length of time does help them emotionally if not physically (running errands and helping around the house). Taking my dad to his last three radiation treatments wasn't a lot, but I'm glad I was here to do it. He's amazingly stalwart and has been so each time he's faced medical adversity. Mom has the ability to draw strength from which there should be no more and does whatever she has to do, just as Dad does for her when he's well and she's not.

They thank God for watching over them and giving them strength and guidance. So do I.

I have no idea the pain they each experience -- no idea what it's like to be strapped to a table and have the sun's power channeled straight into my neck every day for weeks, no idea what it's like to be in constant pain as my body deteriorates more every day.

The only idea I have is in what I know, that I love them regardless and am glad I'm here, heart and mind united.

All done for now, Mom and Pop. All done for now.

We hold fast our whole lives

It was then I imagined us as them now. My voice broke, tears streamed.

Mom could barely speak. Dad more scared than he's ever been in his life. Both have battled back from diseases and surgeries before. Both of them always holding each other close and praying.

This time it's different. This time the choices of doing nothing with the melanoma-filled lymph nodes in his neck or removing them to be followed up with radiation treatments are like when my grandfather used to hold up his fists in a boxer stance and say:

"Six months in the hospital or sudden death?"

But now it's no joke. It's different and more real than it's ever been for them and for all of us.

Because it was then I knew as I've always known, that moment on the phone with my parents a little earlier today, why I love my wife as much as I do, and why we've always wanted to spend my entire life together.

And why we love our children so. Regardless of anything that's come to pass or has yet to.

From the ring my wife surprising me with on our wedding day all those years ago, the 15th-century French phrase "A Ma Vie De Coer Entier" etched along the surface.

You have my whole heart for my whole life.

To sharing the stomach bug with the B-hive this week, me a world away on a business trip unable to help the Mama.

The world is connected with tenuous tethers that snap with the slightest change in pressure, but for those of us who have the other, we hold fast our whole lives.

Every moment tomorrow will be a prayer for my mom and dad and the timeless love they share.

The night before the rest of my life

There's always a night before the moment that changes your life.

It was a Friday night, October 10, 1997. I don't remember exactly what I was doing, but I'm sure I was just hanging out in my apartment alone watching a little TV, maybe writing a little as well. My life was only then at the beginning of a major transition that I had barely begun to understand.

Maybe that's why the late summer swell of El Niño had warmed the waters of the Pacific, to draw me to the sea below the lighthouse, to be there on that very day at that very moment...

But it was only the night before and I do remember there was an offshore flow warming the air outside on the balcony. One of the most beautiful times of the year in Santa Cruz is the month of October, at least during the years I've lived here, and especially the first one.

I had noticed her for weeks on the beach. Always alone, as was I. She was usually reading, always wearing a baseball cap, and always looking, well, quite lovely in whatever bathing suit she wore on any particular day.

But it was only the night before and I wasn't thinking of her. I was thinking of the wreck my life had become, how I had rammed myself against the rocky shore and then crawled onto the beach fearful, yet smiling.

Then it was the next day, October 11, 1997, on the beach, when we finally met.

I usually get the words wrong, but our lover lore recounts the fact that the Mama walked up to me and asked:

"So, do you always come here alone?"

And like a fool, I almost didn't answer her; I wanted to be alone actually.

But then, "Yes, I do. And you?"

Six years later we were married, on the same date. Five years after that we started a family.

On the night before the rest of my life, I never imagined how happy I'd B.

Happy Anniversary, Mama. I love you.

From tiny Toddlerville to the big Childhood City

"Daddy, I'm running so fast!"

Zoom.

No, you're growing so fast, Bea. Too fast. But isn't that the way it always is?

Zoom.

Our elder B started preschool this last week, and although she's been more social and seemingly excited for it to start, we just weren't sure how she's respond to more kids, more adults that weren't us, and more structure, at least as much as circle time and potty time create.

We just never know until we get there, but we don't really want to hurry up to get there. At least we don't. You may think your kid is the "bestest" kid of all, but when they run across that great suspension bridge from tiny Toddlerville to the big Childhood City, that space within the span catches in your throat like the first brisk winds of fall (yes, we do get those in Santa Cruz, sometimes).

The most wonderful time of the year!

Not because of school like in the Staples commercial, but because it's time of reflecting change, of reviewing the year falling away, and because now we go from Bryce's birthday, to Bea's birthday next week, to my birthday in October (don't forget now, you hear?), to our anniversary a week later (love you, Mama!), to Thanksgiving (thank you), to Christmas, to New Year's!

The most wonderful time of the year!

Back to school -- Beatrice really had a great time. Mama will be volunteering once a week in the class, so day one wasn't Mama-less, but day two was (it's only two times per week for starters), and Bea rocked the house.

And she made an apple. Right on.

"Beatrice, what's your favorite part of school?"

"Playing!"

As it should be. And what was funny and quite telling is that when Mama picked up Bea on day two, Bryce wanted to stay and play, and play, and play. Beatrice never would've done that at age one. She would've clung to Mama like a Rhesus monkey.

Oh, how the B-hive buzzes differ, but how we love the sounds of same.

The most wonderful time of the year!

 

Learning to parent the perfect game

If everything came with a warning, would we lose our playful edge?

Don't tell that to Bryce. She'd nod aggressively and take off toddling right in the brambles of mystery and intrigue. She's all over the place, squawking and talking and climbing and falling.

All. Over. The. Place. Toddle, toddle, toddle, crash.

Even Bea, the elder who is usually is more tentative, has recently been feeling her independent oats, screeching off down the sidewalk in a catch-me-you-can cackle while we scream for her to stop, or wanting her gate down on her bed so she can get right up and scare the crap out of me, which will happen a lot more once she moves to the big-girl bed.

Bryce just turned one and Beatrice is about to turn three and start preschool, but unabashed exploration and play is such a huge part of their day.

I listened to a fascinating story recently from one of my favorite internet radio shows, Radiolab. The episode is titled Games and psychology professor Alison Gopnik explains the profound tension between play and rules. Somewhere between the ages of 3-6, once toddlers become children and start school, the free-wheeling liberalism of play becomes transformed into self-management by societal rules. Dr. Gopnik is also a big sports fan and says the perfect game in life is baseball, with its rules and structure disrupted by bursts of chaotic, free play.

Maybe. And maybe my girls will play the perfect game someday, but fast-forwarding is not my forte thankfully, because otherwise I'd be doing battle with two teenage girls, or attending college graduation, or walking them down the aisle, or holding my grandchildren, and God knows I'm not looking forward to that anytime soon.

Wait, who am I kidding? Of course I'm looking forward to every minute of chaotic, free play clashing with rules and warnings, living in the moment and learning to parent the perfect game.

Play ball.

We are the Six Sigma initiative to reduce global human defect.

Yesterday afternoon a car stalled in the road in front of me. A young girl waved us all ahead since she knew she was stuck; they wove around her like fire ants shaking their heads in disgust.

I pulled over and with the help of another passerby, we pushed her to the side of the rode.

"Do you have a phone?" I asked her.

"Yes."

"Do you have someone to call?"

"Yes, I'm calling my friend now. Thank you for your help."

Her smile was genuine relief and gratitude.

It could've been Beatrice. I only hope someone will be there to help her someday.

Cars are expendable. Our children are not.

Fall back to Saturday morning. As we sat watching Good Morning America's weekend edition, a story came on about text rage and the teenager with steel-toed boots with almost killed 8th grader Josie Lou Ratley.

The GMA report said teenage violence was on the decline, but I found other sources that say otherwise.

For example:

• An average of 15 young people are killed each day in the U.S., and over 80 percent of those are killed with guns.
• In 2004, 750,000 young people were treated in hospitals for violence-related injuries.
• One third of high school students reported being involved a fight at school in 2004, and 17 percent reported bringing a weapon to school in the month preceding the 2004 survey.
• 1 in 12 teens in high school are injured or threatened with a weapon each year.
• 30 percent of junior and senior high school students are involved in bullying each year as the victim, bully, or both.
• According to a report by the U.S. Secret Service, in the previous decade, the odds of a high school student being injured or threatened with a weapon were about 1 in 14, and the odds of a teen being in a physical fight were 1 in 7.

Then in the adult world on Sunday, just hours before the historic healthcare legislation passing, it was disturbing to see the democratic senators spit on and called derogatory names.

The hate was palatable.

I understand the internal heat shields slip sometimes and we can be reactively caustic when disagreeing or when wronged, but we're still responsible for how we respond and any carnage we leave.

And for the wildfires we feed.

Fear, uncertainty and misinformation are tantamount today, but we can cope and help each other through it, regardless if we agree on "it" or not. We can elevate without fueling hate, anger and violence -- and we can and should start with our babies and children -- globally and cross-culturally.

If there's a problem beyond rational responsive control, like a physical or mental disability or criminal activity, then those of us who are capable of restraint are responsible.

Yes, we are, whether it be in the forms of counseling, education, medication, incarceration, rehabilitation or institutionalization.

We are the Six Sigma initiative to reduce global human defect. Not God nor the media nor celebrities nor politicians nor captains of industry.

As parents, we can make the next generational difference. We have to.