Socialization

From the American Heritage Dictionary:
socialize
TRANSITIVE VERB:
1. To place under government or group ownership or control. 2. To make fit for companionship with others; make sociable. 3. To convert or adapt to the needs of society.
INTRANSITIVE VERB:
To take part in social activities.

One of the questions homeschoolers hear often is, "But what about socialization?" The question usually encompasses all of the definitions above except the first one (although perhaps that one ought to be examined just a titch). This lumping of definitions means that the question also encompasses a number of assumptions, such as:
(1) School makes kids fit for companionship and for society.
(2) Positive social activities happen for every child in school.
(3) Homeschooled kids are isolated to such an extent that they will not be fit for companionship and society, nor will they get to take part in social activities.

Our societal belief in the first two assumptions is pervasive and virtually unchallenged. In fact, over the last few years I've been struck again and again by how often people accept such societal beliefs without even thinking about them. No logical reasoning is applied. Someone said something to me the other day about "drinking the unschooling Kool-Aid," implying that unschoolers are brainwashed or cultish or perhaps even doomed. Personally, I've seen far more evidence that indicates that we, as a society, have been drinking the school Kool-Aid!

So, I'm here to offer a dose of antidote for the assumptions listed above. I suspect that even listing the assumptions has prompted my readers to see their flaws, but I'll enjoy pointing them out anyway.

(1) School makes kids fit for companionship and for society.

Ahem. Actually, maybe I won't tackle this one myself. Here instead are a few quotes from John Taylor Gatto's "Underground History of American Education."

"By the end of the first quarter of the nineteenth century, a form of school technology was up and running in America’s larger cities, one in which children of lower-class customers were psychologically conditioned to obedience under pretext that they were learning reading and counting (which may also have happened). These were the Lancaster schools... They soon spread to every corner of the nation where the problem of an incipient proletariat existed."

"As I watched it happen, it took about three years to break most kids, three years confined to environments of emotional neediness with nothing real to do. In such environments, songs, smiles, bright colors, cooperative games, and other tension-breakers do the work better than angry words and punishment. Years ago it struck me as more than a little odd that the Prussian government was the patron of Heinrich Pestalozzi, inventor of multicultural fun-and-games psychological elementary schooling, and of Friedrich Froebel, inventor of kindergarten. It struck me as odd that J.P. Morgan’s partner, Peabody, was instrumental in bringing Prussian schooling to the prostrate South after the Civil War. But after a while I began to see that behind the philanthropy lurked a rational economic purpose."

"In the first decades of the twentieth century, a small group of soon-to-be-famous academics, symbolically led by John Dewey and Edward Thorndike of Columbia Teachers College, Ellwood P. Cubberley of Stanford, G. Stanley Hall of Clark, and an ambitious handful of others, energized and financed by major corporate and financial allies like Morgan, Astor, Whitney, Carnegie, and Rockefeller, decided to bend government schooling to the service of business and the political state—as it had been done a century before in Prussia. Cubberley delicately voiced what was happening this way: 'The nature of the national need must determine the character of the education provided.'" (emphasis added)

In other words, American schools were, in fact, designed to socialize kids—into factory workers. The students' fitness as companions has never been a goal.

(2) Positive social activities happen for every child in school.

Oh, I hope no one actually believes this. It simply isn't true. I'll take myself as a case in point. I went to a decent suburban school where there was virtually no violence. I was a successful student. I was reasonably happy in school. I had some fun. I was mildly popular ('though that one is harder to write, because I always felt like an outcast).

I had nightmares every night the week before my 10-year high school reunion.

Imagine what school was actually doing to me if it could have that effect on me ten years later. Imagine what school does to the kids in schools that aren't essentially safe places, to kids who aren't so successful, happy, enaged, and popular.

At my 20-year reunion, one woman wouldn't leave her hotel room because she was overcome with guilt over the way she had bullied her classmates.

And then there's the idea that school is a place where kids can be with their friends. That is also not true! School does not foster social interaction; there are dozens, even hundreds, of rules that prohibit it. Classroom management and school administration is very much about controlling and stifling the natural response of kids who find themselves in the company of other kids—that is, laughing, talking, playing, socializing. (Does the phrase "Stop socializing" sound familiar to anyone? I heard it more than once when I was in school.)

Here's a good example: The Federal Way, Washington, school district is contemplating a ban on iPods and cell phones. District reasoning runs as you might expect, with reference to distractions and text-message cheating, but the ban would cover not only classtime but time between classes and during lunch. Where does their reasoning fit into that? What's really happening is a change-with-the-times expansion of the district's anti-social-interaction ruleset.

Another good example: Classes in MJ and Chloe's elementary school were rewarded for walking the hallways in straight lines with no talking.

(3) Homeschooled kids are isolated to such an extent that they will not be fit for companionship and society, nor will they get to take part in social activities.

Over the years, the media has provided us with a few stories that seemed to support this assumption. There have been some much-publicized cases of child abusers who isolated their children from society and called it homeschooling, and the news stories about these people often carry the implication that these parents' freedom to homeschool gave them the freedom to abuse. Educators line up for the chance to say so on national television. It's bullshit, pure and simple. After all, most abused children are in school. I don't mean their abuse happens there (although it can and too often does), but it happens. School or no school, child abuse happens.

Rather than being about isolating our children, homeschooling is about putting our children into the real world. Instead of being confined to a room with kids their own age, our kids have friends of all ages. Homeschooling families have access to an increasingly vast network of peers, resources, and facilities. I'm sure many homeschooled parents wish their kids were more isolated, because all the running around they do makes for a busy life!

The reality is, homeschooled kids are only as isolated as they want to be.

Our family experience provides a good example. We are a somewhat insulated family, relatively homebound (when we're not out chasing hurricanes), so you might put our routine at the "isolationist" end of the homeschooler social spectrum. Knowing what you know about us and reading the brief history that follows, you might see that it's not very isolationist at all.

In the early days of our unschooling, MJ and Chloe were still in touch with their friends from school, and we had regular get-togethers with them. Those connections dwindled as time went on, and for a couple of years, the girls were perfectly content with the social activities our lifestyle naturally provided (cousins and other relatives, neighbor kids, family friends, Kendo devotees, boat yard and marina workers, sailors, park rangers, etc.). Then last year, MJ expressed an interest in widening her social circle. Chloe didn't much care, but she's gone along for the ride.

I found Hope for Horses, MJ's home away from home, where she has become very close to the adults who run the charity. I can't count the people that involvement has brought into her life, from veterinarians to farriers to musicians to movie makers.

I reached out to the unschooling community and Frank reached out to the cruising community, and we formed friendships with families all over the area. Chloe attended Summerhill School and formed friendships with kids from all over the world. MJ attended the Not Back to School Camp and formed friendships with kids from all over the country. Then we attended the unschooling conference, where a lot of those connections came together in one place (yes, there was even another former Summerhillian there), and discovered what a community of people we have become part of.

And then there's the community we're not part of, the more traditional homeschooling community, with its clubs and co-ops and meetings and potlucks and seminars. It's there, anytime we want it.

The result of this less homogenized socialization is kids who are comfortable talking to people of all ages. Sure, homeschooled kids like hanging out with other kids—and that is definitely a generalization to which there are numerous exceptions—but they don't automatically reject a newly met adult as a potential friend.

Yesterday, at a little gathering of unschoolers that I orchestrated at a park in Monroe, kids sat chatting with us moms at least half the time (with the rest of their time spent running around the tennis court and playground with the other kids in joyful abandon). The kids ranged in age from 12 to 16; nobody's age mattered, nobody was too cool to play, nobody was too young to be included.

Why do people cling to the idea that socialization only happens in school?
I have my own theories about why people cling to this idea so vociferously. There's the self-aggrandizement or self-delusion of the educational establishment. There's the self-protection of adults who suffered in school and can't face the prospect of it having all been for nothing. There's even my conspiracy theory about our government's continuing need for an obedient proletariat. But I'm afraid the real reason is simply that many of us are too well schooled to question our beliefs.

For any who are ready to start questioning, this page provides links to studies that support the ideas in this post:
http://atypicalhomeschool.net/general-information/the-cultural-myth-of-socialization/

On writing

I used to write fiction for fun. Some of my earliest memories are of scribbling down story starts (I rarely finished them), character descriptions, plot outlines, and so on. I still have a lot of the paper I generated back then, starting with the outline of a little sci-fi soap opera I conceived when I was about 13. It's full of complex and intertwining relationships between various members of various royal families scattered across several planets. Had I ever actually written the book, I'm sure it would have been High Art.

These days, my forays into fiction writing are few and far between. I believe the last was more than a year ago, when I produced two pages of a romance novel in order to satisfy a commitment to Chloe. The writing was as fun as ever, and the output was surprisingly decent for having sprung from a command performance rather than true inspiration, but the spark faded as it too easily does these days. I'm not sure I can explain why that is. Maybe it comes from too many years of Doing What Needs To Be Done; the spark is vulnerable to excessive responsibility. That isn't a complete explanation, though. As mentioned above, I never had much follow-through when it came to my dream of writing the American novel (great or otherwise), not even when I was a good deal more footloose than I am now.

I still write, obviously, and I make a decent living doing so (something that—I must confess—gives me a certain smugness thinking back on the various people who tried to rain on my writing parade over the years). Fiction has given way to Help files, white papers, 300-page user manuals, and, of course, blog entries and other online offerings. These are not the tomes my younger self had in mind when she dreamed of becoming a writer, but they are satisfying nevertheless. Writing nonfiction comes easily to me and provides the thrill of that quick, fingers-flying flow of words that happens much less frequently when I write fiction. Plus, it's fun to use and stretch my expertise in creating end-user documentation.

But I think there are still stories inside my brain, waiting to be told. Every now and then, I hear voices in there that are not quite my own. (Sometimes one even takes over when I blog, so a post comes out with a tone rather removed from what I intended when I sat down to type.) When the spark flares to full life again and I find someone else's tale streaming out of me, I'll be pleased but not terribly surprised.

Doings

We had a pretty big weekend. Aeron, Mera, and Jaime (my buddies from the unschooling conference) came over to spend the night Saturday night. Late that night, we were joined by MJ, Madelyn (16), Marty (18), and Conor (17), who had been hanging with each other since the conference, with time spent both in Corvallis and on Whidbey Island. They crashed at our place after spending a long evening in Seattle. We didn't get to see much of them, unfortunately, because Madelyn and Marty got up about 8 to head back to the island, and I dropped Conor at the train station so he could ride back to Oregon.

Sunday morning, Frank left very early to help some people move their new boat from Blaine to Bellingham. It was a rather ill-fated trip, involving low wind (despite there being big wind seemingly everywhere else in the region), engine trouble, a long and expensive tow, and a certain lack of provisions for what turned out to be more than 12 hours on the water. He didn't make it home until nearly midnight, tired and sunburned but fairly philosophical about it all.

Their misadventure put something of a kink in our plans to host a party for a group of sailing/cruising families. I ended up hosting alone, and all but one of the families ended up bailing (no pun intended). So, it was a much smaller party than we expected; we'll be eating spaghetti until the end of time. But it was still a nice enough gathering.

The kids, their parents, and I drove down to the waterfront to watch the kiteboarders playing off Jetty Island. Did you know that Everett is one of the premier destinations in the world for kiteboarders? It is always really fun and sort of fishtank-soothing to watch them, with their colorful kites doing sky ballet. It seems miraculous that they never have collisions, or at least not often enough that I've ever witnessed one.

Last night, we got to visit briefly with my mom and Tom who are, at long last, back from their latest southwest tour. We've missed them, and the girls are really looking forward to a renewal of our regular beach visits. And Angelo the dog is thrilled to be home; he ran around like a crazy thing when he realized where he was.

Today has been a quiet one. Frank worked, then he and MJ went to volleyball practice. Chloe did Chloe things and, to my not-so-secret relief, put off our planned session of amateur hair dyeing. (She's going to try cinnamon-red this time.) I did some party cleanup and checked my email regularly, because I'm waiting for word on my return to work. I'm hoping to set things up so I can take May off, too, with a nice, cushy job with my old team ready for me in June. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

We've finished off the day with a Heroes mini-marathon. MJ had to get caught up because she missed last week, then we watched tonight's very exciting episode. Only three episodes left in the season! Ack! I predict a cliffhanger...

More "should"

Aunt Jorene sent this quote: "Don't 'should' on yourself, or on anyone else!" Read it out loud to get the full effect. :-)

Baby moments

I was in a shop downtown yesterday and encountered a woman with a baby. She had him parked behind her while her transaction was rung up. I started talking to him and jingling my keys at him. She turned to look, so I gave her a friendly smile. She said, "Oh, good," and walked off to do a bit more shopping. It really surprised me, even though she didn't go far and was gone for only a couple of minutes. But I wish the world were such that all moms could be like that, trusting a friendly stranger to give her half a minute to get things done.

That moment in that store has helped a tiny bit to balance a very different moment I had in another store last week. This woman was walking all around Borders with her very small baby in a carrier. He was screaming, arms flailing, cheeks red. At one point, she set the carrier down, turned her back on him, and began to peruse the books. It was heartbreaking. I went up to that baby, too, and even went so far as to ask her if I could rock him. It didn't help. She said, "He doesn't like his carseat." Well, duh. That much was obvious to all of us in the store! I remain baffled over what she thought she might accomplish by torturing him that way.

http://www.attachmentparenting.com/

Chiara de España

In my excitement over Chiara's plans to visit here next summer, I forgot to pass on her other big news: She has been accepted into another exchange program, this one for a year at a university in Spain. (I can't remember what part of Spain, sorry.) She says she isn't very excited about it yet, but I'm sure she'll get there. She just needs a little American recharge first. :-)

Happy Birthday, Frank!

To the love of my life: Many happy returns of the day! And many thanks for sharing 21 fabulous years (and counting) with me.

Should

One of the things I’ve tried to do throughout our unschooling journey is to stop and question any thought that contains the word “should.” It was surprising and liberating when I realized just how many of the shoulds in my life were, upon examination, other people’s shoulds, or society’s shoulds, or just my own misconceptions or exaggerations about what constitutes proper behavior, appearance, and occupation. Initially, all these false shoulds were easily, even gleefully, abandoned. Some examples:

My kids should dress according to Hoyle (a.k.a. societal standards).
But why? To fit in, to make other people more comfortable, to avoid attention.
Who cares? Not my kids, not Frank, not me.

My kids should go to bed at a “reasonable” hour each night (even though they don’t ever have school in the morning).
But why? Uhhh…
Who cares? Not them, not Frank, not me.

My kids should sit down to meals with the family (even though we are together a lot through the day).
But why? Uhhh…
Who cares? Not them, not Frank, not me.

And the biggie:
I should bear full responsibility for my kids’ choices, to the point of taking those choices away as appropriate.
But why? Because society says so.
Who cares? Not them (they like being responsible for themselves), not Frank, not me (well, okay, sometimes me, but I do my best to stifle the controlling urges that come so naturally to me).

So, I threw out all those shoulds and many more like them. It was fun, and it was challenging. In fact, it was one of the most challenging things about beginning to unschool. I mean, Frank and I thought we were making an educational decision—the kids simply wouldn’t “do” school any more—and instead we ended up revamping our lifestyle, our assumptions, and most of our standard operating procedures. We began to question everything. “Who believes this? Is it really me, or is it society or Grandma or the next door neighbor?”

The happy results of all that questioning and revamping were impressive and became the foundation of my passionate belief in radical unschooling (RU), an approach to life and parenting that goes far beyond homeschooling. With RU, our kids became our friends. They began to trust us to be there for them in all ways, without any of the wrangling and plain bad feelings that traditional parenting techniques engender. It was a wonder.

And it still is. But lately, I've been noticing again how often I use “should” in my thoughts and speech. I think I've been backsliding from my early determination to stop letting “should” rule our lives.

Epiphany today: I use “should” regularly when what I really mean is “want to.” For example, it's Frank's birthday today, and I found myself thinking, “We should do something special for him.” How self-defeating that is! It strips out all the love and generosity that is actually contained in the thought, leaving only dry obligation. The fact is, I want to do something special for him. Where “should” is draining, limiting, tedious, “want to” is empowering, defining, motivating. “Should” is from that tense place between my shoulder blades; “want to” is from the heart. (Thanks to unschooling dad and life coach Scott Noelle for helping me place them.)

This is not to say that every should can be reframed into a want. If I say to Chloe, “I want you to wear matching socks,” it can be (and usually is) just as much about controlling her choices as “You should wear matching socks” would be. I’m not going to use my own wants as a weapon against my kids' autonomy.

But I do want to move to a place where I’m better able to recognize my own choices as being just that. The guilty thought “I should call my grandmother” becomes “I want to call my grandmother because I want her to know how much I care about her.” And the shame-filled “I should mow the lawn” becomes “I want to get the lawn mowed because I think it looks ugly when it’s shaggy.”

I also hereby renew my campaign against the false shoulds that bombard our family daily. And I'm going to stop doing the bombarding myself. I can tell I’ve been doing some of that when I open my mouth and my kids look at me with faint apprehension, like “Oh, man, what’s she going to lay on me now?” Enough of that! To help me break the should habit, they’re going to fine me a quarter every time I use a sentence with “should” in it. Here’s hoping they aren’t able to get too rich off my wayward tongue. :-)

Chiara is coming home!!!!

W A H O O ! ! ! !

Chiara just called us. She's coming to visit us this summer! Chloe and I are the only ones home right now, but we managed to make enough celebratory noise for a housefull. Then I stood there in the kitchen and cried happy tears and called a bunch of people. We miss her SO much, and we aren't able to swing a visit to Italy this summer, so I was afraid we'd have to go another year without seeing her. But SHE'S COMING!! She'll arrive late July or early August and stay for three weeks or maybe even MORE.

YAY YAY YAY!!!!

Experiencing acceptance

or "What unschooling looked like this weekend"

Greetings from the rejuvenated and inspired Maier family! We returned home yesterday from a long weekend in Corvallis, OR, where we attended the LIFE Is Good Unschooling Conference (with LIFE standing for Learning in Freedom Everyday). It was an exceptionally rewarding experience. I've been blogging in my head all weekend and will now do my best to recall all the cool stuff I wanted to share.

First and foremost, I want to try to describe what it was like to take my kids to a place where kids are really, truly accepted Just the Way They Are. We had probably 150 kids running free in that hotel (unschooling families occupied all but five of the rooms). They laughed, they ran, they dangled pipe-cleaner creations into the lobby, they played games in hallways, they had discussions and art sessions on stairwell landings, they swam in the pool, they rode skateboards in the parking lot. And they didn't get scolded or frowned at, and no one thought less of their parents for their behavior. Instead, they got indulgent smiles and laughter and sharing and other kids' parents pitching in to the fun.

It was amazing and nourishing and such a relief to be surrounded by people who looked at my teenagers with interest and friendliness instead of with the suspicion and judgmentalness and near-fear that they (and we) are faced with in society as a whole.

And do you know what? Nothing got broken or damaged. The nights were amazingly quiet and peaceful (especially considering most of the kids don't have bedtimes). The kids never fought -- not once -- and tears were very, very rare. There were moms nursing babies anywhere they felt like it, colorful signs on room doors, room doors propped open in invitation, conversations happening EVERYWHERE between people of all ages, and joy in the air so tangible that hotel staff members commented on it and asked to be invited to our next conference.

Some highlights:
* Listening to a speech called "Math Happens." It was given by engineer and math tutor and unschooling mom Mary Lewis, and it served to ease away the last wispy bits of my concern that unschooling math is "iffy." Turns out schooling math is pretty darned "iffy," too. (Did you know that 55% of college freshmen [that is, high school grads who've been accepted into college] are not prepared for college math courses?) She talked about how schooling begins immediately to interfere with the brain's natural ability to do computation by taking math out of the physical too early and moving it into the abstract. Also, that's when we start to tell kids they're "wrong" about math, thereby injecting fear and doubt into something that should be as natural as breathing. She said every one of her students (mostly math-phobic adults returning to school) would have been better off if they hadn't had a single math lesson during their childhoods. And she cemented my understanding of the difference between math computation (can be done on a calculator) and math concepts (must be understood by the brain) and how schooling tends to promote the former to the neglect of the latter.
* Seeing all the awesome, diverse, and interesting unschooled teens in general, but especially during the Teen Panel, when a brave group of volunteers answered questions about life as unschooled teens. Summing up some of their answers, I can tell you they have big plans for the future, they don't always fit in with schooled kids but don't find schooled kids all that interesting, their schooled friends don't seem to envy them (this surprised me because I am terribly retroactively envious of their lives), they bristle when asked if they wish they had more outside motivation -- they motivate themselves, thank you very much -- and their parents began talking to them about sex so long ago that they can't really remember when it started. Summing up my impressions, I can tell you they are articulate, entertaining, and the most settled and directed group of young people I've ever met.
* Sitting in our room with the door open, listening to Frank play his guitar and greeting all the people who wandered in to check us out.
* Finding Chloe and her new friend, Connor (16), asleep on a landing one afternoon, catching up after staying awake with a bunch of other kids all of the night before.
* Hanging out in Diana's room, playing with my new friend Fergus (3), who is just about the cutest little guy I've ever met. He has blond hair past his shoulders, a wicked grin, and a very firm concept of his own personal space. Nobody touches Fergus without his permission. I love that his parents support him in that.
* Going to the nearby Chinese buffet place with Frank, MJ, Chloe, and our friends Jaime (11), Mera (8), and Aeron (6), and watching the HUGE joy on all the girls' faces as they filled their own plates with whatever looked good. This included a fair amount of pudding, interestingly enough.
* Having long conversations with the girls' mom, Toast, who is easing her way into unschooling, and feeling like maybe I'm helping them on that journey.
* Watching the talent show Saturday night and seeing the way the crowd encouraged and applauded a variety of performers for more than two hours. Acts ranged from singers, to jugglers, to dancers, to skateboarders, to musicians, to an apparently quadruple-jointed lad who could practically turn his arms and legs inside out. Every single act was warmly received. My favorite was Mera, who performed a song she wrote herself, about how at this gathering we were all superstars.
* Stretching out on my bed with Mera about midnight one night to have a serious discussion about Battlestar Galactica and Heroes, then walking her back to her room through the quiet hotel.
* Dancing the night away at Sunday night's Barefoot Boogie. It reminded me of a Maier wedding, with everybody dancing with whomever was handy, regardless of age and gender and usually in groups of six or more. The conga line was gigantic and intense and prompted one of the few times the kids were asked to settle down just a little.
* Meeting some of my online friends, including the woman who organizes Live and Learn, the East Coast unschooling conference. She asked if I'd be interested in speaking at the 2008 one! Hmm, let me think...
* Leaving MJ behind because she couldn't bear for it to end. She's still in Corvallis with some friends from camp and will be returning tomorrow, although we still might not see her 'cause she's headed to their place on Whidbey first. I talked to her today and she said, "I'll see you Monday at the latest!"

Some lowlights:
* For us, it had to end.
* The spirituality chat that edged into Christian bashing. I have my own problems with fundamentalist Christianity, but it was unpleasant having the chat leader go negative during what was supposed to be an inclusive chat. She has reasons for her anger (e.g., a fundamentalist minister visited the hospital where her daughter lay dying of cancer and announced that 9yo Hannah was surely going to Hell), but I wish she hadn't expressed it there.
* The night guard at the hotel, thereafter dubbed "Señor Grumpy Pants," who was mean to the people who were still in the pool at 10 when he came to close it down for the night. A smiling "Time to call it a night" would have achieved his goal, you know?
* Not getting much sleep the first night because the girls kept coming into the room. At 2 and 4, it was to use the bathroom (even though there are public restrooms on the ground floor!), and at 6 it was to get their swimsuits. Lotta interruptions for a couple long past the infant-and-toddler stage of parenting.
* Experiencing huge envy of the parents who are unschooling their kids from birth.

But none of those detracted much from a singularly amazing experience. I am totally recharged and ready to dive into life!! AND I CAN'T WAIT FOR NEXT YEAR'S CONFERENCE!!

Want to go with us?

Various

News from New Orleans: Jerry, Cori, and Molly are getting settled in. J&C are both working as temps while they look for career positions. And Marty is doing pretty well. He is still having memory problems--he doesn't remember Gary's name, for instance--and Judy says he sleeps a lot, but Chuck and Eric were happy to find him alert and chipper when they visited there a week or two ago.

There's a new foal on the way at Hope for Horses! The foster parents of Honey, a rescued mare, bred her in violation of their contract with HFH, so she's back at the main barn now, with the baby due soon. MJ wants to spend some nights in the barn on foal watch. I sure hope she gets to watch the birth this time!

With the hype for Harry Potter 7 building, Chloe has been digging back into her mile-high stack of HP books. She decided it would be fun to do some of the assignments the Hogwarts kids get in the books, so she's been spending quite a lot of time writing essays on cool stuff like moonstones, self-fertilizing bushes, Neptune, and kneazles. Her essays are quite good, plus it's been fun to watch her discovering all those school tricks for essays, such as WRITING LARGER TO FILL THE REQUIRED PAGES.

After two weeks with overtime, Frank has had a quiet week workwise, with even the weekly Friday meeting dedicated to a going-away party for one of the editors. So, we've been having a little at-home vacation. We're having a lot of fun with our Netflix subscription these days--each member of the family has his/her own queue now, which keeps all of us watching the mail for movies--and we have more library books out than we can possibly read before they're due.

Speaking of, I want to recommend "Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom" to all my female readers (and interested males, too, of course). Dr. Christiane Northrup shares patients' stories and a lot of medical advice that combines the best of medical science with sensible tenets of spiritual/psychological healing. My favorite part about it is that she begins with the assumption that our bodies are naturally healthy and will remain so, instead of the assumption that we're going to fall apart as we get older. (Did you know that the Tarahumara Indians of Mexico believed that the best runners were people in their sixties, and that researchers who tested the members of the tribe found that the 60-somethings did indeed have the best lung capacity, cardiovascular fitness, and endurance? It illustrates how much our attitudes toward health and aging can affect us!)

Both girls are signed up for next summer's Not Back to School Camp. They are very excited, especially MJ.
MJ has a new haircut! She had about a foot of hair cut off. Cute, huh?

What unschooling looked like today

I can't believe it's been a month since my last post like this! Life is so fast.

MJ and Chloe are on a nightowl schedule right now, so I'll start this from last night.

Frank and MJ watched movies together last night, most with a sci-fi/horror bent. They finished up their mini-festival with some wretched Traci Lords disaster movie on the SciFi channel. You should have heard the blistering commentary drifting up the stairs! They were having a great time together, but there was scientific discussion about earthquakes and other phenomena, plus technical analysis of the craft of moviemaking.

Meanwhile, Chloe and I were hanging out upstairs. We read together some; talked about books; talked about translating unschooling activities into schoolish terms (she's fascinated by this); discussed global warming, the recent release of a rather grim draft report by a couple thousand of the world's scientists, and what our personal response to this report might be; talked about activism and what one person might (or might not) accomplish; talked about the human circulatory system, the benefits of stretching, and deep vein thrombosis; talked about the escapist value of traveling and flights of fantasy; talked about Ireland and England and the recent revelation/confirmation that the Irish and the English are, genetically speaking, one race and how it's cultural and political lines that separate them really; talked about the huge changes wrought on society by the Internet and how we don't really know the long-term effects of same. There's probably more. So, in schoolish terms, we hit on several branches of science, political science, sociology, history, and philosophy. And there's probably more.

After Frank and I crashed, MJ, who is not usually a nightowl, decided to see if she could stay up all night with the help of four frappuccinos. What do you know, she could! Health class, plus a little scientific method, plus a life lesson.

She spent the night writing. Enough said.

Chloe is habitually a nightowl and last night was no exception. She read some of "Hexwood" by Diana Wynne Jones, spent some time reading on fanfiction.net, created an illustrated fairy tale in a mini-book of her own design, and played pretend with her stuffed animals for a while. Oh, yes, and she and MJ had a whispered but nevertheless lively discussion in the livingroom at about six a.m., much to my dismay. Language arts obviously, art, imaginative play to explore interpersonal relationships, and socialization.

Today has been spent in individual pursuits. MJ is still awake and has done more writing. Now she and Frank are continuing their filmfest. Chloe is awake again and has been flitting between book and TV. Both girls and Frank have provided input into my blogging. We have about three hours left in this 24-hour-period, but I'm going to close this post out. There's enough here for you to get the idea. :-)

About intelligences and learning styles

A couple decades ago, Howard Gardner, a professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, developed the theory of multiple intelligences. In a nutshell, he proposed that there is not a single "intelligence" but seven. Those are:

Visual/spatial intelligence
Musical intelligence
Verbal/linguistic intelligence
Logical/mathematical intelligence
Interpersonal intelligence
Intrapersonal intelligence
Bodily/kinesthetic intelligence

More recently, he added an eighth intelligence to the list, naturalistic. For decent descriptions of these intelligences, see the list here. His theory has been accepted through most of the educational community and is taught to many aspiring teachers, but it has been put in practice in only a very few schools around the world. Instead, most schools continue to value and reward verbal and logical intelligences and are geared toward those.

With unschooling, kids aren't all expected to have the same sort of intelligence. Verbal and logical intelligences aren't valued more, so kids with other intelligences aren't at risk as they are in school. For example, a boy with kinesthetic intelligence might be a discipline case in school, or labeled with dyslexia or ADD, or simply made to feel stupid. As an unschooler, that same boy might learn his ABC's while jumping on the trampoline, start reading while playing video games, or simply and beautifully excel in some physical pursuit. Most importantly, he will never be made to feel he's less for being who he is.

Learning styles go hand in hand with multiple intelligences. Gardner says, "Styles refer to the customary way in which an individual approaches a range of materials—for example, a playful or a planful style." With unschooling, we are able to honor our children's learning styles as well as their intelligences.

For example, the verbal intelligence of both of our girls is indisputable, but Chloe's learning style is playful and verbal, while MJ's is more thoughtful and internal. What I think of as their "secondary intelligences" are different, too, with Chloe's logical and intrapersonal leanings and MJ's musical, visual, and interpersonal ones.

So, what does honoring their learning styles and intelligences look like? In Chloe's case, it often looks like conversation! She lights up when we talk, and her experience of anything, whether it's a book or a dream or a trip to the grocery store, isn't complete until it's discussed and, usually, laughed over. She has always been this way. I remember hiring a nanny years ago, long before unschooling, and telling the nanny that Chloe needed to be listened to. We made it a job requirement.

Then there's her sensitivity. She feels hurts very strongly and has had periods of intense awareness of cruelty, hypocrisy, ageism, and, repeatedly, her own isolation from others. (This last is not about social isolation but an understanding that she is alone in her own brain, if that makes sense.) Honoring her intrapersonal processes and periods of grief has required patience, gentleness, and a certain creativity in finding ways to comfort her.

In MJ's case, the honoring often means butting out, something that can be especially challenging for me! She is very independent and very skilled at telling us what she needs, so we really can take our cues from her. Her goals tend to be thought through and well defined, and her pursuit of those goals is deliberate and self-monitored. She's more disciplined than I am, but she never nags, so I too often find myself in the position of holding up her progress because I've procrastinated and then forgotten something she needs me to do. In other words, honoring MJ's intelligence and learning style means daily work on my own faults!

Her study of music and interpersonal relationships has also presented some challenges. As you may have gathered, I hold strong opinions. As MJ has explored the offerings of the music world, I have had to repeatedly reexamine those opinions and tap into my trust of her. Eminem presents one good example. She was about 10 when she wanted to buy her first Eminem CD. "Absolutely not" was my first response, but I had to check that. We had conversations about his lyrics, their potential encouragement of violence against women, and my fears that her listening to his music would change her in negative ways. Then she got her CD. We had more conversations about specific lyrics, but I learned to appreciate some of his music; I didn't see any change in her language, behavior, or self-esteem; and, with all parental disapproval removed, he proved to be just one stop in a long and varied musical journey.

Another example was a TV show she started watching not long after we started unschooling. Its title was something like "I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Outta Here," and it involved plopping several B celebrities into a primitive camp in the jungle to see who lasted the longest. I found it loathsome, especially the flirtatious antics of one "blonde bimbo" on the show, but I was encouraged by other unschooling parents to watch it with MJ and try to see what she found so interesting. That was when her fascination with interpersonal relationships became clear to me, and it wasn't long before I was as hooked on the show as she was. And the blonde turned out to be a sweet young woman, so I got to confront another of my own prejudices.

Because their strengths coincide with strengths valued by the schools, I have little doubt that MJ and Chloe would have excelled and been reasonably content had they stayed in school, and they'll be able to slide back in easily if they ever choose to return. But the thing is, they haven't needed school to develop the skills valued by school. Their interests, inclinations, and abilities have led them to a natural expertise.

Think about that. The kids who do best in school, who have the types of intelligences that schools are geared toward, are going to excel in those areas without ever setting foot in a classroom. So all they really get from school is gold stars and A grades for doing what comes naturally.

And what about the kids who struggle in school? They spend all those years feeling inadequate. Yes, some of them learn to write well, or to enjoy reading, or to do some higher math. But can the schools take the credit for it? After four years of unschooling, I'm not convinced they can. Maybe it's another case of a natural process coinciding with an artificial one. And for every one of those kids who is able to adapt himself and get the rewards of school, there is one (five? twenty? a hundred?) who comes out of school with nothing but a self-esteem problem. It's thirteen wasted years, years he could have spent in an environment that valued the strengths he possesses, developing real skills to build a life on.

Well, I've digressed into a critique of school, which wasn't my intent. I suppose my hope when I started writing this was to encourage people to recognize that we don't all fit into the school mold. For those who don't fit the mold, consider unschooling or other customized education as an alternative to criticism, shame, and prescription drugs. The academic results might be equivalent or better, and the psychological benefits, immeasurable. For those who do fit the mold, school offers little but validation.

Spring Slug Festival

I'm on strike and have barely done a thing for a week (except read, of course). I did manage to play taxi a few times -- I got MJ to and from Hope for Horses twice and ferried her and her cousins to the movies one afternoon -- and Chloe and I had a lovely evening walk the other day. But other than that, taking out the trash once has been my only accomplishment. It's been a pretty good week. I am finally starting to feel bored, though, so maybe I'll get moving tomorrow.

Tidbits:

We received the first installment payment on the boat on time. So far, so good!

Chloe is diligently working her way through the works of Diana Wynne Jones. She was especially taken with "Dark Lord of Derkholm" and its sequel, "Year of the Griffin," and now sees griffins in every cat we meet. (Griffins are called catbirds in the books.)

Frank finished up the latest deadline period for his work, so he's been enjoying the Spring Slug Festival with me a bit.

MJ finished a personal project of hers, rating the 1975 songs in her iTunes collection. She listened to bits of them while she entered her ratings, so we've all been listening to lots of varied music clips. I wish I could describe her amazing collection better. In addition to numerous genres of English-language music from a number of countries, she has songs in Japanese, Romanian, German, Spanish, Russian, Italian, and probably others. I'm especially taken with "Malagueña Salerosa" by Chingon (from the Kill Bill soundtrack).

We had a long phone chat with Chiara last weekend. She is doing very well, being quite happy with her independent university life in Milan and new romantic interest, David. We're looking into visiting Italy this summer, but it would be a lot (LOT) of Euros, so I dunno. There's some talk of just sending the girls to her to save money (and provide them with one heck of a fun time, I'm sure), but I would be SO jealous.

It's raining a lot here, but Spring is all around. The cherry trees are doing their glorious thing -- the girls and I want to get to the Quad at the UW and shuffle through the pink "snow" -- and all the other trees are leafing out. Love it. We took Rodney and Lestat out to the front yard yesterday for some fresh air and adventure. They are pretty tentative outside, preferring to peek their noses out from cover (with their favored cover being our legs, shoes, and clothes), but they got into the spirit and seemed to enjoy being plopped downhill so they could run up the hill back to safety. Rodney got cocky in fact, decided he didn't need us any more, and took off for some further exploration. Chloe rounded him up and we called it a day at that point. :-) He's about half Lestat's size but game.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Chloe the teenager

Well, Frank and I have successfully raised two children to adulthood (as some cultures define it). Chloe has turned 13.

We marked this momentous occasion with a weekend of revelry. Chloe, MJ, and a revolving series of cousins celebrated with an hour's hot tub rental at Tubs in Seattle, followed by hours and hours of swimming and an overnight stay at Embassy Suites in Lynnwood. I am photographically impaired, so I only have photos of presents and cake in the room, but I will strive to post a couple of those later.

As for Mom and Dad, we are already enjoying life with two teenagers. They are fun and fascinating creatures. :-)

With a monumental crash

Frank's bachelor days are over! The girls and I have returned to our happy -- and now much less quiet -- home.

It was a good trip, but I'm pretty worn out now! There was a big snowstorm in the Siskiyous when we left, so we cut over to the Oregon coast and worked our way (slowly) down that way. The coast highway was as deserted as it gets, but still slow going with all those hills and curves, towing the trailer. Pretty, though, and the weather wasn't bad except for a record rainstorm that dumped all over Eureka and us before we headed out east again.

After four days on the road, we spent two lovely days and one *very* chilly night at Joshua Tree National Park. A trailer snafu meant we had no heat, so we went to bed early, piled under sleeping bags and a variety of blankets, with not even our noses poking out. But the daytimes were wonderful. We got some hiking in and made friends with the young jackrabbit "assigned to" our campsite.

Joshua Tree Photos
Chloe on Big Mac Rock (photo by MJ)
Chloe in black and white (photo by MJ)
Mid-hike snack at Cottonwood Oasis
Momiji the Baby Jackrabbit

As evening approached on the second day, we started being uneasy about another chilly night, so we gave into impulse and packed up the trailer, then headed for lower ground. (The lowest campground at Joshua is at 3000 feet elevation.) We spent the night in a motel in north San Diego County, dropped off the trailer at the repair place, and then headed for my dad and Renee's. We had four days in San Diego, mostly spent visiting with family (I got to meet my nephew finally!) and enjoying the sunshine. We also toured a couple of museums (cars and aerospace), the SD Zoo, and Seaport Village (where I fell madly in love with the stunning paintings of Jia Lu but managed to resist buying my $40,000 favorite).

Then it was back on the road. My mom and Tom were belatedly starting their annual trip south, so we met up with them at Seven Feathers Casino in southern Oregon. It was a nice little interlude and another chance to use the trailer so I didn't feel like such an idiot for towing it all the way down. Tent trailers are not usually allowed at the RV park at the casino -- not posh enough for them, although I thought we held our own against a couple of the ratty RVs that were pulled in there -- but they made an exception for us. For those who meet their standards and are into that sort of thing, it's a pretty nice setup. Full hookups, heated pool, frequent shuttles to the casino, decent setting. We liked the ice cream sundaes at the casino restaurant, and MJ was pretty happy with the video arcade there, but mostly we were just pleased to have some visiting time with Grandma and Papa.

And now we're settling back into life at home. The weather has conveniently turned pretty here -- we missed the five inches of snow last week -- so it's not as sad as it sometimes is to be away from the sun zone. Now if it'll just stay this way!!

What unschooled kids talk about when they get together

Horror movies and how idiotic the main characters often are
Anime
Other kinds of movies
Video games
Politics and current events
Music
SCA
Fear Factor
Comic books
Manga
Other kinds of books
Their feelings
The weather
Sports
Sibling relations
Blackberries (the fruit, not the device)
Airsoft rifles
YouTube
Other cultures (especially Japan)
Horses

You get the idea. Just about the only thing unschooled kids don't discuss much is unschooling. It's a topic of conversation for the parents, because it takes some work to wrap our schooled brains around the concepts, and we like to hear each other's stories and be reassured as to the rightness of what we're doing. For our kids, it's just LIFE.

Speaking of traveling...

The girls and I are heading out tomorrow for an impromptu roadtrip. We'll spend a few days in Joshua Tree National Park and then head over to San Diego to finally meet my nephew, Colin. I'm on a roll with these unschooling essays, so I might do a little blogging from the road. If not, I'll do a trip report when we get back circa 3/1.

Unschooling all the time

It occurred to me that choosing to write about my kids' learning on a day when they were sick was illustrative of another reason unschooling works: learning happens all day, every day. There are no school hours, no weekends off, no holidays, no spring breaks, no teacher work days, and no sick days. You might say our kids have to go to school every day. We prefer a slogan of the unschooling community: "Everything counts."

Below, I've chosen a few "rot your brains" examples to show how learning comes from surprising sources:

Watching movies and television

1. Chloe and one of her cousins were flipping channels the other day and landed on the "The Phantom of the Opera." They got hooked and watched through to the end, whereupon they came sobbing out into my mom's livingroom to say what a good movie it was. They had missed the beginning, so Chloe put it into her Netflix queue. She's been watching that this weekend, singing the songs, discussing the movie, etc. Coming up next in her queue is the Lon Chaney original. Doing my part, I pointed out that it started out as a legend and then a book, so we're headed to the library tomorrow to check it out. It's a literature unit a teacher would approve, and it's been entirely self directed.
2. I mentioned in another post that my friend Stephanie had gotten me hooked on "Firefly." Well, now I've gotten the family hooked on it. It's led to so many interesting discussions. For example, the political environment of the show is similar to that of our post-Civil War era, with the Alliance in charge and the "browncoats" (including our hero, Captain Mal) struggling with resentment and bitter defeat. We picked up the official published guide to the series, and it has information about, for example, the design of Mal's gun, a high-tech one-off of a Civil War revolver. We've also discussed the look of the show and how they use lighting, somewhat old-fashioned film techniques (often faked in CGI shots!), and costumes to create atmosphere. And then, of course, there is all the shared enjoyment of what is simply a fun, expertly crafted bit of entertainment!

Video games

Quite a few unschoolers have learned to read by playing video games. There's a lot of text on screen, for one thing, and reading is required to go out on the Internet and look up cheat codes and such.

For most kids, game playing is an indisputable physical workout. I've never seen so much wiggling and laughing. And amazing social interactions take place when kids gather around or even just discuss a game.

Video games are now being credited with kids' developing "higher skills" (e.g., problem solving and analytical thinking), to the point that educators are starting to catch on. This article outlines how they are starting to use games as learning tools (although they think they have to write special games for it -- talk about making yourself feel needed!).

But it's more than that. Just ask any unschooling parent who has watched a video game inspire a kid. They play, and then they start making connections. Rather than reinvent the wheel and describe this process, I'll simply direct you to an excellent article by unschooling parent Mary Gold, If You Give a Kid a Nintendo.

Reading the funny papers

I talked some in my last post about all the learning that's been triggered by my kids' interest in manga and anime. But our first experience with funny-papers learning happened way back at the beginning of our unschooling. The girls discovered my old Far Side, Bloom County, and Calvin & Hobbes collections. Wow! All of a sudden, we were discussing biology, liberals vs. conservatives, freedom of the press, the Reverend Moon, transmogrification, drawing styles, and innumerable social events of the 80's (e.g., rock-and-roller cola wars). It was lightning-paced, it was vibrant, it was FUN!

Going on vacation

We've done more than our fair share of traveling. Our number one goal while traveling is always having fun. We never -- NEVER -- structure our days around learning, and we never sit down to teach our kids anything (unless they ask us to). So, all in the name of fun, the girls (and Frank and I) have learned about geology, history, evolution, biology, social and cultural issues, natural disasters, meteorology, politics, physics, writing, economics, mathematics, various interesting careers out in the real world, various really nasty jobs out in the real world, foreign languages, etymology, entomology, enology, conservation, pollution, government funding, and, of course, map reading.

Oh, yes, and vocabulary. :-)


The point is, learning is natural and unavoidable. It's not constrained to a classroom, a schedule, a curriculum, or a season. And it's inspired by everything.

What unschooling looked like today

This is the first in a series of peeks into our unschooling routine (or lack thereof). I'll shoot for posting one mid-month each month.

But first, a quote from Chloe: "The purpose of unschooling is to make sure everyone in your family is happy with their life."

I couldn't have said it better. And now, the report on today.

Both girls are a little under the weather, so it was a pretty sedate day today. Nevertheless, there are a bunch of activities to report. In addition to the activities in the list below, both girls reviewed my last blog post for accuracy. They're my subject-matter experts. :-)

Chloe
Read some fanfiction
IM'd with MJ (yes, MJ was in the next room)
Chatted over AIM with the Mini Skirt Army
Set up a new blog (she's not sharing it yet)
Discussed Fruits Basket (a manga series)
Plugged different dates into a zodiac calendar online
Watched the last disk of Full Metal Alchemist
Talked philosophy with Mom
Played with the rats
Had a pillow tug-of-war with MJ

MJ
Reread select passages in Eragon
Worked on her 2nd sci-fi novel, including a swordfight that is "completely badass"
IM'd with Chloe and a friend from NBTSC
Made plans with her cousin for Saturday night
Checked in on MySpace
Discussed Fruits Basket (a manga series)
Watched some South Park and the last disk of FMA
Talked philosophy with Mom
Updated our Netflix queue
.....(Alert: MJ's movie, "Zoo," is coming soon!)
Played with the rats
Had a pillow tug-o-war with Chloe
Listened to her iPod

I've been asked to clarify that the IM conversation between the two girls was actually an icon war. Just don't ask me to explain that. :-)

Academic translations for a few of those activities
Several:
Socialization!
Language arts (creative writing, editing, critical thinking, book reports)

Zodiac web site: Math - Chloe was calculating years of birth for Fruits Basket characters

FMA: alchemy vs. science and mechanics, history (WWI, zeppelins and the blitz, and the build-up to WWII), seven deadly sins

Fruits Basket: Japanese culture, names, language, Chinese zodiac, biology, and Choir (they sang the FMA and Fruits Basket theme songs together - in Japanese!)

iPod: Music Appreciation and Music of the World (it's a very eclectic collection)

Pillow fight: PE, of course!

----------------
P.S. After I posted this, the girls and I went back to our individual activities, MJ still listening to her iPod and Chloe fiddling with my deck of cards. I got on YouTube because I wanted to hear "Spirit in the Sky" (don't ask me why). I found one clip of the 45 going 'round and 'round, with a comment attached that the center dealie on the record looked like a swastika. Someone then pointed out that the swastika was originally a Hindu symbol, which I didn't know, so I got on Wikipedia to learn more. My expressions of surprise and interest drew attention from the girls, so we finished up the day with another impromptu history lesson. These weird little chains of connections are one of the reasons unschooling works so well. That's another big subject and one I'd love to expound on more, but I'm going to call it a day.

The girls don't seem anywhere ready for sleep, though. Guess they'll have to continue their learning without me.

Accepted

Did any of you have a chance to see "Accepted," a little movie that came out last summer? It's about Bartleby, an enterprising young man who, faced with a series of college rejection letters and a pair of severely disappointed parents, comes up with his own college, the South Harmon Institute of Technology (you supply the acronym). He and his friends create a letterhead, set up a web site, and hang a sign on a former mental institution, then recruit a cranky, shoe-selling former professor to do the welcome interview with Bartleby's parents. The fun starts when a web-site snafu leads to hundreds of kids showing up for the first day of school.

The movie was marketed as this generation's "Animal House," and it certainly contains enough collegiate antics to qualify. But as much as I loved "Animal House," and despite its none-too-subtle jabs at college administration, the Greek system, and politics (remember, Bluto becomes a senator), "Animal House" doesn't come close to containing the important messages that "Accepted" contains. It explores the idea that kids who lack the 4.0 GPAs, test scores, athletic abilities, and other credentials traditionally valued by colleges still have a lot to offer, and that we are all worthy of acceptance.

It probably goes without saying that I loved this movie. It spoke to my unschooler heart. The scene where Bartleby welcomes the new students and tells them that, here, they will be accepted for who they are, brought me to tears.

With traditional parenting and traditional schooling, kids are dictated to, criticized, corrected, pressured, shamed, and pigeonholed. There are hundreds of rules to follow -- the shoulds, I call them -- and a very small set of traditional goals that are deemed worthy of pursuit. Don't get me wrong: there may be a wealth of love and encouragement in these kids' lives. But I believe the presence of those positives can only balance the negatives; it can't make up for them.

Our approach with unschooling is different, and it's demonstrated pretty nicely in the movie. Instead of leading with "This is who you should be," we ask (or simply wait watchfully to be shown) who our kids want to be.

This kind of acceptance represents a huge subject, the core of unschooling, and it has many parts. Education and learning styles, socialization and manners, whether kids should be "toughened up" or protected, whether parents should discipline their kids, nutrition, hygiene, chores, and even financial issues. I might go into more depth on some of those in later posts, but for now, here are some principles we live by:

• Our kids are okay just the way they are.

I should highlight that one or something. It's huge. If you really want to "get" unschooling, meditate on that concept for a while.

• If our kids are not okay (unhappy times, challenges to face, something missing from life, etc.), it's our job to help them find the resources or tools they need to get back to being okay.
• Our kids are, at all times, learning and changing, and it's our job to be attentive to and supportive of that.
• If our kids are having fun, they're learning at top speed. It's our job to facilitate fun.
• We trust that our kids will learn what they need to know, when they need to know it. There is no lesson, academic or social, that has to be learned by a certain age, and parental embarrassment is not a good reason for shaming a child.
• There is no good reason for shaming a child.
• We trust that our kids will, on their own, fill their time with the activities that are best suited to their moods, needs, interests, and natural learning processes.
• It's our job to provide a resource-rich environment for our kids, no matter how messy it makes the house.
• We have no idea what our kids might accomplish if encouraged, and it's not our job to make them "face reality." When offered the Great Gift of a glimpse into their dreams and wishes, we don't have to be their voice of reason or the rain on their parade. We just have to say, "Oh, cool! How can I help?"
• It is much better to say "yes" than "no," even if it is a qualified "yes." For example, I might say, "Yes, we can go to the mall just as soon as I finish this blog post" instead of "No, not right now." It's a little thing, but all those yeses add up to a much more positive atmosphere.
• The lifestyle we are living was our choice (meaning mine and Frank's); supporting the lifestyle is our responsibility and not something to be foisted off on the kids. This includes caring for the house we live in.
• A kid who is acting out, angry, frustrated, or crying is a kid who needs help and understanding. And maybe some food. It's the adult's job to stay calm, step back, try to see through the kid's eyes, and listen.
• Kids need space to feel their emotions instead of pressure to stifle them. (Small kids might also need help identifying their emotions; sometimes hearing a description of what they're feeling is all they need in order to calm down.)
• Punishment has no place in our home.

Well, that turned into a long list, but it really comes down to trust and acceptance. We trust our kids to learn and grow and thrive in the loving home we provide, and we accept them, as-is.

The unavoidable opposite of acceptance is rejection. I think adults inadvertently aim a lot of little rejection darts at the kids in their lives, thinking they're doing the kids a favor by attempting to "fix" trait x, y, or z. Knock it off! Just love them and trust that they'll get it all figured out in their own good time. They will!

New furniture

Frank and I have a new bedroom set. After many years of "maybe someday" and then a couple of months of fruitless searching for something light and airy enough (but still attractive) to suit our "undersea" bedroom decor, we finally decided to just buy something we like. The pieces are big, dark, heavy, and (we think) gorgeous. You can see the pieces here (except we got a tall chest of drawers instead of the dresser shown, and we don't have an armoire) and a detail shot of the marble top on the nightstands here.

Oh, and btw - we didn't pay anything close to these prices! There's a pretty cool furniture warehouse/store near us that offers wholesale or container prices. We have several friends and family members who've found good deals there.

More work coming to fruition

Chloe and I returned home from some errands a little bit ago to find a package from Microsoft on the front porch. My boss, David, sent me my very own copy of Point of Sale, the cash register and inventory management software that has been the focus of my professional life for these past few years. It might sound lame when I say so, but I am very excited to have it. I'm really proud of this product; it's slick and powerful. Having been in on the ground floor, I've gotten to contribute a lot to its design, usability, and continuing improvement, and the documentation set is the best I've ever worked on (if I do say so).

If anybody has a store that needs computerizing, I can help!

Point of Sale Web site

A peek at what I do

The project I finished up before I left Microsoft has been published to the Web. If you want to take a peek, it's here. Enjoy! :-)

Sale of the Zombie Princess

Well, it's official: the good ship Zombie Princess has a new owner.

The boat sale saga:

Interested party #1 -- The spider-bitten jailbird

Back in November, we had a cash buyer all lined up. We'd agreed on a price and were set to do paperwork. Then he vanished. Eventually, our broker learned that he had been arrested for being Drunk and Disorderly. He served his 30 days or whatever and then resurfaced, still interested in the ZP, before dropping away again, claiming to have been bitten by 18 brown recluse spiders who were living on his boat. Don't ask me why 18 reclusive spiders would all be living on one boat, or why they would all decide at the same time to be sociable enough to come out and bite him. If the jail sentence hadn't been enough to convince us he was a gen-u-ine Key West character, the spider story pretty much confirmed it! But he hung around the periphery right up until last week when we gave him one last chance to ante up. No deal.

Interested party #2 -- The reverse boatlift Cubano

As some of you may recall, back in 1980, more than 100,000 people left Cuba, with Fidel Castro's blessing, and arrived in the U.S., primarily in the Miami area. (Many of these turned out to be inmates of Cuba's prisons and mental hospitals -- sending them to America was Castro's solution to their overcrowding problems.) This became known as the Mariel Boatlift.

Well, evidently rumors have been flying for months among the Cuban population in Florida that Castro is dead. Some Cubans with means have been buying up boats on the cheap in preparation for a mass return to Cuba. I'm not sure what their goal is, reclaiming the whole country or just their own abandoned property, but whatever it is, they're planning to go.

One of these hopefuls became interested in the ZP in early December. He submitted a lowball offer, so our broker very kindly backed out of the deal, giving us her $2500 commission for extra negotiating room. Frank called the buyer directly to see what could be arranged. In short, NOTHING. The guy was exceptionally abrasive and pushy, wildly exaggerated the boat's faults, etc., and managed to completely alienate Frank. We decided not to sell to him unless we could do it with Vanessa running interference for us, negotations broke off, and the deal fell through.

Our only regret is that if we'd sold to the guy, we evidently would have been contacted by some U.S. government agency or another about bugging the ZP before the guy took possession. We don't have any strong feelings about the government in Cuba; it just would have been fun to imagine some poor agent listening to this guy spouting obnoxious things all the way from Key West to Havana.

Interested party #3 -- The baffled Brit

Just after Christmas, we struck a deal with a man from England who was shopping for a little boat on which to go cruising in the Caribbean. It looked very promising until he had the survey done. The surveyor pointed out that the compression post wasn't original, and the buyer got fidgety, even though replacing the compression post on a Hunter is a Very Good Thing. He ultimately decided against buying her, stating that it wasn't the survey that swayed him but a reconsideration of the to-do list for getting her ready to cruise. We were disappointed and frustrated -- he knew the to-do list before he put down his deposit! -- but what could we do?

Interested party #4 -- The bicycle repairman

With power at the boatyard about to be cut due to major construction, we were feeling pretty panicky about the boat still sitting there. Without power, an unattended boat in the water is in great danger of sinking, because the batteries go dead and the bilge pump doesn't run. Dreading the thought of having to go down and find her a new home, we began to reconsider the offer of a KW local who had been checking out the ZP for months and months. He was clearly a serious buyer, but he "had to have" seller financing.

I did a bunch of research about seller financing a boat. The consensus: Don't do it!

But we're doing it anyway.

It's a gamble, but Greg seems like a nice guy. He's very earnest when he talks about repaying us, and he doesn't have bad credit so much as no credit at all -- not even a department store card. We've tried to dot the i's and cross the t's on the loan paperwork, and I followed a bunch of advice about making it as easy as possible for the buyer to repay, but for us the bottom line is that (1) the boat is being tended to now, (2) somebody else is paying for her mooring and insurance now, and (3) there's a chance that we'll end up receiving a decent price for her.

We received the downpayment today, so the boat has actually shifted from the "expense" column to the "income" column. It's a major milestone.

The Bill of Sale goes out Monday, so we have reached the end of the tale of the s/v Zombie Princess.

The End?

Not really. This should conclude the Blog of the Zombie Princess, but then I'd have to start a whole new blog for family news, unschooling essays, and my occasional political opinion pieces, AND you all would have to update your Favorites. So, I've decided to continue blogging here even though the ZP is no more.

Does that make me the new Zombie Princess???

I guess I can live with that.

The Princess is dead. Long live the Princess.

Weirdnesses tag

I've been tagged. I'm always happy to respond to chain questionnaires, so here are my six weirdnesses (or six of my weirdnesses, I should say), in no particular order.

1) I get a little freaky over the amount of tape that gets used when wrapping a present. "Not so much! Not so much!" The only thing that kept me sane when the girls were tape-happy toddlers was buying each of them her own roll. Then I could be as anal as I wanted with *my* roll.

2) No matter how tired I am, I turn bright-eyed and chatty when I go to bed. Frank has long since learned to wait it out: I chat, chat, chat, chat, chat, then pretty much fall asleep mid-sentence, just like that.

3) I eat marshmallow creme by the spoonful.

4) I *really* have a one-track mind. I have trouble carrying on a conversation if the radio is playing, and people generally have to grab my face to get my attention if I'm reading.

5) I save my tax returns for decades. I probably still have the first one I ever filed back in 1984.

6) I pace. Frank says I'm a shark: If I stop moving, I'll die.

I won't tag other people in turn. If you're reading this and you've got a blog, feel free to join the game with a weirdness post of your own. Or chime in with a comment here.

I'm back!

Here I am, returned both home and to blogging. Last week, I finished up my latest contract at the Velvet Sweatshop and immediately flew off to Georgia for a few days visiting my best pal, Stephanie. (She and her husband, Rick, moved to Athens last summer, having had enough of Northwest weather. Seems like they got out in the nick of time.) We did some sightseeing and shopping, but the highlights were a bunch of time spent having complete conversations, a fab multicourse dinner at a restaurant near their house, and their introducing me to Firefly, an excellent TV series that should never have been canceled -- check it out on DVD!

Now, I am settling into life at home. I have to be away from Microsoft for 100 days (required after every 365 days worked there as a temp, ever since a certain lawsuit filed against the company). My Big Plan is to enjoy some time with my kids. Frank's work continues, so I get to revel in my time off, knowing we still have income. Pretty cool.

I am very tardy in announcing the birth of Molly Eileen Lewis to proud parents Jerry and Cori. She arrived January 19th, a few weeks ahead of schedule. She weighed in at just under 6 pounds and had to spend a few extra days at the hospital to finish "cooking," but mother and baby are both doing well. J-man gets out of the Marines late February (not late March as I previously told you, Jorene, yay!), then the family is moving home. They'll stay at Grandma Judy's while they get settled. Grand-aunt-ma Ronnie is very excited to get her hands on that baby, but we're not sure when that will happen.

Our other item of news is a sad one: We said good-bye today to Snowball the rat. She died in her cage this morning after living several months with a large tumor and showing distinct signs of old age. MJ and Chloe are pretty sad -- Snowy has been with us through a lot of adventures -- but they find distraction in a couple of comedians called Rodney and Lestat.

Anyway, we're all doing well. I'll try to fill in more details of the past few months in subsequent posts.

Happy New Year!

Yes, we're still here

I am a terrible blogger, I know. I'll resume operations after the holidays, if not before, but for now I wanted to let everybody know that we're fine after Hurricane Northwest. Our neighborhood never lost power, so we have heat and light and working freezers and cool things like that. It cost me a work day, though, because Microsoft is dead as a doornail -- which I unfortunately didn't discover until I had driven down there and inched my way through about a dozen dead traffic lights. And we had a houseguest briefly, my coworker who drove into work not realizing she wouldn't be able to fill her gas tank to get home in the horrible traffic.

I could rant about the traffic -- where exactly did all those people think they were going? -- but it would be a bit of pot calling the kettle, since I was out there with all the idiots.

Anyway, we are safe and warm, with a fallen fence the worst of our complaints.

In case you don't hear from me before then, I wish you the happiest of holidays. Merry Everything!

Memories from February 2005

Chloe's amazing talent

Nick and Chloe on the Space Needle observation deck

Chiara and Ronnie at Priest Point

Marty on the move

Marty's physical and occupational therapy is coming along really well. He can walk a little bit now, using his walker (which he was using even before the stroke), and is able to get his shirt off and do other tasks like that. This morning, he confounded Frank (and probably himself) by maneuvering himself to the side of the bed, lowering the rail, and climbing on out of bed. He ended up on his knees and needed help, but it was some impressive feats of strength and dexterity up til then.

They had a family gathering yesterday with the whole gang out at Judy's. I'm sure the company and food were just fine. Sorry I missed it!

Photos

I had to steal this photo of MJ's birthday party from Erin's blog:
Ella, MJ, Chelsea

And here is a blast from the past -- Chloe at approximately age 2, feeding ducks at Lafreniere Park in New Orleans
(photo credit: nephew-son Jerry):

Derek's triumph

Check out this entertaining and impressive video of Frank's cousin Mary's son, Derek, achieving a personal best.

http://www.strangepuzzle.com/videos/3x3x3 DerekTilton 52.75.wmv

Grammar makes a comeback

From the Washington Post:

Grammar for Teachers
"The Loudoun County school system offers an annual summer staff development session called Grammar for English Teachers, tailored to teach the basics to teachers who didn't learn them in college. 'It usually fills up pretty quickly,' said Carrie Perry, supervisor of English language arts in Loudoun... The newest English teachers are products of a grammarless era, unprepared to distinguish an appositive from an infinitive.

"'What you have is a generation of teachers from the early to mid-'70s who don't know grammar, who never learned it,' said Benjamin, an author of the national council's publication. 'We have armies of teachers, elementary teachers and English teachers, who don't have the language to talk about language. It's kind of their dirty little secret.'"

Grammar for Students
"In surveys, not quite two-thirds of students said they had studied grammar by the time they took the 2005 SAT.

"Those concerns, and a growing consensus among scholars that many high school graduates 'can't write well enough to get a passing grade from a professor on a paper,' drove the addition of a third section to the SAT, upending decades of balance between reading and math, said Ed Hardin, a content specialist at the College Board.

"The new section introduced a long-form essay and -- less publicized -- a series of multiple-choice responses that test how well students can assemble and disassemble sentences."

The full article is here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/22/AR2006102201135.html

Brief e-mail from Chiara

Chiara wrote to say that she loves her new college life in Milan. She didn't share any details, unfortunately (e-mail being her least favorite conversational medium). I'll track her down and provide more info as I get it.

Nonconformists?

I'm an emo kid, nonconforming as can be

You'd be nonconforming too if you looked just like me

"The Emo Song"

Traffic was really bad when I drove home from work yesterday, so I cut over to a side street once I reached Everett. There was a pack of teenagers strolling down the middle of the road. There were five or six of them, girls and boys, all dressed in black, with black hair, piercings, tattoos, studs on their clothing, etc. Real badasses. They stayed in the middle of the road even as I came up close to them, then grudgingly moved aside (gray vans winning out over black Vans any day of the week).

They all looked over at me, no doubt expecting to see irritation or even an angry gesture or two. Instead, I was grinning like a fool. They were so cute!!!

On their way

MJ and her friend Kyla are on their way to San Diego for some fun in the sun with Papa Bill and Renée, Aunt Lynn, Artie and Colin, and, of course, Brody-the-Airedale. It's MJ's first time flying without a parent. She's pretty excited.

They don't have firm plans yet for what they'll do. Evidently the weather is fabulous down there, so just about anything will be a treat. There's been talk of the zoo, the beach, and maybe Dizzyland (as Papa Bill calls it).

Star of saddle and screen...

MJ had a long work day at Hope for Horses today. The organization is being featured in an upcoming documentary about a much publicized bestiality case that occurred here in Seattle in the summer of 2005 (a man died after having sex with a horse). The horse ended up with HFH and was eventually placed with a family up in Bellingham who have a 14yo daughter. Bellingham isn't real convenient, so the film crew used one of the local HFH horses as a stand-in for the horse/victim. For the 14yo girl, they used (you guessed it) MJ!

They started setting up about 1 and filmed until nearly dark. Chloe and I went to watch the tail end of it (no pun intended). It was very cool. The crew would set up the shot, then the director would say, "Sound on. Camera on. Aaaand... MJ, action!"

I think MJ had a really good time (aside from getting a little saddle-sore), but Pete, the stand-in horse, was pretty fed up with all the rigmarole. Saddle on, saddle off, move him here, move him there. It was nice, though: You'd see him getting irritated, but then MJ would talk to him and his eyes would go all soft again. Those critters really adore her.

The movie itself will be, er, interesting. They are evidently giving equal time to the people who think bestiality is okay. Here are a couple of write-ups I found on the Web:

Documentary Filmmakers to Tackle Enumclaw Horse Case

The crew is hoping to get the film ready for Sundance 2007.

Improvements all around

Marty is doing really well. He had a doctor's appointment Monday. Doc says, whatever they're doing, they should keep doing! The difference in Marty between last Tuesday at the nursing home and this Tuesday at Judy's is HUGE. The doctor said he doesn't need to see him again until December. Yay!

Sooo... Frank is coming home. Another yay! We miss him a lot. He'll be back a week from tomorrow. Cheaper fares then, and he'd like some time with his dad knowing it's just a visit and not a good-bye.

I made major handoffs today for the two major (ridiculously scheduled) projects I was working on. I feel light as a feather now! I'm down to one full-time job instead of three! Yet another yay! After nearly 5 months of being buried, this feels really good.

New passions

A while back, I posted a list of things we proselytize about. Here are some new additions:

14. Heroes. Monday nights on NBC, repeats Fridays on Sci-Fi. This comic-book-as-a-TV-series show has us totally captivated, especially the Japanese character, Hiro. If you want to join in the fun, NBC will be re-running episodes 2 through 4 in the Sunday Night Football slot starting Oct. 22. (They can't show football during World Series games.) Things are getting really interesting.

15. Manga, manga, manga. See previous post. Ties in nicely to #14 above.

The original list is archived here: June 2006 (June 10th).

Chloe manga

After years of frustration with her drawing skills, Chloe has found a style that suits her to a T. Here are a couple of her wonderful new manga* characters.

* Manga: Japanese-style comic-book art


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Good news from New Orleans

Marty moved home to Judy's Tuesday (the same day Frank arrived), and he is doing SO much better there. He had pretty significant all-over swelling that is way down now, and he's off the pain medications they had him on. The result is that he feels better and is much more alert.

The alertness is probably the biggest, happiest improvement. He had been sleeping virtually all day and had to be shaken awake at mealtimes and so on. But last night he seemed to shrug off the last effects of the pain meds. Judy was out, so Marty, Frank, and Gary had boys' night and stayed up until midnight eating and shooting the breeze. For the first time in months, Marty asked about his money situation (something he checked in on regularly before the stroke), cracked jokes, and seemed to really tune into life. And today, he took only a couple of small naps and showed signs that his so-called incontinence was more a factor of the inattentiveness of the nursing home staff than a real condition.

Frank is very pleased with the physical/occupational therapy Marty is getting. The therapists actually get him on his feet, despite the weakness/immobility of his right side. This contributes greatly to his feeling of self-reliance and dignity.

The news is not all good, unfortunately. His short-term memory is definitely impaired: he has to be told daily where he is and why, and he didn't remember much of last night's conversation today. Also, we don't know the status of his kidneys; he has a doctor's appointment on Monday that we hope will tell us more.

Keep a good thought!

Frank's report on Marty

Marty's kidneys seem to be failing, so Frank has flown down to New Orleans to have a visit and help out. Here's a snippet from the e-mail he sent to us this morning:

"Got Dad to Judy’s yesterday afternoon. He slept well and had breakfast and is now in the shower. Nurse/assistant seems nice and is taking good care of him. He seems pretty alert to me. In the wheelchair but mobile in that context. Physically he’s shaky and has right-side pain but does have some mobility of his right arm. Mentally he seems just about as 'there' as he used to be. Sleeping frequently. We watched some Law&Order after he got home and he followed it as far as I could tell."

The girls and I are bach'ing it, which is going to take some juggling since I've got 5 due dates in the next couple of weeks. MJ leaves for her San Diego trip with unschooling pal Kyla in a week, so she at least will be well entertained then.

Please welcome Lila!

Emma and Ella have a new sister! Lila Elita Jean was born at 4:16 Saturday morning. She was 9 lbs., 6 ounces, has lovely dark hair and eyebrows, and is sweet and calm. Mom Erin and Dad Erik were both troupers (Mom through labor and delivery and Dad through a nasty bout of food poisoning).

In addition to her immediate family, Lila's arrival was attended by her aunties Megan, Denise, and Ronnie, and cousins MJ, Chloe, Chelsea, and Megan. The livingroom was a bit crowded, but it was sure a special time!

Blog neglect

I know, I know, no posts in weeks. Sorry! September is always a busy month for us, usually with at least one birthday party each weekend. This September has been even crazier because I had a big deadline last Thursday. I made my deadline, but that's about it for my news because I've spent so much time at work.

MJ and Chloe have been quite the social butterflies. In addition to all the birthday parties, they've had a couple of get-togethers with some of the kids from Not Back to School Camp. They spent one afternoon in Seattle, first in the University district and then downtown at the new library and beyond. There was a pack of about 12 of them, and they ended up having so much fun together that they organized an impromptu slumber party at one boy's house (a boy who obviously has very accommodating parents). That was so much fun that MJ and Chloe invited several kids over here for a sleepover the next week. It ended up being 5 girls and one outnumbered-and-loving-it boy.

As you can see, we have definitely entered the teen years. It's going to be fascinating.

Perhaps because of all this new exposure to other kids, we've had two different colds hit various family members this month. I got both of them, of course. Fortunately, the second one didn't attack until after my deadline.

Frank has been working pretty consistently, doing a second pass on all the files they threw at him so hurriedly in order to make one of their legally mandated milestones. But he's finished that now, so he should get a couple weeks of getting paid for being on call. I'm sure the girls wouldn't mind a tad bit more attention.

MJ continues her work at Hope for Horses. She got to be one of the bosses the day 30 or so Microsoft employees showed up at the barn for the Microsoft/United Way Day of Caring. Also, HFH is gearing up for their annual fundraiser auction, so she helped put together the packets and invites for that. She plans to work the auction, so we went to our favorite thrift store to find appropriate attire for an event at Bellevue's swank Meydenbauer Center. Mom and daughter disagree just a bit about what "appropriate" means. I found her this gorgeous, 100% silk Georgiou dress that looks fabulous on her -- the steal of the century at $5 -- but she thinks it's too boring. She prefers a cute spaghetti-strap number in blue (that I think is a bit casual). Her opinion will no doubt rule the day.

That thrift store is so fun! The three of us spent about $70 total and ended up with six dresses, a skirt, a jacket, and several shirts between us. All like new. Love it!

As you might have noticed, Chloe has not returned to Summerhill. In late August, she started expressing serious reservations about going back. We had a number of conversations about it, and Frank and I shared our best advice ("Go back"), but ultimately she decided that the good times she had there didn't outweigh her loneliness and boredom and some things about the school that made us all uncomfortable. (Here, I'll just say there was an incident that left us with serious doubts about the headmistress' competence. If you want the gossip, send me an e-mail.)

So, we have our daughter back. We felt compelled to advise her to go back, but Frank and I couldn't be happier that she ignored our advice! :-) She's been filling her time with the usual Chloe Variety Pack, but the last week or so has been devoted to watching over a hundred episodes of Inuyasha (anime) on YouTube. She is quite excited about it and now wants to learn Japanese. She's already putting together a bit of vocabulary, just from reading subtitles. The series is set in feudal Japan, so we've made some neat connections to other video ("Shogun" especially) and Dad's sword-based Japanese martial arts.

She's also conducting a bit of an experiment on herself. All this Inuyasha watching has taken place mostly at night, so she's started charting her sleep hours to see if her body runs on a 24-hour clock or not.

Anyway, all is well at our house (except maybe our upper respiratory systems).

Big news from New Orleans

Judy and Gary are engaged!!!!

No date has been set yet.

Happy Birthdays

To Gabrielle yesterday (12)
To MJ, Pam, and Judy today (14 and never you mind)
To Madison tomorrow (8)

The latest on Marty

Judy says:

"We're not real happy with the nursing home. It seems that another nursing home wouldn't be any better. We're VERY seriously considering taking him home once he's done with therapy. I need a little more info on what Medicare will cover and we need to see if we need to make some modifications to the house... I'm just not comfortable with him there & Gary has been very unhappy with their performance even with us going every day & keeping on them about stuff."

We'll keep you posted.

MJ the college student

We enrolled MJ in a drawing class at the community college today. Art 100. At the end of Fall term, she'll have her first two college credits. Not too shabby for a 14-year-old, eh?

Unschooling and allowance and math

Each of my kids gets an allowance. The amount has varied some over the years. Right now, they each get $10 per week. They don't have to do anything to earn that money; it's simply their share of the family income. (And when you think of it that way, $10 per week is not so much!)

The idea is that having money to spend will help them learn how to spend money. I think having a relatively generous allowance gives them more room to learn. I mean, about all you learn when all you have is $2 is that $2 doesn't buy much! At the level they're at, they can actually buy something now and then. They get practice choosing between desired items and saving for more expensive items (without being completely discouraged about how long it's taking), and they are learning how to make a dollar stretch.

The other area that this ready money addresses is math. Every time they go shopping anywhere, they get some math practice. They don't think of it that way -- they're just shopping -- but math happens anyway. Without teaching, they can figure percentages, estimate totals, multiply prices by quantities (or, in Chloe's case, add all those like prices together impressively quickly), and so on. This real life math is natural to them, stress free and practical. It's a far cry from the "I hate math" comments we were hearing when they were in school.

In fact, for most of us, it is only in school that math is something separate. The reality is that math is as much a part of everyday life as reading, writing, and speaking. Here's something I wrote recently about math in our lives:

"I've noticed quite a bit of math going on in our house lately, but I'm probably the only one who characterized it as such. My daughters were figuring out how many of these, estimating how much of that, playing with a new calculator, figuring a tip, calculating how many dollars this many [British] pounds is, measuring each other for their passport applications and talking about converting inches to feet, noticing patterns in some fractions, figuring out which new cage would give the rats the most floor area, asking questions about sales tax percentages, figuring out how many notebooks they could get for so many dollars at Target's 10-notebooks-for-a-dollar sale and how many pages that would be at 70 pages per notebook, and so on. They did all of this in a very matter-of-fact way: I need or want this information, and I'm going to figure it out. It's not 'math' to them, it's just taking care of business."

And how does all this translate to the math-on-paper skills the schools hope (but so often fail) to impart? Very well, actually. Neither girl has plans at the moment for going back to our lovely public schools, but I have every confidence they could slide back into the school flow with their former classmates without any difficulty. Except perhaps extreme boredom! ;-)

Artist Trading Cards

MJ has started making Artist Trading Cards. These are baseball card-sized pieces of art that can be collected, traded, or given away as a friendly sort of business card (title and artist information goes on the back). The content is as varied as the artists who create them.

Here are four of MJ's creations, our mutual favorites:





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To my Republican readers

I would be curious to know if your continuing support of the Republican party (meaning the more traditional, small-government, fiscally conservative Republican party) extends to Bush and his cronies. The speech linked below, delivered by Salt Lake City's mayor on the occasion of Bush's visit there, outlines several of the reasons that I, even if I were Republican, would find that particular group of people beyond tolerance.

I am aware that parts of the speech are easy-to-spout one-liners, especially near the end, but the middle part -- where he's describing the deliberate misinformation that led us into the war in Iraq -- outlines some of why I consider GW terrifyingly incompetent at best and a traitor and criminal at worst.

I am truly puzzled about why anyone would support him after all that. It's one thing to be determined to continue to vote Republican, whether due to concerns over a particular issue or because of a lifelong affiliation with the party, but why support Bush, Cheney, Rice, Rumsfeld in spite of their clear failings?

Here's the speech: http://www.slcgov.com/mayor/speeches/2006%20speeches/SPdemonstration83006.pdf