A Week with James

This past week, my sister Jessica took care of James as it is childcare vacation week, but both Kelley and I had to work. She wrote this post about her time with James and graciously agreed to let us use it as a guest blog entry. Thank you, Aunt Jessica!  

The 25 things I learned during my week on James Patrol:

1) Pushing a toy train around a circular track for hours on end is actually pretty Zen, as is digging a hole and filling it in, over and over and over again.

2) I do, in fact, lift from the knees - my legs are killing me from carrying James all week but my back is totally fine.

3) Speaking of carrying James, it turns out that a sprained elbow from a high school injury has the habit of flaring up again, 20 years later, if you spend the week carrying a child.

4) Playing with James' hair or driving him around after a few hours of stimulus, is a sure fire way to get him to go to sleep - sometimes mid sentence. "Aunt Jessica, did you see that dig-zzzzzzzzz"

5) Pushing a stroller with a two (almost three) year old in it for two miles is a lot harder then just walking (or even running) that same two miles.

6) The Faneuil Branch of the Boston Public Library doesn't open until noon on Tuesdays.

7) Grilled American cheese sandwiches are quite possibly the most amazing things ever invented...no, I don't care that American cheese isn't a real food.

8) Thomas and Friends is actually rather entertaining, with some truly catchy tunes that will stay with you for hours and hours and hours.

9) A two (almost three) year old can be solidly distracted by play-doh, bubbles, pink & white, Thomas, trains, and of course, diggers.

10) The Boston Road Crews (the ones who trim the trees from the power lines), and the garbage men of the city are either super friendly, or all have little ones at home because I honestly don't think we passed a single city employee during the whole week who didn't take a second to wave to James.

11) The Children's Museum is exactly as much fun as I remember it to be.

12) The children of Boston, and their parents, are incredibly sweet, well behaved and conscientious of the other children around them...or at least the ones who were at The Children's Museum on Wednesday were.

13) It turns out a two (almost three) year old boy is fascinated by all manner of bodily functions - pee, poo, toot, burp, you name it - it's all awesome and hilarious to the child.

14) A water/sand table is pretty fun, not just for a two (almost three) year old.

15) Grapes are better when cut in half and shared with a nephew.

16) Boynton books are awesome but so are a whole bunch of other board books like THE LITTLE BLUE TRUCK and SHEEP IN A SHOP.

17) Two (almost three) year olds can be incredibly bossy and particular...oh, and did I mention destructive, but they can also be the cutest thing on the planet - painfully, adorable - truly.

18) It's super fun to say things around a two (almost three) year old just to see if he'll mimic you in his adorable voice. There is nothing quite so hilarious as hearing something like "you can't handle the truth" or "these aren't the droids you're looking for" or "no power in the 'verse can stop me" out of that adorable and endearing chirp of a voice.

19) If you put down a paper-tape track through the house with the intention of the two (almost three) year old using it to drive his cars around in a circle, know that it will never be used for that intended purpose and instead you will find yourself running around the track in a circle being chased by said two (almost three) year old for a good hour at least - the good thing is that you will not need to do your scheduled 4 mile run that day.

20) There is no limit to the energy of the two (almost three) year old, but a 40 (almost 41) year old runs out of steam about 2 hours into the day.

21) You can, in fact, get a two (almost three) year old to bake his own birthday cupcakes, as long as decorating the cupcakes once they're cool is in the offing.

22) Magic words are real once the two (almost three) year old realizes that nothing will happen without the most magic word of them all - "please".

23) The two (almost three) year old is a booger making factory. Seriously, if we could harness that power from all the two (almost three) year olds in the world I think we could end this country's dependence on foreign oil.

24) Time runs differently when caring for a two (almost three) year old. In fact, I wonder if there's some sort of worm hole surrounding the little ones that actually changes the laws of physics - have we discovered the true fluidic space?

25) ...which leads me to the fact that caring for a two (almost three) year old for a week is a level of chaos that I couldn't have fully understood until today. Bravo to the mommies and daddies and day care workers and babysitters, the grandmas and grandpas and aunties and uncles who do this on a regular basis. I tip my hat to you all and, though I don't plan to have any myself, I completely agree that there is nothing quite so indescribably wonderful as hearing "I love you, Aunt Jessica" from that sweet and marvelous little boy.

Jessica Ammirati is a director and doula extraordinaire who lives in Brooklyn, NY. The founder of Going To Tahiti Productions, you can find her regular blog posts for GTTP at http://goingtotahitiproductions.com/blog/. 

Come for the Spanish, Stay for the Love

Part of what sets
Pine Village apart:  co-founders
Brid and Emma

A few weeks ago, I joined PVP’s Enrollment Director Kendra Bucklin at Back Bay’s Kingsley Montessori Meet the Schools Night. One of the questions that a prospective parent asked me was, What sets Pine Village apart from all the other schools out there? For someone who can go on for hours about "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" (don’t ask; truly; hours is not an exaggeration), you’d think that I could have been a bit more articulate about a place I love sooooo much when asked that question. And yet I have to admit, I kind of bumbled my way through it.

I mean, of course I talked about the bilingual/Spanish part. That’s a given. And after a minute or so of babbling the kinds of clichés that any other high-quality preschool could babble, I did finally say that, upon learning that we were pregnant with kid #3 after kids #s 1 and 2 were well out of Pine Village, one of my first thoughts was: thank goodness, we get to go through Pine Village again. But I’m not entirely proud of my performance with that particular parent. And I was grateful for Kendra who stepped in and rescued the entire conversation.

Several minutes after the parent left the table, seeing that I was still ruminating on my not-so-great showing, Kendra very nicely didn’t mention how tongue-tied I’d been, but instead said something that has stuck in my head for these last several weeks: “Families come for the Spanish, but they stay for the love.”

Will and me

Our story is slightly different. We didn’t choose Pine Village specifically for the Spanish. Although we loved the idea of a bilingual preschool – and some day I’ll be happy to go on about the long-term benefits for our kids, now respectively eight and five years later – what struck us about Pine Village from the start was exactly what Kendra said: the love.

Not that there aren’t preschools out there that don’t share a similar philosophy. Not every place is a nameless, faceless corporate monolith. And, o.k., yes (she begrudgingly said), even the nameless, faceless monoliths have amazing teachers and staff and are overflowing with love. 

But I can’t help it; Pine Village is different. For us it always has been. And although I still have a problem fully articulating why – it’s hard to translate that gut-busting, warmth that spreads deep inside whenever I see my kids in the Pine Village environment into words – this weekend I was reminded a little bit as Will (i.e., kid #2) and I walked with Pine Village in the Boston Pride Parade.

This was the first time that our family has had a chance to participate. I’m not sure where we’ve been for all these years, but we do travel a lot, so it’s not always easy for us to do the weekend stuff. Since I’ve been working more closely with Pine Village over the last few months, though – and since I haven’t had a chance to partake in a lot of the other events that PVP has been represented at over that time – I really wanted to share in the experience. And what an experience it was.

The Pine Village Crew

There’s something about walking through the streets with thousands of people cheering you on that brings a smile even to the surliest of faces. And, well, Will can most definitely be on the surly side; it’s been known to happen enough that I have a whole series of photos of Will sulking his way through various landmarks – Monticello, Four Corners…

Luckily, the surliness isn’t usually part of what Will shows the public for the most part; that is mostly reserved for those of us on the homefront. But knowing this other side of him exists and seeing it are two entirely different things. Watching Will scoot his way from side to side of the parade route, seeking out kids to give stickers and seed packets to, was, well, gut-busting and warmth-spreading. If I hadn’t been so focused on not tripping and falling on my face in front of the crowds, I might even have cried a little. (O.k., so maybe I did. Cry that is.)

Beacon: the final stretch

But what also made me smile was knowing that I was marching with an organization – a preschool – that doesn’t only talk the talk, it walks the walk. (Literally. I clocked 19,000+ steps!) And it’s been doing so for years. Long before it was fashionable – for ten years, to be precise – Pine Village has been marching in the Pride Parade. It was the first preschool and toddler program to do so, and it’s been doing so each year, ever since. More importantly, it’s been preaching – and carrying through – the message of acceptance for all families – regardless of family makeup, regardless of background, regardless of just about anything else you can think of – since day one.

So, yes, Pine Village is definitely about the Spanish. It is a Spanish immersion program, after all. But what is also infused through every moment, action, and its very existence, is the love. Every family, every child, every day.

Lockdown

James (2), watching for helicopters
outside our window

So, apparently, I spoke too soon. Remember last week how I said my family wasn’t directly affected by the events of the week?

On Friday morning we woke up to a phone call at 6:08 a.m. Early morning phone calls are rarely good, and my heart was pounding a little as I listened to the caller i.d.

City of Boston? On school vacation week? That was… odd. I had James, though, so my husband answered it – or listened to it rather – and he gave me the overview: bombing suspect had been involved in the MIT shoot-out the night before, was suspected of being in Watertown… And he was going to take a shower. (He meaning my husband, of course, not the suspect.)

Um, o.k., I thought. Thanks City of Boston for the update. I went back to sleep.


Ten minutes later, the phone rang again. This time it was Boston Public Schools and I’m not sure if they gave more detail, if I was more receptive to it than my husband was, or if it was just that by that time we were more awake. Because, well, Watertown was shut down, no cars in or out? Allston-Brighton was on lockdown? What exactly did that all mean? With plans to go to visit my parents in Connecticut for the day, it was an odd experience to call my mother to say that we wouldn’t be there later in the morning because we weren’t allowed to leave the house. Our house, you see, is on the edge of Brighton. On the Brighton/Watertown line, to be specific. The Black Hawk helicopters everyone was seeing on the news? I was seeing them out my bedroom window.

Once again, Facebook came in handy. With Will (10) in the living room watching Netflix, turning on the news wasn’t an option. And ironically, to begin with, I got more information from friends and family across the country who were watching the news than I was getting at home. Thanks to a friend in Ohio, I was able to get the link to the Boston Police scanner channel and get a better understanding of what was happening for a little while. (And let me tell you, listening to them talk about addresses that I could practically see from my house – to see the command center set up in the parking lot of the Target I go to pretty much ever week, or the reporters talking from the intersection I drive through every day to pick up James from daycare – is a strange and surreal thing.) When that no longer worked, another friend posted a link to a TV station’s website that was running live updates along and live-streaming their newscast along with closed captioning – again a necessity with the kids around.

And what about the kids themselves? Will, as noted above, watched Netflix all day. In fact, he wasn’t even aware that we were "sheltering in place" until Saturday morning, after the events of the previous day were well over. For most of the day, I couldn’t tell if he knew something was going on but had gotten away with watching thirteen hours straight of TV so he wasn’t going to say anything until we did, or if he was truly so wrapped up in his show that he was entirely clueless. (It turned out to be the latter, giving me new insight as to why we have to tell him something nine times before he finally acknowledges that we’re talking to him.)

James, at two, couldn’t have cared less. In fact, he actually handled being cooped up in the house better than I expected. His favorite part was to watch the “big, fat helicopters” (presumably big and fat because they were flying so low and close to our house). It wasn’t until about twenty minutes until bedtime that it was clear that he’d had it. For the most part, however, he was content to just hang out with everyone and to run around. Being allowed to play ball inside the living room, was icing on the cake.

Of the three kids, Lucy, at 12-going-on-13 (literally; her birthday was that very day) was the toughest. She had a friend sleeping over, which was a Godsend for all of us as Maeve provided enough of a buffer for the others to keep them from turning on each other or on us. And I have to say, that the two of them held it together for most of the day. (Although, after telling them what was going on when they ventured downstairs in the morning, Lucy did say, “Well, that’s a lot to wake up to.”) Maeve mostly read her Kindle until her mom broke lockdown to come get her, and Lucy played games on her computer and watched YouTube. It being her birthday, we opened presents (although, unfortunately, I had not purchased any DVDs for her, which would have been an excellent distraction) and ate birthday cake, all along trying not to think about what was going on out in the world on her 13th birthday.

All in all, for as strange as the day was, it wasn’t really that much stranger than the rest of the week. And although I saw several people on Facebook question the difference between “lockdown” and “martial law,” I can certainly say that knowing the strength of the law enforcement presence was more reassuring than frightening. In fact, although I was restless – o.k., and pretty much useless (as my husband will attest) all day – it wasn’t scary. The first time I felt that fluttery panicky feeling was about three minutes after they lifted the lockdown. Because if they didn’t find him in the neighborhood right around the corner from me in broad daylight, and if he were hiding out in some nook or cranny (or, as it turned out, boat), then all I could envision was him making a run for it and ending up in my backyard – or coming in through our back door – and then everything would change.

But that’s what it comes down do, doesn’t it? Everything didn’t change; not for us, at least. It’s been a scary and surreal week, one that I’d prefer not to repeat. In some ways, even, it’s been uplifting – before Monday, the idea of Boston Strong spreading around the world would have been, well, ludicrous. The traffic signs saying “We are one Boston” make me cry every time I see them. And I’ve never felt more of a Bostonian or prouder of my neighbors and city than I do today.

But when the suspect was finally captured, and the relief and rejoicing began, I couldn’t bring myself to join those posting something to the effect of “It’s over.” Because I don’t believe it is. I think about Oklahoma City, and London, and, of course, New York. And, yes, you can be damn sure that I think about Afghanistan, and Syria, and Iraq and Iran. I think about our children and the way of this world and am grateful that, on Friday night, I was able to put my kids to bed saying that the police did what I’ve raised my kids thinking police always would – they protected the public. They got the guys who did this. They were patient, and painstaking, and worked together as a team and didn’t give in to the pressure for more information (true or not), more action (justified or not), or more of anything other than what was needed to get the job done. I also know, however, that there are children out there for who this is not the case, who may grow up not feeling safe or loved or cared for. Who may not grow up, period.

So I will pray for Martin Richard and Lu Lingzi and Krstyle Campbell and Sean Collier. I will pray for their brothers and sisters, their mothers and fathers, for the families, friends, and communities who love them. I will pray for the nearly two hundred wounded in the Marathon bombings, for the recovery of their physical and mental and emotional beings. I will pray for the caregivers and the law enforcement and for each and every person who witnessed or experienced this day. I will pray for anyone anywhere in the world who has feared for or, worse, lost, a loved one be it in the name of peace or of war, whoever defines those terms. And I will pray that someday, there will be a generation of children who grow up and figure out a way to manage their differences in a way that doesn’t involve violence of any kind. Perhaps those children will be ours. 

Times Like These

This week’s blog post was supposed to be about books. I got a little heavy last week, so I thought that I’d lighten things up, go with the curriculum theme of the month, and focus on the books that James looks forward to every night. But, obviously, that isn’t exactly at the top of my mind today.

I wasn’t there on Monday; my family wasn’t affected. Not directly at least. But I’m not sure anyone in Boston – or who has ties to Boston, for that matter – can say that they’ve been unaffected. I’ve always loved the fact that Boston, despite its city-status, often feels like a small town. Downtown is navigable and familiar. The rest of the world may not think we’re the friendliest, but we tend to see people we know wherever we go.

What that means in a situation like this, of course, is that, if we weren’t there ourselves, then we know someone who was. And, in many cases, it’s not just that we have a friend who went to school with someone whose husband's college roommate was right there; it’s more that it was our neighbor’s friend. Our friend’s niece. The grad student who works for us. And although most of us are lucky enough to have enough distance to know that life will return to normalcy at some point in the not very distant future, for some of us that isn’t the case. The broken bits and pieces of my heart go out to those for whom it never will be. Our challenge as parents is to try and figure out how to reconcile that understanding with allowing our children to remain as unafraid as possible. For us to remain as unafraid as possible.

On Monday afternoon I was getting ready for Lucy’s birthday party, a slumber party with seven 13-(or-soon-to-be)-year-olds. Lucy wasn’t actually home because she’d gone into work with my husband, but 10-year-old Will was, as was his friend from across the street. I was midway through hanging streamers when I got a text from my sister asking if I was o.k. After a few furious texts back and forth, I got onto Facebook, which ended up being my news source for the rest of the day.

In a way I was grateful that I had a house full of kids – it kept me from, a) collapsing in tears on a regular basis, and, b) keeping the news on for the remainder of the day and night to catch whatever snippets of actual information I could. From the little I did see, it would have been an exercise in futility given that there was so little anyone could yet say.

After a frantic few minutes of trying to get in touch with my husband (just to confirm that he hadn’t on a whim taken Lucy into Boston to see the marathon) and then realizing that cell phone service was down, I posted on Facebook to let our family and friends know we’d been nowhere near downtown, and then spent the next two hours texting and talking to various members of my family to fully reassure.

What I didn’t do right away was tell Will because, well, I had no idea what to say despite the advice going around on various sites. I knew his first question would be about his teacher. (Remember his wonderful teacher Ms. Harmon that I talked about last week? As her whole class knew and was eagerly following, she was running that day). To be honest, when I finally got the opportunity to talk to him, I botched it pretty badly. And several days later, even though I know all of the steps I’m supposed to take, I’m still having a hard time figuring out how exactly I should handle this.

The good thing is that, for all of Will’s anxieties, this isn’t the kind of thing that scares him. And Lucy seems to have gotten my husband’s lack-of-worry genes. So I sit here reminding myself that, if Lucy asks me if she can go hang out in Harvard Square with her friends for a few hours, rather than say, you-are-never-leaving-the-house-again, my answer needs to be “yes.” And when Will asks me if we can go to the movies, my first response can’t be you-want-to-hang-out-in-a-crowded-movie-theater-during-April-vacation-week???? but instead, “what show do you want to see?” At the same time, last night, when Lucy started to argue with me that it wasn’t energy efficient for her to charge her cell phone every night, you can bet I pulled out the “I’m your mother and I say so; end of discussion” line.

We can’t live our lives in fear. That’s not something I want to pass on to my children.  What I do want to make sure they understand is that, although bad things happen, there’s good out there, too. Or, actually, maybe that’s something I need to remind myself of.

So I’ll try to forgo the news footage and the graphic photographs and instead focus on the stories of heroism and kindness that came to light. If that means I overdose in reading about the Yankees playing Sweet Caroline at their game the other night, so be it. (In some families it’s about race or religion; in my Yankees-fan, New York-based family, marrying a Red Sox fan – much less becoming one – was sacrilegious.)

But at the same time, I’m going to force myself to have the hard conversations with my husband and my kids. Who is the person we call if cell phones go down and we can’t reach each other? Where do we meet if, God forbid, something like this happens again and we can’t get to each other? Who picks up James, who picks up Will, and how to we track down Lucy if that’s what it really comes to?

Many years ago, Will and I pulled up to my mother-in-law’s house to pick up Lucy after school. Then-5-yr-old Will asked me if he could bring his Hot Wheels cars into the house while we waited for her to get her things together. If you can carry them, I answered, you can bring them. So he gathered ten or so into his arms and carefully walked up the path and into the house, murmuring to himself, Be strong. Be strong.

Be strong, Boston. I may be a transplant, but you’re still my home.

In a message sent out to Pine Village families on Monday, April 15, PVP co-founders Emma Lougheed and Brid Martin sent out the following message that we’d like to share here as well:

As we reflect on yesterday's horrors, we want to send all of our fellow Bostonians love and support during this unimaginable time. I know we are all weighted down with a sense of sadness for our city, and for all of our neighbors who have been personally affected.  The Pine Village community has tremendous strength and spirit and we ask you to please send your positive healing vibes to all of those who were tragically touched yesterday, and of course for peace.

The PV family is several hundred strong.  Many of you came to school this morning wishing to share your stories with us and asked us to share in helping you to protect and support our children through this complicated time.  We want you to know that the Pine Village staff is here for you in any way we are able to be.  Please talk with us and let's stick together as we reassure our children that they are safe and loved.

"There is more good than bad in this world. More light than darkness.  And YOU can make more light." 
Written for every child - Peter Reynolds 4/15/2013

Warmly, Emma and Brid

More information about helping kids of different ages deal with traumatic experiences can be found at http://www.nctsn.org/trauma-types/terrorism and http://www.psychiatry.org/mental-health/more-topics/coping-with-disasters.