Public Enemy (Grade) 1

I have probably mentioned that my daughter has possibly more than the standard allotment of personality. As my son is fond of saying (when he’s not shrieking her name at jet-takeoff decibels), “Dad, she’s a rascal, dad.” He has in some ways keen powers of observation, but you don’t have to watch her for long to figure out – if not how her mind works, exactly, definitely toward what end.

The first weekend after she started kindergarten, we received a phone call from her teacher. When she identified herself, my heart sank and I immediately imagined all sorts of issues my girl had gotten into in her three-day educational career. But the teacher immediately put my mind at ease: “She’s already become quite a leader. Some of the other kids are timid about trying new things, but when they see that she’s willing to try anything, it puts them at ease.” So I was relieved and only a bit surprised to find she was using her superpowers for good, rather than for evil.

Since then, the teacher reports have been generally quite glowing… although there have been the occasional incidents of Interpersonal Clash (I may have mentioned as well that she is a junior member of the International Society of Frequently Wrong, But Never In Doubt). In any case, we always experience that delightful jolt of uncertainty when it’s the teacher on the phone – as was the case last week.

This time it was not a plaudit, but instead the news that she had been overheard using… colorful language. It would be impolite of me to specify the color, but suffice it to say it was not a word from her spelling list, not to mention one she hadn’t encountered at home.

And yes, I know that’s what they all say, but although all of us in the house are capable of expressing ourselves with force and clarity, I can say with some assurance that she didn’t hear it here, or at the church.

The teacher hastened to add that she had had a visit with the principal and that she seemed visibly and almost violently remorseful. This is as good a time as any to mention that, especially as former teachers, my wife & I make a practice of backing the teacher to the hilt; we told her that we appreciated her dealing with this swiftly and firmly (this is not a girl, if I have not already made this clear, who does well with a long leash).

When she got home, I waited to see if she’d betray any hint of her ordeal, but when her lips (for once) seemed sealed, I confronted her directly with the Stern, Solemn Talk. I told her that these were not words that she learned or heard or would be permitted to use at home, and that we expected her to behave in a respectful and correct way at all times. I impressed on her the embarrassment attached to going to the principal and having the teacher call home; I know she’s sensitive to being embarrassed. She told me that she was just “repeating” the words – which apparently doesn’t count as “saying” the words – and that she wouldn’t do it again.

When mom arrived, we went through the drill once more – this time with a trifle more, um… emphasis. And this time she revealed something I didn’t know: not only had she employed the word I’d already heard (a relatively junior officer in the Colorful Language Army), but had in fact let loose with the Head Honcho, the dreaded F-bomb. In fact, to prove it, she set one off right then & there in the living room.

My wife was looking at my face when our 6-year-old girl launched it, and she said the color completely drained from me. I have to admit, that was a milestone experience for me, and not in the best possible sense.

Well, washing her mouth out with Clorox seemed inadvisable, so we had to settle for a just-short-of-unhinged lecture and withdrawal of Electronic Privileges (Game Boy, videos, CD player) for one week. And as we all know, there are few more stringent sentences in the modern world than to be unplugged.

I’d like to think that for a normal kid, that would’ve been the end of the story. But in the midst of this, she also slipped in, “By the way, dad, you need to send in money for my cafeteria account.” I knew I’d just sent in money recently, and she’d brought her lunch every day since, so I couldn’t imagine what had happened. I quizzed her: “You’re just getting milk every day – right?” “Yeah, dad, just milk!” When I looked at the check register, I realized I’d sent in $10 one week prior. All I could figure is that maybe the check didn’t make it all the way to be deposited somehow, so I grabbed the phone book to look up the bank’s 800-number so I could find out whether it had cleared.

That’s when she said, “Um, dad, I think I need to tell you the truth about something.” She had been buying a lunch every day, in addition to bringing a lunch with her. I asked her why; was it to be cool or like the other kids? “No, I just like it.”

So in addition to her Electronic Grounding, she also was lunch-grounded the same day: her account was closed, and she was told all she could buy for the rest of the school year was white milk.

Seeing how much she’s testing our parental ingenuity at age 6, it seems to me like I ought to go on amazon.com or eBay or some such place and find out what it takes to pick up an electronic monitoring ankle bracelet. Ought to come in handy right about 2nd grade.

M Is for...

In American culture, there are all sorts of traditions around Mother's Day. For those of us in geographical proximity to mom, brunch seems quite common, and the local restaurants oblige with high-priced spreads (I saw one place that advertised Mother's Day Brunch and Drink Specials, just in case your family tradition includes getting Mom hammered). Hallmark, of course, is founded upon this kind of occasion -- and it's important to go for the real thing. If you send Mom an American Greetings card, all you're doing is saving yourself the ink for writing inside, "Hi Mom, I threw this in the cart while I was at the grocery store!" And if you use one of the "funny" American Greetings, you weren't at the grocery store, you were at the dollar store (Don't even get me started on those 99-cent cards... which send the clear message: "You haven't changed my old bedroom into an office yet, have you, mom??").

When in doubt, go for Hallmark: the ones that are about as big as a manila envelope, with a flower on the front and that translucent "cover page" on the front. If it has a paper insert inside the card with the words printed on it, so much the better.

Anyway, those of us in the church will recognize another Mother's Day tradition: the mom-centered anthem (this was not quite what I had in mind, but apparently it was for Google). They are usually, let's say, not quite as musically exemplary as the anthems for the week before and the week after. This year's selection here was probably a cut above the average: Honor Thy Father andThy Mother, from a composer I generally enjoy.

It got me thinking about what that phrase -- well, it's not just a "phrase", I guess -- really means. Obviously first it means exactly what the casual reader would suppose: be respectful to your parents. Treat them with honor, and even assume that they know what they're talking about (this is one I'd especially like to impress on my daughter; her default response when I say anything factual to her is "No!" This is age 6, so I'm not really looking forward to 14 or so). Twain said it a long time ago... or maybe not.

But especially for those of us who have gotten past the Teenage Retort stage, I think there's a wider view: honoring your parents also means bringing honor to the name they passed on to you, making sure that the way you live your life and the decisions you make reflect well on them -- even if they're not really getting the credit/blame any more.

And even if you can't fit it into a manila envelope.

Face the Virtual Nation

Some time back, I mentioned to my niece -- as I have to virtually every living creature I encounter -- that I was writing a blog (this was way back when I was actually, you know, posting something once in awhile). She said, "Oh, on your MySpace page?"

I had to admit that I didn't have a MySpace page; I didn't add that I felt I was being pretty hip just to have a blog. Now, I'm not going to beat into the ground the extent of my non-hipitude; I've been over that ground before and it may fall pretty well into the dog-bites-man category anyway. But I've always been at least a wee bit (sometimes less wee) behind the times, even on techie-related stuff. I'm certainly not a rusher-into-things by nature.

I had actually been thinking a bit about Twitter recently. You can't turn on the TV or pick up a magazine without encountering a Twitter reference -- even the sports mags are talking about who's Tweeting (and sometimes when). And it did kind of appeal to me because there are times I have something brief I'd like to say; it doesn't seem quite like a whole blog post, but it would be nice to put it out somewhere (usually it's a joke or maybe something that strikes me weird on TV or in the newspaper).

Still, I was kind of waiting it out; I wasn't sure if I could keep two Webby things going and I was a little worried about that little touch of OCD I have: would I be Tweeting every hour on the hour?

As I pondered, I got a comment right here on this blog from a friend I hadn't heard from in 25 years. I wanted to contact her back and catch up, so I googled her & discovered she had a Facebook page. Well, since Facebook has more or less been supplanted by Twitter in the public consciousness (I'm sure that Entertainment Weekly would call it "5 Minutes Ago"), that really makes it right up my alley.

So I got myself a Facebook page and started hunting down people from my life both past and present. One of the really difficult aspects of Facebook, especially when you're a newcomer, is that you have to ask people to add you as a friend, and then wait to see if they do. I made sure to add a little personal message, in some cases almost a "hey, I'm not really stalking you" kind of vibe. Nevertheless, sometimes you don't hear back so you have to ask yourself: did they decide to Ignore me, or are they just not very active users?

Then after I connected with a few people from college, I started to hear from their friends -- often people I'd recognize, but not necessarily close friends even back in the day. Then I was on the responding side and had to decide: do I accept people I don't have a close connection with? It was a lot like going to a reunion and trying to decide where to sit.

On the other hand, at the reunion, if I sit down I'm obligated to make small talk... in the online reunion, we've essentially all agreed that we'll eavesdrop on each other but we don't necessarily need to speak directly to each other. So sure, if you want to listen to me on those terms, come on aboard! And I quickly realized as well that I could potentially pick up a few new readers for the blog.

The bad news: I'm every bit as compulsive about checking my page as I feared I was going to be. Several times a day, most days, I check to see if anyone's posted something of interest, or has commented on one of my Major Pronouncements. It's a little like hanging around the ballfield waiting to be picked; at least I can't see anyone else's home page and discover they've hidden my posts.

I suspect I've probably repurposed a few of my formerly blog-dedicated brain cells (although not to tremendous benefit so far -- I'm not sure I've really advanced the cause of online literature with my contributions to date). But you know I'll keep trying to find the groove; first of all, I'm a sucker for connecting with my past, and the majority of my Friends so far come from my prior experiences. But mostly it's another chance, just like this is, to talk and hope that someone out there is actually listening.