How
do you handle your child's holiday giving? Because I am lost. I think
that up until about (some age) you tell the kid the list of people to
whom they should give gifts (which is sort of sadly correlated with
"people from whom they can expect gifts" but here we are), and you
discuss those people's interest, hobbies, etc., and then you take the
kid shopping. Or, even better, you make the kid create something for
each person. But this year I left Squire to his own devices and he did
nothing for anybody. Whoops.

I think it makes more sense in terms of the "spirit of giving" for
him to MAKE something, something personal. For the last couple years I
had Squire make the Christmas cards with his own sweet hands, and that
was his contribution to the gifties. But this year he didn't want to
make the cards himself, and I didn't want to stand over him screaming.
He also didn't want to just pick out gifts for me to buy and ship, nor
did he want to take credit even when he helped me pick, which I
appreciate in a way although it left him sort of stranded. I suggested
alternatives (draw a picture? write a letter?) but I feel like, dammit,
it's not MY GIFT. In retrospect I think I cut him loose too soon, but I
really don't know.

Understand that I am not talking about epic gift giving. I give
Christmas gifts to family only, for… well, complicated reasons. Of
course also there's the "husband who doesn't do Christmas" element to
consider. The man just doesn't. And what I "just doesn't" is pretend to
buy individual presents from other people. And why should I nudge a kid
when there's an adult in the house modeling the very behavior I'm
saying isn't okay? And why isn't it okay? (I know why I think it isn't,
and it's to do with "fairness" but really: if some people don't
celebrate a holiday, why do they have to give gifts to the people that
do celebrate that holiday, right?)…

So I dunno. All gifts this year that went outside our trio came
from me, and I signed them as being from the three of us. And now
Squire is in minor anguish because he didn't really send anything, and
he SHOULD be in anguish, in my opinion, because people sent him things.
I like to hope that this anguish will translate into him moving off his
butt next year and doing something for the people who do things for
him, but… am I supposed to be driving, still? Did I take my hands off
the wheel too soon?

Your thoughts?

SQUIRE: Hey Mom.
ME: Hey.
S: What are you doing?
ME: I'm talking to you.
S: You sound sad. Are you sad?
ME: No, I'm okay. A little tired.
S: Well you can be honest with me if you are sad like you sound sad,
and I think you do really sound sad for real. I trust this phone's
transmitting capabilities to the full extent of… to the hilt.
ME: I… I'm fine, sweet. I'll see you soon.
S: Your laugh sounds good, now.

For Easter we dyed a whole carton of eggs which white eggs are not always easy to find here but we found a whole carton of them and dyed them with fantastic colors and then ate one just to see of course and took the rest to the cottage and Saturday night the Easter Bunny who had had perhaps a bit too much of the stuff with the human face hid the eggs all around the inside of the cottage, had to hide them inside because there was a snowstorm outside, and left a note telling Squire he had to find all eleven (because 12 made – 1 eaten = 11 left; Easter Bunny does math real good!) before he could get any of the chocolate; Sunday morning he was hunting and hunting and only found nine, which is amazing, because the cottage is like 9×9 feet and nearly no furniture. How hard can it be to find 2 eggs? The Easter Bunny in mufti was counting on her fingers frantically: one in the coat pocket, one in the tool box, one in the… no, we found all those! So we all got dressed and the fire was tended to and glasses were donned and the eggs were hunted … but to no avail. Then Friar pointed out that a carton of eggs only has 10 in it here. HAD SQUIRE FOUND ALL THE EGGS? SHOW YOUR WORK.

Oh, my G-O-D!
I got no real I.D.
But I say that I got one
to pass through the agencies

But no one really knows
That I like CD’s
Like the rapping one’s
And the Hip-Hop one’s.

And then someone knows
that I got no RID
probably from the agencies
But it’s too late!
I passed those stupid agencies!
Into another country-ry-ry-ry…

And when I come home,
I see a little tree,
A little Christmas tree,
Standing all alone,
In my living room,
And then I know,
That my real place is
home-ome-ome.

clearly, it’s a poetic and somewhat metaphorical approach to the immigrant experience with an emphasis on the demands of paperwork, addressing the issues of identity and the definition of home in a culturally complex environment. right? or maybe he just wants to be sure we get a tree?

NIGHT 1
ME: Tonight, instead of arguing, let’s vote for which game we play.
FRIAR: Catan!
ME: Catan!
SQUIRE: I want to play Clue.
ME: But we voted.
SQUIRE: I don’t care.
[argue argue argue; we play Clue]

NIGHT 2
ME: Do you want to play Clue or Carcassone tonight?
SQUIRE: I want to play TransAmerica, it’s my favorite.
ME: But I offered Clue or Carcassone.
SQUIRE: [heavy sigh, with drama] I guess we’ll do what you want to do anyway.
ME: Well… I want to play a game.
[we play TransAmerica]

NIGHT 3:
ME: Okay, how about if you narrow it down to two games you want to play, and then we can choose one of those two.
SQUIRE: I don’t want to choose only two games. I want to choose five and then you choose one of those.
ME: O… kay?
SQUIRE: Catan, Carcassone, TransAmerica, Risk, or Clue!
ME: Any of those… I guess Catan or Carcassone.
FRIAR: Catan!
SQUIRE: I don’t want to play Catan.
[we play Clue and Carcassone]

Whereupon it was determined by me, who is tired of this Every Single Night, that games shall henceforth be played in alphabetical order. HA! It’s a very democratic approach the games, albeit not to the players. But it is more democratic than the dictatorship we were sliding into, and sometimes in a democracy we have to do things for the common good, and it’s to everybody’s benefit to not have a stupid argument over what game to play every. single. night. Amiright.

We had the quarter-year parent/teacher conference at Squire Tuck’s
school. BOY do I like his new teacher. She just does so many small
subtle things that I think are correct. Like she offered either
individual private consultations or she said she could talk to us as a
group. Offering to talk to us as a group says: We’re all adults here.
We’re all working on the team that wants our kids educated. This runs
circles around standing out in the hallway shifting our weight from one
foot to the other for one or two hours, wondering what the hell was
going on, and the teacher exhausted by the end. So we sat together and
we all heard about little Vaclav and little Martin and little I don’t
know, some other kids’ name that isn’t actually a kid in the class. And
then some parents stayed behind to talk about private concerns; I
stayed behind to tell her I appreciated her approach and how much
happier Squire was this year, and that I hoped she’d let us know if
there was anything we could be doing.

It’s always interesting to hear the parents’ side of the
story, isn’t it? You learn so much. The mother who is defending her
child’s behavior is the one whose kid is a bully. The one who is
surprised to hear that her kid is flailing is also the one who just had
a baby. I am the only parent with a notebook for writing down what the
teacher says, and I think at first that it is because one of my
superpowers is Preparedness! but then it may also be because I’m the
only one who can’t hold a thought in her head for more than 5 minutes
unless it’s printed in front of me. I wonder what correlation that will
be found between me and my kid, as I sit doodling in the margins of the
notebook I brought and listening to the other parents.

No, yeah, I get it.

Out of the nine boys in the class,
two have not yet been to the principal’s office for discipline
problems; one of them is our boy.The teacher says he’s in his own
world, and existing in that world keeps him from learning as much as he
could, but he’s not dragging anybody else away with him. It’s both good
and a little sad. The endless renderings of detailed spaceships, each
window perfect, hold him drifting in orbit away from grammar and
division; if he didn’t have a tutor 3x a week, I doubt he’d be pulling
in the Bs and Cs he’s getting now. But it seems to me that now he’s
doing this because the schoolwork is boring and he’d prefer to draw,
rather than because he is confused or because he needs the escape, so
it’s quite an improvement over last year. Baby steps, you know.
And you could do worse than be a drawer of starships.

Last
month the applications came around for the kids who want to transfer
into college prep schools beginning next year. You were supposed to pay
for the applications, and we didn’t know, and I kept asking him about
it and he didn’t know, and we went rounds, and the date passed. I spent
about 5 minutes being upset about it. Well, maybe a whole day. It’s a
door, closed, which always makes me want to kick at it. And Friar said:
You cannot honestly think he could handle the workload college prep
school when he can’t even remember to tell us to order the
applications.
Which is: yeah.

This has been a Squire Tuck update.

Two weeks of school down. Squire’s already lost his
locker key and missed a couple homework assignments, but he seems to be
holding onto the lunch card, which is impressive. And I think the
school supplies thing went okay. Ah, the school supplies thing: I
promised Julia I’d tell.

In June, the teachers hand out a list of supplies. This list
is all the things the students will need in addition to the previous years’
supplies, so you have to remember what all that stuff was (i.e.: the
special little white shoes for gym class that became cottage shoes in
the summer? remember you need to replace those now; they’re not on the
list) and also get the stuff that’s on the list new this year (
i.e.: four paintbrushes: three large and round, one flat. The large and
round ones have to be different sizes, which you didn’t know, so Day1
you’ll be back at the store getting different sizes). And you also have
this stack of notebooks to buy, different sizes and different lines.
And even different pens with different ink colors. And each notebook is
supposed to have the kid’s full information on it, AND a plastic cover.
No store is going to have all the notebooks, all the right sized
covers, all the pens. So the week before school starts is a mass of
parents running around the stationery stores and already resenting the school for all of
this, the purpose of which is as far as I can tell to rob you of the
last week of summer.

This year I asked Friar to do the shopping with Squire,
because last year I nearly had a nervous breakdown in the "tea egg and
sugar company" trying to find 6 each of four different kinds of
notebooks with the corresponding plastic covers. When facing a nervous breakdown: Delegate. They went to three
different stores and still didn’t get everything, but finally we got
the whole list checked off.

And then in September you drop the kids off at the school,
marching bravely through the doors in their new backpacks (when Squire
started first grade, his backpack was full of so many supplies that he
actually tipped over backwards), and 45 minutes later they pop back
out. And the list has changed over the summer, it has always changed,
and this year I realized that a Clever Parent would have waited til Day
1, asked for the list on the 45 minute day, and then gotten the stuff, because the first
week of school is a JOKE and I feel like a PD Eastman dog: The parents
are going around and around. "Go around again!"

Anyway, two weeks. We have the tutor again, so that’s going
well. And we’re remembering this
year that life exists beyond school. Last night we played Catan, and
Squire and I worked to sing all staccato like Regina Spektor and we
worked on dinner together, because it’s fun, and because I maintain the
hope that through cooking he’ll come to appreciate a more balanced
diet. Thursday night as Squire piled his plate with the third helping
of pasta
and cheese (our ironic nod to the Italian pasta
strike), bypassing the homemade primavera sauce and the juicy chunks of
chicken for which the pasta was supposed to be a side dish, I realized
that he eats like a college student. First, there’s the stunning
quantities, with no parallel weight gain. Also, there’s the fixation on
white foods. In college, you gravitate towards white food cause it’s
easy to cook, but Squire genuinely loves the stuff. Toast!
Awesome, my favorite! Pasta and white cheese, mmmmm. RAMEN NOODLES
ALWAYS YUMMY. Maybe when he goes to college he’ll have a love affair
with vegetables just to continue in his bizarrosity.

We’re doing well, I hope you are, too.

We went to the beer garden yesterday to play Scrabble, which we’ve done
nearly every night for the last week. School starts Monday, so spending
every possible evening out of doors, especially for Squire, seems
necessary and important. Although it was the same even temp in the
apartment yesterday as it is every day, it was colder outside, and my
sleeveless dress meant I was unable to spell words other than
"freezing". As Squire was anyway not playing, I called him over &
begged him to run back to the apartment to get me a sweater. The
apartment is less than 15 minutes’ stroll from the beer garden, and I
thought that Squire, running like the wind, could solve my chattering
teeth in about 20 minutes. Bribes were offered. Specific sweaters and
their locations were mentioned.

Slightly over 30 minutes later, he ambles back. He was delayed because
he went to the bathroom at home. He has a letter from the mailbox. He
has his magic wand. You totally know where I’m going with this, don’t
you.

I myself suffer from recurrent destinesia. I will walk into the bedroom
to get my glasses, stand there for a minute, dumbfounded, and wander
back out again with no glasses. Did I walk in there to blink myopically
at the dustmotes, or what? Ten minutes later I may even do the same
thing again. However, if I say the word "glasses" before walking into
the room, it kicks the brain over the barrier with ease. How could
someone have a clearly described item in his mind, go for the specific
purpose of getting it, have a bribe dangling at the end of the line,
and … forget?

Anyway, he went back to get the sweater, and this time it only took 20
minutes. I do understand that it was entirely my fault for forgetting
to bring a sweater (I normally do, even in the hottest months), and I
understand that my physical unease today is a result of my behavior,
not his. However, I am a little worried about this whole "back to
school" thing. Between the early onset destinesia and the new "different teacher for
every class" system, I think we may have a very long year ahead of us.

Squire Tuck returns from his week away at camp today, and I told him I’d clean his room while he was gone, because it is beyond the skills of a ten-year-old to handle the mess in there, and sometimes you need a fresh start.

As payment for my cleaning, I am stealing this story that I found in one of his notebooks, which I believe he wrote last year, and which is totally him in a nutshell. Two pages and he’s nowhere near the point, and he seems to have abandoned or forgotten that he was even writing a story, and yet it has a certain undeniable charm for me anyway.

When I was in third grade our schooll took a field trip to a place very close to a very old castle to witch we one day went and I there learned about "The Legend of the Magic Bed."

The castle was very old, probably used in the 16th century, in witch Legends, Myths, and Folk Tales were once the true warmer of slaves, beggers, and other people.

Here Beggins the Legend:

In the 16th century when the castle was full of people, a servant ran to the King with a letter in his hand, and gasped: "Your Majesty, Your Majesty! A moment please." So the King folowed the servant into the "Imperial Letter Office" and read:

Dear Oulac the Imperial,

I was just going to ask my trusty servant Ivan to make me some strong coffee when he reminded me that I was to visit you for three days expect me in four hours.

Love,
Mistress Lentantribe

The servant looked at the king.