Category: Parenting

  • After Effects of a Vacation

    I read an article yesterday that most people are happier leading up to their vacation, than actually on their vacation. I took a second to think about that, and I knew that this was true. Yes, the best part of a vacation is counting down the days. Once you get where you are going, then everything goes sideways.

    This year, we talked to kid about this. How, the one of the best parts of being on vacation is when things do go wrong, because that is when you make new discoveries. I know that isn’t 100% true, but I wanted to plant the idea in her head that when things go wrong, it becomes an opportunity to try new and different things. I think it sort of worked. There wasn’t too much complaining, but the trade-off was that she wanted to spend a large amount of time on the family iPad.

    Oh well…

    But we did experience something new with the kid this year when we came home from vacation; she was a little depressed. The kid is seven now, and not little anymore, both physically and emotionally. We all have known that feeling of coming home from a vacation; if you had a good time, then there is that feeling of letdown; a little sadness of having to come home and go back to the old routine. That’s normal.

    This year was the first time that the kid experienced that. And she didn’t know what to do with these feelings. She was sad, sullen, and even had a little bit of a breakdown, and cried in her room for a bit. The wife and I talked, and made sure that we were on the same page on how to deal with this. The most important thing was not to make her feel ashamed for feeling sad. We let her tell us in her own way what was wrong, and let her just experience feeling bad. Then when she calmed down, we started talking about the fun we had, the memories we created, and what we should do with the rest of our summer.

    I know we can’t stop her from feeling bad, or sad, or experiencing emotions that are hard to put your finger on. But we can help her understand that having strong feelings is normal, and can be a good thing. And that there are constructive ways of dealing with them.

  • ODDS and ENDS: New Schedule, Rewriting, and August 6th

    (I do less before 9am, than most people do all day.)

    The kid is out of school for summer which means that stay-at-home-dad’s school year schedule has been thrown out the window. I know it isn’t my job to “entertain” the kid every moment of the day, but it does mean that I am her go to person for questions, and just about everything else. The quandary I find myself in is when do I write? I was knocking out blogs in the morning, but as of this week, the time is hard to find. I might have to write at night and publish in the morning. Or, whatever. I’ll figure out the new schedule.

     While I was on vacation, I didn’t do much writing, though I did spend a bit of time thinking about it. What I came up with is that I have to rewrite a story. And it’s a story that I have rewritten three times already. And it’s a story that I have submitted to four different lit journals. Not that it matters, as the chance of it getting published, even if it is rewritten, are slim at best. I just can’t stop tinkering with it. On one hand, I want to get it right, and on the other hand, I wonder if I keep messing with it as a form of procrastination?

    Premiere League starts up on August 6th. Well, that’s when Tottenham’s first match is.

  • Odd Start to Summer for the Kid

    New York City is just weird compared to the rest of the country, so let’s just start right there. I say this because around here, kids are off from school for July and August. The month of July is when all the camps happen, both sleep-away and day camps. August is the vacation month, or at least that’s when most people take their vacations, because August is honestly the worst month to be in NYC; it’s hot, humid, and there is this tar/urine/wet-garbage smell that is everywhere. Last Summer, in the month of July, the kid was in a day camp for the first two weeks in July, then we spent a couple of days with friends in Vermont. Following that, the kid took the last week in July to visit a friend in Virginia. It was only when we got to August that we started running around the parks and playgrounds again, and the kid made some friends that she ended up seeing most days, so she had someone to play with. We left on vacation right after school ended, and now that we are back in the City, the kid is running into the problem that there aren’t any kids her age to play with at the playground. There are little kids under six years old, but very few kids over that age. And today, it finally clicked in why that is; all the older kids are at camps. And it is really hot out, too. It’s an odd start to Summer in the City for the kid. Added on top of that is the inevitable let down of coming home from after a vacation. Home just seems very dull after a week of staying up late, eating ice cream, and going to amusement parks. She’s a little bored, and I am okay with her learning how to deal with boredom. Yet, I also had hoped that there would be a few kids she could run around with.

  • The Selfish Act of Parenting

    I’ve had a rough couple of years. From my mother’s death, moves, career changes, and a pandemic, it’s been a lot. On the whole, I’m good, but like everyone of late, I do have rough days, where I do despair and wonder, what am I doing with my life?

    One of the things I tell myself, or remind myself is more accurate, is a question I was asked a while ago from a good friend; Why can’t your purpose be to become the best father that you can be? Let that guide you, and everything else will fall in line to that.

    Like I said, I have to remind myself of that. And I can fully admit that a mess up often as a father. I do my best, I’m not perfect, but I hope that raising a daughter who knows she loved and supported in what she does will go a long way in helping her become a strong and independent woman.

    I thought about that this morning as I was making breakfast for the kid, and we talked about what we would do on this first day of Summer vacation. And then I thought about the selfless act of being a parent… But is it selfless?

    Follow me on this; if by choosing to be the best father I can be is to give myself a purpose, then isn’t the quality parenting that my daughter receives just a positive side effect of a selfish act? I’m not choosing to be a good parent strictly to be a good parent, but if by choosing to be a good father to my kid makes me feel like a good person, than aren’t I putting myself first?

    I can admit that these thoughts are a “Chicken or the Egg” quandary. Does it really matter who gets put first if the end result is that the child receives quality parenting?

    Do I have too much time on my hands, and thus think about details that have no effect on the whole?

    That’s all possible.

    (Oh, and if you like what you read, please take a second to like, share, or leave a comment.)

  • My Daughter Called Me Out

    On Saturday night, the kid came out of her room, and told me that she wanted to make a movie. RIGHT NOW! I thought about it for a second, and said yes. Over the course of an hour, she explained to me the story she wanted to tell, I came up with the shot, and we filmed it. The story was of a detective who is hired to find out what happened to the mummy in the museum. The mummy comes to life and the detective sets a trap which captures the monster.

    It was fun, and we are still editing the thing together. Hopefully we will get it completed for festival season.

    I was older than my kid when I started trying to make home movies. I think I was fourteen, and my dad was willing to help out. Though he didn’t want to be on camera unless he really had to, but he was willing to do all the other work. When the kid came out and told me that we had to make a movie, my first thought was of my dad, and how this was my moment to step up, just like he did.

    When I was tucking the kid in that night, I told her how much fun I had with her, and also let her know that her grandfather helped me make movies when I was a kid, too.

    Then the kid said to me, “I didn’t think you would say yes. You say no to things like this.”

    And my heart broke.

    I thought I was the dad who said yes to creative things the kid wants to do. But clearly, I’m the dad that says no. I guess I should feel honored that I was even asked. Either way, it was a huge gut punch. And it happened the day before Father’s Day.

    Unggg…

    By the way, I totally believe her, because when she said it, in my head, I was like yup, I do say no too often. And for the life of me, I’m not sure how I got here.

    (Say! If you enjoyed this post, please take a moment to like, share, or comment on it. These interactions determines my worth as a human.)