A Perfect Day

They don’t happen too often but when they do they tend to be simple, just like this past Saturday.

• Wake up at 6am to do yoga practice and prepare for morning class. Asana and seated meditation then shower and get dressed for class.
• 7:15am take Spike-ito out for a walk.
• 8:30am leave to teach morning yoga class. M-ito and Mom-ita are still asleep.
• 9:15-10:45am teach class – students are back from vacations, class is packed, and life is good.
• 11:30am back home for brunch with Mom-ita and M-ito.
• 12:30pm take Spike-ito out for walk with M-ito. We talk about Warhammer games (our newest father son obsession), school, life in general.
• 1:30-4:30pm lazing around on couch with M-ito, him watching Saturday afternoon TV shows, me napping on and off, Mom-ita reading, napping, cleaning.
• 5pm head out with M-ito to the dog run for the first time. Mom-ita is napping.
• 6-6:45pm Watch Spike-ito make friends and play at the dog run. M-ito at first watches from the bench trying to read his book. Then after five minutes of watching Spike-ito run, wrestle, crash into cement pylons, run, run, and run some more with his new pals, M-ito gets up and joins in. He chases Spike-ito then meets the other dogs, moves our stuff next to the other owners on the other bench, and starts up conversations with the other owners like, “What kind of dog is yours? How old is he? Where did you get him?” It’s hard not to smile while you’re at the dog run. It’s a pretty happy place and the happiness is infectious. I marvel at my son and how he, as an eight year old boy holds himself and interacts with adults. As the dogs start to get tired we collar Spike-ito up and walk him home. All the way home we talk about the experience, what we learned about Spike-ito (he’s a high energy dog, loves to run, is faster than the average dog, gets knocked over a lot but like the energizer bunny keeps on going, loves, loves, loves to play, and how much he needs a bath after all the slobbering from all the other dogs and the dirt and dust) and what we’d like to do when we get home.
• 8pm our pizza from Louie’s arrives. M-ito loves their pizza.
• 8:15-10pm we watch Diary of a Wimpy Kid, all three of us and sometimes four of us (Spike-ito included) seated across the couch, laughing. Ice cream included as dessert.
• 10pm Mom-ita takes Spike-ito out for his final walk and M-ito and I head to bed. We read for a few minutes then its lights out.
• 11pm Mom-ita joins us.

Spike-ito is in the House

We got a dog.

We’re in day three of dogdom.

I can’t believe it.

Momita has bad allergies to all creatures with dander so the fact that a dog has been in our home for three days is still amazing to me. Momita has been promising M-ito he could get a dog for a few years – though I’ve had no idea how this would occur. Then by chance a couple of months ago we found a friend with a dog called a Havanese that has hair, not fur and is hypoallergenic. We tried hypoallergenic before with cats when we first got together – Momita loves cats. But even the naked cat (appropriately called the sphinx) caused a bad reaction. I had given up any hope of dogdom (other than being “in the dog house” myself many times) a long time ago so these promises – well, I didn’t take them too seriously because I didn’t think it possible. Momita and her health is much more important than any pet.

Then she chanced upon this dog and two months later, a number of emails to a dog trainer we know, lots of internet time logged studying the breed and looking at recommended breeders, a date to get a dog was arrived upon – September.  Then a connection to another dog trainer who just happened to have an 8 month old Havanese looking for a home occurred and September became July 18th.

We have a dog.

We’re all getting used to each other. One thing I’ll tell you having a dog is a lot of work and it’s very challenging. Even when the dog comes trained and housebroken. As a family we have to work together to integrate Spike-ito (he came named and we decided to stick with the moniker) into our daily life. I have the morning shift before everyone gets up. M-ito and Momita have the afternoon until I come home from work. Then M-ito and I have the evening.

I’ve had dogs before but as a kid. My dad always had them. But that doesn’t mean I know much about how to care for them or what makes them tick.

I read three books, My Smart Puppy, The Perfect Dog, and The Art of Raising a Puppy. My Smart Puppy was the recommended book and the style used to train Spike-ito. But he’s an adolescent and we’re new owners and so we’re off to the races. We have so many things to get used to.

There are crates, poop bags, leashes, collars (three different types), treats, compressed rawhide bones, dog food, food and water bowls, a dog proofing of the apartment (it forced us to clean up better than ever!), a co-op advisement of  “dog-entering-the building” to be sent to the board, pictures to be taken, commands to be learned (was that down, sit, come, or wait?), whining to be heard (only from the dog), and general anxiety about the new responsibility of a 10lb creature to be dealt with (that’s from all parties including the dog).

And how is M-ito about all this? Walking on air at first. But building a long-term relationship with any creature takes time. This will be a big challenge. And I’ll get to watch and help (I hope) along the way. Oh yeah, Momita and I have relationships to build with Spike-ito also – I’d almost forgotten.

The End of the School Year is here!

M-ito graduated from 2nd grade today. When the headmaster told the lower school that the 2009-10 school year was officially over and added, “you can yell as loud as you want to, now – ” the room exploded with K-4th graders going crazy – including M-ito. I watched him from a few rows back with Mom-ita. He yelled as loud as he could with his friends. It was a whole body yell. An exhalation of all the work he put into his education this year. So many evenings of push and pull over homework assignments. My son has his first real understanding of what summer vacation is about.

In Kindergarten he was too young to understand the rhythms of school and summer. Last year he was starting to understand the process but with the changing over from one school to another it was all still new to him. But this year… well, he yelled and screamed with the rest of his friends, his sneakers ready to run on grass, his ears listening to waves washing up on a beach, electrical impulses in his brain ready to encounter summer camp of three different types, and his psyche ready – almost longing for long endless days in the heat.

I can still feel those feelings in my bones, like it was just yesterday. The dry wind outside my window whispering… Summer.

Breakfast Talk

My son’s writing poetry and it’s beautiful. I know, I’m his Dad-dito so I’m biased but this is the greatest.

Breakfast

By M-ito

sizzle! ding! I get out of bed.

what’s all the noise? I go to the

kitchen and… whistle! bump! crack! my mom

made everything! I race to the table.

gulp, gulp, gulp. I am out the door.

Mom-ita told M-ito – after she told him how much she loved the poem – “But that’s not the truth. Dad-dito makes breakfast.”

M-ito replied, “No, Mom-ita, you don’t have to tell the truth in a poem.”

Momita: “And you don’t have any capital letters either.”

M-ito: “Poetry is about breaking the rules, Mommy.”

If only I could use the same rules at work.

I’m singing in the rain …

Okay, I’m not singing – mostly groaning. Why me? Why me? Giving my son a shower is not my favorite thing to do. I’m just putting that out there so you know where I’m coming from. It never really has been. Back when he took baths it wasn’t my favorite thing to do either – mostly because my son doesn’t like to take either a shower or a bath. But… these days it’s showers he takes and in the last couple of months I’ve noticed some changes. It’s not like it used to be.

Old days for a bath: I chase my son around the apartment and try to get him to take a bath. He won’t do it. I plead. I insist. He eventually goes in, complaining the whole time, sometimes kicking and screaming. “The water’s too hot. The water’s too cold. I don’t want to get my head wet. You’re pulling my hair. Ouch.” Then, I can’t get him out. He plays and plays and plays. I get splashed. It’s exhausting.

Old days for a shower: The same thing for starters. Arguments, and explaining why a shower is important (smelling bad is bad, smelling good is good) begins things, then half an hour later entrance into the bathroom. I shower him and he complains the whole way through. “The water’s too cold. The water’s too hot. Don’t splash me. I don’t like it when you splash me. I’m cacacacacacooold. I’m hahahahot.” Then it’s time to get out and he wants to stay in. The water is like rain and he’s singing. He laughs. I cry. It’s exhausting.

New days for a shower: Mom-ita says, “Shower night,” and both M-ito and I sigh and say, “NO!” at the same time. Mom-ita laughs. It takes a half an hour to get him into the bathroom – another ten minutes to get him undressed. I sit on the toilet seat (seat down) because there’s no where else to sit and watch as he slowly, slowly, slowly washes himself. To do his feet he puts the washcloth on the floor, steps on it and moves his feet back and forth – a big smile on his face. It’s genius. He doesn’t actually step under the water until he has finished dabbing and touching each of the areas he’s supposed to wash with a washcloth that has just a little bit of soap on it. Then I wash his hair and he laughs through most of it. Every once in a while he complains about the water being too hot or cold. Then I tell him to wash his face. This whole procedure from beginning to end can take another twenty minutes with me constantly prodding, “Come on M-ito. Wash yourself.”

I don’t get as wet as I used to so that’s something. I’m still just as tired when he finishes. He cleans himself more often than not. And he does laugh a lot. He likes to wash himself, even if he doesn’t do the best of jobs. I’m trying to let it go at that. Because when he’s finished, he smells good and that’s what Mom-ita checks for when he comes out.

One Meatball

It’s Sunday evening dinner. Mom-ita made pasta (my sauce, M-ito’s and my meatballs – true teamwork).

“How many meatballs do you want, one or two?” Mom-ita asks from the kitchen.

“One,” M-ito says from the living room. He’s packing his DS into his new Pokemon case. We just bought it on our way back from Tae Kwon Do practice.

Mom-ita asks again. “One or two?

“One,” M-ito says louder.

Twenty minutes later…

We sit down to eat. M-ito, standing, picks up his fork while swaying back and forth (ah for the days when he sat down and sat still for meals).

“Sit down, please,” I say.

“Sit down, M-ito,” Mom-ita echoes.

M-ito sits. His knees are six inches from the table edge. I reach over and slowly draw his chair in towards the table so his “drop-zone” is smaller.

“You should have changed your pants,” Mom-ita says. He’s still wearing his white Tae Kwon Do pants. “They’re never last until Wednesday.”

M-ito smiles as a pea rolls off his fork, unnoticed. I wonder if it hit his pants on the way down. He puts a whole meatball into his mouth and starts to chew.

“Don’t do that!” Mom-ita says, exasperated. “You could choke on that. I told you not to do that!”

“It’s small,” M-ito says around the disappearing meatball.

I shrug. He swallows.

M-ito reaches into his bowl with his fork and starts moving the pasta and peas around. He looks up at us. “Where’s the other meatball?”

“You only asked for two,” Mom-ita says.

“No I didn’t.”

“Yes. Yes, you did.”

“No I didn’t!”

I take my second meatball and place it into his bowl. M-ito smiles.

“What are you doing?” Mom-ita asks. “How’s he going to learn to accept the consequences of his actions if you do that? He said he wanted only one.”

I shrug again and give her the what can I do, he’s my son look.

She’s not buying it and looks down and away from me, exasperated again with another male in the family.

We eat quietly for a while. M-ito’s meatball disappears, one half at a time. I drop a pea on the floor. It rolls under M-ito’s chair and remind myself to pick it up after we’re finished eating.

Then half a meatball falls off a fork, Mom-ita’s fork, and onto my plate, like manna from heaven. I stare at it for moment, then pick it up with my fork and eat it, smiling at my wife. She rolls her eyes.

The circle is complete.

A Day in the Life

6:31 – Wake up having overslept.

6:32 – Roll out mat and do short yoga practice

6:47 – Wake up M-ito and Mom-ita (Mom-ita already awake)

6:50 – Make breakfast for M-ito (humus on toast, hard-boiled egg from yesterday that Mom-ita made, glass of milk)

7:42 – Out the door and drive M-ito to school with Mom-ita

8:35 – Stop at Starbucks near M-itos’ school for tea for the trip back into Manhattan

9:55 – Park car in parking garage – finish tea

10:05 – Sit down at desk to work while Mom-ita goes off to work

4:45 – Leave parking garage with Mom-ita

5:05 – drop off Mom-ita in Woodside at friends – Mom-ita has PTA meeting at M-ito’s school

5:20 – Arrive in Murray Hill to see M-ito’s Tae Kwon Do practice and meet his Grandmother (who picked M-ito up from school to take him to practice)

6:15 – Leave Tae Kwon do and head home

6:40 – Open front door

6:50 – Start cooking dinner

7:10 – M-ito finishes practicing piano

7:30 – M-ito finishes homework

7:50 – Dinner finished

8:15 – Both reading books in bed – M-ito The Magic School Bus “Volcanos”  and me a book on Meditation and Yoga

8:35 – Lights out

9:08 – M-ito finally falls asleep

9:30 – Dinner cleaned up

9:35 – Mom-ita comes home from meeting

11:15 – Finished answering emails

12:14 – Blog entries done – off to bed

Tomorrow morning… start all over again

Birthday Boogers

I woke up this morning with my son beneath the covers next to me. His eyes were open as if he’d been waiting for me to wake up. I had  a yoga class to teach so I closed my eyes, hoping in my fantaasy world that he would go back to sleep. He leaned over, smiling, and said, “Happy birthday,” then closed his eyes and pretended to go back to sleep.

I rolled out of bed, my body achy from a cold I’ve been fighting off – that and too many late nights/early mornings this week tteaching and travelling. M-ito came out a few minutes later. “Dad-dito,” he said. “I want you to know I didn’t put any boogers on you last night. It’s your birthday so I put them on me instead.”

“Thank you,” I said. “That’s a very thoughtful gift.”

“Today,” he continued, “we’re going to do all things you like to do. So if you don’t want to watch Pokemon tonight (a bit of an evening ritual we’ve been following these days) you don’t have to. We’ll watch what you want to watch.”

“Okay,” I said.

“But… if you want to watch Pokemon, the movie we still haven’t seen, you know, that’s all right with me too.”

“Good.”

Then he hugged me as we looked at each other in the bathroom mirror. It wasn’t so long ago he couldn’t see himself without standing on the step-stool. Now he almost fits under my arm – almost. He’s a beautiful combination of Mom-ita and me.

Then we went out to the living, me to my yoga practice and preparation for the class I had to teach in an hour, and him to watch some TV, Phineas and Ferb to be exact. Usually I don’t let him watch TV while I do my practice. But it’s my birthday, so I figured if he could put the boogers on his own arm instead of mine, I could let him watch a show while I did my practice.

In-school Bardo

Bardo – Buddhist term – an intermediate state. The term usually refers to the term between death and rebirth. The Wisdon of No Escape, Pema Chodron.

My son is in bardo – the place between comfort in his old school and his end destination of fitting in at his new one. I’ve heard a little through M-ito but mostly late at night or via phone calls while I was away in New Orleans and then Lansing Michigan – working. But the picture is pretty clear to me. My son is in bardo. It’s a hard place to be, but it’s a place of growth. My son doesn’t want to hear that, though. He just wants to be out of bardo and on the shore of fitting in.

M-ito made his first friend during his first week at school. He called them aquaintences up until then. He named his first friend, Jacito, a boy from the other 2nd grade class. They played tag together with some other boys. Tag is one of M-ito’s favorite games. He laughs when he plays and his laughter is a sound that makes you and anyone around you smile. I thought, from my hotel room, listening to Mom-ita tell me of his adventures, that things seemed to be moving along. The process of forming with a new group had begun. I had expected it to be rocky but so far so good.

After he made his first friend, he told Mom-ita that he waited for the other class to come out for recess the next day. He waited by the door. I have this picture of him waiting for the other class to come out. “Will they come out today?” he told me later  he wondered. “Are they out sick?” Two days a week the two classes did not have recess together. He learned this while waiting for them to come out. Then on Friday, M-ito’s friend changed the game of tag to bullfight tag. A different game – out of my son’s comfort zone. He was still in bardo. He didn’t want to play. I know some things about my son and one thing is he likes to have mastery over games he plays. He doesn’t like games that he thinks he’s not good at – especially games that he’ll look bad playing. Embarrasment is a big factor even for 7-year olds. I understand this.

He sat on the fence watching the kids for two days. Mom-ita didn’t know what to do but she waited it out. She bounced her ideas off of me but she knew in her heart what was right for her son. I listened and agreed with her. M-ito’s teacher came to Mom-ita at the end of the second day and said, “I’ve been watching and waiting too. Other kids have asked him to play games bu he’s saying no. I’m not going to let it go on much longer.” The next day she asked M-ito to sit by her so he wasn’t by himself again. Some kids asked him to play bull fight tag then and he said yes. This time he got the rules down and played better. Perhaps the choice of sitting next to the teacher, whom he seems to like, or playing tag pushed him to play. In any case it worked.

He’s played other types of tag since then and played soccer yesterday. He played goalie. He says it’s easy and he likes it – with a shrug. No one else wants to play goalie so he steps up. He found a place from which to participate. I give him a lot of credit. Bardo is not an easy place to be. It’s so much easier to stay in your comfort zone, so much harder to step off into a strange land.

As a father I have found the whole process to have a hint of the unreal about it. I’m experiencing much of it second hand – through Mom-ita. M-ito is close to her because she drives him in and picks him up. She is his lifeline to see at the end of the day. I am the guy he sees most evenings at 6pm – regular time, usually coming home while he’s in the middle of his homework. He doens’t ask me for help, that is Mom-ita’s domain. Even trying to make one day a week driving in with the two of them – it’s still hard to stay part of things. Drop-off happens so quick. Mostly, like so many Dad-ditos these days, I try to catch up on the weekend. You see, I’m in my own bardo too. I’m adjusting to change and allowing this new aspect of our relationship to grow also. It sounds good on paper but it sure is hard to do.

First Day of School

Who’s more scared? Parents or kids? At a new school for the third time in my child’s life I think it might be a tie. Mom-ita and I drove M-ito to his first day of school last week and I took two days off to be there for the whole first day and for the one hour intro to school the day before. The commute was fine, not to much traffic, but lots of nervousness in the back seat and the front.

Mom-ita cried and I found tears coming to my eyes also as we gave him a hug before he was lead off to his classroom. M-ito’s first day was well planned out by the school he’s going to. They welcomed new students by name, with a handshake and gift from an upper classperson, in a morning assembly that all parents were invited to. We ate lunch with our kids then took off and did some food shopping while we waited. It was something to do. It was a day of waiting and of reflecting and shopping was a nice concrete something to do. We had about four hours to wait – on and off during – that first day in between meeting his teacher, seeing his classroom, being told by school administrative staff and the headmaster that “everything will be okay,” over and over again. Sure – easy for them to say.

I was surprised at how strongly I felt about sending him to school. This was truly the summer of transition from one school to another, from one set of friends to another, and for us as parents from one set of parents whose kids M-ito knows, to another. We are in the midst of meeting all these new parents, just as M-ito is in the midst of meeting all these new kids. Each of us is having to manage new relationships like crazy. I have to put my hand and my “self” out a lot. I have to say hello and introduce myself, try to remember which kids are which and which go with which parents. Mom-ita has been doing it all summer and I’m still catching up. Now I’m putting faces to names I’ve heard and trying assign kids to them.

What has caught me a little more by surprise than these difficulties is how watching my son go to school has reminded me of my own going to school when I was his age. It has brought up deep feelings of loss and sadness for what was. I changed schools and homes when I was going into fourth grade, M-ito is changing schools in 2nd. I remember leaving people behind and meeting new kids, best friends-to-be, none of which I’m still in touch with or becuase they have died long ago. I remember getting a new father and house to live in. I can feel this viscerally, in the tingling in my fingers as I type away. What a mix. Seeing this kind of history spread out in front of my son overwhelms me. But it’s my past not his.

At lunch after the assembly my son came over to me, so that Mom-ita wouldn’t be able to hear, and said, “I want to go home.”

I looked at him with my heart breaking. “Can you last for a few more hours?” I asked him, looking deeply into those brown eyes of his.

“How many hours is that?” he asked.

“Two.”

Then he nodded and hugged me. I didn’t tell Mom-ita about this until later.

When we came back to pick him up at three o’clock he was happy and seemed fine. He’d had science last period and he loves science and so his whole experience was framed by what he did there. His teacher had told them to pick a kind of scientist they would like to be – M-ito said paleontologist, of course – and to draw a picture of one on the front cover of their science notebook.

From the back seat of the car M-ito said, “I tried to be small in the class, but they wouldn’t let me be.” Mom-ita smiled while I drove. In his last school M-ito could “be small” and not noticed – not get attention – if he was quiet and followed the rules. He could “dissapear” if he wanted to – which I think he did a lot. In this school they introduced the kids to each other, asked them to play games with each other in recess (stopping cliques from arising – or at least attempting to) and seemed to try and notice what kids were doing and not doing. Small classes, good teachers. So far so good. But it meant that M-ito had to be more social than he was used to being. He is a shy kid who takes time to warm up. He must have been exhausted from all that kind of work. I know I was. I said hello and shook many hands in the parent meetings, at the coffee shop where I saw more of the same parents hanging out – just like us – and when we picked M-ito up. I had to force myself. I learned new names and forget them all within a matter of moments. Still, it’s part of the job of a parent. At 47 I have to tell you it’s not easy to go out and make new friends. I don’t necessarily want to put in that kind of effort but it comes with the territory. I guess I like to “be small” too.

After not talking about school for a few hours – even though we pestered M-ito left and right about what he did, at dinner time he finally gave us the whole run-down.

His second day I went to work with a knot in my stomach.

It’s his third day today, this beautiful Monday morning, and his first whole week of school. I’m doing my deep breathing exercises, trying to stay present, and not slip into the past. Mom-ita and M-ito left 45 minutes ago. I’m heading out too. I find I have to remind myself, this is his school experience, not mine. And this is my parenting experience, not his. The idea, I think, is to try to keep things that way. The challenge is in making it so.