Biking

The fact that our kids, at ages 7 and 10, did not know how to ride bikes yet was a source of increasing chagrin to us as parents. We've tried, but it's always been very frustrating and not very productive: the kids would cautiously squeak along on training wheels, and that's it. This weekend we decided it was time for Bicycle Boot Camp. We informed the children that it was part of our job as parents to teach them to ride bikes, and they could do it, and we were going to make it happen, kind of whether they liked it or not, even though we hoped they would like it. I made up my mind to power through, maintain my own good cheer, and not get sucked in to any kid drama or misery. I did some research and decided we would do it the way REI suggests. This is where you first remove the pedals and put the seat low enough that the kid can have both feet planted on the ground; their first stage is to just walk the bike along, which is intuitive and secure for most kids. Next they scoot with their feet to start coasting bit by bit. Next they coast farther and longer, learning to balance and steer. Then the pedals go back on and you're practically there. 

On the big day I packed my purse with candy to use as rewards and off we went. At the start, Jordan was timid and Aaron threw a complete tantrum for twenty minutes, during which time I ignored him and worked with Jordan. And it worked! Jordan went from barely walking the bike, to coasting for a beat or two, to shouting with joy while he coasted faster and longer! He worked his tail off and made giant, huge, major advances within one hour. Aaron, meanwhile, calmed down enough to try again, and he did all right too! It was a very hardworking hour - the boys dealing with themselves both physically and emotionally, and me absolutely determined to keep up a cheerful and impervious front. But it was a big day. And they were very excited. They asked to do it again the next day, and within one more hour were coasting gleefully through obstacle courses we set out with cones, and crushing crackers that we threw out ahead of them as targets. Now they want to go biking every chance they get. They do not want to put the pedals on yet, but that will come soon... we just keep cheerfully saying that biking with pedals is almost exactly the same as without, except you can go uphill. 

These movies are from the second day:

On the first day, the boys each dealt with their emotions in their signature way. Aaron went immediately to pieces and pumped himself into an ever-greater frenzy of anger and sadness and hopelessness with negative self-talk, screaming "This is impossible, I will never be able to do this!" and flailing himself around and shouting at me. I calmly stated things like, "You can choose to try again." Once I even said, in response to some I-will-never-be-able-to-do-this statement, "You can prove yourself wrong." Eventually the storm passed and he wanted to try again, and I helped him, and he was joyous at his own transformation, and said merrily on the way home, "Mommy you were right! I did prove myself wrong!" No self-consciousness or baggage that I can see. Jordan, meanwhile, pretended everything was fine even though he was clearly hating the whole thing bitterly at first. At some point he got frustrated and started to become overwhelmed, but stuffed it. Used his extraordinary emotional self-control to squeeze that anger and sadness down to a small dot inside him and put his attention back on his task. Then he started to succeed, started to feel himself flying, and loved it, and was triumphant. Which style is healthier? I really could not say.

Op-Ed

Several weeks ago, a colleague of mine who does advocacy for the American Physical Society asked if I would write an op-ed for our local newspaper. I was surprised that he asked me; I'm not much in politics, especially compared to some people I work with. But the APS does not have many active policy-type people for the state of Washington, and one of our senators cares about women in the sciences, and they were hoping for a piece connecting women in physics to federal funding for the sciences. They said they would strongly assist me with writing the piece (they have staff for that). So I said yes, sure, I'll help, why not.

The way it worked is that an APS person interviewed me about my own history as a woman in physics. She then drafted an opinion piece that connected my story with what's going on politically, and framed a particular request for legislative action. Since I knew basically nothing about the political part (or about writing op-eds), her collaboration was essential. However, she said things I would never say (like "build a better America"), and the op-ed has only my name on it, not hers. When I read her first draft it really hit home to me that everyone would see this: my friends, my neighbors, my rabbis, you name it. I had to write something that I felt good about. So I put more work into it than I was initially expecting to, and felt okay about the result.

I submitted it to the Seattle Times (did you know that just anyone can do this?) and they picked it up within the hour. There was then an editing process with the newspaper, during which they changed the order of things and removed all uses of the word "we" (apparently readers will not know who it refers to). And then on Monday morning it was published! With a title I had never seen and don't actually think describes the piece well. But I am prepared to let it go.

The resulting piece is not 100% me. This is not even necessarily the issue I care most about in the world. (I'm not even sure what issue I care most about in the world; it depends on the day.) The piece is a meeting place, where my own heart and expertise are put in the service of a cause that is presenting itself. It's opportunistic, like my volunteering. Something shows up that needs doing, and maybe I can help do it.

It seems like the thing is getting a heck of a reception. I was so right about everyone seeing it: every day more people I know say something nice to me about it. I posted it to Facebook and got 60 likes and 4 shares, which for me is a lot. The Times asked permission to distribute it to its partner news outlets, and so far it has been picked up by the Walla Walla Union-Bulletin, the Columbia Daily Herald, and the Virginian-Pilot. The STEM Education Coalition put it in their newsletter. LinkedIn has a group discussing it. SPU will republish it in its glossy magazine. The APS is contacting reporters about whether they want to interview me. My best guess is that this will die down shortly; but hopefully even if it does, I am helping tip some scale or other.

The comments on the online article are mostly pretty bad. The most common response is along the lines of "Girls are free to study whatever they want; if they're not interested in science, that's up to them." This, while it sounds all very progressive and American, denies any responsibility for how we shape and constrain girls' interests. (I'm not even counting the one who said, "If chicks do get interested in pursuing physics and STEM, the jobs they would have had can be filled by chickified dudes." WTH?) Other deniers of gender unfairness take a line more like "Guys have to deal with the occasional jerk, too; just man up." (Here's another op-ed those folks might read.) Then there's the commenter that assumed that I was a B student (because I said science has a place for B students), and the people who think I am an example of a woman who dropped out of physics to be in the social sciences (understandable, but incorrect). I have not joined the fray... I think it is better if I just stay out of it.

The emails, though, I will respond to individually. These are emails from strangers who took the trouble to look me up, and every one of them is thoughtful and substantive. One is from the parent of a thirteen-year-old girl with tremendous aptitude in math and science who is starting to experience gender crap that steers her away - for example, her school (on Bainbridge Island) offered her the chance to walk to algebra in sixth grade, but since the other students doing the walking were all boys who treated her poorly, she would rather not. This parent wanted my suggestions for how to support her. I didn't know what to recommend, and felt the burden of being in the role of an expert without any actual expertise, but I knew who to ask, and got some good leads. Another letter was from a woman who faced similar obstacles 50 years ago and just wanted to say good luck. Another letter was from a scholar of gender effects on academic performance who wanted me to review his work. Another was from a high school teacher who wanted my advice for supporting women and underrepresented minorities in his physics class. Each letter is fascinating, and a little scary, and very human.

Volunteering

Our family is involved with a number of worthy nonprofit organizations, and I do a fair amount of volunteering. To be honest, I don't so much do this because they need me; there are many, many needy people and organizations in the world and I am not always motivated to help them. Sometimes I do it because it's a quick thing I can do to help out (I think of this as mini-volunteering). More often I do it because I want to build my own community, and getting together with people to do a helpful activity is a great way to get to know them. Then there are the times that I can really take the lead on something that I enjoy for the sake of the project itself. These categories are just off the top of my head. I am continually being asked to volunteer for more things, so I thought I would take a look at what all I am doing volunteerwise, to see the big picture.

Temple
My big volunteer commitment for temple is that I co-direct Mitzvah Day, a day of community service involving about 400 kids doing nine different service projects (one for each grade). This takes many hours of organization spread over many months. The most fun part is that I work with a terrific co-director, who has become a friend primarily through this collaboration, and connect with many parents to help them run the projects for their grade. It is also pretty darn satisfying to help make so much community service happen. In addition to Mitzvah Day, I organize the annual "schmoozes" for religious school parents, which is easy to do. I also help with one-off things like office work and honey cake; since we live nearby, it's easy for me to pitch in with little stuff.

School
I am pretty excited to make friends with other families at our new school, so I volunteered to be the room parent for second grade, which will put me in communication with a particularly terrific bunch of families (who will be our cohort for four years, presumably). I am also going to go ahead and volunteer to do procurement for their annual fundraising auction, because I think I will be working with people I'll like, doing something that I'll be good at.

Boychoir
For boychoir, I have done only mini-volunteering. I might do some ushering, but that is pretty self-interested (ushers attend concerts for free!), and I want to chaperone the tour next summer. My experience is that boychoir does not foster community among the parents the way temple and school do; boychoir is mainly about the boys.

There is also another category of activities that I am tempted to call volunteer activities, but because they are part of my academic life, they are called "service." These activities are expected of me as part of my work culture. I am not specifically rewarded for them the way I might be if I was faculty, but it's what people like me do, and it is often a way to collaborate with colleagues I like as well as make things happen that I am glad to see happen. Examples of service activities are reviewing papers (either formally or informally), mentoring or advising students at other institutions, serving as an elected representative in my professional community, writing an op-ed advocating for science funding, and so on.

Bad Words Education

I am of the opinion that there are a lot of bad words a kid needs to learn before middle school. Not in order to use them, although I think that in the right time and place that can be fine. The main reason is that to be uninformed is to be vulnerable. If other kids say, "Hey come with us, we have some pot," or "Everyone who comes to this party gets a blow job," and you don't know what "pot" or "blow job" are, you are helpless. It is nice to fantasize that no one will ever say these things to our sweet innocent children, but this is a fantasy. It is also tempting to think that we parents are protecting our children's innocence by keeping these words from them, but I think this is not true either. Our family discussion of the Vagina Chant has not caused any increased use of the term (far from it). And also I think their innocence runs deeper than any vocabulary, a true absence of the kind of cynicism and rebelliousness that bad words signify. Though possibly this is another fantasy.

We are embarking on a year of Bad Words Education in our household because Jordan starts middle school in a year, and is already hanging out with 13 year olds at boychoir. Life presents many teachable moments in this area. For example, Aaron's seven-year-old friend told Jordan yesterday that Aaron was "pissed off" about something. (This was correct, but crudely put.) Jordan did not know what "pissed off" meant, but he could tell it was a bad word, and he was startled that this kid would say it. It turns out that Jordan and Aaron didn't know what "piss" meant, either. So I told them piss is a rude word for pee, kind of the same thing as crap being a rude word for poop. I said how some people might say they were going to "take a piss" and that means go pee. I said how people who do this are probably looking to sound kind of tough and shocking on purpose, to get your attention, but it really just means pee. I said that for some reason that I don't know, "pissed off" means angry. We had a laugh imagining what the relationship might possibly be: do people have to pee when they get really mad? Do they get so mad they want to pee on someone? A mystery. (Bad Words Education will have many mysteries.) After this discussion my kids were more disturbed by the phrase, rather than becoming inured to it, and more disturbed that their friend used it.

Rachel: I think bad words come in three categories: swearwords, sex words, and drug words. I will tell you about these words a little at a time, not all on one day. You don't want to hear them all at once.
Jordan: No, that would make me sick.
Rachel: Aaron, you do not have to listen to these words if you don't want to. You have a long way to go until middle school, so you could wait.
Aaron: I want to hear this too. My friends say bad words sometimes, like, you know, that one that we talked about.
Jordan: One guy in boychoir says - Mommy can I say it just once to tell you what it is?
Rachel: Yes, definitely. You can always say any word one time to tell me what the word is. You will never get in trouble for that.
Jordan: Okay. One guy in boychoir says.... eff you. I'm not going to say the word after all.
Rachel: Okay, let's talk about that one. I'm going to say it, so get ready: The saying is, fuck you.
[Jordan and Aaron gasp and giggle.]
Rachel: We have talked about this word before, do you remember? This saying means something like, "Somebody should stick their penis in you whether you want them to or not."
[The children are appalled, a tumult of small shrieks, disgusted and giggling and writhing in their seats.]
Jordan: I don't even know why anyone would do that!
[See what I mean about their deep innocence?]
Rachel: It's meant as a very angry thing to say. But maybe the guy in boychoir was not very angry. Sometimes people say it just very casually, too, not only "fuck you" but "fucking" [the children wince]. Like someone might say, "Could you get me some more fucking water."
Jordan [laughing hysterically]: That is so weird! That doesn't even make any sense!
Rachel: You're right, it makes no sense, but the idea is that it sounds kind of angry and exciting. People usually say it when they're frustrated. The water is not a very good example. A better example would be, remember before dinner I was having such a hard time stringing those beads? I might have said, "I cannot get this fucking bead onto this fucking string!"
[The children collapse in gales of helpless laughter.]
Jordan: What does that even mean! Stick your penis in a string? Stick a string in your penis?
Rachel: I know, it doesn't make any sense.

After we had recovered from that, I invited Jordan to choose a bad words category. He said "I definitely do not want to hear any sex words, and we already did some swear words, so you can tell me some drug words." I decided to start with marijuana, which is all over the newspapers these days in our state. I told them all the nicknames I could think of for marijuana, for getting high, and some basic paraphernalia. I am sure I did not cover everything, and will never cover everything in this lively, ever-changing linguistic area. But I think it helps. If nothing else, it establishes bad words as appropriate subjects for family discussion.

Sticky spot

Jordan is at a sticky spot in his piano learning. He can do all the major scales at about 152 beats per minute, which is awesome, but he is not perfectly consistent about which fingers he uses for which notes, and that is something that is supposed to become automated, the way it is in typing. He also uses a hand position that will not serve him well in the long run (flat fingers instead of tall, playing on the pads of his fingers instead of the tips). Lastly, he has been working on a particular Bach minuet for several weeks, which is not in itself a bad thing, but it's something that his teacher, Ben, thought he would blow through a lot faster. And here is where Ben really demonstrates his character as a teacher. My own temptation, much as I hate to admit it, is to think something along the lines of, "What's wrong with you? Shape up!" Not very constructive. Ben, on the other hand, at a moment when Jordan was doing something else out of the room, said to me: "Hm; this piece is not as easy as I was thinking it would be. What do you think is going on?" The assumption being that if the learning is not going smoothly, there is probably something that the teacher needs to learn, in order to better facilitate the student's progress.

Once Ben asked that question, I realized I actually think there is an answer to it, or part of an answer. Jordan has the following awesome musical skills, among others: He can hear intervals instantly and precisely, he can solfege anything either in writing or by ear (which is an extension of hearing intervals), and he can memorize music. All of these are strongly reinforced at boychoir. The Bach piece, however, has a lot of big, unpredictable intervals in it, so you are really better served by knowing that the next note is a D, instead of knowing that it is an octave-plus-a-third down from the last note; and reading music by the letters is not one of Jordan's strong suits. Jordan knows this; he has told me that he finds notes on the piano by intervals from a known note, instead of absolutely, and that naming the notes is harder for him. This is a solvable problem! I will hop down to our music store and get flash cards. This will be good for both him and Aaron.

About the fingering on the scales: I bet this is a similar issue to handwriting, which is also not automated for Jordan the way it is for many of us. Ben's action plan for this is to just really practice the scales with correct fingering, even though it means slowing down, until the correct fingering is reliable. It is hard for Jordan to slow down in order to use proper form... in anything. But he is trying.

First day of school

Today was the boys' first day at Seattle Jewish Community School, and everybody loved it. Jordan said, "Everyone told me everything I need to know. They told me so well, I didn't even feel like it was my first day. It was like it was already the third day." Aaron declared that he and his Hebrew teacher are "matched," because they are both new to the school. I said, "It feels good when someone else understands how things are for you, doesn't it," and he agreed. We new parents had a couple hours of orientation in which we were not only doused with useful logistics, but also inspired and moved (at least I was), and delighted by the staff and the other families. The letter home from one of Jordan's two teachers brought a tear to my eye... she said her favorite teaching is "Treat no one lightly and think nothing is useless, for everyone has one's moment and everything has its place" (Pirkei Avot 4:3). What a great thing, to be at a place where people have not only the intention, but also the expertise and the resources, to carry this out.

We are jumping in to this excellent community with both feet. Dale volunteered to be the first-day photographer, helping take cute pictures of every single family as they arrived (except our own, of course). And I will be the second-grade room parent. It's going to be a busy year, but a good one.