It is amazing that my children have any grasp of time at all. "We're leaving in TWO MINUTES" I say. Then I get chatting to a friend, and ten minutes later I repeat "I said we were leaving in TWO MINUTES. Come on, hurry up, get your stuff. Now. Quick. We're going to be late." Then I remember one more thing I had to tell my friend, and five minutes later I repeat "Now. We're going. Quick. I said TWO MINUTES."
Maybe my mother was the same. Maybe that's why I have a struggle with the whole concept of time. If my children ask me any of those cosmic-related questions like why we have summer and winter, my reply is "that's because the earth spins on its axis, no, hang on, wait a minute, no, it's because the earth goes round the sun, and, um, the sun is hotter on one side than the other, no no, that's not right, um, oh yes, I remember, it's because the earth is tilted and doesn't face true north, so it gets colder when it's round the back of the sun because England and America get tilted away, and yes, that's why the moon is sometimes up in the daytime too because we see it for longer when we're tilted." Poor kids. They don't have a chance.
I know 7-yo ponders these things. He once said to me "It's not fair for kids. When you're a kid, when something is boring, time seems to slow down and it lasts for ages. Then when you're having a good time, like at recess, time seems to speed up and it goes by so fast." I hated to disillusion him, but felt I had to. "You know what? When you're an adult, it's exactly the same thing. You've got more used to it, but it's the same thing." He took the news in his inimitable child stride.
Living in America makes it more complicated for them than it was for me as a child (which was already complicated enough, let me tell you). They know that when we Skype grandparents, it's our morning but their afternoon. How complicated is that? They understand very easily now, but I remember struggling to explain it before we came. Before we flew out, nearly two years ago now, we carefully explained to them that it was going to be a long and exhausting journey. Not only was it a long, long way and we'd have to be in the plane for a long, long time, but also, there was this thing called the time difference. This meant that the day would be an extra long day, because it would be like it had six extra hours in it. We'd arrive in the evening, but it would be for us as if it was the middle of the night. We'd be tired, very tired, was the message I was trying to get across. 7-yo took a different message though. He told a friend of mine "Do you know, in America it's great, because their days are six hours longer than ours."
I repeat, I would love to be inside my child's head for a day.
.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Friday, October 24, 2008
Time flies
I don't know what they've been teaching 7-yo at school. Actually, I do know. They've been teaching second graders all about spiders and insects. This is why last night at dinner 7-yo shared some of his knowledge with us along these lines:
"Did you know flies see things in slow motion? If you do this..." (waving his arm up and down vigorously) "they see it like this..." (same action, but at 1/16th speed). At this point, Husband and I are looking at each other quizzically. I've never been very good at the whole time/space comprehension thing, and am grappling with the idea that the humble house-fly might be not only more able to understand it than I am, but is even somehow at the level where he is able to control it. Husband, who is a philosophy professor (have I ever told you that?) has a mind that is probably some light years away already on a journey of analysis of 7-yo's statement from historical, ethical and theological perspectives.
7-yo fills the silence with more insights. "They know what is going to happen next. That's what it's like when you see things in slow motion. You can tell what is going to happen next. That's why they're so difficult to swat. They know you're coming." So not only can the house-fly slow down reality, as he buzzes about his daily business, but he can also see the future, (which must be a burden, if it is a future that contains the bashing of himself continuously against the inside of a never-to-be-opened window). Blimey. Evolution got it wrong. They'd be much better at running the world than we are (once they'd got the hang of window catches).
Husband and I agree that this would make a rather good episode of Primeval (which is all the rage with the programme schedulers on BBC America), and the conversation moves on to more pressing matters, such as choice of ice cream flavour for dessert.
I would love to be inside my child's head for a day.
.
"Did you know flies see things in slow motion? If you do this..." (waving his arm up and down vigorously) "they see it like this..." (same action, but at 1/16th speed). At this point, Husband and I are looking at each other quizzically. I've never been very good at the whole time/space comprehension thing, and am grappling with the idea that the humble house-fly might be not only more able to understand it than I am, but is even somehow at the level where he is able to control it. Husband, who is a philosophy professor (have I ever told you that?) has a mind that is probably some light years away already on a journey of analysis of 7-yo's statement from historical, ethical and theological perspectives.
7-yo fills the silence with more insights. "They know what is going to happen next. That's what it's like when you see things in slow motion. You can tell what is going to happen next. That's why they're so difficult to swat. They know you're coming." So not only can the house-fly slow down reality, as he buzzes about his daily business, but he can also see the future, (which must be a burden, if it is a future that contains the bashing of himself continuously against the inside of a never-to-be-opened window). Blimey. Evolution got it wrong. They'd be much better at running the world than we are (once they'd got the hang of window catches).
Husband and I agree that this would make a rather good episode of Primeval (which is all the rage with the programme schedulers on BBC America), and the conversation moves on to more pressing matters, such as choice of ice cream flavour for dessert.
I would love to be inside my child's head for a day.
.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
What's in a name? - Part III
They held a mock election in 11-yo's school (middle school). McCain won by 4 votes. He voted for Obama, in spite of the fact that one of his friends told him that Obama supported terrorists.
7-yo has also been told that Obama supports terrorists, is a terrorist, in fact. They're not holding an election in his school (lower school), which he is sad about. He'd vote for McCain. "Why would you vote for McCain?" I asked. "Because it sounds like candy cane, and I like candy canes", he replied with a grin.
Now there's an angle that I'll bet the Republican PR people haven't thought of using.
7-yo has also been told that Obama supports terrorists, is a terrorist, in fact. They're not holding an election in his school (lower school), which he is sad about. He'd vote for McCain. "Why would you vote for McCain?" I asked. "Because it sounds like candy cane, and I like candy canes", he replied with a grin.
Now there's an angle that I'll bet the Republican PR people haven't thought of using.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
The Magic Pumpkin
Tomorrow, weather permitting, I am going with 4-yo's preschool to the Pumpkin Patch. We did a similar visit last year. I'm not the rookie this time round, and that's such a good feeling. I know what is going to happen (ooh, tempting Providence there), I know where it is, I know what activities will be on offer, I know what to wear, and I'm not having to ask anyone any idiot questions. In fact, another mom asked ME whether we leave at the usual preschool start time, or whether she needs to be there early. I replied from my superior knowledge, and then had to re-read the newsletter to make sure I hadn't led her astray. You get my drift, though. It is very nice not to be the first-timer.
It was this time last year that I lamented that there was no mythical story or character relating to the Pumpkin Patch (and was duly corrected in the comments). Maybe 7-yo's Second Grade teacher feels the same way, however, because tonight, his homework was to write a story entitled The Magic Pumpkin. She had said that it had to be at least 5 sentences long, which, as any self-respecting Second Grader knows, means 5 sentences long. The exercise reminded me of those memes that go round, where you have to say what you did today in seven words, and that kind of thing. I'm glad that Second Grade is carefully equipping my son with the skills he'll need to be a future blogger. Anyway, this is the story he wrote:
The Magic Pumpkin
Once there was a
magic pumpkin.
It was small.
It got bigger and
bigger and bigger and
then it gave me
a brand new T.V!
And it did my
homework for me!!!
The pernickety among you will be saying to yourselves "that's only 4 sentences", and I can't deny that is technically true. But if I could scan the original manuscript in here, you would see that the layout - which I've tried to replicate above - clearly indicates the intention of 5. Invention first, grammar and spelling later - I think that's the way forward with creative writing.
Speaking of which, this is my 100th post, by the way.
It was this time last year that I lamented that there was no mythical story or character relating to the Pumpkin Patch (and was duly corrected in the comments). Maybe 7-yo's Second Grade teacher feels the same way, however, because tonight, his homework was to write a story entitled The Magic Pumpkin. She had said that it had to be at least 5 sentences long, which, as any self-respecting Second Grader knows, means 5 sentences long. The exercise reminded me of those memes that go round, where you have to say what you did today in seven words, and that kind of thing. I'm glad that Second Grade is carefully equipping my son with the skills he'll need to be a future blogger. Anyway, this is the story he wrote:
The Magic Pumpkin
Once there was a
magic pumpkin.
It was small.
It got bigger and
bigger and bigger and
then it gave me
a brand new T.V!
And it did my
homework for me!!!
The pernickety among you will be saying to yourselves "that's only 4 sentences", and I can't deny that is technically true. But if I could scan the original manuscript in here, you would see that the layout - which I've tried to replicate above - clearly indicates the intention of 5. Invention first, grammar and spelling later - I think that's the way forward with creative writing.
Speaking of which, this is my 100th post, by the way.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Nature calls
One of the things I miss most about life in Britain is the countryside, or not even the countryside, just the freedom to potter about in the outdoors. Here, the land outside the city is agricultural and inaccessible to walkers (no paths, barbed wire fences on a huge scale), and let’s face it, very flat and featureless. There are parks in the city, but they’re very small, and what you might call functional rather than beautiful.
We find we pay increasingly frequent week-end visits to the Nature Park. It’s small (a rectangle exactly a mile by half a mile), and surrounded by dual carriageways, so the chirping of the crickets has to compete with the noise of the traffic, and in winter when there aren’t leaves on the trees, you can see the large concrete building and big square orange logo of Home Depot from pretty much wherever you are in the Park. Nonetheless, green space is green space, and I am grateful for it.
The children share our excitement. When Husband and I suggest an afternoon walk in the Nature Park, they’re like little crickets themselves, jumping up and down and chorusing merrily “oh no, not AGAIN, boooring, do we have to? can I get some extra playstation time if I come?” Their enthusiasm is infectious, and we head off, beckoned by the call of the wild.
It was a really beautiful afternoon there today. Warm sun, strong breeze, clouds wandering across a blue sky, autumn colours at their finest. Autumn has always been my favourite season, but I realise now my previous experience of it has been somewhat impoverished. The trees and shrubs here put on a much better show – deep reds, earthy maroons, bright oranges, startling yellows. I don’t say this lightly. I grew up in the Chilterns, so I thought I knew a thing or two about autumn beauty. The beech woods can be stunning, majestic, exhilarating. But here, the season lasts so much longer, the variety is greater, the display more dramatic, and the weather still summery enough to allow full enjoyment of it.
This afternoon, for example, the Nature Park looked like this (you'll have to click to enlarge to do the colours justice):
There are always turtles to be seen, paddling along lugubriously or sunning themselves on logs, and a few weeks ago I spotted a muskrat in the water. There are elegant herons, and rather overfed ducks, who swim past hunks of bread floating in the water without even a second glance (this is a Nature Park on the edge of a big city, after all, not the wilderness). Dragonflies and damselflies dart in front of us. Crickets sun themselves on the paths, so old and slow this late in the season that we have to be careful not to tread on them before they leap away. Imagine being able to get close enough to take a photo like this (um... you'll definitely need to click to enlarge that one!).
Large spiders sit in the middle of their enormous webs, and 7-yo, who has been learning about them in science, tells us about their habits, and identifies the different kinds of web.
These are hedge apples, which are such a luminous, almost neon, green that we first told the kids that they were alien brains, fallen out of the sky, (but don’t worry, we only kept that story going for a few minutes – we didn’t want nightmares disturbing their and our sleep). They are solid and large (to give you the scale, this one is pictured in four year old hands), and they make a satisfying splash when lobbed into the creek.
I love this place. For me, it offers the perfect blend of familiarity and novelty. I know my way round the color-coded trails, enough at least to navigate back to the car park by the shortest route if legs are tired, or to promise that we’ll be crossing another creek if hedge apples are being collected. The wildlife and flora still seem exotic to me, though. “Get me” I think to myself, “watching snapping turtles on a Sunday afternoon”, and I tuck the thought away so that in years to come I can say “In America, we used to watch snapping turtles on a Sunday afternoon”. Even the complaining which precedes the trip has developed a comforting feeling of family ritual about it (they complain, but we know from experience that they'll have a good time). It was thus when we lived in Scotland (“why do we ALWAYS have to go to the beach or Tentsmiur?”) and I remember it from the week-ends of my own childhood too. But I couldn’t identify a zipper spider (also known as a writing spider) in those days.
I am very cautious about posting photos on the web, and I guard my family’s anonymity carefully, but I thought this one of our shadows on the water was safe enough.
And, getting brave now, I didn’t think back views could hurt. Here are 7-yo, 11-yo and Husband.
And here is 4-yo.
We find we pay increasingly frequent week-end visits to the Nature Park. It’s small (a rectangle exactly a mile by half a mile), and surrounded by dual carriageways, so the chirping of the crickets has to compete with the noise of the traffic, and in winter when there aren’t leaves on the trees, you can see the large concrete building and big square orange logo of Home Depot from pretty much wherever you are in the Park. Nonetheless, green space is green space, and I am grateful for it.
The children share our excitement. When Husband and I suggest an afternoon walk in the Nature Park, they’re like little crickets themselves, jumping up and down and chorusing merrily “oh no, not AGAIN, boooring, do we have to? can I get some extra playstation time if I come?” Their enthusiasm is infectious, and we head off, beckoned by the call of the wild.
It was a really beautiful afternoon there today. Warm sun, strong breeze, clouds wandering across a blue sky, autumn colours at their finest. Autumn has always been my favourite season, but I realise now my previous experience of it has been somewhat impoverished. The trees and shrubs here put on a much better show – deep reds, earthy maroons, bright oranges, startling yellows. I don’t say this lightly. I grew up in the Chilterns, so I thought I knew a thing or two about autumn beauty. The beech woods can be stunning, majestic, exhilarating. But here, the season lasts so much longer, the variety is greater, the display more dramatic, and the weather still summery enough to allow full enjoyment of it.
This afternoon, for example, the Nature Park looked like this (you'll have to click to enlarge to do the colours justice):
There are always turtles to be seen, paddling along lugubriously or sunning themselves on logs, and a few weeks ago I spotted a muskrat in the water. There are elegant herons, and rather overfed ducks, who swim past hunks of bread floating in the water without even a second glance (this is a Nature Park on the edge of a big city, after all, not the wilderness). Dragonflies and damselflies dart in front of us. Crickets sun themselves on the paths, so old and slow this late in the season that we have to be careful not to tread on them before they leap away. Imagine being able to get close enough to take a photo like this (um... you'll definitely need to click to enlarge that one!).
Large spiders sit in the middle of their enormous webs, and 7-yo, who has been learning about them in science, tells us about their habits, and identifies the different kinds of web.
These are hedge apples, which are such a luminous, almost neon, green that we first told the kids that they were alien brains, fallen out of the sky, (but don’t worry, we only kept that story going for a few minutes – we didn’t want nightmares disturbing their and our sleep). They are solid and large (to give you the scale, this one is pictured in four year old hands), and they make a satisfying splash when lobbed into the creek. I love this place. For me, it offers the perfect blend of familiarity and novelty. I know my way round the color-coded trails, enough at least to navigate back to the car park by the shortest route if legs are tired, or to promise that we’ll be crossing another creek if hedge apples are being collected. The wildlife and flora still seem exotic to me, though. “Get me” I think to myself, “watching snapping turtles on a Sunday afternoon”, and I tuck the thought away so that in years to come I can say “In America, we used to watch snapping turtles on a Sunday afternoon”. Even the complaining which precedes the trip has developed a comforting feeling of family ritual about it (they complain, but we know from experience that they'll have a good time). It was thus when we lived in Scotland (“why do we ALWAYS have to go to the beach or Tentsmiur?”) and I remember it from the week-ends of my own childhood too. But I couldn’t identify a zipper spider (also known as a writing spider) in those days.
I am very cautious about posting photos on the web, and I guard my family’s anonymity carefully, but I thought this one of our shadows on the water was safe enough.
And, getting brave now, I didn’t think back views could hurt. Here are 7-yo, 11-yo and Husband.
And here is 4-yo.
Friday, October 10, 2008
What's in a name? - Part II
Is anyone else amused by the fact that, with all this talk about the old enmity between Britain and Iceland during the cod wars, our current Ambassador to Iceland is called Ian Whiting? (He spells it Whitting, but he can’t fool us.) I think he needs to update the Embassy web page. His welcome statement reads
"I am delighted and privileged to serve as British Ambassador in Reykjavik.
The UK and Iceland enjoy excellent relations, with extensive links in every field of activity. I am looking forward to developing this partnership still further as we encounter the challenges and opportunities of an increasingly globalised world."
Let's hope he still feels delighted and privileged to be encountering those "challenges and opportunities" in what he so correctly identified when he wrote that statement as our "increasingly globalised world".
Another name that amuses me is Nastia Liukin’s. I mean, why didn't her parents stick with Anastasia, instead of shortening it to Nastia? Is she the middle child of a trio, Nasti, Nastia and Nastiest? Or is her older sister a famous beauty queen, and they chose Nastia so they could say “Our second daughter is Nastia Liukin, but liuks aren't everythin”. Or is Nastia a clever word play on GymNastia? So many questions.
My third name observation comes from seeing signs stuck in people’s front lawns with the names “Obama - Biden” on them. They look like this:
and yes, you do see quite a lot of them even here in red states heartland.
Does anyone else misread this as Osama Bin Laden, or is that just me? I mean, Obama is pretty darn close to Osama. Biden is three letters short of Bin Laden. If you take Bin Laden and remove those three letter from the middle, then as the French say, oop-la, or in this case n-la, you get Biden.
But then McCain is clearly all about pizza and oven chips, and Palin is too close to Pain for comfort, so there isn't a clear winner on the name ticket.
"I am delighted and privileged to serve as British Ambassador in Reykjavik.
The UK and Iceland enjoy excellent relations, with extensive links in every field of activity. I am looking forward to developing this partnership still further as we encounter the challenges and opportunities of an increasingly globalised world."
Let's hope he still feels delighted and privileged to be encountering those "challenges and opportunities" in what he so correctly identified when he wrote that statement as our "increasingly globalised world".
Another name that amuses me is Nastia Liukin’s. I mean, why didn't her parents stick with Anastasia, instead of shortening it to Nastia? Is she the middle child of a trio, Nasti, Nastia and Nastiest? Or is her older sister a famous beauty queen, and they chose Nastia so they could say “Our second daughter is Nastia Liukin, but liuks aren't everythin”. Or is Nastia a clever word play on GymNastia? So many questions.
My third name observation comes from seeing signs stuck in people’s front lawns with the names “Obama - Biden” on them. They look like this:
and yes, you do see quite a lot of them even here in red states heartland.
Does anyone else misread this as Osama Bin Laden, or is that just me? I mean, Obama is pretty darn close to Osama. Biden is three letters short of Bin Laden. If you take Bin Laden and remove those three letter from the middle, then as the French say, oop-la, or in this case n-la, you get Biden.
But then McCain is clearly all about pizza and oven chips, and Palin is too close to Pain for comfort, so there isn't a clear winner on the name ticket.
Saturday, October 4, 2008
What's in a name?
I really hesitated to write this post. The choice of names for children is such a sensitive subject among parents. But then when I thought of how much my English readers would enjoy it, I couldn't resist.
I met a mom with a small son whom she introduced as Camp. Short for Campbell, she explained. Ooooh noooo....
I met a mom with a small son whom she introduced as Camp. Short for Campbell, she explained. Ooooh noooo....
Friday, October 3, 2008
Falling tones
I've just seen an advertisement in Starbucks for their signature hot chocolates, and the caption reads
"Make fall seem a little more like autumn".
(I might not have got the wording exactly right, but near enough.)
Help me, o American readers, understand this. Does the word autumn have connotations for you that fall doesn't? Does autumn conjure up pictures of toasty fireplaces and cosy sofas, crumpets and melted butter, golden sunshine through orange leaves, ripe berries and dark chestnuts, frosty mornings dissolving into mellow afternoons (how am I doing here?) that fall doesn't?
Or do you think the British are a nation who sit around drinking luxury chocolate beverages all day long?
"Make fall seem a little more like autumn".
(I might not have got the wording exactly right, but near enough.)
Help me, o American readers, understand this. Does the word autumn have connotations for you that fall doesn't? Does autumn conjure up pictures of toasty fireplaces and cosy sofas, crumpets and melted butter, golden sunshine through orange leaves, ripe berries and dark chestnuts, frosty mornings dissolving into mellow afternoons (how am I doing here?) that fall doesn't?
Or do you think the British are a nation who sit around drinking luxury chocolate beverages all day long?
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Gone all political
Thus far I've avoided getting political on this blog, but this amused me. And before you start getting all upset in the comments box, yes, I know it's more complicated than that, and that we need to restore confidence, and that it's not all the bankers' fault. It just amused me, is all.
Click to enlarge, and feel free to copy.
Click to enlarge, and feel free to copy.
Words
Sorry, I’m going to write about accents again. You’ll think I’m obsessed.
We moved from the south of England to Scotland when our eldest was 3 years old. He retained his English accent, although it did soften round the edges. I remember the time he came home from school, aged 5, and said they’d been learning about volkeenaws. It took a minute for the penny to drop, and then I realized that he was talking about vol-cay-noes. Never having heard the word in an English accent, he didn’t know to anglicize his Scottish teacher’s pronounciation of it for my benefit. They were just volkeenaws.
The same thing happened here in the US last year around St Patrick’s Day. My second came home from Kindergarten with a picture of a man in a funny hat, and told me it was a leprechaahn. When I said “oh, a leprechaun, how lovely!”, he retorted “it’s not lepre-coooorn, Mum, it’s lepre-caaaahn.”
Now it’s happened again with my third. She has a dvd which she borrowed from a friend, and which she calls “The Princess and the Paahprrr”. She first heard and used the word at the friend’s house, and I certainly wasn’t going to adjust her pronounciation, so in order to avoid confusion, I now just find myself talking about the princess and the paaahprrr too. It’s bad enough trying to explain what a paaahprrr is to a 4 year old, without having to remember how to pronounce it each time.
Today when she put the dvd on, we got off to a very complicated conversation when she asked me what a paaahprrr was (again…), and because I hadn’t seen what dvd she’d chosen and lacked the context, I started explaining how some kids call their parents Mommy and Daddy, but some kids call their parents Mama and Papa. She looked at me very blankly, and I eventually realized the confusion. It was quite a long conversational journey back from that to Barbie twirling round in her (suspiciously rather attractive and not at all ragged) pauper’s dress.
You will be able to tell from this story how very impoverished the conversation round the dinner table in our house is. Husband and I evidently never discussed volcanoes, leprechauns or paupers at all in front of our children in their crucial early formative years.
We moved from the south of England to Scotland when our eldest was 3 years old. He retained his English accent, although it did soften round the edges. I remember the time he came home from school, aged 5, and said they’d been learning about volkeenaws. It took a minute for the penny to drop, and then I realized that he was talking about vol-cay-noes. Never having heard the word in an English accent, he didn’t know to anglicize his Scottish teacher’s pronounciation of it for my benefit. They were just volkeenaws.
The same thing happened here in the US last year around St Patrick’s Day. My second came home from Kindergarten with a picture of a man in a funny hat, and told me it was a leprechaahn. When I said “oh, a leprechaun, how lovely!”, he retorted “it’s not lepre-coooorn, Mum, it’s lepre-caaaahn.”
Now it’s happened again with my third. She has a dvd which she borrowed from a friend, and which she calls “The Princess and the Paahprrr”. She first heard and used the word at the friend’s house, and I certainly wasn’t going to adjust her pronounciation, so in order to avoid confusion, I now just find myself talking about the princess and the paaahprrr too. It’s bad enough trying to explain what a paaahprrr is to a 4 year old, without having to remember how to pronounce it each time.
Today when she put the dvd on, we got off to a very complicated conversation when she asked me what a paaahprrr was (again…), and because I hadn’t seen what dvd she’d chosen and lacked the context, I started explaining how some kids call their parents Mommy and Daddy, but some kids call their parents Mama and Papa. She looked at me very blankly, and I eventually realized the confusion. It was quite a long conversational journey back from that to Barbie twirling round in her (suspiciously rather attractive and not at all ragged) pauper’s dress.
You will be able to tell from this story how very impoverished the conversation round the dinner table in our house is. Husband and I evidently never discussed volcanoes, leprechauns or paupers at all in front of our children in their crucial early formative years.
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