THE COMMON WHORE (or other appropriate nicknames) by Kathryn Merrifield

My new thing?  Opting out of kid testing.  I've been thinking about it for the past year, embracing all arguments and social pathologies potentially attached to my kids, and they're NOT DOING IT.

Why?  It's a waste of time.  It benefits:

1)  government;

2)  (publishing) industry (Pearson);

BEFORE:  

I caved to administration and I caved to social pressure.  I caved to hoping for the best.  I caved to my children's inclusion and the threat of social alienation because children under ten years old would have to deny testing in the face of their peers.  I caved to an attempt not to alienate my childrens' passionate, caring and patient teachers.  I caved to an inordinate amount of government's attempt to control education at the expense of teaching and of teachers.  I caved to what I knew what was not right... and I felt like a fraud who linked sandbags to my kids and their educators and threw them into the Long Island Sound.

Surprisingly, up until now, government officials and Bill Gates (champion of Charter schools, hence champion of farming out kids from public schools) decided they knew better.

Bill Gates is a private education drop out.  So is Steve Jobs.  The private sector knows how to make money and drive semi-private charter schools.

Politicians trusted privately funded publishing companies to implement a core curriculum and fast and now and who cares about teachers.

My school district doesn't need it.  Our Superintendent (despite his misguided blockage of school bussing), fights against it.  At the core, he has fought for our teachers and students.  We pay this so we get that.  We are here and he is accountable.  Superintendent Peter Mustich knows that Rye Neck academic standards exceed the Common Core because of our demographics.  Politicians are looking for someone to blame for low education standards.  Don't blame economically fit school districts.  Look to yourself and leave us alone.  It makes local government accountable so they offset the blame to some of the lowest paid government workers:  teachers.

The best do their jobs privately.  When government intercedes either someone is politically or economically benefitting or off-setting accountability.  

Do your research. Opt-out.  It's a waste of time.

Diane Ravitch, passionate educator and compatriot of all teachers and student advocates for authentic education, said it best when (loosely quoted) she admitted to not needing to administer or comply with a corporate agenda, so she could say what was on her mind.  Ms. Ravitch also attributed it to her Seventies (so I can't wait to be in my Seventies!).

That said. I have some good friends.  One of my most respected friends is Gina Tampio, mother of four beautiful boys and wife to anti-Common Core Champion and Assistant Fordham Political Science Professor, Nicholas Tampio. 

So, here's the deal in a nutshell:

1.  Our kids took tests last year that teachers didn't teach to;

2.  Teachers were given materials mid-September and expected to anti-up so had not idea what to teach to;

3.  No one knows what happened yet everyone is stressed out.

AFTER:  

Since last year, my son, a child in a contained classroom who received a mid-thirty percentile grade on his tests, has dropped from a 3 to a 2 in all core (ELA and Math) curriculum.  He is in fourth grade.  My understanding is that fourth grade is a repetition of third.  Does this make sense?

No.

Children who are errantly tested miss out on up to 1000 minutes of direct instruction per day as per misguided government mandate.  

Every child needs a chance.  This is not one of them.

(I'm really hoping you're getting this unless it requires a language barrier translation).

OPT-OUT.

OPT-OUT.

OPT-OUT.

E-mail your teacher that you will not participate in spring testing. 

DO IT NOW.  I did it.  Twenty seconds, max.  No harm done...  Only good. 

And that is all.

Book a tutor, have coffee, go for a swim, shoot hoops... snuggle with your child and he or she will be far better off for time better spent.  

So will your teachers.  

So will your school.  

So will you.

ACCIDENTAL SCALPING OF RATIONS by Kathryn Merrifield

Yesterday evening (some would say last night but night means different things to people and it was six-thirty), I wandered into Whole Foods in search of a few things, including cereal, a couple of boxes of pasta and some other weird things, like soy mozzarella cheese, the only real mozzarella cheese Luke and Leo will eat because it’s organic offered in thick but a little pricey, slices, Fage yogurt (not weird), lunch meat for the kids.

Finished with my one basket shop, I came upon a family new to New York form the UK who I met at a birthday party.  One of their two children is a girl classmate in Leo’s class.  She was perched on her father’s shoulders and having a great time.  We talked for a while, about snow and passing a New York State Driver’s License test (hooray), the snow, and the rabid consumption of food before a storm – no green leafy or spuddy (broccoli?) vegetables or bananas in-house at Sunday’s end.  I actually mentioned bananas, not even needing them because no one in my house likes them much (there’s one, actually, who has an adverse reaction to them – not like anaphylactic shock but, like, gag) and the woman passing said, “No bananas.”  I felt like I was in a gas line during the Seventies or in a similar condition to what my younger brother says about his experience at Trader Joe’s in Brooklyn.

That said, me and the family kept talking right in front of the cereal endcap when a small bunch of bananas was lowered from shoulder-perched-girls little hand and held in front of our faces.  There was a bunch hiding behind the top row of cereal.

ME:  “I don’t even need them but I’ll take them.  Maybe I should scalp them outside.”

That was the other story for the morning.  Here here if anyone needs them… VERY marked up.  And fathers, always prop your daughters high enough that they can see everything.

ARNOLD by Kathryn Merrifield

At the suggestion that we stop by the library after school as part of the pre-blizzard prep, Venna Rose told me she didn’t want to go because we wind up getting movies like THE TERMINATOR (we’ve checked it out twice at Luke’s and never watched it).

ME:  “THE TERMINATOR is a very important movie.  Arnold Schwarzeneggar is part of American history.”

This segued to a morning story told to three amused faces…

It went something like this:

My dad used to take us to The Palm restaurant every other weekend.  It was this really cool restaurant.  There were murals all over the walls – caricatures of celebrities and a lot palm trees.  Sawdust covered the hardwood floors.  We’d get a plate of some kind of meat and sides of vegetables.  There was a dish called Half-and-Half, piled high with half homemade fried onions and potato chips from scratch.  Clams Casino with clams on the half shell – bacon pieces on top and bread crumbs.  We’d tear off pieces of the big sliced loaf of bread and spread butter on it or dip it into the Clams Casino juice. 

I saw a couple of celebrities, one of which was Arnold Schwarzeneggar.  Then, he was body builder who no one but my dad knew because he followed body-building and martial arts.  Later on he became and actor and starred in the TERMINATOR film franchise (explanation of what a franchise is followed but affirmation from me to Leo that, yes, a franchise is like SPIDERMAN).  After that he became the governor of California (explanation that a governor is the boss of the state).

Yawns and giggles from Venna Rose… 

I thought it was a good story chock full of memories about the few times the wait staff brought a lobster to the table and showed us that by petting its head, it could be put to sleep.

That and Woody Allen’s ANNIE HALL are the reason I stay away from lobster and keep close (with my eyes covered) to the movie franchise.  Not those that serve as political resumes.

For example:  http://moviepilot.com/posts/2014/09/17/watch-arnold-schwarzenegger-kill-everyone-2276715?lt_source=external,manual

The commentary is worth it.  The violence is not.

We didn’t get the library.  Sticking to animation for the blizzard.   Luke decided not to watch it which brings me back to what is important in American history…  Shut-in sweetness.

ABOUT TIME: My Mortgage is My Party Space by Kathryn Merrifield

We live in a service industry.  We have our nails done.  Our hair done.  Our houses done.  Our all done.  Our clothes bought.  Our food prepackaged and made for easy-but- not-too-easy-that-it’s-not-homemade-enough, preparation, so we fell better about our domestic skills.  We have our lawns cut (some of us) and watered, our kids entertained and scheduled, our TV programming specialized to our needs, when and how we want it.  There is no waiting or setting aside time for a “program.”  It’s recorded.  It's not an event.  Our mail is delivered too fast via e-mail and too slow in paper.  Our stars are in the same place.  Our Earth spins. 

What do you do for you?  I can’t sew, because my great grandmother labored at it and didn't want her daughter to suffer so.  My own grandmother did, though the clothes were a bit weird and the Halloween costumes, less so (weird, intentionally).  My mom, was a fine artist, turned interior designer, turned environmental activist (a legacy).

Our priorities have changed.  Everything is made for us.  So we don’t know about each stitch that goes into it.  We don’t know how bacon, or chicken, or flank steak is made – it’s killed and sliced and shipped, in case you were wondering.  Stuff is sewn, industrially.

You may have all that pedicure stuff, but you may not use it.  I do, because polish always chips when I do have it done, max four times per year, because I swim in a chlorinated pool to help my back and this is not good for beauty or nail polish or hair color longevity.  So I utilize the stuff I have.  I do it because there’s no impact with the drive or the the pick, or the push, or the brush, and there’s nothing that makes me wake up to the world like a WARM pool, so I won't change that.  It’s horizontal, the swim, maybe that’s it.  Blue Mind, maybe.  Maybe I’m born again.  There’s a reason for water and it’s to swim.  There's a reason to have stuff to do stuff to not depend on anyone.  

Be a self-starter.

So once I had a party at home, there was no other way.  I’ve tried to convince them kids of the better venue to make my life easier, but they won’t fall for it billed as a more exciting option or because so-and-so, liked it.  It's the same every time at the This Place and That Place and Good Place and Bad Place.  They like to be at home, with its own canned party which I’ve nailed down to a two-hour segment of play (hopefulness at good weather that always seems to cooperate), pizza or baked Costco chicken nuggets and Ore-Ida fries, more play (sports or cupcake decoration), then cake feasting (this time Costco despite my objections because I usually make it), then piñata, then part favors, then thank you and goodbye.

It's simple.

Honestly, I think that I’m just too lazy to schlepp all of that stuff to and from a venue.  Perhaps I just don’t want anyone orchestrating my child’s party and making money off it.  Maybe (ha-ha), I have too much time on my hands (hardly).   Or, there's "Control Freak."

Make it what you want but I orchestrated #25 birthday party last Sunday and it ROCKED!  Yes, two E-vites were never received and I have to do a make-up party because I feel like an asshole after apologizing to parents and kids and... feeling like an asshole, later to be rectified with more cupcakes or brownies and more kids here, so I don't feel like an asshole.

Perhaps, I just want to infuse my home with the happy presence of friends who make my children and me get through another day.  That’s it.  It’s the time with them.  It’s the amnesty of legal hardship because someone may fall on their (collective or individual) face at my house, but thinking that no bad things will happen or spiral or domino.  It’s watching them play soccer in the driveway and remember the story my mom told me of my older brother’s first birthday party, at home, where he and his friends ran up and down the driveway. No one needed to entertain them and they didn’t need to be entertained.  They had a driveway.

Kids don’t need to be entertained.  Give them room and let them be.  Give them time to roam.  Inhabit birthday venues as needed but not for the Jonses’.  The Jones’ don’t do anything different, anyway.

ABOUT TIME: Relationship - Are You Serious?

    How much time do you need to...

    Consider yourself in a serious relationship?

Friend wrote this post:  “Relationship question for all of you interested in weighing in: What is the least amount of times you think a couple can see each other on a weekly basis and say that they are in a ‘Serious Relationship’? Personally I have no number and am aware that work schedules, family/friend time, personal time, life obligations, etc. come into play so I am fine with whatever works, even once or twice a week, but I am just curious... what do others think? How often do you see your partner? What is your criteria and what is the absolute minimum you would accept?

 First off, Friend, you sound like a real giver.  What is the absolute minimum I would accept?  That is not how you start a negotiation.  Of course, if you’re a fairly authentic individual, it’s not really a negotiation but an experience.  Desperation is kind of like lowball pricing.  Maybe short-sale.  Short-sale is neat if…

I’m getting into that.

Does that mean you’d be bidding on a short-sale property and thus property would be either of you?

I think that’s the wrong question.

How about, what do you have to give? 

The other just appears that you don’t have a piece to spare.  That’s coming from a forty-four-year-old woman with three kids living in southern Westchester with far too many hobbies.  I read something once that narrowing your curiosities was a sign of maturity.  It was bad news.  Perhaps that makes me the girl version of Peter Pan.  Ummm, even though Peter Pan in the stage version WAS a girl (see: Julie Andrews).  It’s not a time to pick on people though.  It’s a time to investigate the time commitment of a serious relationship.

I’d like to shift that.  Let’s call it a “Committed Relationship” in which partners promise to keep each other safe by restricting certain intimacies, physical and emotional, that are unique to them.

            Just for kicks lets try on a Mock Dear Abby column to see if this one fits you.  Or, for the sake of analogy or, more dramatically, embellishment:

Dear Abby, 

My husband/boyfriend/partner is chatting online with a woman.  He’s telling her what he won’t tell me.  But I wish he would, even if it would risk hurt feelings.  The acute hurt comes from not trusting me with whatever his derelictions, hesitations, fears, hardships, disappointments are.  All I want is for him to tell me, mostly so he can rise up from them and know that there’s no chance of failure in sharing yourself.  
I've spent #___ years with this man and he's never taken the time to either disclose himself to me or even be mildly supportive.

Signed,

Getting Divorced from Scared and Selfish

Dear Getting Divorced from Scared and Selfish,

            Your concerns are real.  Men maybe different than women in their entitlements to emotion and disclosure, but relationships are about relations in every way.  How you relate determines must of who you become and how you accept each other and yourself.  Big ideas to learn from.  It sounds like you know what you need.

Signed,

Abby

 P.S.  It's okay if you kill him in his sleep.  

None of that is about time.  Time is something I monitor with a schedule of three kids, work, writing, and exercise because I’ve been blessed with this vessel of creativity, love for human differences, and hyperactivity (I should probably be taking meds for this but I’m hoping age will kill that off).  I do not watch TV because I have very little free spots of it, and I’d rather space out and tie up story knots or just listen to music.  My head is already too busy for TV information and I get the news via the internet.  Meditating to resolve whatever parenting snag is tugging at me also works.  And it’s very quiet… ahhhhh.

There just isn’t a lot of time.  I mean, really, I barely have time to read anymore.  Reading comes slowly to me because I read every single word.  Being an author makes you respect every single word.  It’s a curse but it’s also the little knots that tie up the loose ends of my errant spirit.

Time means the most, is what I think I’m saying here.  So, I suppose my take on this is that the once or twice per week of physical presence is fine.  But to me I think that having and giving space with that presence is a huge challenge.  People are so complicated, get their feelings hurt, need time when it’s not available.  What they want and what they do can be on opposite sides of the planet.  Actions and words, the same.  Sometimes just being there when you don’t really want to be, but find out it’s importance, is the serious part.  Or the committed part.  But you have the love part.  Any parent can probably relate to this and the unexpected magic that can happen in those moments.

So, committed or serious would seem to require time because depth requires it.  Hijacking a life, not required.  Changing yourself for someone else in a way that is contrary to your inner voice of intuition and just how you are.  Not required, in my book.  Owning anyone or trying to… 

Corny, but as Keb Mo would say, “That’s not love.  Love don’t feel that way…”

My intention was to, uh, include all kinds of comments to Friend’s post, but it would be so long and that would take more time.  You can comment on your own, if you feel inclined.

Be yourself.  It’s advice from my (now and present very much not short-sale but real) mentors gave me.  That was the best news I’d heard in a long time.  And she does give me her time.  More than most would.