The Challenge of Participation

When Ella was maybe 2 or 3 years old, we were told by her teachers that she didn't always participate in the classroom activities.  I honestly don't recall exactly what activities it was that she was choosing to skip, but it left an impression on me that I haven't had a reason to shake.  Ella doesn't always go with the proverbial flow -- Ella doesn't do anything Ella doesn't want to do.  I've seen her at birthday parties -- yes, plural -- sit along the wall, watching her friends participate in the themed activities with no intention of doing so herself... and be perfectly fine with it.  I find this both comforting and concerning.  Comforting as I look at her as a teenager being tempted to do things and choosing not to do them because what teenager really wants to do the crazy shit they do?  Concerning because I am a firm believer in the value of participation in the development of a child and his eventually leading a fulfilling life. I believe that participation in school and extracurricular activities made me the active, pretty well-rounded person that I am today.

So, yes, I want my kids to participate in activities, and I'm trying to instill some of that in them now.  But it's difficult.  Getting them to want to participate and try new things is a challenge at which I'm failing.  And I really don't know what the right approach is -- make them participate because they don't know how good and fun it can be or let them choose to participate when they know they're ready?

When I was growing up, I was a huge participator, playing any sport I could (except for soccer, of course), holding positions in the student council, accepting spots on the Mathletes and JETS teams, being a member of clubs from the Outdoor Club to the French Club, and, of course, actively participating in my schools' Spirit Week.  My parents didn't have to goad me to do this, either -- I did it all without question.  To me there was no choice, no alternative BUT to participate.  Of course, that was when I was older than the Leatherkids, say, 11 or 12.  I know I first tried out for softball, my first sport, when I was 9.  Maybe I didn't do anything before 9... but I would have given the choice!

With a couple of seasons under his belt and a dad who played, Cal is committed to baseball now and doesn't have any vision of anything other than baseball for himself.  But I do!  The kid is athletic.  I've seen him dribble a basketball time and time again, and I've listened to the thud of him dunking his mini basketball on the hoop on his bedroom door enough to know that he's at least interested in and has some skills for the game.  I know a player when I see one, and he's it.  So I keep asking him as I find Park District programs, "Cal, do you want me to sign you up for this basketball camp?"  He always gives me some wishy-washy answer, I tell him he needs to broaden his horizons and try different sports and that he'd be good and then we move on to a different topic altogether.  I've told him that skills I learned in basketball I applied to softball and vice versa.  I believe it, but it's lost on him.  He's 8.

And Ella, whom I believe is an even better athlete based on natural movement alone, is worse.  She has no vision of herself playing any sport whatsoever.  This is (sort of... take a breath, Mommy) fine; but I can't get her to want to do gymnastics or an art class (she's good at that, too!) or want to attend a freakin' birthday party.  She swims now and knows that once she becomes a "swimmer for life," we'll let her choose whether to continue to swim or not.  She's totally going to choose to not swim -- we let Cal off the hook at the same point, and she knows this.  But she's the better swimmer!  She could do it!  Ugh!

Our front door with targets

I played volleyball for many years, on school teams through college and in many competitive co-ed and women's leagues and organizations as an adult.  I absolutely love the game and loved my time playing it.  And I really want Ella to play the game.  I'm not sure exactly when it started, but I've been throwing out this question for some time now: "Ellie, do you want to play volleyball?"  Her answer has been a consistent "no."  But when her dad sent me a picture of her hair-do in December where she asked for her nearly patented "pony braid" with a bow on top "just like the volleyball players," you can bet that I jumped all over that and bought her a "lite" (for early learners) volleyball for Christmas.  That kid is going to (try to) play volleyball if it's the last thing I do.  I told her I'd put an "X" on our front door above Cal's strike zone so she can practice passing.  She asked for a check mark.  Sure, Ellie, whatever it takes.

Cal is 8, and Ella is 6.  That I feel a little behind in getting them involved and participating in activities is likely attributable to a handful of things.  For one, I work a lot and don't have much weekday time. We have weekends, and that's about it.  Second, Cal swam, spent two seconds playing soccer, a few Saturdays playing basketball and a couple of seasons playing baseball; Ella is swimming.  Their peers are doing so much more.  Are they asking to or are their parents making them because that's just what you do with your kids in the 'burbs?  We are, in fact, behind.  Is that okay?  Lastly, the Leatherkids just don't show the interest... at least, they say they're not interested. And making a disinterested Leatherman do something is downright painful.

Our plane

On Sunday, a co-worker of mine texted me out of the blue that he had reserved an airplane at our local airport and would I like to bring the family by to see the plane and even take ride?  Rather than reply immediately, "yes!", I asked the kids if they'd like to go.  Ella, without hesitating and sucking me in for some misery later, said she wanted to go.  Cal?  Cal said, "no"... repeatedly.  When it came time for Ella and me to head to meet my co-worker, I suffered so.  "I don't want to go," she repeated, and I can't remember all of the other negative stuff that she said.  When we got into the car, I broke into tears and told her to "just, please, go and be nice to Mr. Gevin... you can be mean and complain to me about it, but please, be nice when we're at the plane."  I was defeated.

Ella radioed up

It turns out, Ella was positive and enjoyed every moment we spent at and on that plane.  She doesn't know it, but she had an experience that few have or will ever had.  We went for an impromptu plane ride to Yorkville!  And what I took away from that is that, given the choice, she wouldn't have been there to experience it.  In the end, I made her go.  And my conclusion to it, applying it to the dilemma I've been facing in getting the Leatherkids to participate in things, is that I need to just sign them up, make them try new things.  Given the choice, they won't.  I know better, though.  As an experienced participator and knowing the positive effect it's had on my own life, I have to strongly influence them to participate in activities.  I know it'll be painful and likely involve my own tears; but it's important to me that they not hide from things, that they be well-rounded kids, that they find that they can do and enjoy more than they think they can and will by simply trying.

Cal may end up not being good at basketball and Ella not so at volleyball.  But I see potential, and I want them to just give these things -- any things, really -- a try.

Treasured Ornaments

So I last wrote in my blog before Christmas season, almost dreading it because I knew I'd be with the Leatherkids constantly at the end of it for two solid weeks.  I don't know if my last post actually said that, but that was certainly its intended prevalent theme.  It goes without saying that I truly love them; they just have a way of driving me nuts.

It turns out, it was tolerable... and, looking back, fast... and almost describable as "fun" at times.  We had the right amount of goings on to break it up with Christmas Eve at my brother-in-law's house, Christmas with my family at our house and then a three-day trip to the Dells for some Great Wolf Lodge Waterpark fun with my sister-in-law and her kids starting the day after Christmas.  After a couple of recovery days and a visit from my dad to help him with some computer issues, we found ourselves rolling into New Year's Eve, which we spent at our house with the Reinkes and my dad.  And then we visited our friends the Henses on the 1st (all day -- sorry, Jen and Kevin) and spent some time furthering our Great Wolf Lodge time by visiting my sister-in-law on the 2nd.  I texted my mom that the kids were driving me nuts on the 3rd and could she take them to a movie, survived all day alone with them on the 4th, and here I am blogging while the kids watch "Sing" with my mom on the 5th.  All in all, I'd say the 4th was the worst day where I survived by, in a great Mommy moment, letting them use the ipads, practically unsupervised, for what seemed like 12 hours (in the end, it was somewhere between 4 and 5, not that that's any better, really).  I felt better about myself when, at the end of the day, I told them they'd get "no ipad time tomorrow, so don't even ask"... which, of course, didn't stop Cal from asking for ipad time today, to which I responded, "No, and if you keep bugging me about it today, you won't get it tomorrow."  He gave me some mad, I-don't-like-you face but didn't ask me about it anymore.  Mommy 1, Leatherkids 23 (not that we're officially keeping score).

So here I sit at "The Vault" in Lemont, drinking a Pollyanna IPA, and blogging while the kids are with Grandma.  I love this.  It's EXACTLY where I want to be.

And what I really want to write about is my ornaments.  Yes, that's right -- my Christmas ornaments.

I spent virtually the entire day on the 3rd taking down and packing away our Christmas decorations. I really don't understand how it's possible that it took this long because we basically have decorations in the equivalent of four rooms (living room, family room, kitchen and two bathrooms... that's the equivalent part).  A quick assessment from an independent party would likely be two hours; anyone who knows me would know better because of how perfect and precise I am when packing things.  But six hours?  This would be on no one's radar.

To be fair, it's probably ornament removal and packing that at least doubles de-Christmasing our house.  There are just so many of them!  I all-encompassingly blame (and by "blame," I do mean blame, but with an appreciative slant) my mom for it.  Afterall, she gave us a 50-pack of a mixture of red, green and white balls, flakes and spires last year because our tree apparently had some gaps in it.  She's also responsible for my initial supply of ornaments, a hodgepodge of "my" ornaments that she made sure to collect, protect and save during my childhood.  And that she did that for me and that I value it more than she may know, I am doing it for my kids -- every year, they each get a new store-bought ornament to hang on the tree; and when it comes time for them to buy their own trees, I'll give these to them.

So decorative balls, treasured oldies and hopeful future treasures -- my mom is behind all of them.  And every year, when it's time to pull out the decorations and to put them away, I thoroughly enjoy my walk down memory lane, not the one with the 50 balls, flakes and spires on it, nor the one with future treasures; but the one with the treasured oldies.  I remember them all and thought I'd share some.

This one on the left, I made in 1976, the same year that my husband was born.  Yes, I was crafting when he was barely cooing.  Now, I don't remember making it, but we know that I did because my mom made sure to label it.  That a handmade ornament survived this many years I attribute to my mom's and my careful handling.  And why did we care so much?  Because this is part of my story.

The one on the right, the shepherd and his lamb, is my favorite of all of my ornaments.  I can't explain why -- I really can't.  It's not colorful.  I am not religious so I don't fully appreciate the religious story behind it, nor do I know who might've given this to me, or, if it was my mom, why she chose to give this one to me.  I adore it.  Perhaps it's the shepherd protecting and loving his lamb, like I might do with my pets.  I protect it.  I always hang it in a prominent place.  I don't know for sure, but I believe this one is dated 1979; and look at the condition it's in.  It's perfect.  I love it.

That Geometry book on the left I made when I was in high school.  Mr. Gonz's class.  It's a piece of construction paper wrapped around a piece of styrofoam, held in place by push pins, and decorated, of course, by me.  I loved that class.  Everyone loved Mr. Gonz.  I wonder how many of my classmates still have their ornaments?

That desk on the right Grandma Reiter gave to me.  1987 is the year I graduated from high school.  This ornament accompanied the gift that she gave me in the Reiter Christmas exchange.  It's my memory of her... one of many memories of her.

Last but not least, is my Fenway ornament.  Fenway was the German Shepherd who was unexpectedly given to me as a gift (never give a dog to someone as a gift without talking about it beforehand) and whom I grew quickly to love.  He was so smart and so good.  I remember rollerblading with him running alongside of me.  I lost Fenway early when, tragically, he was hit by a car.  He was in my life for only a couple of years, and I have an ornament that I put on the Christmas tree to remember him.

Those are just a handful.  The oldest ornament I have is dated 1972.  It's a glass ball with some old Norman Rockwell-types of characters on it. We had problems getting this year's Christmas tree to stay standing (it fell three times), and this ball survived the tumbles where a couple of other newer, less meaningful ones did not.

There are volleyballs and a basketball and a bat, ball, and glove combo.  There are ornaments from my local trips to Lincoln Park Zoo and to the Morton Arboretum.  There's a seal from San Francisco and a skier from Vail.  And there's my new Chicago skyline ornament.

These ornaments tell my story.

There are others, and I can tell the story of most.  I can even tell the story of our newer ones that are the beginning of the collections for each of the Leatherkids.  They each get a new store-bought ornament every year; and I make it a point to save (and hang) every one of their hand-made ornaments.  The laminated paper ones.  The hardened dough ones.  The ones missing an eye... or a limb... or both.  These ornaments will tell their story.  It'll be their decision what to do with them and how much to value them; and it'll be my job to instill in my kids that appreciation for the meaning behind the ornaments, something that I think is probably actually beyond the ornaments themselves.  But as far as the ornaments go, I'm going to value them and take care of them, much like my mom did for me.