Name a Price !

Is price a guarantee for quality? What price is realistic for a product that is made with durable materials and purposeful technology in a process that respects both labour and environmental laws and is locally produced? I am willing to pay a price, or save the money until I am able to pay the price as long as the thing, whatever it is, lasts and works well. Someone just please make an unsponsored list of stuff that actually works and I will treasure it with my life!!

Puppy-dogs' tails

J. has his friends over and they are in the garden knocking each other over, tumbling on top of each other while giggling hysterically. All I can see are heads knocking into noses and elbows bruising cheek bones. When they come up for a bit of air, I open the back door and holler to take it easy, especially J. who seems massive compared to the other first graders. I am greeted with three beamish smiles and the reassurance that it’s all right since the whole point of the exercise is for J. to knock their front teeth out. And I thought that’s what a crisp Granny Smith was for...

Being There

Having been in this job now for almost fifteen years now, this much I know: you tend to get out of it what you invest in it - and I don’t mean money. Parenting is by far the most time consuming endeavor you could take on apart from being human. It will require every last iota of your cognitive and emotional ability and it will make your brain grow new pathways in nanoseconds, simply because often your life (and your child’s life) depend on it. From learning to skillfully handle various kinds and amounts of bodily fluids to efficiently communicate with the parents of the class bully, from keeping an open mind to ever changing health and safety advices to forming a clear and consistent set of rules, from establishing a relationship of trust to admitting fault when necessary, and from being believable to being unbelievably goofy, it will help to acquire a certain level of agility in a variety of areas. All of this takes time and lots of practice...years of practice, but then, we are in it for the long run anyway...!

Lucky You !

If you were born in the last forty years into a country belonging to the so-called Western Hemisphere, if you were born into a family without any history of abuse and furthermore if you were born healthy and with a moderate all around intelligence and the will to stay out of trouble and work hard and you haven’t had to deal with any major personal hardships then, really, things are looking pretty good - even if you are still earning minimum wage at age thirty and are living with your parents. Anything better than that and you can truly count yourself lucky and it may be time for pay back. The world is a pretty screwed up place and the best those lucky ones of us can do is to make it better!

February Fool

Once again I had thought myself to have given a perfect rendition of Father Christmas: the omniscient (almost there), fat (oh well), sexless (I guess that is sort of crucial to the roll) octogenarian (half way there...) who is vexingly smart (...), because he knows not only about every mishap but also happens to know the most ardent wishes of his little devotees. From skateboards to triple ball bearing diablos, from sowing kits to purple tutus, from remote controlled helicopters to friendship books and scooters, the guy knows not only what kids want, but where to get it. And so did I. A few months later, however, Jules wonders why on Earth Santa didn’t know that all that cool stuff he brought turned out to be absolute garbage. The remote helicopter didn’t last three minutes before the back propeller broke off (utterly not Jules’ fault), the scooter lost its break pedal within a month and the beginner sowing machine never sowed a stitch, because the needle it came with was bent, and I am just waiting for the diablo string to snap any minute now... However, the friendship book still works...