josetteplank.com

Taylor Swift Throwdown

Mother: Your room is a disaster.

Child: I'm doing something right now.

Mother: You need to do something about your room right now.

Child: UGH!

Mother: Right. Now.

Child: (singing) Some day!

I'll be!

Living in a big ole city!

And all you're ever gonna be is mean!

Mother: (singing) That day!

I'll be!

Renting out your big ole bedroom!

And all it's ever gonna be is clean!

Child: Mom!

Mother: (singing) But to-day!

You'll be!

Sweeping with a big old push broom!

And I'll be making me a cup of tea!

Child: MOM! STOP!

Parent Volunteering: FAQs and Phobias

If you have kids, chances are you’ve already been asked to Volunteer. And if you haven’t been asked to Volunteer yet, chances are you will be.

Should you? Could you? Why would you?

Listen to me. I’ve been a Girl Scout leader, an elementary school room parent, a Soccer Mom, a Lunch Bunch monitor, a Book Buddy, and I’m currently the Test Chair for a local skating club. (The duties of Test Chair are similar to those of a military commander planning the invasion and occupation of a small country, except with more sequins and tango music.)

And I’m going to answer the most pressing questions parents have when it comes to volunteering.

You’re welcome.

Ready?

Let’s roll!

1. What is volunteering? A lot of my friends are doing it and tell me I should try it, I’ll have a good time. But other friends who volunteer just look tired and paranoid. Is volunteering like smoking pot?

Volunteering as a parent generally means performing some kind of task which directly or tangentially promotes and assists in educating children in the arts, math and sciences, social sciences, or athletics. Parent volunteering may also support and enable kids’ own volunteer endeavors, e.g. a scouting troop collecting personal care items to donate to a homeless shelter, or a skating club hosting an event for a local charity. There are several reasons why adults might be needed to volunteer in support of children’s activities. Like so:

· Mrs. Murray, the first grade teacher, listens to different groups of children read out loud each day for ten minutes. However, this year Mrs. Murray has thirty kids in her first grade class instead of twenty. Until Mrs. Murray wins the lottery and hires her own full-time aide –because she’s not getting one from the district this year - she’s asked a few parents to come in for a half hour each day to sit in the hallway and listen to children read out loud from simple texts. Just sit there. Maybe nod and say, “Hmmm!” or “Wow!” or help sound out the word though, which is a tricky word when you’re in first grade.

· The scouting troop wants to go to Washington, DC to visit the Air and Space Museum where the boys will suddenly envision themselves finishing their algebra homework every night so that they, too, can become fighter pilots. Unfortunately – very unfortunately – it’s too expensive for everyone to take the train to DC. The leader asks parents with big, honking minivans to help transport scouts.

· A parent of one of the girls on the U11 soccer team is ill, and the family can’t make soccer even a third-tier priority right now. The coach asks if another parent or two could help keep the ill parent's daughter involved by offering rides and reminders and game day snacks -not only because the soccer team needs another player, but because right now this child could really use the soccer team.

You kinda feel good already just imagining the hypothetical people who will raise their hands and say, “Sure! Sign me up!”

And just think – that hypothetical person’s hand could be your factual hand!

However, I have to be entirely truthful and admit that there’s a gently sloping and slippery downside to raising your hand that first time, and it is this: once you volunteer, you will be forever branded as “the type who volunteers”. Even if you never want to volunteer again. Even if you explicitly say, “No thank you, not this time, thanks, I’m in traction from a skiing accident and can’t leave the hospital for six weeks.” Like an unknowing soul wandering into a cattle auction, volunteer organizers will take any slight signal – a sneeze, waving away a stink bug, a facial tick – that you are ready to help out again. And before you can begin to wonder what part of “No” didn’t they understand, you own a Holstein.

2. I’ve heard I can volunteer for fun and profit! Is this true?

Yes!

And No!

Meaning, Yes! You might have fun…probably.

But No! Volunteering will not directly put cash in your pocket. Oh sure, volunteering at the hot dog stand or bake sale might help defray band or team costs overall, and in that way save you a penny. But no, since most volunteering is done for children’s organizations with 501(c) (3) IRS tax exemption status (fancy talk for “the whole point of volunteering is so that it benefits the kids, and we mean all the kids equally, not just your own kid mostly”), there are very few occasions – if any – when you would be getting fee-for-service without the IRS getting a tingle in its butt. So to speak.

If you want to work to financially benefit only your own kid's participation, that's called A Part-time Job.

However, if by profit you take a more poetic meaning - as in “benefiting all kids through enrichment ” - when then, by golly, in the words of Tiny Tim, God Bless us, every one.

3. Do I need a certain hair style to volunteer?

This unfortunate typecast of volunteers with charity-ball hairdos, threaded eyebrows, and the correct modest-come-hither hem length is a notion which began with Jeannie C. Riley’s infamous song about a certain parent’s group in Harper Valley and hasn’t let up since.

And to be sure, there are some volunteer groups which conduct themselves like an exclusive club of estrous-Napoleons posing as Talbot's ads. Or – more rare, but not unheard of – groups of anti-establishment, cowboy-coffee non-conformists who guffaw when you unpack your collapsible French press and celadon bean grinder 1,500 feet into the Appalachian Trail youth backpacking tour.

In reality, most parent-run organizations are made up of a few folks who are large and in charge, and a majority of underlings who all personally feel as if they are somehow mismatched and bumbling their way from one event to the next even when they are, in fact, being efficient and Very Useful. Somehow, it all works out and the bake sales run on time and no one comes to fisticuffs. Most people even make new friends.

Normally, if a group has asked for volunteers, it’s because the group actually needs volunteers and not because they’ve run out of people to sneer at. Even in a worst case scenario, there might be a ritual hazing – when during the first project you take on, you are made to feel like a failure, an unwelcome threat, and an oddball - after which the group will wondrously and inexplicably welcome you whole-heartedly and possibly even make you a chairperson of something or other.

If they don’t make you feel welcome even while still asking you to volunteer, you could try chanting, “It’s for the children, it’s for the children.”

If that doesn’t work, tell them to stuff it. You can find somewhere else to help out.

4. Do I need a certain kind of car to volunteer?

No. Although, if you own a minivan, pick-up truck, or retired school bus, you will be on several people’s speed dial.

5. What will I be asked to do as a volunteer?

Everything and anything, included but not limited to shuttling kids, hauling equipment, baking brownies (or buying homemade facsimiles), cutting construction paper shapes, taping art work to walls, chaperoning field trips, donating good used copies of Bud,Not Buddy or My Brother Sam Is Dead for fifth graders who can’t afford a paperback for class (for real), monitoring kids at recess, tracking funds for the softball team, organizing a fundraiser, organizing volunteers for a duck pond booth at the fun fair, talking to a group of girls about your career as woman in the engineering field, discussing care of sheep with 4H kids, mentoring an Eagle Scout blazing a new trail, copying papers, stapling things, making sure kids cross the street safely, encouraging a child to try reach for the next grip on the rock climbing wall, bringing twenty-four juice boxes, tutoring a young piano player, and sitting with preschoolers coloring while their parents attend teacher meetings for their older kids. And more. It’s like choose your own adventure!

6. My kids are in school and sports and all these freaking activities, and each one wants me to volunteer. What the hell?

What the hell, indeed!

Try not to feel pressured. Do what you can, when you can. And if you can’t right now, maybe you can later.

If you have any You Must Volunteer To Participate obligations that you can’t fulfill, perhaps you can ~~bribe~~ ask a grandparent or auntie to show up in your stead. Or maybe you share your home with an older teen who can exchange mowing the lawn this week for running the ticket booth at the middle school play. (Bonus! If your older teen is moderately willing and able to take part in activities with much younger kids, your teen will be treated not unlike a rock star or minor goddess by the little ones. It’s actually very sweet. Ignore your teen’s eye rolls. They love the adoration.)

If people are still attempting to make you feel bad after you’ve offered to fulfill your volunteer duties to the best of your ability, screw ‘em. That’s not playing nice.

On the other hand, it’s probably prudent to get clear on the expectations before you commit your child to participating in an activity. If you anticipate conflicts, discuss them with the organizers before you start signing papers and writing checks. There may be alternatives to the hourly requirements (e.g. your work schedule better accommodates volunteering one day for six hours instead of two days for three hours) or even a cash buy out. Inquiring beforehand whether or not there is flexibility in fulfilling your share of the load might extend you some goodwill and willingness to negotiate.

7. Other grown ups can be scary and intimidating, what with their gung-ho attitudes and organizer apps that they actually use. I want to help, really, I do! But how can I ever measure up?

Be friendly. Ask questions. Take on the odd jobs that others might not want. Ask to shadow another volunteer to get to know the job better.

Don’t go in all gangbusters with new ideas for process improvement and threaten any delicate status quo – there will be time for making your mark after people get to know you and become fairly certain you aren't recording all their quirks and idiosyncrasies for a Facebook ramble.

And remember: as much bad press as some volunteer run groups get, there are exponentially more people out there who are friendly, devoted to working with kids, helpful, grateful for your time and talent, and who will also genuinely like you.

Really.

You’re pretty darn likeable.

Short skirt and all.

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Free Repeat Sunday

Just going through my blog-files as I write a new post. Here's one from a me with slightly younger children:

Would You Rather...?

A. Walk with a two year old through a mile-long corn maze on a seventy-eight degree afternoon exactly at nap time

OR

B. Eat a leather shoe?

Would You Rather...?

A. Spend an entire morning in an ice cold skating rink watching your beginner skater perform skittering tricks to grainy recordings of instrumental Broadway show tunes, High School Musical karaoke songs, and umpteen different versions of The Nutcracker

OR

B. Read the phone book?

Would You Rather...?

A. Listen to your eight year old wax poetic for hours on end on the joy that is Tamagotchi

OR

B. Sneeze staples?

---------------------

Some days are hard.

Or rather -

in my world of privilege, abundant food and water, indoor plumbing, and luxurious time to spare, some days are "hard".

Some days, it takes a great effort of sustained reverse imagination to stay in the moment -- any moment -- and enjoy this luxury of accurately and genuinely seeing these small people I made, see them and soak them in like honey on a sponge cake, soak them in like the dessert that they are and not, instead, some bowlful of dry lentils.

Some days, I need to play a reverse version of the Our Town Stage Manager and lead myself forward in time to another version of myself - an older, less agile, more pained version; or a version of myself anxious and waiting in a hospital room; or a version of myself alone in a kitchen pouring, finally, an uninterrupted cup of tea and wondering what my grown babies are doing, where they are in their own heads, where they will lay those lovely heads that night, and not being sure where or in what room or place they will meet the dawn....

I need to lead myself forward in time to one of these moments of unwanted solitude and then back again, back to this uneventful day, this unimportant day, this day of ever watching clocks while rushing and prodding children through one moment into the next:

Now breakfast, now the arguments about cleaning up dishes and pulling combs through tangled hair, now out the door to school and homework left on the counter, now wondering how much longer I need to play on the floor in order to call myself "good mother", now nap time, now the afternoon crush of low sugar and out the door to soccergrymnasticsballetskatingscouts, now the dinnertime squabbles, now the gauntlet before bedtime, now one ear awake all night hoping to not hear them before dawn -

But, just for a moment now we're all together.

Just for a moment we're happy.

Let's look at one another.

On day, I’m in the middle of a hot, dry corn field maze with a toddler who is at once cranky, at once laughing and pointing toward the golden stalks bending over him like gods' heads, now screaming on the ground, now kicking a stray kernel through the dust, now rushing ahead of me singing a song never heard before, never to be heard again, the words stringing out and disappearing like the seconds, now turning a corner, a glimpse of Spiderman sneaker, a corner of blue coat sleeve, a few fine strands of strawberry-blond hair, later clipped and pasted on a page….

Some day in the quickly closing-in future, I'll give anything and everything to be in that hot, dry cornfield again.

Some day, I'll give anything for my biggest immediate problem to be wrestling a tired toddler -- even the beating fists, even the tears -- just to feel the beautiful weight of him in my arms, just to know where he will be laying his lovely head that evening, just to remember what it felt like to be able to run after my little boy...and keep up with him.

Mama, I'm here.

I'm grown up.

I love you all, everything.

I can't look at everything hard enough.

Oh, Mama, just look at me one minute as though you really saw me.

This lanky girl who walks into the kitchen on colt's legs, a mane of chestnut hair, a book under her arm, a book filled with words she may never show me, a book filled with a version of herself that she’s inventing while I’m not looking. My authoress who will, I know, parse me and poem me until I become an unrecognizable Picasso work reinvented by my own invention.

This golden daughter in the middle who becomes a mystery to me each day even as she smiles out loud. She pokes fun and teases me and refuses to be a simple known quantity easily assembled from bits and pieces of a mother plus a father. She equals nothing I have ever known before and this is a joke she loves repeating, her heart-sleeve emotions a punch line that gets me every time.

Oh, earth, you're too wonderful for anybody to realize you.

Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it?

Every, every minute?

We take photos.

We make videos.

We write.

We blog.

We document and describe what is happening, what was, what we think we’ll never forget but press into scrapbooks just in case - this endless hour of breastfeeding, this first week of autumn, this secret flashlight and shape of finger shadow on tent wall, this sound of giggling from the next room, this frosty morning, this small hand on my arm….

And still so many moments slip through like water in a cupped palm.

So many days are here and gone with the waiting for each day to end.

I am not perfect.

I am not a poet or a saint or - Shakespeare's aphorism notwithstanding - even a character in a play with or without a Stage Manager at hand to prompt me into climactic monologue of perfect awareness.

I’m just a mom and a blogger and someone who can occasionally trick herself into answering "A" for every "Would You Rather...?" when really, it should take no trick at all.

When really, 1:34 PM on a glorious Tuesday in warm October in the middle of a tall corn field with a red-haired little boy shouting

"Now! And now! And now!"

should be enough.

Keeping It Real

Mother: Hey, guess what! I wrote something that got published a few different places!

Child: Good job, Mom!

Mother: Yeah, and a newspaper called me and asked me my opinions about parenting!

Child: A real newspaper?

Mother: Well...yes...a real newspaper.

Child: Huh! That's cool. Good for you, Mom.

Mother: I'm kinda excited!

Child: So, are you famous now?

Mother: Well...no. Not really.

Child: Are you going to be rich?

Mother: Uhm...not exactly.

Child: Well, I'm proud of you. I know you like to write.

Mother: Thanks.

Child: Maybe you can write a book or something.

Mother: I think I could! It would be a lot of work.

Child: You're always telling us to work hard.

Mother: That's true.

Child: Okay.

Mother: Okay.

Child:

Mother:

Child: Are you writing right now?

Mother: No, not right now.

Child: Could you make me a sandwich?

Calling My Husband's Bluff

(a re-gifted post for Valentine's Day)

Me: What should I write about on my blog today?

Husband: Me.

Me: Really? You never want me to write things about you.

Husband: Meh.

Me: Fine then. I'm going to write things about you.

Husband: Meh.

Things About My Husband

This is my husband.

The first thing to know about my husband is that he has very wavy hair that he almost always combs straight. I don't know why he does this. Maybe because he tries to look like a respectable member of society, but wavy hair can often say otherwise.

His hair looks very good wavy. I tell him this, but he doesn't believe me.

I don't know why he doesn't believe me.

I'm right about almost everything.

This is my husband before I knew him.

I don't know how old he is here.

All I know is that our oldest daughter also very frequently gives me this look when she thinks I'm being ridiculous.

I pity whoever it is who was taking this photo.

This is my husband when he used to play men's adult league baseball.

If my husband looks serious about baseball here, it is because he is serious about baseball.

When we lived in Philadelphia, my husband and his friends formed their own league. My husband's team was the Black Sox. These guys wore cleats and played with wooden bats and slid into base

and got lectures about hitting the cutoff man.

One time, I drove my husband to a field in the middle of February in the middle of North Philly so that he and his friends could begin spring training. They shoveled snow from the field so they could practice. That was the day their pitcher broke his arm because it was spring training and these guys took baseball very seriously. Someone was bound to break an arm.

Can I tell you how many Saturday mornings I've spent in dusty fields somewhere in Philadelphia watching a bunch of guys playing baseball and yelling at each other in English, Spanish, and Italian? Lots. Lots and lots and lots. So many that even though my husband hasn't played baseball in years, I can still most likely get him to do things for me by saying, "Remember all those times I sat in dusty baseball fields in South, North, and West Philly - AND New Jersey - watching you play baseball?"

And I could still be owed one.

However...I don't do this. My husband doesn't play baseball anymore, even though I know he really wants to. When you have lots of kids, some things get put away. He put away baseball.

But...I'm thinking he should play again.

He's a pretty good shortstop.

And someone has to remind people to hit the cutoff man.

This is my husband with our eldest daughter.

He's good with toddlers.

Which is wonderful, because I am not as good with toddlers. And it helps if at least one parent is.

Here he is with all our kids.

All of our kids got his intelligence and athletic ability.

None got his wavy hair.

I met my husband at the birthday party of a mutual friend. At the time, my husband was wearing a bright yellow raincoat. I don't have a photo of him wearing that raincoat, so this photo of him in a turkey hat will have to do.

I spent the evening talking about being an English major in college. He listened to every word. Or maybe he faked listening to every word. All I know is that a lesser man would have politely excused himself and gone to search out a drunk girl dancing in a corner.

At around four in the morning, he asked me for a ride home.

I drove him home through the empty streets of Philadelphia in my Dodge Colt and the entire time I was thinking, "Uh-oh...I bet he's going to try to kiss me goodnight."

But he didn't.

He played it cool.

I bet he didn't know I'd have a photo of him in a turkey hat posted on my blog twenty years later.

This is my husband on top of a wintry mountain with our red-headed baby.

That night I drove him home through Philadelphia, I bet he didn't know I'd have this photo, either.

This is a drawing of my husband and me on a date at Silk City Bar in Philadelphia.

For about a year or so, we spent almost every weekend at Silk City. We spent a lot of weekdays there, too. We listened to Frank Sinatra. We listened to Deee-Lite. We listened to 808 State. We listened to U2.

During these dating years, my husband used to wear his hat backwards and drink Rolling Rock in pony bottles. There is a number "33" on the Rolling Rock bottle. This was also my husband's baseball uniform number.

This was all just a coincidence. I think.

In 1996, we got married and my husband started law school and we didn't go to Silk City as often.

Law school puts a lot of things behind you.

Or...if you plan on graduating law school, you have to put a lot of things behind you.

This is my husband with a glass of champagne, smoking a cigar, in a hot tub at a ski lodge in the Poconos.

My husband is a joie de vivre kind of guy.

And even though he and I are now respectable members of society, we neither of us turn down invitations to hot tubs and champagne and cigars. Think of us when planning your next night of low-level debauchery.