Claireify

Et Tu, Fido?

2010-02-15T20:10:00.018-05:00

Inexplicably, I love the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show. Generally, I am not a big fan of dogs. Dogs instinctively know this, which is why they always jump all over me, given the chance. (It reminds me how I never ran into a prominent Democrat when we lived in D.C. during the Clinton years, but Bob Dole death-gripped me into a photo when he was running for President. Arm, schmarm.)

Maybe I love Westminster because it's on my TV screen: I can't smell the dogs and there's no slobbering. I love that I have picked the winner more than once, with no doggy knowledge whatsoever. (If you've ever been in the Oscar pool with me when I haven't seen any of the movies, you might wonder why I don't pack it in and go to Vegas.)

But intellectually, what I really love about the dog show is this: every dog is judged for itself. The competition isn't dog-eat-dog. Instead, each dog is judged according to its own breed standards, even for best in show, when the top dogs of each group compete for the big water dish. Are you the best YOU you can be? In other words, a beagle doesn't have to try to be a poodle to get ahead. Take that, supermodels.

I went on like this, blissfully ignorant of the truth, until Sunday's New York Times shattered my illusions and exposed the money and power behind the top dogs at Westminster. Apparently, the "special" dogs are bankrolled for thousands of dollars in Dog News (no really, Dog News) advertising and name recognition.

This "helps" the judges, who have to judge so many dogs they apparently need some pointers in the right direction. As one professional dog handler remarked to the Times, "By [pros] showing up, judges seem to say, 'Thank God you're here because I don't know what to pick.'" So, according to the article, it turns out the unknown, unadvertised underdogs don't have much of a chance against the Big Dogs. Sadly, every dog doesn't have his day.

The whole situation reeks of politics, and we all know politics sometimes reeks. Outside of the dog tent, who knows what candidate corporate campaign contributions will crown top dog in the next election cycle, thanks to the Citizens United decision from the U.S. Supreme Court. Here in Cuyahoga County, corruption and (almost equally poisonous) alleged corruption have severely damaged the Democratic brand. One of the big problems in politics, nationally and especially locally, is that name recognition and familiarity often win. Not always (gObama!) but it's enough of an advantage that some aspiring local politicians will even try to change their names to get a better ballot moniker.

Let's face it, it takes a fair amount of effort to be an informed voter for local races. So, when the "pros" come in with their nice familiar-sounding name, it's easy to have the same "Thank God you're here __________ because I didn't know who to vote for," reaction (fill in the blank with your favorite local politician surname). And the voters could very well end up electing a real dog.

Those are some of the reasons why I'm signing the Statement of Values of the Cuyahoga Democrats for Principled Leadership (CDPL). The CDPL are local Democrats who want to re-energize the Cuyahoga County Democratic Party, calling for ethical leadership and greater participation and transparency in party governance.

Best of all, CDPL calls for "objectivity in selecting party leaders based on qualifications and fulfillment of job responsibilities rather than on factional loyalties or control of jobs or campaign funds."

In this world of dogs and politics, that's what I call a breath of fresh air.

Testing Testing 123

2009-09-23T23:03:00.009-04:00

Standardized testing is upon us. Upon my 7-year-old son Jonah this week, to be precise. Here's what he had to say:

"We have these very very important tests. They are very important. Very very important tests."

"They say, 'fill in the bubble under the correct answer' so you have to fill in the bubble."

"They are very important tests because the President of Testing wants to know how second-graders are doing."

"The President of Testing might even show them to Barack Obama!"

"The tests are very hard."

"At the bottom of the page it says 'Go On' and then you go on and then at the bottom of the next page it says 'Go On' and then you go on and at the bottom of the next page . . . and at the bottom of the next page it says 'Stop,' so you stop. Then it starts a new chapter. At the bottom of the page it says 'Go On' and then you go on . . . and then on the last page of the last chapter of the test book, page 99, it says stop, so you stop."

"The test book is very big."

"If you fool around on the test and answer something with the wrong answer even though you know the right answer, you have to go to the office. Because the tests are very very important."

So, I asked him how it made him feel to hear how very very important these tests are.

"Worried."

He's only a second-grader, and, President of Testing and President Obama's interests aside, I don't think these particular tests are even the biggies in terms of the State Report Card, No Child Left Behind, etc. Yet, the pressure is already huge.

The detrimental culture of testing goes even further than a week or so of pressuring small children like they're sitting for the LSAT. There's all those bland fill-in-the-bubble worksheets they do, starting in the earliest grades, to get them ready for tests later on. All the creative work they could be doing. And all the dumb movies they watch at school in the spring after the high-stakes tests are done and everyone gets to goof off because the very very important stuff is over.

Testing proponents maintain that testing helps, because it holds schools accountable for making sure every child succeeds. Unfortunately, every child does not succeed. Some states are already making tests easier and eliminating subjects, sometimes in order to address low scores or poor passage rates on graduation tests. What's wrong with this picture? Here in Ohio, budget cuts just eliminated writing and social studies tests for some elementary and middle school grades. So are the tests essential or not? Do they test something we value - or not? Are teachers going to stop teaching subjects that aren't tested - and what does that say about our educational values?

I'm no expert, but I strongly believe excellent teachers, sufficient resources, and creative curricula would do more for our kids than the barrage of tests they are now subject to. Do we want our kids to have a common base of knowledge? Ideally, perhaps, yes, although what the common base should be in a global society is another sticky question.

Our kids need to become literate (including mathematically and scientifically literate) citizens with well developed critical thinking skills and hopefully a dash of creativity. How do we get there? There's no easy solution. But bubble tests in a kiddie pressure cooker? I don't think so.

What do you think?

Reality Bites

2009-06-24T23:31:00.005-04:00

What have I learned from watching too much reality TV this summer? What haven't I learned! Time to settle in with some munchies . . . .

1. Family life can be exploited as a for-profit commodity but only at a price. (J&K+8) Okay, I never actually watched this show because there was never anything going on.

2. Teresa of NJ Housewives would be totally skeeved by my house because we just don't keep up with the "cleansy." (Real Housewives of New Jersey)

3. New York City prep school kids lead lives that have no resemblance whatsoever to my life at 16. Are they really real? F'real? F'real real? (NYC Prep)

4. It's okay to be gay if you DANCE but not so much if you SING. (So You Think You Can Dance, American Idol). Well, we don't know who's going to win the dance thing yet . . . and nobody's out (including that one dude on NYC Prep), so I guess it's basically the same.

5. Parenting can entail pimping kids out as models and actresses, living in the Hamptons while your teenagers live in NYC alone, resisting giving the kid her brand new car until she gets her grades up in summer school (hey, where's my car - Dad? Dad?), dragging many many kids to your press events with nothing to drink, letting your daughter live with Hugh Hefner and his harem, ew, and then discouraging her from moving out because it is such a great gig and how will she ever take care of herself, etc. etc. . . and a heaping helping of superiority. (Real Housewives, NYC Prep, JK8, Girls Next Door/Kendra etc. etc. etc.)

6. Epidurals are the bomb. Like, you can totally talk when you're OMG having a baby. Who knew?!! (16 and Pregnant)

7. I do not, in fact, have the Messiest Home in America. (Clean House)

8. I too could make a gourmet meal with just a microwave and hotplate. I do it practically every night. Here, try this salmon on angel hair. Or this Boca on a bun. Or this . . . . (Top Chef)

9. Eating Costco chocolate covered raisins every day will not help you lose weight, despite the healthy fibery raisin inside the delicious chocolate coating. Oh, wait, that wasn't on TV. That was on the couch in front of the TV.

9.5. If you are thinking about having a baby, try moving a chimp in first. (Keeping up with the Kardashians) This will make you reconsider.

10. If all else fails, Dance Your Ass Off. And pass the chocolate.

Schizophrenia or My Life?

2009-03-12T22:52:00.004-04:00

Is it just me or are the shifting roles throughout a working mom’s day enough to make you completely insane? Like the characters on “Lost” who seem totally okay, except when the random time travel starts to catch up with them and they get that telltale nosebleed indicating that their brains can’t take much more? (No, I don’t watch it anymore either.)

In the morning, I am the world’s worst drill sergeant, trying to get uncooperative kids off to school. They immediately have a million interesting things to do – or else are totally asleep because of all the interesting things they were doing at 11:00 the night before. My kids have perfected molasses-like movements in putting on boots and coats, etc. My script: “C’mon c’mon you’re going to be tardy, c’mon, C’MON!” In fact, I could run a recording of my lines daily, and get a little more sleep myself.

Then I try to turn into a productive member of society and go to work. Except I’m already mentally exhausted from the drill sergeant duty. It’s like 9 a.m.

I get to the law school. Get some work done. Maybe even teach a class.

Sometimes I shift into my creative writing personality – go off to playwriting class, sing crazy songs, talk about plays, check out everyone’s tattoos.

I return to the law school. Try not to fantasize about career as successful famous playwright. With many, many tattoos.

Meanwhile, those phone calls and emails and random ADD thoughts are coming in, relating to any and all of the above. Answer student emails! Call the school! Who’s picking everyone up? What meeting do I have to go to tonight? How did my kid get injured at preschool today? What’s due tomorrow? What’s for dinner? When can the law school committee meet? Who needs a letter of recommendation? What am I teaching in class this week? Who has to go to the doctor? What do I have to grade? When's the parent-teacher conference? What happens tomorrow?

That reminds me – human computer and calendar. My brain hurts.

In the evening, there might be some time as a loving parent. Unfortunately, I also have to be a child psychologist and social worker, and the occasional probation officer.

Not to mention the wife role, which I often ignore to my peril. Someone else needs my attention? Really? Now?

My parents are healthy, so I’m fortunately not in the position of having to parent my parents. But I see more roles on the horizon.

Yeah, I know I should slow down and enjoy this time. Too soon the kids will be teenagers, instead of pretending to be Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Jim and I will be older, and so will our parents. Work obligations and meetings won’t matter so much. There might not even be so many things on the calendar to keep track of, though I doubt it. (I mean, I’m sure to have a play premiering somewhere, right? Right?)

Until I can figure out a way to make it all work, the world whirls by, and I play catch up.

What Matters About What Happened

2008-11-08T22:46:00.030-05:00

I am still in disbelief and sleep-deprived from election night. I feel like I am living in a dreamy parallel universe where Barack Obama has won the election and my big brother actually sends me a text message acknowledging "u were right all along AND u r probably the smartest." I must be dreaming. I am elated. I am exhausted. And I am thinking-

Why does it mean so much that Barack Obama won this election?

The obvious answer is race. Little kids of every race and of mixed race can now dare to dream about being President someday. (Thanks to Hillary's historic run, girls can too.) In Obama I see the faces of the kids sitting next to my sons in school, and the brilliant kids I went to school with myself, some black and some biracial, just like Barack. Just like President Obama.

For older Americans, it is, as someone said, as if the country has been reborn. For me, it means whenever Sam Cooke's "A Change is Gonna Come" comes on the radio, I start tearing up again. And that endless sea of people of every shade coming together in Grant Park - that's Barack's America. And ours.

On a smaller and pettier generational note: Finally, FINALLY - the Boomers are out of power. We can stop fighting the stale battles of Vietnam and who inhaled and focus on today's world with all of its complexities and challenges. Just in time.

Obama's election also marks the beginning of the end of Idiocracy (I can dream too, can't I?). Obama never talked down to us. He never tried to be someone he wasn't (except perhaps in that unfortunate bowling incident). He never dumbed it down. In fact, Obama would tell us not to fall for the ol' "okey-doke" when the other side tried to go to the lowest common denominator. He trusted us to be smart enough to get it, and he wasn't afraid to show he was a pretty smart guy too. As Obama said many times on the campaign trail, now was no time to have a "big election about small things." For once, we got it right and brushed aside the nonsense.

Apathy went out of fashion. Remember in 2000, when you heard over and over, "It doesn't matter if Bush or Gore becomes President. It makes no difference to my life." We know now how much it matters, in lives lost and in lost livelihoods. It matters. People who had never voted before showed up this time and their votes counted and they helped to elect the next President of the United States - because it matters. I especially want to thank the radio personalities - like my personal favorite Michael Baisden - who never let up about the election and the importance of having a voice.

At last, the Good Guys won. I was never so thrilled as when Clinton won in 1992 because it felt like the political shadow over almost my entire childhood and adolescence had lifted, and the sun was out for the first time. As my four-year-old son Mills says, "Barack Obama cares about everyone." That's it exactly. I have never felt that the Republicans cared about everyone. Not when they only want to win in "real" (read: rural white Christian) America and hold their election night party at an exclusive gazillion dollar resort. Not back when Reagan conjured up the "welfare queen" or when Pat Buchanan railed against gay rights and feminism at the 1992 Republican Convention or when McCain put air quotes around "the health of the mother."

When Barack Obama says he will be the President for the United States of America, I believe him. He understands that the problem is not that government has been in our way, but that government has not been by our side when it matters. He understands that we need to restore the social contract in America and bring back a spirit of national service. Of course President Obama won't be able to solve all our problems, but he can surely lead us in a better direction than that of the past eight years. He gets it. He's smart. He cares about everyone.

Amazingly, he won. I'm wide awake.

The sun is shining.

Never Say Never

2008-09-23T23:00:00.008-04:00

Five things I thought I'd never ever ever do . . . and have done.

1. Go to law school
Somehow during my upbringing (ahem, Mom and Dad) I got the distinct message that going to law school was not a desirable life choice. (Maybe I imagined this, like I thought there was some big political reason for me never getting to join the Girl Scouts, and when I asked Mom about it, she said, "I don't know. Maybe you had a music lesson that day?") So I declared that I would never, ever do such a thing. But then there I was after three and half years of blissfully not thinking about a productive career or even what comes after college. My now-husband commented on my Spockian logic in arguments and got me to take the LSAT. My parents commented on how I could go to Case law school on a faculty-kid tuition waiver. And the rest is history.

2. Go to Case
Come to think of it, I am pretty sure I never intended to go to Case, what with both my parents working there. But at least in law school I could borrow their car (and run it into the garage door, oops).

3. Go back to school ever again after law school
I was absolutely sure of this up until this past summer, when I enrolled in creative writing courses at Cleveland State and had the time of my life. Now I am seriously considering pursuing an MFA.

4. Break up with a friend
Like breaking up with a guy, only a million times worse. But sometimes necessary.

5. Sign up for Weight Watchers
As a foodie raised by foodies, I was positive I could never look at each bite numerically (counting up the Weight Watchers daily "points"). But I looked around me (or tried to, I do need to lose a few pounds) and noticed that the people I know who have successfully lost weight have done it with WW. So after consulting with my trusty friend Jen, I joined the online version (I am way too introverted, not to mention busy, for meetings. The very thought makes me shudder). I actually really like it, though the website is just as addictive as the snacks I am learning to avoid.

6. Vote for a Republican President
Ha! Just seeing if you were paying attention. Ain't gonna happen. But in all other matters, never say never!

What Do I Have Against Hillary and Her Peeps Anyway?

2008-09-02T23:48:00.011-04:00

Why am I hatin' on all the Hillary supporters? Friends (as John McCain would say), that's not it at all. My whole family was for Hillary. Some of my best friends were for Hillary. My most brilliant students were for Hillary. Do I think they are stupid and knee-jerk? No. I also don't think they will sit out the election or vote for McCain for spite. But I did sit beside a Hillary supporter at the Cleveland Heights Democrats meeting who told me she just wouldn't vote for President since Hillary was so wronged. I've seen their quotes in the paper or on the news about how four years of McCain would be worth it to allow Hillary to run again. I saw that woman crying (and crying and crying) on CNN. PUMAs do exist. I profoundly disagree with them.

Now, there are plenty of people out there who believe McCain is best for America. Fine. I disagree with them too. But I'm not upset with true McCain supporters in particular, because they are voting their convictions. I am upset with the PUMAs in the Democratic party who will vote against their political beliefs just to avenge Hillary's loss in the primary. That is self-destructive, and unfair to the rest of us who would have to live with his policies just so they can get their petty (or strategic) revenge. And it degrades the democratic process.

If you have talked politics with me recently, you know I Don't Like Hillary. I got very tired of her tactics. I got very tired of her presenting herself as Co-President when she was really Wife Of (Obama should have been much more critical of her "experience" claim - now it is the gospel). I got very tired of her sense of entitlement. In short, I really don't like her style. Plus, I don't trust her. I feel like she will vote conservative if I turn my back for a second and she thinks it will help her win the next election.

But that's just my opinion. Plenty of people voted for Hillary because they truly believe she is the best candidate. However, I also can't count how many times I saw someone in the news say they just wanted to see a woman elected President before they die. That's great, but don't vote McCain because it didn't happen. That just leaves the rest of us hanging.

I have been for Obama since '04, when my jaw dropped during his convention keynote address. "Who IS this guy?" (and it had nothing to do with his looks this time, I swear.) He cuts through all the noise that other politicians thrive on. He gets it. It's not superiority or conceit on the part of Obama supporters - it's just our conviction that this is the right guy, and as we all know, the right guy hardly ever shows up at the right time, so let's get him elected.

The bottom line is, if the PUMA Democrats don't vote Obama, it will be one of the reasons we (all) lose. Don't be a PUMA, people!

PUMA Patrol

2008-09-01T11:08:00.010-04:00

Ok, I looked up "PUMA" and found it stands for the very classy "Party Unity My Ass." That's beautiful, isn't it? I like my version better.

I also just perused McCain's abysmal record on women's issues. This link comes from the Obama campaign and appears to be accurate. Women who will vote for McCain just to get back at Barack Obama are throwing the rest of us under the so-called Straight-Talk Express.

Now, maybe it is a stereotype that the PUMAs are all baby boomer women, but I still think there is a big generational conflict here. Hillary and her PUMAs were all about electing a woman because she's a woman. Yes, I know they believe she's more qualified, but the real pain comes from the fact that we were thisclose to nominating the first woman, and the cool handsome young male upstart took it all away. So obsessed with the retro-feminist factor, they can't even appreciate what it means to black and biracial kids across the country that they might soon have a President who looks like them.

PUMAs seem to be mired in an outdated version of the women's movement the way Presidential politics for decades were mired in Vietnam (and I'm afraid that measuring contest's not over yet, with McCain and Biden on the tickets). Is it a coincidence that blouses with bow-ties are back in the stores? Is it all about getting a woman into a man's world or are the issues more nuanced now? That's not to say it won't be a milestone when we finally do have a woman President or that the women of the sixties didn't break down doors for the rest of us to walk right through. But we have to live in the present, and the fact is, now women are walking through those doors as breadwinners for our families and as caregivers, going to work with our kids and our infants and our breast pumps and yes, our ambitions. There's a lot more to this election than feminist symbolism. There's modern feminist reality.

Frankly, I don't want these sore losers dictating my and my kids' future. Here on the ground, we need expanded and paid family leave, equal pay for equal work, access to universal preschool and childcare, a woman's right to choose, sex education that's based in science, not religious belief. We need the Hillary feminists of yesterday to get with today's program. Yeah, that means get over it. (Hey guys - the same goes for Vietnam.)

If PUMAs vote for McCain or sit this one out, they can only blame themselves when it all falls apart. Of course, many of them will be comfortably sitting back on their pensions and Social Security, plotting for Hillary's comeback in 2012. Their daughters and grandchildren will pay the real price.

Who the Hell is Sarah Palin? and Other Questions

2008-08-30T19:51:00.014-04:00

It's time for some political questions of the moment:

1. Who the hell is Sarah Palin? Yes I know, devoted hockey mom meets the religious right. I actually think this was a brilliant BRILLIANT chess move by McCain, but I hope I am wrong about that. It neutralizes Biden (can't pick on her in the debates or he's sexist, right Hillary?) and puts a happy personable human next to McCain. Of course, standing next to McCain, she also makes him look particularly elderly and creaky, which I like. Hopefully the concerns over her lack of experience and preparation will win the day. And is it just me (being sexist?) but who goes back to work running the state 3 days after having a special needs baby and then runs for vice-president 5 months later? Scary Republican Super-Mom, that's who.

2. Is Barack going to be tough in more than one speech? Barack did a great job in his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention. As one commentator said, "Here is a Democrat who has found his spine." He attacked head-on the notion that only Republicans can be trusted with wars and national security. He alluded to McCain's volatile temperment as a liability. He said, "ENOUGH." Will Barack keep it up or was that a one-time show? Everyone knows Obama is a superb speaker, but he has been notoriously generous with his opponents. Yes, it's part of his charm, but there's no time for that now. I heard comedian D.L. Hughley on the radio the other day giving some of the best political analysis I have heard in a while. He said we gotta fight this dirty, like a Republican or a Clinton. Ok, maybe not quite that dirty. But wouldn't it be great to see an ad that cuts all McCain's senior moments together with perhaps some temper and "bomb bomb Iran" for good measure? Take off the gloves, Barack. We'll still love you.

And speaking of the Clintons . . .

3. Do they really mean it? Hillary and Bill both gave excellent speeches at the DNC. In Hillary's though, I would have liked to hear less about Hillary (we get it, you were ALMOST President and you're a WOMAN) and more about why she supports Obama other than that he is not McCain. But she did everything she could to get those (in Rachel Maddow's terminology) "post-rational" PUMAs to vote for Barack. Bill filled the gap in Hillary's speech beautifully. He detailed why Obama is qualified to be President and noted that people thought Bill Clinton wasn't experienced enough either - but then we had all that prosperity and happiness back then when he was President. Remember? Remember? But until I see Bill and Hillary relentlessly on the campaign trail for Obama (and Hillary, in particular, putting the smackdown on the Palin strategy) I can't help but think what they are thinking: 2012.

4. Will the damage done by Hillary in the primary decide the election? Yes, conventional wisdom is that she acquitted herself and all is forgiven because of that speech in #3, above. But every devastating word Hillary said about Obama in the primary is now being replayed in McCain ads. Hillary painted Obama as inexperienced and unqualified for months without Republicans having to lift a finger. And then there are those rabid PUMAs - I don't know what it stands for (that's another question!) but I am guessing it is People United to Make America suck. Just sayin'.

5. In the debates, will the moderators take to heart Obama's admonition not to make this big election about little things? Or will they pursue tabloid "gotcha" questioning, as they did in the primary debates? Then their (lame) excuse was that the policy differences between Hillary and Barack were so slight, they simply had to ask about inconsequential nonsense. That line of reasoning is out the window with Obama and McCain, Biden and Palin. So now what? I won't hold my breath in this Britney-Lohan nation, but let's have the audacity to hope for something better.

6. And speaking of Britney and Lindsay Lohan, why when I listen to 96.5 Kiss FM (Cleveland's local top-40 pop station) would I think that there isn't even a Presidential campaign underway? All the newsbreaks are about "celebrities," and no, even Obama doesn't make the cut. It's irresponsible to fill young people's heads with nothing but fluff, even if you're not NPR (ick). They could take a lesson from Michael Baisden or Tom Joyner, who use their radio airwaves for more than just entertainment.

7. Finally - Is it ok to say Barack Obama is hot? My friend Jen texted me the night of the speech: "Obama is so dreamy!" Totally! Remember when the Republicans thought women would vote for Bush I because of Dan Quayle? We were so offended. Number 1, we don't vote based on looks. Number 2, Quayle was so not hot! Barack Obama is another story entirely. Of course that gleaming smile is so NOT why I'm voting for him.

Stay tuned . . .

Summer Summary

2008-08-03T22:46:00.003-04:00

I promise essays and you keep getting poetry. It's just been that kind of a summer.

Summer of Broken Things

these blissful summer days with you
as the garage door crumples
fridge stops humming
computer blue, click click click
“Beginning Internal Memory Dump”

our sweet ice cream’s melting
steadfast sink’s sprung a leak
dishwasher rivers snake across the floor
TV crackles, smokes
falls silent

better get outside
better get out
this house is shutting down

Something for Summer

2008-07-10T00:36:00.003-04:00

Here is just a little something for summer, since I've been writing quite a bit of poetry over the past couple of months. Jen, Erin, Heather (yes, you!), this one's for you!

Landscoping

summer's coming

girls out driving

warm breeze blowing

boys on display

mowing, planting, trimming

young muscles rippling

tanned and shirtless

try not to swerve

the best time of year

landscaping season

finally is here!

Say It Ain't So!

2008-06-02T16:34:00.011-04:00

A new word has come into my home. "Ain't." Jonah picked it up at school, and now his little brother Mills is saying it too.

Growing up, I couldn't tell my parents about how "me and Melissa went to the store," without being interrupted with barely a syllable out - "Melissa and I went to the store," my mom or dad spoke over me grandly. Or else they'd ridicule: "Would you say, 'Me went to the store?'" Sometimes I would give up and refuse to tell the story. It drove me nuts, like they were more interested in correcting me than in hearing what I had to say.

Now I teach legal writing to law students, some of whom have never heard of subject-verb agreement. I can get a little nit-picky at times, I admit. But I know my students will lose the respect of some future clients (say, my parents) if their writing is incorrect.

I try not to be all over my own kids on grammar and usage. I mean, Jonah's only six, and Mills isn't yet four. I don't want to stifle them so that they don't talk to me anymore. Given my upbringing and occupation though, I can't always help myself. Still, it can be counterproductive. For example, now that Jonah knows I don't like "ain't," he uses it at every possible opportunity.

Lately, I've gotten used to my kids picking up language habits from their classmates in their racially and socio-economically diverse schools. A little Ebonics comes with the package, to be blunt about it. Parents whisper about this, but it's a pretty uncomfortable subject, fraught with race and class.

So I gently correct when Jonah pronounces "dead" as "deeyid" or when Mills tells me what another friend "brung" to school that day. It's a delicate balance - correcting their speech without judging their peers or the cultures they come from. I listened to Jonah exclaim "DANG!!!" for a couple straight days before I suggested that he might try to restrain himself.

The other day, when Jonah came home saying "ain't" I assumed it was more of the same. Wrong.

His teacher read a book to the class that day, entitled, "I Ain't Gonna Paint No More!" So in kindergarten, where the children learn new words each day from their teachers, one of those words apparently would be "ain't."

I have a problem with this.

I wonder if there is a problem with me having a problem with this.

Jonah has a wonderful teacher. This year, he learned to read, to add and subtract, and much more. His teacher is so wonderful that I haven't been able to bring myself to mention my displeasure with the whole "ain't" thing. (Plus, I feel like the hyper grammar parent.)

On the sly, I looked up the offending book on Amazon. Supposedly, it is some award-winning beloved delight. Only a couple of grammar grouches like myself gave it bad reviews.

It's not like these are fully literate young minds reading Mark Twain. They don't know what is proper English and what is not. Their teacher is the wise guru at the top of the hill. If she says "ain't," it must be ok. But it isn't.

I remember a day in elementary school when the teacher taught us that the word was "ask" not "ax" and other similar lessons. Some students honestly didn't know until that moment. It wasn't their fault - they'd just never been taught the difference between colloquial speech and formally correct English.

I would think that this kind of teaching would still be a priority today.
Maybe it is.

Maybe it ain't.

Why the Dream Ticket is a Nightmare

2008-05-11T12:22:00.004-04:00

I wish everyone would stop talking about making Hillary Clinton the Democratic Vice-Presidential nominee. This dream ticket would be a nightmare. And we might wake up to find John McCain in the White House.

Ever since she realized Barack was a real threat to her preordained Presidency, Hillary has argued that he is too inexperienced to be the President. Now he’s too elite, not a down-homer like Hillary. In her recent remarks, she also implied that he just might be too black to win votes from hardworking white folks. She firmly believes she would be the better President and says so at every opportunity.

On his end, Obama has argued that it is time to turn the page in our divisive politics, and many of his supporters undoubtedly agree. They see Hillary as part of the politics of a fading era. Her combative style and low road campaigning go against everything Obama says he stands for.

The argument goes that these primary spats can be smoothed over. I’m not sure that’s true in this case, but let’s say for the sake of argument that Hillary and Barack can bury the hatchet. There’s still a problem. The so-called dream ticket would provide endless fodder for the nonstop “gotcha!” game that has consumed media coverage of the Presidential race (along with math problems involving such oddities as half of a super-delegate). This destructive distraction would far outweigh any benefit to be gained by teaming up in hopes of uniting a divided party.

It will be enough trouble getting the news media on track to focus on issues when there are so many other fun topics, like wayward pastors and Weathermen. We have the Republicans chomping at the bit to go after an official Democratic nominee. We’ve had Presidential debates where virtually every question was designed to trip up the candidate rather than elicit actual policy positions. The last thing the Democrats need is to provide more ammunition for those who would rather we miss the forest (tragically unnecessary and costly war, economy headed toward recession, diminishing infrastructure and safety net, eroding civil rights and unchecked executive power) for the trees (funny middle names, lapel pins, gotcha again!).

“Senator Clinton, you said Senator Obama wasn’t ready to be President, right up until last week. What changed your mind?”

“Senator Obama, who will be running the country on Day 1 – you or Senator Clinton?”

“”Senator Clinton, considering your view that you are the more experienced candidate, will you be acting as a Vice-President in the Cheney mold?”

“Senator Obama, you’ve been sharply critical of the Clinton campaign method. Do you feel different about that now that it’s no longer directed at you?”

And so on. The more the relationship is parsed, the less time will be spent defining the differences between the Democratic nominee and John McCain. The less we will focus on what path our nation should take at this critical moment in its history to regain our footing at home and our standing in the international community.

Then there’s Bill Clinton. He’s been just as divisive as Hillary in this primary campaign. And everyone agrees that it would be beyond awkward to have the former President hanging around the White House as the Second Spouse. Unfortunately for Hillary, with the Clintons it’s still 2-for-1, and that’s not always a good thing.

There’s no bright side. Hillary should not be the Vice-Presidential nominee. What she should do is figure out how she can best deliver her supporters to Obama for the general election, instead of continuing to insist that he’ll never get them. Here’s the dream we desperately need to come true – Hillary Clinton finally being a team player for the Democrats in this election.

Winning in November is not going to be a cakewalk. The Democrats can’t afford the distractions that would come with putting Hillary on the ticket. Whatever the exit strategy is for Hillary, it should not be the Vice-Presidency.

Mother's Day in the Life

2008-05-10T00:15:00.001-04:00

I wrote this essay a couple of years ago when both my boys were in preschool. It reminds of that time, and it reminds me to be present for my kids when they ask me to play.

This Mothers’ Day, I thought about whether I am the mother I want to be. Ideally, I’d like to spend more time with my kids, maybe stay home with them and do something crafty. Not crazy crafty, like in the back of the parenting magazines, where you turn their sandwiches into sea creatures or wrap up the Kleenex boxes in aluminum foil. But I am pretty good with the basic toilet paper tube, for example. I’ve made a dollhouse-sized mailbox with letters and even a little potty, when that was a major matter of interest. My Play-Doh talents have been lying dormant since my older son stopped making requests like, “Mommy, make a radio!” and started making his own stuff. I’d love to return to these domestic artistic pursuits with my boys full time. I have stay-at-home mom envy.

It occurs to me, though, that if I stopped working outside of the home, we might find ourselves living outside the home too, because my paycheck helps pay the mortgage. Or at least, we’d be living less comfortably, with the utilities turned off.

And of course, there’s that open secret among moms that being with the kids all day can drive you completely insane. This is why I have so much respect for my stay-at-home mom friends. I can go to my office and relax. Sure, I have to work, but most days nobody’s going to spill anything. It’s harder for moms at home to get a break from the non-stop demands of parenting.

When I think about mothering, I think of my own mother. She played both roles at different times: stay-at-home and working mom. My mother was home until I was about eight years old. When she told me that once, it surprised me, because I always remember her working. But seeing my mom with my boys now that she’s retired, I remember. I understand why I am so intrigued by the artistic possibilities of the toilet paper tube. She makes them shoebox guitars or a doll outfit out of an old sock. Now I realize that she did this when my brother and I were kids, and that’s why I know how to do it. It’s an act of love to make something out of whatever you have for a little kid, and it teaches that child to be creative and innovative too.

In the years in between having small children and her retirement last June, my mother worked. And worked and worked. Her job was her identity in a lot of ways, and it took most of her time. She was late picking us up from our music lessons (but her working probably paid for those lessons). She missed my high school graduation because she was traveling. But she was there for family dinner, and our concerts, and to help with our math homework. She worked hard to help support us, and she worked harder than she had to because she thrived on it. With parenting, your kids absorb it all. Lessons are taught and learned, consciously or not.

So I wonder: am I the mother I want to be? My kids are little (4 and almost 2) and I work full-time. I don’t spend as much time with them as I would like. I take them to all-day preschool when they don’t want to go. I take them to their grandparents’ house where they love to be, but still ask me to “stay here, Mommy. Don’t go to work.” I miss dinner twice a week when I’m teaching night classes. Yet, I am with them every morning for breakfast and I am home for family dinner on non-teaching nights. Sometimes, I can even chaperone the field trip or spend a weekday morning with the kids. I still find time to make something out of whatever I have, for them to play with.

When my boys pretend they’re going to work, they take keys and a purse with them to the door. Most of their friends’ moms work, and many of the dads drive to preschool. Daddy makes dinner and vacuums the house. This has to be part of what they’re absorbing from childhood – what they might not remember learning, but will have learned nonetheless, like the toilet paper tube and the Play-Doh.

But that’s the thing about working moms and stay-at-home moms (and dads, too) -- we’re all making something for our kids out of whatever we have, as an act of love. We’re doing the best we can, loving our children and working hard for them. We’re all looking to hold on to ourselves while we do our best by our kids. We’re teaching our children how to be the parents that they will someday want to be.

Gunning for the Dumb Vote

2008-05-04T22:38:00.001-04:00

Have you seen the movie “Idiocracy”? In this satiric look at America’s future, a soldier selected for his averageness and a prostitute trying to escape her pimp are frozen in an army experiment, forgotten, and emerge 500 years later, when the United States has devolved into a society dominated by sex, violence, and crass corporate commercialism. Everyone in the future is gravely stupid as a result of the intelligentsia having fewer and fewer children for generations, while the dumb people had more and more kids. The two average folks from the past are now the smartest people in the world. The President of this future America is a professional wrestler, like the ones on WWE.

That’s right, the WWE where you recently saw our current Presidential candidates posturing for votes. Sometimes I worry that the future is now.

I don’t mean to sound like another Ivy League-educated elitist, but doesn’t it seem like the Presidential campaign keeps getting dumber and dumber? Here’s Hillary, throwing back whiskey and beer, talking about huntin’, that is when she isn’t dodging sniper fire in her personal Rambo movie. There’s Hillary threatening to “totally obliterate” Iran, leading Iran to complain to the U.N. about the threat from She-who-would-be-President-or-else. (You can almost hear John McCain singing that old ditty of his, “Bomb, bomb Iran” in the background.)

Hillary leads among Democratic voters who have a high school education or less, as well as among hunters, gun owners, and bowlers. Barack Obama is portrayed by the Clinton campaign and others as an Ivy League-educated elitist. At the same time, it’s hinted, Obama just might be an angry racist black man or Muslim – I mean, as far as we know. Wait, it’s been a full five minutes since someone mentioned crazy Jeremiah Wright – that’s far too long!

Hillary had a nice privileged upbringing and an Ivy League education. Like George W. Bush, she’s trying to portray herself as the candidate we’d like to have a beer (or a near beer) with. President Bush was elected on that basis – Gore and Kerry were too intellectual, too stiff, too “French” – and the results have been just peachy.

Not to say that Hillary isn’t smart. Her wonky command of policy detail is well documented. She’s also clever like a fox, as her sound bites and those of Fox News on Barack become harder and harder to distinguish. She’s not trying to play dumb (that would be career suicide for a woman politician); she’s just gunning for the dumb vote.

The media is interested in the dumb vote too - critical thinking is overrated when it comes to ratings. Who wants to hear about Jena, Louisiana when we can hear about Jamie Lynn Spears in Louisiana? Who wants to hear the candidates answer substantive debate questions about United States policy and the direction of the nation, when we can keep playing an endlessly fascinating game of gotcha?

On the election front, Hillary wouldn’t have it any other way. To paraphrase one of the slogans from her boomer ‘60’s: if it works for her, do it.

Barack Obama doesn’t want to play the same old game. He tried to elevate the conversation from the very start of his campaign, and for a while, it seemed like it might work. But now even he has been put on the defensive and forced into the dumb and dumber trenches. His own missteps like Bittergate haven’t helped nor has the media-hungry Reverend Wright. It’s a shame.

Barack Obama is a member of an elite, not because of his circumstances (he and Michelle only recently paid off their school loans, and are not part of any Presidential dynasty), but because he is asking the American people to rise above all the idiocy. That’s a rare and risky position to take, but he knows nothing will change until we do. Yet, with the media and his Democratic rival hurtling headfirst into the idiotic future, where is the hope? Barack needs to get his groove back and get back on message and above the fray. America needs to listen and follow him out of the muck. We can’t be so dumb as to repeat the same political nonsense over and over again, and expect a different result.

In Search of a Sampler

2008-04-27T20:34:00.000-04:00

When my friends Bethany and Lisa and I get together, we talk about anything and everything that’s going on in our lives. Family, marriages, kids, work, dream jobs, and daydreams. Sometimes the outing is planned in advance; on other occasions one of us calls an emergency meeting. We might be drinking martinis, coffee, or Diet Coke. There’s just one more thing we need on the table – a sampler.

What is a sampler? Ideally, it’s a plate holding a variety of delectable (mostly fried) appetizers in sharable quantities. For us, that means at least three of everything; spare us the appetizer fractions. Think mozzarella sticks, BBQ wings, chicken fingers, and so on. What could be better than a sampler among friends? (Fortunately, we’re not big on dieting.)

I think our sampler addiction began at Johnny Malloy’s on Coventry in Cleveland Heights. Johnny Malloy’s is in the old Centrum Theatre – now a sports bar with gigantic TVs to watch the big game. Not totally our speed for a girls’ night out, but an excellent sampler, just as you might expect. The Combo Platter includes plentiful quantities of wings, mozzarella sticks, BBQ ribs, potato skins, and chicken fingers. At $12.99 it’s more than enough for all three of us and the variety can’t be beat. Unfortunately, when the Ohio smoking ban went into effect, Johnny’s was – how shall I put this delicately – maybe less than fully compliant? Residually smoky? Whatever it was, the sampler was great, but the air quality was not. We had to move on.

Sports bars seem like the perfect sampler setting: lots of hungry sports fans looking for delicious fried goodness. Through a series of mishaps, our most recent meeting got bumped to the Tavern Company on Lee Road in Cleveland Heights. We had intended to sip margaritas at Lopez down the road, but this being Cleveland, Lopez was tightly shuttered by 9 p.m. on a school night. So we settled into a booth at TavCo and started looking for a sampler. Sad to say, there is no such thing on the menu. It’s always disappointing to find a sampler-worthy selection of appetizers, and yet, the powers-that-be have not seen fit to offer a sampler platter. What are they thinking? Do we have to do everything all the time? And didn’t we just leave our husbands and children for the evening to escape that very feeling?

We got to work creating our own. We ordered mozzarella sticks, hot wings, and, for a change of pace, crab cakes. We sipped our drinks and waited. Then the pseudo-sampler showed up. The crab cakes were underwhelming – a bit on the soggy side, and the whole shrimp embedded in the crab cakes were disconcerting, like something you’d expect in a Vietnamese dish, but not in your trusty sampler. And there were only two crab cakes on the plate (see appetizer fractions, above). The wings were passable. But most remarkable of all were the mozzarella sticks. Round 1: the mozzarella sticks arrived as hollow, empty shells. That’s right, no cheese inside. We peered through them at each other just to be certain, then called the waitress. She shared our horror and disbelief, and returned the crusty shells to the kitchen. Round 2: hot and cheesy, but still rather bizarre. The outer shell was a wide rectangular shape, not round, and too big for the amount of cheese inside. The cheese itself was unusually sticky, stubbornly clinging to lips and fingers. We looked like our little kids trying to eat something messy. The accompanying marinara (we think) was darkly colored like old ketchup, thick, and chunky. I don’t think anyone dared to dip. Overall, disappointing and overpriced. And we had to do all the work.

Which brings us to our best-kept sampler secret, discovered by Lisa, who is partial to getting together at home now that she has a nursing infant. Arby’s – yes Arby’s – offers all the makings of a first-class sampler at a fraction of the restaurant price, with most sampler fare on the Sides and Sidekickers menu. Drive through and order the mozzarella sticks, jalapeño bites, and perhaps the loaded potato bites, onion petals, or even popcorn chicken. Our favorites are the mozzarella sticks and jalapeño bites, which are always piping hot and delicious. Proceed to a friend’s couch and create your own ambience. After creating a tasty sampler, how hard can it be?

Hit the (High) Road, Hillary

2008-02-25T22:44:00.000-05:00

It’s time for Hillary to hit the road. Would someone please tell her?

If Hillary had won the last 11 primaries in a row and was leading in delegates, she would be loudly and proudly directing Barack Obama to bow out. So would the media, the Democratic Party establishment, and everyone else. But the tables are turned. Why isn’t anyone calling for Hillary to call it quits? Hillary’s sense of entitlement to the Presidency seems to have been shared by those covering this election, as well as by her insider pals in the Democratic Party, many of whom crowned her the inevitable candidate before any votes were cast.

Despite Barack Obama’s soaring popularity and winning streak, the election is still presented as Hillary’s to win. As a commentator on Michael Baisden’s radio show recently observed, Obama’s wins have been viewed by the media through the lens of “Let’s see what Hillary needs to do to beat him now,” rather than as the well deserved victories of a front-runner. It is telling that Hillary is unwilling to make concession speeches when she loses. She’s so obviously annoyed that Obama is still around, crashing what was supposed to be her party. Desperate to save what she sees as rightfully hers, she’s tearing him down as best she can – you remember, the “fun part.”

There are two potential outcomes to this strategy. One possibility is that Obama emerges as the Democratic nominee, and Hillary has to support him after her negative campaigning has dinged him up for the general election (Hillary will presumably flip-flop and concede that Obama will be ready enough on Day 1). The other possibility is that Hillary will win the nomination with her party insiders and her stone-throwing, and thousands of disillusioned Americans will go back to what they were doing before they found a candidate who could inspire them. These are not desirable outcomes for the Democratic Party or for America. But Hillary doesn’t see it that way, and neither do her followers and surrogates.

Former Vice-Presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro asserts in Monday’s New York Times that the super-delegates should lead the Democratic Party in determining its nominee and not follow the will of the voters to Obama. She argues that Obama has won states where the primaries were open to more than Democrats – Republicans and Independents voted for him too! – and that this diminishes the significance of his victories in those contests. Party loyalists and insiders, she claims, are better suited to choose the Democratic nominee.

This argument is reminiscent of Hillary’s reaction to Obama winning Kansas and other so-called “red states.” Hillary’s campaign argued that since those states will never vote blue, Obama’s victories mean little. Last time I checked, the Democratic Party has a 50-state strategy under Howard Dean’s leadership (someone who knows something about inspiring young voters and being quashed by the party establishment). Apparently Hillary and her gang didn’t get the memo. Obama’s ability to reach Republican and independent voters may very well be what clinches the general election for him. It’s not a weakness that he can attract these voters in the primary and win in red states – it’s a major strength that Hillary (despite her gung-ho vote for war) will never have.

Ms. Ferraro also notes that her Presidential ticket lost in 1984, but “that loss had nothing to do with Democratic Party infighting.” The next loss might. Hillary’s supporters will argue that she still has a fighting chance, she’s still leading in Ohio where we vote next week, and she’s neck and neck in Texas. If Hillary ekes out a victory in one or both states, will she take that as a mandate that she is now America’s candidate? The map of Obama’s victories suggests otherwise.

It is becoming clear to more and more people that Obama is a candidate who will lead the party, and eventually the nation, with vision, intelligence, character, and class. He’s a candidate who can win over voters in the middle and even on the right. The country is coming together around a remarkable leader, but it’s not Hillary. That doesn’t discount her intelligence and capabilities (although I question the experience by osmosis argument), but she is not the leader we need, right here, right now. It’s her time to bow out gracefully and offer Senator Obama her full support. If she’s truly in this race for her country and not for herself, it’s time for Hillary to show it and take the high road – home.

Rant On

2008-01-31T22:19:00.000-05:00

Everybody’s got a rant. Just probe a little, and you’ll see.

Mine is NPR. Despite fitting the NPR profile to a T, I can’t stand the stuff. Bong bong bong, here’s a poem about a dead leaf. Great, here’s some jazz – oh, sorry, that was just the introduction to another poem about a dead leaf. On my foot. In winter.

Of course, that’s unfair. NPR is a venerable institution. I read many of the same interesting stories in the New York Times, so I don’t feel deprived when my husband tells me about all those fascinating “driveway moments.” But my friends are always amused to elicit my NPR rant, especially among Diane Rheem devotees, who seem to be multiplying by the minute.

My friend Bethany hates jazz. I am sure there is a rant there, but I haven’t heard all of it – probably because she knows I love jazz, though I too dislike that doodly doodly imitation Coltrane stuff, and please don’t tease me with jazz as an introduction to the world news on NPR.

My sister-in-law Alyssa has a great rant. We call it The Cake Rant. It is all about how at birthday parties, graduation parties, and baby showers, everyone raves about the store-bought cake with the lardy super-sweet frosting, but actually this cake is horrible. If you have ever had homemade cake with real homemade frosting with butter and sugar, this store cake is not even close, the worst stuff ever, and she just wants to shout that the emperor has no clothes and this cake is terrible, what are you all raving for!

I just discovered my husband’s secret rant is about key lime pie. Maybe there is something in his family about food and rants, what with the cake rant and now the key lime pie rant. Just get him going. What is the big deal about key limes? Why is this on every menu, even if you’re not in Florida? Who wants a sour pie anyway?

It is a fine line between having a nice therapeutic rant every now and then and becoming a crackpot with a rant a minute. Sometimes politics make some of us feel like ranting non-stop, and about issues that are more pressing than taste in cake and radio stations. The key is to pace yourself, stick to what’s most important, and not rant about everything. It’s like the Boy Who Cried Wolf – is that you, complaining again?

In a political question and answer session, there is always a ranter who turns his question into a ten minute manifesto, as the rest of the audience groans and checks their watches. Then there are the well-meaning folks who speak publicly on an issue – but then misspeak on something big, like race or religion – and everyone feels for them that a public rant was perhaps not the best way to go.

But there is something comforting about a nice private rant among friends, like sharing a secret. Make some cake. Bring on the rants. What gets to you?

Paradise Lost

2008-01-18T09:56:00.000-05:00

Someday, we may have to sell the Vineyard house.

I said that to my mother the other day, although I felt like a traitor putting the thought into words. It’s a statement loaded with privilege – who has a Vineyard house anyway? – and, at the same time, loss.

Let me explain. In the sixties, my very smart grandfather had the good idea to buy land on Martha’s Vineyard and build a summer home with an ocean view. His family had rented cabins there in summers past. He was a physics professor at Harvard, so Martha’s Vineyard was a natural vacation spot, only a couple of hours away. When my grandfather chose a place, he chose well. There is a private beach for those with houses on the hill where we are. Drive a few minutes in one direction, and you are at a picturesque fishing village. A tiny town can be found the other way down the road. We’re away from the crowds. At least we were.

We can walk up the hill to the cemetery. My mother has started saying she knows more people in the cemetery these days than on the hill. Visitors leave stones and shells and wildflowers for their loved ones. Our plot is in a shaded corner. My grandmother Peg I never met who died suddenly in her sixties after enjoying only one summer in the Vineyard house, my cousin Keith who drowned at the age of 9 (not at the beach as I believed for years, but in a swimming pool in Dayton, Ohio), my uncle who died of cancer and the oddly jarring blank space on the same stone for his widow, still living. And the stone for my grandfather, who made this summer home for his extended family and lived into his nineties. We’re not the sort of people with big fancy gravestones. We’re the sort of people who pick out just the right natural stone, rolling boulders and smaller rocks, part of the landscape, to mark that we were here.

Our house is small, but I never noticed. Then the new people started building their houses bigger and bigger. I wonder what their gravestones will look like.

My mother, my aunts, my cousins, and my brother no doubt have their own Vineyard memories, as I have mine. Childhood adventures with my brother and cousins - fishing expeditions on the pond, sneaking food into the movies, hitchhiking home from the fair when I knew we shouldn’t. My Grandpa’s big birthday parties. Gatherings of neighbors, physicists, New Yorker cartoonists, artists, and writers (my grandfather remarried before I was born, my Grandma Helen, an editor for a New York publishing house), their cigarette smoke, cocktails, and chatter filling the room. Helen’s fabulous cooking. Learning to drive on the dirt roads on the hill. The summer I spent on the Vineyard as a teenager. Walking the beach to get through difficult times, and picturing it when I couldn’t be there. Years later, my husband proposing marriage on that same beach. Burying my beloved grandfather. Now bringing my children to see the ocean and meet old friends.

What started the conversation the other day? My mother informed me that another new resident is building an enormous house, blocking the view of many others, and is importing tall trees to boot. They’re building a swimming pool – a swimming pool! – on the property, despite that there is no municipal water supply and a pond and the ocean are just steps away. The last few times I’ve been to the Vineyard, I worried as much about the massive Mercedes and Lexus SUVs racing down the road as I did about the poison ivy we had to practically jump in to get out of their way as we wandered down to the beach. I can’t relate to the super-rich families I see on the beach these days, their children trampling in the dunes. The middle class owners of my grandfather’s day have sold, died, or are fading away.

I guess I have an old money attitude, but without the money. My family doesn’t want these upstarts spoiling our view, the ones who don’t even know enough to keep their kids off the dunes or board up the windows for a hurricane. We want our privilege, but the way it always has been, the way we inherited it. It’s embarrassing really, but there it is. Or maybe it’s just resentment, because they can afford something we might be losing our grip on. The old summer residents are the Vineyard’s first wife, traded in for a newer, richer, tackier model. And we don’t quite know if we should leave the party and go home.

There is something about holding on to a family house on Martha’s Vineyard when you are not otherwise wealthy. You know you belong (at least you did), but the people around you are perhaps beginning to wonder.

For some people, the Vineyard is all about belonging, and more importantly, showing that you belong. Who owns, who rents, who stays the whole summer, who can only get away for a week or two, who still says Gay Head instead of Aquinnah, who has perfected that Vineyard style of dress – tastefully disheveled with the right color of faded red or blue, like you have just awakened after sleeping on a sailboat, with salt in your hair. Who has the oldest date on their Black Dog shirt. And who is connected enough to know all the new people on the hill.

I don’t see my family fitting in with the nouveau riche crowd. In my generation of cousins, we have a puppeteer, a storyteller, a musician, and a writing teacher. We’re not exactly stockbrokers. We can’t afford to stick around, the intellectuals and artists, I guess. We aren’t rich enough, not in the right way. We haven’t raised our standard of living the way our grandparents did for the next generation; in fact, our trend is downwardly mobile. With the Vineyard house, we might struggle to manage and share the property and its burdens. As it is, the family has to rent it out most of the summer to afford to keep it. The house could someday divide us where once it brought us together.

A decision on selling is a long way off. My mother and her sister manage the house, and it is still a gathering place for family. It will fall to my generation, someday, to decide what to do. A year ago Labor Day the younger generation gathered on the Vineyard. It was magic to see my cousin Josh and my son Jonah playing together, to see my cousin Mark’s daughter reading with my son, my toddler riding the tricycle I rode as a child, to be together the way we all were as kids, and to still have a place to be, with memories filling the room.

We’ll never lose those memories. But I sometimes wonder if there’s still room for us on the Vineyard at all.

What Social Contract?

2008-01-09T21:58:00.000-05:00

Do the ends justify the means?

Should we finance health care and the arts by taxing cigarettes? Fund schools with lotteries and casinos? Where’s the sin in a few sin taxes?

With sin taxes, we tax the few in order to benefit everyone else. Convenient, since everyone else no longer expects to pay taxes – at least not higher taxes – to receive the benefits of organized, civilized society: good schools, basic services, fine arts.

Yes, ok, but we’re taxing the bad people, the sinners. Or – in preschool mom parlance – the people who make bad choices. If only those folks would make better, more holy choices – well, they could free themselves of the sin tax. Never mind what happens when everyone quits smoking and stops gambling. Just ignore the socio-economic angle to who smokes the most or buys the most lottery tickets. There will always be sinners, after all, and therefore always sins to tax. At least we never have to raise taxes, not the non-sinning kind, the kind on everyone.

When President Bush recently vetoed an expanded children’s health insurance program, only a few critics of the legislation focused on the proposal’s funding source - an increase in the federal excise tax on cigarettes. That adds up to a feel-good something for nothing for non-smokers. The Cuyahoga County arts and culture initiative of 2006 was funded by a cigarette tax. It passed – why not? One of the campaign slogans assured voters, “If you don’t smoke, you won’t pay anything for Issue 18.” We want our arts and culture, but please let the people over there pay for it. The ones huddled in the cloud of smoke.

The Republicans and more than a few co-opted Democrats have drilled into the American people that tax money we pay to the government is still our money, even after we pay it, and we should all get a nice chunk of it back every now and then, preferably close to election time. Liberal is a bad name no one wants to be called. A politician who proposes raising taxes might as well start packing his boxes to go back to the farm.

Whatever happened to the notion of citizens contributing so that the government can ensure good schools, necessary health care, durable infrastructure, strong national defense, a healthy environment, a safe and adequate food supply? The idea that we should contribute to our government in order to reap its benefits is extinct. The social contract was dead in America by the end of the twentieth century.

Americans opting out of their democracy (why bother to vote?) isn’t just about taxes. We can say with certainty that there will never be another military draft. Why should everyone have to fight a war or even think about it or grieve about it, when we have other people to do it for us?

So here we are. As bridges fall, soldiers call home to their families for needed equipment their government fails to supply and return to combat zones for lengthy tours of duty, food contamination scares and toxic toys become commonplace, school levies fail, New Orleans is all but abandoned, children fall ill and families lose everything paying for health care – as all this surrounds us, politicians of all stripes promise to cut taxes so Americans can hold onto more of their money.

To be sure, raising taxes or re-instituting the draft would not alone solve our country’s problems. Far from it. But the idea that every citizen – not just the smokers or the enlisted soldiers – should be invested in our democracy, that there is a mutually beneficial and mutually obligatory social contract between the citizen and his government – must return. If it doesn’t, the future looks bleak indeed.

Cleanliness

2008-01-07T22:49:00.000-05:00

Are working mothers messier than stay at home mothers?

A recent study showed that working moms managed to spend just as much time playing with their kids as stay at home moms. So what gives? Housework, of course, as many of us already know from cluttered and dusty experience. Apparently the time sacrificed by working moms is not the all too precious time with their kids, but quality time with their vacuums, dust mops, and sponges.

To be sure, there have always been those working moms who manage to do it all – stellar career, lots of time with the kids, and a sparkling home. What can you say about such people, if they are, in fact, human? Lots more husbands pitch in now too (I simply refuse to vacuum, but my husband actually likes it.) And those who can afford to hire outside help do so in increasing numbers.

But some of us just remain rather, well, messy, and at least we have the career and kids to provide some cover. I am particularly sensitive about my mess; if I had three wishes, one might very well be devoted to cleanliness. Growing up, my mom was the same way. The mess sort of takes over and makes you wonder if you will ever get our from under. Frantic pre-guest cleaning ensues. As that great Internet cleaning guru the Fly Lady says, we suffer from CHAOS – Can’t Have Anyone Over Syndrome. We at least hope that when we die, we won’t have one of those articles about us that says that the house was “filled with debris,” floor to ceiling of clutter taking over every square inch of space, suffocating the life within.

There are those who truly believe cleanliness is next to godliness. In a cruel parting shot in the break-up of our longtime friendship, a stay at home mother friend emailed me that I was so messy she expected Children and Family Services to take my kids, and I should spend some time picking up my house rather than thinking so highly of myself (and presumably my career). No, I assure you I am not so messy that CFS needs to come by and check up on things. My friend knew I was sensitive about the mess though, and she hit where she knew it would hurt. I suppose it elevated her status as a perfect homemaker to say those things. Would it be better if I cleaned more and played with my children less? Is my failure to attain a picture perfect home just that - failure?

Why can’t we all just get along in these mommy wars? It’s really messy out there, the dried up play-doh, the sticky juice boxes, the overbearing value judgments on both sides. Maybe it is time to clean up our act. Just don’t make me vacuum.