Posts Tagged ‘parenting’
Cindy on August 1st, 2010
Every spirit builds itself a house, and beyond its house a world, and beyond its world a heaven.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
Riding my bike on a beautiful day last week, I noticed very few kids playing outside. Made me a little sad. The following piece from my memoir, Writing Home, chronicles a late-summer memory of my son’s childhood. First published in the Christian Science Monitor, it still gives me that “end of the summer” feeling every time I reread it . . .
Summer Home
It began in June with a large cardboard box, just roomy enough to house my wiry eight-year-old son, Nate, and a scrap of old tweed carpeting.
“The fort,” as Nate dubbed it, was expanded throughout the summer to include several new rooms, each designed from salvaged appliance boxes of various shapes and sizes. By the time it was finished, the fort curled like a corrugated snake across the entire lawn. Other kids in our neighborhood added their own flourishes — round windows, paper awnings and banners, plastic pipes and tubes. (Whether these served functional or aesthetic purposes, only the children knew.)
By the end of July, Nate’s cardboard Xanadu had become something of a local landmark. It was such hot property, in fact, that you had to write your name on the official SIGN-UP SHEET to be admitted inside, a bit like the exclusive restaurants lining Main Street downtown. Since we live on a corner lot in a carefully maintained suburb, I worried that our neighbors would object to the ever-growing mountain of boxes in our yard. If you had no imagination and didn’t know you were looking at a playhouse, you might have guessed we were careless about storing our trash.
But no one complained. Other parents who had watched the fort’s progress were amazed to see that something as simple and economical as a stack of empty appliance boxes could keep so many children amused for so long. One afternoon, a local building contractor even stopped his truck to admire the fort’s design.
“Hey there, that’s quite a place!” he called out to Nate and his pals. “Are you renting space in your cardboard condo?” But the kids insisted they weren’t looking for more tenants.
“Every spirit builds itself a house, and beyond its house a world, and beyond its world a heaven,” wrote Ralph Waldo Emerson. We’re born with the desire to create a home, to build our own retreat. And while home can mean something different to everyone, the need for a sense of place is universally human. To a small boy, a discarded carton contains unlimited potential for a playhouse or a fortress of his own.
But to the homeless man who camps near the railroad tracks at the edge of our town, a cardboard box might be his only refuge.
Nate and I first spotted the shelter a few weeks after his fort was built. We were heading toward our favorite fast-food restaurant downtown, taking our time as we walked along a gravel service road flanking the railroad tracks. We noticed a crude assemblage of large boxes almost hidden behind a tangle of wild thistle and Queen Anne’s lace. Torn blankets and soiled clothing were strung on branches nearby; long sheets of blue plastic encircled the base of the boxes like small rivers. We agreed that the makeshift shelter looked remarkably like his cardboard fort back home.
“What’s all the plastic for, and why does the man live there instead of a real house?” he asked as we walked past the encampment. I explained that the homeless man probably used the plastic to keep the boxes dry when it rained. But I didn’t know how to explain the complexities of being homeless to a suburban second-grader who is tucked securely into bed on a full stomach every night.
Following a heat wave later that week, a powerful evening storm rolled in. It brewed so quickly that my husband and I didn’t have time to pull Nate’s fort into the garage. By morning it was scattered across the lawn. Even “the turret,” a sturdy refrigerator carton in its previous life, had toppled like an uprooted tree among the soggy ruins.
At first I was secretly relieved that we could finally dismantle all the boxes that had taken over our yard. But Nate was fighting tears as he tried to salvage parts of his handiwork, and I couldn’t help but feel his loss. Together we folded the sheets of rain-soaked cardboard and piled them near the trash in our garage.
Since then, school has started again. But we haven’t discarded a cardboard box without seriously considering its possibilities. And we often wonder about the homeless man who had set up camp near the railroad tracks. The last time we walked there, we noticed that his shelter, like Nate’s fort, had collapsed in the hard summer rain. – Cindy La Ferle
Cindy on July 2nd, 2010
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.” ~Albert Einstein
I’m always tickled when my essays are chosen for new story collections. Released this summer, Jennifer Bove’s Wild with Child: Adventures of Families in the Great Outdoors, includes a piece I wrote about surviving Cub Scout camp when my son was a kid.
Don’t let another summer weekend go by without spending quality time outdoors. Unplug your gadgets for a few days and reconnect with Mother Nature. Pitch a tent, swim in a river, feel the grass on your bare feet, cook dinner on an open fire, and make your own family memories under the stars. –CL
Cindy on May 15th, 2010
At commencement you wear your square-shaped mortarboards. My hope is that from time to time you will let your minds be bold, and wear sombreros.” ~Paul Freund
A blog pal recently asked if any of her regular readers had a few pithy words of advice for new graduates. I was reminded of an earlier column I wrote when my only son graduated from high school in 2004. I tucked it into his suitcase when he left for college, then dug it out of the archives the week before he walked across a stage in a black cap and gown at the University of Notre Dame.
Like most moms I know, I spent years drilling my kid on the importance of working hard, keeping his integrity, writing thank-you notes, and ironing his dress shirts. But I overlooked some things along the way. And besides — there are a few infallible pieces of advice that a parent simply cannot overemphasize. That’s why, six years ago, I wrote a list of “survival tips” and included them in the newspaper column. Here’s an excerpt:
A SURVIVAL GUIDE FOR GRADS
*Relationships, like cars, need regular upkeep or they won’t keep running. Maintain the good friendships you’ve made as surely as you forge new ones. Treat your old friends with as much respect as you’d treat business clients you want to impress.
*Learn from your adversaries. The people who push our buttons tend to reflect qualities we dislike in ourselves.
*Encourage others to talk about themselves. You’ll make a great first impression and learn something new. Unless you’re on a job interview, the talk should never be all about you.
*Don’t be too proud to ask for help when you need it.
*The notion that everyone is having a better time somewhere else is one of the world’s dumbest illusions. Refuse to believe it.
*Losing is a great character builder. If your best effort misses the mark, ask yourself what you can learn from the loss.
*Be a community builder wherever you go. If we can’t make peace with our neighbors, there’s no hope for the rest of the world.
*Be thoughtful. Good manners were designed to make others feel comfortable.
*Handle money with respect. Never let it run your life, overshadow your career, or spoil your personal relationships.
*Strive for decency and compassion, and accept nothing less from everyone you hang out with.
*Get enough sleep; take care of your body. Pay attention to what you eat, where it came from, and why you’re eating it.
*Make good on your word. Show up on time. If you promised to bring the salad or move furniture, follow through. Return what you borrow.
*Keep your faith, but learn about the great religions of the world. Self-righteousness is a huge turn-off.
*Spend time outdoors. A walk in the woods is the best antidepressant.
*Spend time alone. Creative ideas and solutions are sparked in solitude.
*Never leave your underwear on the floor. As every good room mate will tell you, neatness is essential in cramped spaces.
*Don’t wait for holidays to tell people how much you appreciate them.
*Always take the high road. Admit your blunders and apologize if you’ve hurt someone.
*Find your inner compass and stop seeking approval from others. Be too busy to wonder what other people think of you.
*Don’t limit your shopping to chain stores. Support local businesses and discover the heart and soul of every new location you visit.
*Travel is the best way to learn about the world, but stay on the lookout for a place to set down roots.
*Savor your memories but don’t live in the past. Anyone who insists their high school or college years were “the best” is stuck in a rut. Life gets richer and juicier as you move on. Enjoy every minute.
*Never forget how much you are loved. Phone home when you need a reminder.
– Cindy La Ferle
–The full version of this essay originally appeared in The Daily Tribune (Royal Oak, Mi.) and is reprinted in my book, Writing Home –
Top photo: My son Nate (the tall guy) and his Zahm Hall buddies. Bottom photo: Andrea (Nate’s girlfriend) with Nate, Dad, and Mom on graduation day, 2008. Both photos taken on the University of Notre Dame campus.
Cindy on May 9th, 2010
When you have raised kids, there are memories you store directly in your tear ducts.” — Robert Brault
Today’s essay first appeared on Mother’s Day 2004 in my Sunday column in The Daily Tribune of Royal Oak. At the time, my son and his longtime friends, a.k.a. “The Crew,” were preparing to graduate from high school. This piece is dear to my heart, so I’m sharing it with all of you in celebration of Mother’s Day. — CL
All My Children
When people ask me how many kids I have, I tell them I’ve lost count. This might sound strange or irresponsible to most parents, but some of you know exactly what I mean.
If, like me, you’re the parent of an only child, you’ve probably invested a lot of time scouting for playmates to foster some pseudo sibling rivalry in your own backyard. To entertain an “only,” you often have to play Pied Piper to the neighborhood kids.
But I look back fondly on the years I made our home kid-friendly and child-proof, and I like to think I became a more patient parent while getting to know and love other people’s children.
So I like to remind all of you younger moms that it’s really worth the effort to host as many playmates as you can. Keeping extra snacks on hand is always a good start. But you also need to lower your standards for house and garden.
One summer, for instance, my son and the neighborhood kids decided to build a fort out of discarded appliance boxes. Raiding parking lots and trash piles, they collected enough scrap metal and cardboard to make our entire yard look like a temporary shelter for Royal Oak’s homeless population. Occupying our property for weeks, the fort was a tribute to inventive teamwork. Still, I was amazed our neighbors never complained about its lack of curb appeal.
Later, in the middle school years, the kids developed a burning interest in chemistry, often using our home as their laboratory. There was the time my son and a buddy decided to make their own paper pulp in the basement, for instance. Using an old 10-speed blender, the boys pulverized newspaper scraps in a perilous base of water and craft glue. One of them forgot to put the top on the blender, and the resulting glop still decorates half of the basement ceiling.
Our home was also frequently chosen as a location for school video projects. I don’t recall where the kids obtained all the pyrotechnics they used for special effects, but the final footage was typically awesome. One year, after the crew filmed Macbeth for an English lit class, I spent several days picking melted candle wax from the Oriental carpet in the hallway.
Believe it or not, I’m really going to miss all of this. As the old cliche goes, kids grow up way too fast. By the time you’ve finally figured out how to spell baccalaureate, they are packing for college and you’re praying they’ll come back to mess up your house all over again.
Next Sunday I’ll be watching the graduation ceremony for Shrine Catholic High School’s Class of 2004. There will be tears and accolades and promises to keep in touch. There will be words of gratitude for teachers and school administrators — and for all the parents who created a real extended family for these kids.
Decked in cap and gown, my son will pose for photographs with the talented young people who have graced the past thirteen years of his life. I will add these to our family albums, which are already bursting with earlier photos of the same kids dressed up for Heritage Day, bike parades, Halloween contests, prom nights, and homecoming dances.
I’ve also kept a nostalgic stash of notes from these youngsters. Some are thank-you cards for special gifts, impromptu field trips, or birthday parties. There’s even a heartfelt letter of apology for the spilled candle wax from Lady Macbeth. Re-reading these notes never fails to touch me, and I couldn’t be more proud.
They say it takes a village to raise a child, and I’ve never doubted this maxim. But I have also grown to believe it takes a village to raise a mother. — Cindy La Ferle
___________________
Originally published on Mother’s Day 2004 in The Daily Tribune of Royal Oak, this essay was reprinted in Hometown America (Ideals/Guideposts; 2008) and is included in my own collection of essays, Writing Home.
Top photo: “The Crew” dressed for senior prom, posing on our front porch in 2004. My son is the tall guy, second from left. Bottom photo: “The Crew” at a summer BBQ in 2008, after college graduation.
Cindy on March 10th, 2010
A shaky child on a bicycle for the first time needs both support and freedom. The realization that this is what the child will always need can hit hard.” ~Sloan Wilson
Note: This essay was published earlier this year (“A New Season of Parenting”) in Metro Parent magazine. It was written especially for friends whose children will be starting college this fall…
It’s going to be a roller coaster year for a friend whose youngest child will graduate from high school in May, then head out of state to college in August. My friend is already working through some conflicting emotions. She gets a little teary at the thought of one less place setting at the family dinner table, yet she’s thrilled about the prospect of a keeping neater house (and gaining a spare bedroom) in the fall.
My son’s last year in high school was a bittersweet time for me, too. Like Janus, the ancient Roman god of gateways, beginnings, and endings, I found myself looking forward and backward as my son closed the door on high school and prepared for his new life at college.
When I wasn’t caught up in the May-June whirlwind of award banquets and graduation ceremonies, I spent a lot of time wondering where his childhood had flown. When no one else was looking, I’d search for it in a family album crammed with precious photos of birthday parties, Fourth of July bike parades, Cub Scout camps, Christmas mornings, and Halloween nights.
Around that time, it also hit me that one of the sweetest gifts of midlife is the maternal amnesia that blurs the other memories of infancy and childhood — the post-partum blues; the exploding diapers; the marathon temper tantrums. Not to mention those snarky adolescent insults. When our kids prepare to leave home for college, after all, we tend to focus on the Hallmark moments.
All of this reminiscing seems a bit maudlin to me now. But revisiting the highlights of my son’s childhood helped soothe my empty-nest blues. Pausing to savor and reflect on my early years of motherhood made it easier for me to move on. It also made me grateful for the privilege of raising a child — and grateful for the chance to spend time with so many terrific young people.
During the high school years, for example, our home was a favorite gathering place for my son’s friends, so I always stocked up on extra snacks and soft drinks. Looking in our refrigerator in those days, you wouldn’t have guessed that we were a small family of three. When I unloaded my grocery cart in the checkout line, clerks would often ask if I was feeding a very large family or hosting a party. I always answered yes to both questions.
And since my “extended family” left for college when my son did, my feelings of loss encompassed more than one child.
Taking flight, moving on
Grieving isn’t unusual in the early weeks of empty nesting. Raising children gives us a sense of mooring and purpose. That sense of mooring suddenly disappears when they move out, and getting used to a quieter household can be a huge adjustment. As essayist Marion Winik wrote, “Once you’re a mother you can never think something else is the most important thing.” Still, few parents I know are comfortable with the term “empty nest.” An empty nest sounds pathetic and forlorn — adjectives that hardly fit the millions of accomplished women and men who are reinventing their lives after child-rearing.
“A word signifying a void or a vacuum is an unfair way to describe a time when life can be full of growth possibilities,” note Laura Kastner and Jennifer Wyatt in The Launching Years: Strategies for Parenting from Senior Year to College Life (Three Rivers Press). But even more important than finding a new catchphrase for the empty nest is shifting our focus to the fresh opportunities awaiting our kids on the other side of the threshold.
Our job, after all, is to help them learn how to leave us; to let go.
It’s also our job to get on with our own lives. Just as we hope our kids will thrive without our constant supervision, they need to believe we’ll be just fine, too. In the long run, helicopter parenting doesn’t do anyone any good.
So, even if your kids aren’t leaving home this year, it’s not too early to sign up for those ballet lessons you’ve postponed for ages. Or to rediscover the sport or the craft that kept you juiced up and inspired before your name was Mom. Pat yourself on the back for a job well done. A new season of parenting will unfold. – Cindy La Ferle
– Nest photo by Cindy La Ferle –
Riding my bike on a beautiful day last week, I noticed very few kids playing outside. Made me a little sad. The following piece from my memoir, Writing Home, chronicles a late-summer memory of my son’s childhood. First published in the Christian Science Monitor, it still gives me that “end of the summer” feeling every time I reread it . . .
