Drastic Measures

If you have ever met me, you will know that what I am about to tell you is completely and utterly unexpected, out of character, and insane.

We are going to homeschool A. Peevie for high school in the fall.

I KNOW.

I sense a whole bunch of blog posts in my future about this decision--which, BTW, just became final this very evening.

As you may recall, we are not satisfied with the experience A. Peevie has had at the little Lutheran grade school he's been attending since kindergarten. I'm sure that most of the teachers and staff are well-intentioned--but that place is almost as inflexible as the character of the Almighty himself--only not in a good way. 

For a kid like A. Peevie, who does not have a typical learning style, and who thinks so far outside of the box that he doesn't even know there is a box, it is a prison of random, painful tortures.

One problem is the rules. They love rules, those Lutherans; they love making new ones, and allowing no exceptions to the existing ones. Even about things that really should not matter. Midway through the school year, for example, we learned that his teacher had banned the wearing of hooded sweatshirts. This was well before Geraldo Rivera infamously blamed Trayvon Martin's death on his hoodie. The reason: Hoodies make kids feel too comfortable, too relaxed.


Seriously, Ms. Lutheran School Teacher? You believe that feeling relaxed is a deterrent to learning? For A. Peevie, who lives in hoodies and finds comfort in their relaxed fit and warmth, this was a terrible blow.


This teacher is very young--which is sometimes a good thing in a teacher. But she appears to have no clue how to relate to adolescent boys. Day after day, A. Peevie would come home with a story about how she embarrassed one boy, spoke harshly to another, or teased another. This is the last thing a boy needs to deal with, when he's already trying to figure out how to navigate the scary, hairy, testosterone-fueled world of male adolescence.

Remember those unseasonably warm weeks of early spring in Chicago, when the temperatures reached the 80s on eight days in March? The principal was unwilling to allow exceptions to the rule on the books that stipulates "no shorts before April 1," and even punished kids who wore shorts on those days.


Mr. Peevie requested a special dispensation, and even offered a script for how this rule exception could be presented; and the response was, "The students will be able to wear shorts on March 23 for Fun in the Sun Day. What a blessing we have with this warm weather!" 

Predictably, and ironically, Fun in the Sun Day turned out cold and rainy.


But these are not really the reasons we are quitting school. Our reasons have to do with the random boxification of education. Everything is boxed up, planned, and rigidly controlled; there is very little room for exploration, imagination, or inspiration in a traditional educational setting. Some kids still learn and thrive and grow--possibly in spite of the boxification. 


But a kid like A. Peevie does not flourish in this kind of environment, and this is the reason we are contemplating turning our lives upside down.

Random Things In My World

1. A guy walked across the intersection in front of me when I was stopped at a red light. He was young, probably in his 20s--but he was wearing a geriatric beige V-neck sweater; and--get this--he wore black rubbers over his brown dress shoes. Adorable.

And even more adorable? As he crossed the street, he gave a little skip. And then another one, clearly picking up his pace in order to not hold up traffic. He appeared to be totally un-self-conscious--which, how rare is that?!--and it made me want to give him a hug.

2. Toilets are getting smarter. Today I met a toilet that offered two flushing options: one for poop, and one for pee. Allegedly, sending pee-pee to the sewers takes less flushing power than sending poo-poo to the sewers. Who knew. So there were instructions next to the flushing lever: For liquid waste, push handle up. For solid waste, push handle down.

3. Here's an interesting psychological situation that my children and I have observed many times on the way to and from school. A woman takes her brushes and sponges and buckets and brooms outside and cleans the sidewalk and street in front of her three-flat. Yes, you read that right: she sweeps. The street.

If it has recently rained, she'll sweep water into a bucket, and then carry the bucket off and empty it somewhere. If it's dry, she sweeps leafs and sticks and even dirt into a neat pile, and then brushes the pile onto a dustpan, which she then empties into a bin. Sometimes she even crosses the street and sweeps the gutters on that side.

I think this must be some sort of OCD, because there is no practical purpose to her sweeping. She's not cleaning the drains to prevent flooding. She's just sweeping up tiny bits of lawn debris--sticks, leaves, even dirt. It's THE GROUND. There's SUPPOSED TO BE dirt.

It reminds me of my across-the-street neighbor, who used to spend hours on summer days lying on his stomach, plucking clover from his front lawn. Hours. I told my friend the therapist, Dr. Paradigm Shift, about him, and she said, "OCD. Off his meds."

I think there must be an OCD epidemic in my zip code. Hope it's not contagious.

4. We were driving home from church the other day, and Civil War by Guns N' Roses was playing on the radio. The kids recognize this song from the first note, which is not actually a note but the voice of Strother Martin as the prison warden in Cool Hand Luke famously saying, "What we have here is a failure to communicate."

We listened to the song for a minute or two, and then M. Peevie, who thinks deeper thoughts than most nine-year-olds, asked, "Mom, how can war be civil?"

And then we had a whole discussion about what "civil" means, and C. Peevie pointed out that many others in history have asked that same question, and I said, but not many nine-year-olds have asked it, and ultimately none of us really knew the answer.

And there you have it. Four random things from my world. Bet you're wishing you were me right now, aren't you?

Deep Thoughts

I was having some deep thoughts in the car this morning. I thought I'd share.

1. Nothing is linear.

2. Except lines.

3. Everything is a back-and-forth, up-and-down, side-to-side process. Sometimes this feels a little bit like mental illness. Sometimes it IS mental illness.

4. You spend your life trying to get from here to there, and you think, OK, all I have to do is put one foot in front of the other, and I will get where I'm going. And then you end up somewhere else. And you don't know where the hell you are.

5. Or what you're supposed to be doing. Or why you're doing it.

6. Then you start to get depressed. Or angry, which is really the same thing.

7. Eventually, you go to see a therapist, who confirms what you've known all along: Yes, you are mentally ill. You are probably one meltdown away from being institutionalized.

8. Some days you feel like a reasonably functional human being. You take a shower and bake some bread. The smell of fresh bread makes you weep with happiness.

9. Other days you feel like an undiagnosed schizophrenic, living two or more secret lives, with a tenuous hold on reality.

10. But your therapist reassures you that you are not really schizophrenic, or bipolar, and you don't really have obsessive-compulsive disorder, although you might, indeed, have a tiny case of ADD.

11. But the real problem is this existential angst (see numbers 4 and 5), which is essentially the human condition.

12. What to do, what to do? Think. Talk. Become more aware of your interior life, so that you make intentional choices which are driven by meaning and purpose. It's a process.

13. This process takes time.

14. And it is not linear.

I just thought I'd share.

Nothing Ever Happens on My Block

Did you read this book in your erstwhile youth--Nothing Ever Happens on My Block? OMG. I LOVED that book. And then it sort of disappeared from my life, and I didn't think about it again until I had kids. In searching for information about the book, I came across this cute blog that highlights vintage children's books.

Meanwhile, in only-sort-of-unrelated news, The Crazy Lady on my block got taken away today by the entire police department and half the fire department of Chicago.

I was sitting on my couch, minding my own business, watching People's Court (I have a girl-crush on Marilyn Milian), when I noticed a squad car out in front of my next-door-neighbor's house. Not the neighbor with the jungle, the neighbor on the other side. So I peeked out the window from behind the sheers. There was not just one squad car, but three!

Two police officers were standing on the walk in front of The Crazy Lady's house--and BTW, I mean no disrespect to TCL, who suffers from schizophrenia or some other fairly serious mental illness--and as I peeped, another officer went tearing around the side of the house, down the gangway to the backyard.

Well, being the responsible homeowner that I am, I felt that it was exactly the right time to take out my trash. (I'm not proud of this impulse to gawk at another person's private demons being brought out into the light of day--but it's in me. I wasn't the only neighbor with this indecorous inclination. Other neighbors were not just peeking over back yard fences, but actually walking down the street to get a closer look.)

I went out the back door with my Hefty Bag, and as I crossed the deck, I could see two officers restraining TCL and trying to talk her into accompanying them to the squad car. She resisted them, hollering and flailing. Eventually, four officers carried her around the house and stuffed her as carefully as they could into the back of the squad car.

TCL was still yelling and flailing, and the officers called for back-up. Within minutes, three more police vehicles showed up, including a paddy wagon (are they still called that?) and an SUV. The officers unloaded TCL from the back of the squad car, and re-loaded her into the paddy wagon.

She was not pleased, and she started clawing at the wire mesh. I think she was starting to hurt herself, because within a few minutes the officers extracted her again, two of them peeling her fingers from the doors and two holding her legs to keep her from kicking. Once they got her extricated, they gently plopped her on the street, where she sat, hand- and ankle-cuffed, rocking and occasionally yelling at them not to touch her (they weren't) and that she needed to lock her doors. She was surrounded by officers, and once or twice she started butt-scootching along the pavement, but each time an officer stepped in front of her.

In a few minutes, the six police vehicles were joined by one more squad car, a fire truck, and an ambulance. The paramedics, wearing thick rubber gloves, loaded TCL onto a stretcher, covered her with blankets, strapped her in, and wheeled her off.

TCL has been dealing with obvious mental illness since before we moved into the neighborhood, but she has also had periods of calmness and lucidity. Lately, however, her crazy had been escalating to the point where she was making threats to neighbors and generally acting in a threatening, unpredictable way. She tried to run over one neighbor with her car recently, and she has thrown rocks at children.

Last week when A. Peevie and M. Peevie were playing in the backyard, I went out to check on them. "Mom," A. Peevie said, "That lady is saying B-I-T-C-H over and over again. Really loud." He couldn't even bring himself to say the word in reporting it to me.

M. Peevie came over and told me the same story, and we had a little object lesson in mental illness. "She can't help it," I told them. "There's something in her brain that makes her act that way." I told them that if they felt uncomfortable, or if she directed any of her scary talk directly at them, they should come in the house for awhile.

So the neighbors reluctantly went to court yesterday, and hours later the entire fleet of emergency response vehicles showed up. TCL is currently being held for observation somewhere. It's all very sad and disturbing. The neighbors didn't want to make police reports or go to court to have TCL picked up; but they felt it was the responsible thing to do. Mental illness is absolutely horrifying, and I truly feel compassion for TCL and her husband.

But nothing ever happens on my block.

Bosses Don't Have to Suck, Part I

In honor of National Boss's Day on October 16, this two-part post is dedicated to the one boss I have had who knew how to be a great boss. Before I tell you about her, though, let me tell you about some bad bosses I have had.

Bad Boss #1 (not necessarily in order of appearance in my employment career): BB1 was the kind of person that makes you think she is evolved, fair-minded, even-handed, and capable, but if you get on the wrong side of her, you will quickly learn that you should not turn your back on her. She was also a lunatic.

Every year we planned and organized a huge fund-raising event. Everyone in the office had a role to play, but I was the lead staff member. On the night of the event, one of our staff members--I'll call her Monday--never showed up, and never called. We scrambled and re-assigned volunteers at the last minute to cover for her, and worried about her safety.

The following Monday, there was Monday, sitting at her desk, apparently oblivious to the inconvenience and concern she had caused. I asked her what happened, and she said she had gone to get her hair done, and it had taken longer than she had expected. By the time she was done, the event was mostly over.

As a white woman, I understand that I am almost completely clueless about the intricacies, politics, and meaning of a black woman's hair.

However. To blow off the biggest fund raising event of the year, planned months in advance, because you couldn't schedule your hair appointment around it? Unacceptable. I spoke to my colleague in an honest and respectful way, and she acknowledged my personal and professional disappointment and appropriately offered a heartfelt apology. We had a good relationship both before and after this incident.

But when I spoke to my boss about it later, she gave this jaw-droppingly lametastic, white-guilt-fueled response (slightly paraphrased): "Her behavior can be excused because of 400 years of oppression." She said I was wrong to call Monday on her lapse of judgment, and that I should have just let it go.

I...I...I got nothing.

BB1 eventually fired me, ostensibly because I was a poor writer, and dishonest. She took a sample of my writing to an editor-friend of hers, she said, and the editor-friend said it was filled with grammatical errors. She also accused me of trying to torpedo a direct mail campaign in order to make her look bad. I did have a hard time managing the direct mail project because we were rolling it out at the same time that I was dealing with a high risk pregnancy and the subsequent death of my daughter--but it doesn't even make sense to suggest that I would purposely fail at my own project, hurting myself and my own work record more than hers.

As I said: lunatic.

I think the real reasons she fired me were that a) I let her know that I felt that it would not be appropriate for a social service agency to receive funding from The Playboy Foundation; b) I questioned the methodology we used in creating budgets for proposals to make them look less like general operating requests and more like specific program requests; and c) I was starting a family.

Another bad boss was an incessant micro-manager who had a predilection for telling me not just what to do, but how to do it. She had the irritating habit of sending me emails saying, "Call me!" instead of picking up the phone and, well, calling me. Because of her borderline personality and bipolar disorder, her expectations and moods were constantly moving targets, and it was almost impossible to predict whether she would love me or hate me. It kind of depended on whether her other direct reports were in or out of favor at the moment.

At one point, I was venting to Dr. PS about the constantly frustrating and emotionally unstable work environment (at times, she literally danced on tables, and at the opposite end of the spectrum, there were times when she'd be sobbing in her office), and she gave me wise advice.

"You are dealing with too many borderline personalities," she said, mentioning a close friend and a family member who were both exacerbating my stress level. "You need to get rid of them." Well, I couldn't change families; and I didn't want to give up my job.

Fortunately, the friend took herself out of my life, and the situation with the family member subsided into occasional fits of dysfunction, so I was left only dealing with one borderline personality. Eventually, I traded up to the best boss ever--ME!-- and entered the (ahem) lucrative business of freelance writing.

Which I would not trade for a real job, even if said real job paid < Austin Powers voice >One Meellion Dollars < /Austin Powers voice>.

Unless Mr. Peevie insisted.

Which he wouldn't do because he loves me too much to want me to GO INSANE.

But I digress. Let me tell you about the really great boss, and what makes the really great boss really great.

Tomorrow. That will give you time to get out pencil and paper so you can take notes.

In Which I Take Up Smoking, And Then Quit

I smoked my first cigarette ever on my 48th birthday this week. Boy, did I feel cool. And sexy.

My friend Rock Star had to light it for me, because I had no idea how to do it. I sucked on it a teensy bit, and coughed like a 12-year-old sneaking one of mom's smokes behind the garage for the first time. Even though I watch lots of TV shows where people smoke, I still had to be reminded to tap the ash off before I set myself on fire.

I wasn't planning to acquire a new noxious habit on my birthday; it just sort of happened. We were celebrating Dr. Vespinator's upcoming nuptials with a surprise shower. J. Cool hosted what was supposed to be a "godden potty" on the verandah, but of course this is June in Chicago, so with the wind chill in the 20s, we took it indoors.

At one one point, Rock Star, our resident bad girl and the most fun pastor's wife you will ever hang out with, went outside to smoke. We all decided to go out and smoke with her, sort of as a joke and sort of as a sign of solidarity. ("Smokers are one of the few groups left that it's OK to malign," Rock Star had said. "Yeah," I added knowingly, "Smokers and fat people.") So I grabbed her cigs from her purse and handed them around to the rest of the gang.

We all went outside with a cigarette hanging from our lips or dangling casually between two fingers like Marlene Dietrich. Rock Star was touched, I think; or maybe she was annoyed that we had just wasted an entire pack of cigarettes.

With our cigarettes in one hand, and our glasses of champagne in the other, we went around the circle making toasts to the guest of honor.

"To 50 years of uninterrupted wedded bliss!" I said, and we all clinked our glasses boisterously.

"Move over, Brangelina," toasted Queenie, "Make room for Mixie!" We giggled, clinked, drank and smoked. (BTW, that's funnier if you know Dr. Vespinator and her fiance's real names.)

I got better and cooler with the smoking with every puff; and I even tried to smoke out of my dwindling surgical neck hole* like a tracheotomy patient. But I'm happy to say, for the benefit of the youngsters out there, it was not enjoyable at all. I'll stick to my many, many other vices, thank you very much.

*NOTE: I can't believe I never told you the story of my gigantic surgical neck hole. I'm sure you'll want to hear it, and see pictures. Maybe later, kids. Try to keep yourselves calm while you're waiting.

Desperation and Potential Insanity

Here's how desperate I'm feeling about finding work: I'm thinking of taking A. Peevie and M. Peevie out of the Lutheran school and...wait for it...homeschooling them.

Remember in January when I homeschooled for one morning, and I was so happy when it was time to take them to school for the rest of the day? Yeah. I'm not sure that our major medical will cover that much mental health treatment. Do they still do electro-shock therapy?

Even though this solution would save our family about $8,500 in expenses for the year, I do not envision myself as a homeschooler. I do not have the patience, wisdom, patience, creativity, patience, or desire to home school my two younger children--and yet, what are my options? Sending them to the local public school? Not gonna happen.

I'm not opposed to public schools in general--just under-performing ones, where my kids won't get the right combination of challenge and support. The school within walking distance from us is one of those. I've helped the neighbor kids with their homework from that school, and it all looks like lame-ass busy-work to me. In 2005, for example, only half of their fifth graders met the state standards for reading. The school's numbers are improving--and good for them; but meanwhile, I want my kids in a place where they will be expected to perform well above the state-mandated minimums.

The only way to continue sending them to their friendly, mostly wonderful Lutheran school is for me to build my freelance writing business (I've been trying--I expect to receive my Professional Resume Writing Certification any day now) or get an actual job. The job situation is tricky. If I'm going to get a job outside of the house, it probably needs to be part-time during school hours. Does that kind of job even exist?

My creative friend Mrs. D'Onofrio suggested that I find a job as a part-time astronaut or possibly a part-time runway model, which made me start thinking about all sorts of other interesting vocations that I could pursue part time: carnival game operator, brain surgeon, criminal defense attorney, financial advisor, professional television watcher.

My blog and I are open to your suggestions. And meanwhile, if you have a friend who is looking for a writer with mad skilz, please give her my name.

Monument to Ego

Mr. Peevie recently brought this to my attention: Roland Burris' headstone, a monument to an enormous ego.


On the right side, Mr. Burris has listed his Major Accomplishments, and on the left, hilariously, his Other Major Accomplishments. (I borrowed the photo from the Politico.com blog The Crypt, which offers commentary on breaking news in Capitol Hill.)

Two additional, carbon-based monuments to his own Goliath ego: Roland Burris' two children are named Roland and Rolanda. Seriously. He even uses the Royal We to refer to Himself. Mmmmmkay.

Roland Burris, like most of us, wants to know that his life had meaning and significance. That he wasn't just another blip on the timeline of humanity--but that his existence added value, so to speak. I get that; I really do. Sometimes, when I'm wiping the smell of pee from my bathroom floor (why can't those boys aim better?!), I wonder about the meaning of life, and in particular, the significance and value of my own life. When I'm folding underwear, or scraping crusty batches of nature from various surfaces in my house, I wonder what people will say at my funeral.

"She was a lousy housekeeper, but she sure had a good throwing arm."

"She really didn't have much of an edit function in her brain, but she was mostly not a horrible person."

"She sure did watch a lot of television."

But anyway, to get back on point, Mr. Burris has written the script, basically, for his eulogy, and had it engraved on his stone crypt, which he sensitively endowed with a comfortable bench for those of you who would like to rest in the shade while you visit with the Spirit of the Trailblazer and ponder his Major Accomplishments and his Other Major Accomplishments.

Seriously.

Does he really not understand that by accepting this contaminated appointment from our legally plagued, morally ambiguous, allegedly sociopathic governor that he is causing his own reputation to depreciate rather than to appreciate?

Or is he so blinded by his own ambition that his brain keeps blocking out messages about integrity, process, and character, and the only ones getting through are the ones that say, "Fuck 'em. Fuck 'em all. I'm getting this title because I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and doggone it, people like me."

Not that he'd use language like that. He's not the governor, after all. He's a church-going man, causing some of the rest of us church-going folks to wince mightily. Burris even boldly, if not sacrilegiously asserted that his Senate appointment was ordained by the Big Guy.

I'm sure Mr. B has his headstone engraver on speed dial.

Meanwhile, my brother Deedee, who lives in Argentina, accurately and a tad meanly pointed out that Illinois is a lot like a third world country, with its political scandal and pervasive corruption. It's nice to know that our state is the source of so much entertainment to the rest of the country, even the world.

Step away from the Senate seat, Mr. Burris. Drop the weapons (supporters who play the race card, blind ambition, ethical ambiguity), and step slowly away. There you go. Now you can salvage what's left of your reputation.

Unprepared

No matter which way you're planning to vote in the next presidential election, this Sarah Palin clip is unsettling. It's disturbing that a person who aspires to the second highest elected office in the country would be so woefully unprepared to answer an obvious question about the top issue on everyone's mind: The $700 billion bailout.

It's understandable that she wouldn't know what the Bush Doctrine is, because it has changed frequently over the years. She was probably going for cute and clever when she answered a question about her foreign policy experience by saying, "I can see Russia from my house!"--although she'd be smart to back down from that now, instead of talking about Russia invading our airspace and Putin rearing his head.

But I can't think of any excuse for her to be unprepared to answer Couric's question about the bailout. Here's a bit of the transcript:

Couric: Why isn't it better, Governor Palin, to spend $700 billion helping middle class families struggling with health care, housing, gas and groceries?...Instead of helping these big financial institutions that played a role in creating this mess?

Palin: Ultimately, what the bailout does is help those who are concerned about the health care reform that is needed to help shore up the economy--Oh, it's got to be about job creation, too. So health care reform and reducing taxes and reining in spending has got to accompany tax reductions and tax relief for Americans. And trade--we've got to see trade as opportunity, not as a competitive, scary thing. But one in five jobs being created in the trade sector today--we've got to look at that as more opportunity--all those things under the umbrella of job creation.

Seriously. I can understand my more conservative friends being leery of Obama's liberal voting record. I understand--and agree with--the desire for less government, and I know that many Obama opponents believe that he will usher in bigger government and more taxes.

But how do you justify wanting to put this woman one door down from the oval office? She wants to be vice president, and maybe even president--but she's incoherent and unprepared on the most urgent issue of the day.

It's not even funny. It is embarrassing to this country, and especially to the Republican Party.

It's All About the Kids, Part II

Sometime during our stay in Door County, we lost the Sangria Poltergeist--although we still have the fumes and fruit flies. Maybe my mechanic is not so crazy after all. I'm kind of going to miss the Korean alt hip-hop, though.

On Saturday we took the herd to a campground to swim and to somehow lose six golf balls in the water hazard on the miniature golf course. (The only reason the golf balls matter is that it was my driver's license that was being held hostage until the golf balls were found and returned.)

We set up camp in a picnic table clearing, and while the kids splashed and dunked and slid down pool slides, Mr. D'Onofrio cooked up a storm. Actually, it was more like an entire tornado system.

Earlier that day Mr. D had created a huge batch of homemade potato salad, complete with hard-boiled eggs. We were originally planning on having deviled eggs, but we waited too long to peel the dang things, and the peeled eggs were so pock-marked they looked like ovoid golf balls.

I do not know what Mr. D included in his mayonnaise mixture, but it was so delicious that if they had trading cards for picnic side dishes, the Mr. D Unbelievably Delicious Potato Salad card would be as coveted as the 1909 Honus Wagner.

He laid out a feast of burgers, hot dogs, sausages, and a huge pan of BBQ ribs. Then, after everyone had piled their paper plates to the tipping point, he said, "I guess I'll throw the steaks on now." Oh yes, he did. We all just looked at him like, "Dude, you're insane." Then we looked at each other and shrugged. "OK," we said; and we proceeded to eat ourselves into the greatest meat coma of all time.

After we all regained consciousness, we drove north for the Big Sister Bay Fireworks Extravaganza. We spread our blankets and folding chairs on the lawn overlooking the bay, and waited for dusk to turn into dark. Someone near us had what sounded like a transistor radio tuned to a station playing patriotic numbers.

As the fireworks began, I suddenly missed Mr. Peevie, so I borrowed a cell phone. It was hard to hear, what with the bombs bursting in air and the rockets' red glare and all. We passed the phone around for a few peeps to say hi; and when C. Peevie started talking, I almost cried. "I really, really miss you, Dad," he said. "I wish you were here." He might be almost as tall as me, way smarter, and with twice as much B.O.--but inside, he's still just a little boy who needs his daddy. Aw.

When I saw that A. Peevie had snuggled into the lap of C. Peevie's friend X-Man to watch the light show, I got all misty again. (Anytime somebody is kind and gentle with one of my kids, it just makes me all verklempt. I can't help myself. Sometimes I am just a big crybaby.)

Eventually we made it home to the shack. The adults were exhausted, but the teenagers found a second wind and decided to hang out by the bonfire until the wee hours of the morning. Several had brought guitars, both acoustic and electric. They played music and talked and made s'mores--it was like a scene out of a teenage-angst-but-with-a-happy-ending movie.

Most of these eighth graders have been together since kindergarten. A couple have even left our school for other education options--but they still choose to be a part of this unique and diverse collection of kids from all across the city: black, Asian, white, faithful, faith-free, long-hairs, crew cuts. They are actors, musicians, artists, athletes.

Mrs. D'Onofrio might be a tiny bit insane for putting together this "It's all about the kids" Door County farm weekend--but sometimes insanity is a good thing. What a great finale to what feels like not just the end of the summer, but the end of an era. Next summer, these kids will be getting ready to head off to high schools across the city. Some will keep in touch; some won't.

But I bet when they're 20, or 30, or--heaven help us--40, memories from this farm weekend will still crop up from their subconscious. They'll smile, and one or two of them may even press a button on whatever cell phones have evolved into, and reach out to one of their eighth-grade buddies, and say, "Hey, remember when we went up to Door County that one week with that crazy Mrs. D'Onofrio? Fun times. Wanna get together for lunch sometime?"

Thanks for that, Mr. and Mrs. D.

(The fireworks photo comes from PD Photo.org. The other photos courtesy of J.Ro.)

It's All About the Children, Part the First

That's what my insane friend Mrs. D'Onofrio says: "It's all about the children."

The hell you say.

I might be willing to spend my entire Labor Day weekend at a "shack" in Door County with 400 eighth-graders and their assorted siblings and pets--but I refuse to get on board with this "it's all about the children" insanity.

But I'm ahead of myself. Mr. and Mrs. D'Onofrio invited the whole eighth grade class to hang out at their Door County farm property for an end-of-summer-eat-play-chill-fest. From Monday to Labor Day Monday, people came and went. Mostly, they came. Twenty-two children, ten adults, two dogs, three goats, and a pot-bellied pig swarmed over the property, in and out of the two small farmhouses, up the hayloft, and across the soybean fields.

By the time I arrived with the two younger Peevies on Friday evening in my sangria-infused van, I was ready to sit back, put my feet up, and partake of an adult beverage. Seven or eight sweaty teenagers were playing basketball against the side of the barn, dribbling and passing on the packed dirt "court." C. Peevie, the clear leader in the Sweatiest Boy of All Time contest, held up the game to come over and say hi.

I hugged him gingerly, trying to avoid a massive sweat transfer. "C. Peevie!" I said, happily, "I missed you!"

"Hi, mom," he said. "Missed you, too." He had been at the farm since Wednesday afternoon, and I suspected that I was looking at two or more days of accumulated sweat and grime. I saw it as a positive thing: three girls had bravely joined the class outing--but what 13-year-old girl would want to get within a yard of a boy that smelled that bad? Apparently an eighth-grade boy's aversion to showering was the equivalent of an adolescent prophylactic.

Mr. D'Onofrio whipped up a dozen frozen pizzas for the younger set while the grown-ups patiently sipped margaritas. Then he set to work putting a more mature feast out, including steak, Boursin-and-spinach-stuffed chicken breasts, rice pilaf, fresh green beans, and gravy. If this is what Mrs. D. means by "it's all about the children," then I'm totally on board.

Between the six bedrooms and the four tents in the yard, everyone found a place to sleep. Mr. and Mrs. D. selflessly gave up their air-conditioned Chinese bedroom (adorably decorated with Chinese checkerboards and Chinese-themed art and bedspread) to me because I was cranky, seasonally allergic, sweaty, and menopausal. I believe that Mr. D'Onofrio actually slept in his car.

I'm pretty sure they were all a little afraid of me.

During the night, the tent that housed the three younger boys mysteriously collapsed. I believe it had something to do with the teenagers jumping up and down on it. So the pre-teens abandoned their collapsing abode and dragged their sleeping bags upstairs to the stuffy corner bedroom where Mrs. D. had finally collapsed at about 2 a.m.

Then, because "it's all about the children," she cheerfully got up with A. Peevie at 5 a.m. to take him downstairs to the bathroom. (He was too afraid to go down the dark stairs by himself.) Meanwhile, I slept blissfully, the white noise of the AC drowning out the sounds of things going tinkle in the night.

I awoke refreshed and cool as a cucumber, thanks to Mr. and Mrs. D's insane level of hospitality. When I left the Chinese Room, delicious smells of pancakes and sausage wafted toward me. Mr. D. was hard at work preparing breakfast for the tribe, which had grown since I went to sleep the night before.

Tune in tomorrow for It's All About the Children, Part the Second.

Gerbils on Stilts

The Fug Girls do NOT need my help boosting their readership, but this made me snort Diet Coke out of my nose:

"As Paula Abdul would say, it's just not connecting with the audience, and also, gelato unicorns don't talk to gerbils on stilts unless there's a rainbow involved."

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! They've totally got their P.Ab impression nailed! In the proud tradition of Simon Cowell's favorite eye-roll target, it's a comment that vaguely alludes to an actual aspect of a performance, but then it veers off into a surreal, nonsensical, hallucinogen-inspired homage to Lewis Carroll's Jabberwocky!

And after I read that line, I searched on the Fugly site, and discovered that these bee-yotches can totally channel Paula, every single time. OMG. I'm still laughing.