One of the hardest things about being a German trying to be an American parent are pounds and feet. Pounds, feet, hogsheads and smidgens are all measurements that I barely understand let alone can teach my children. They come home with their homework and the homework asks what is the area of a space 3 yards long and 2 yards wide. I think the answer is a lawn, but I'm not sure. I don't want my children to think I don't know anything, so I throw it out to my readers.
How many yards are there in a lawn?
Wednesday, January 28, 2015
Sunday, January 25, 2015
Lazy Sunday Afternoon
Today has been a lazy Sunday. My kids were supposed to do their homework but are betting that they will have a snow day tomorrow. I'm not the weatherman and my husband and I were too tired from drinking too much Italian Moscato at a dinner party the night before, so I didn't stop them from not doing their homework. It's a free country, as they say in America, and if they want to do poorly in school, then that is their choice, so long as they make their choices after much thought and consideration.
The boys played video games and my daughter was over at a friend's house for a sleep over. It's late afternoon as I write this and she hasn't come back yet from her friend's house. I don't remember which friend she spent the night with and I didn't feel like calling up all the possible parents to see if my daughter was there. As I said, it's a lazy Sunday afternoon.
You work hard all week and sometimes you just have to be lazy. It's my American right to be lazy. When I was growing up in Germany, my parents were Schwabs and Schwabs, or Swabians as they are strangely called in English, are known for their industriousness. Schaffe, schaffe Häusle baue, or work, work build houses.
The boys played video games and my daughter was over at a friend's house for a sleep over. It's late afternoon as I write this and she hasn't come back yet from her friend's house. I don't remember which friend she spent the night with and I didn't feel like calling up all the possible parents to see if my daughter was there. As I said, it's a lazy Sunday afternoon.
Tuesday, January 20, 2015
Colonel Rather Than Corporal Punishment
At some point, perhaps many times a day, as a parent, you
are forced to confront and deal with the bad behavior of your children. My
parents dealt with my bad behavior with Körperstrafe, or Corporal Punishment.
Personally, I never thought it worked. If it worked so well, then why did it
happen so often to me? My dad would use whatever shoe he was wearing while my
mom would use a special stick that had been handed down from generation to
generation in her family.
When I became a parent, I rejected all of that. It simply
doesn’t work. One could argue that World War II is the ultimate Körperstrafe
and that didn’t turn out well. Still, I needed a replacement. After a lot of
error and trial, I came upon the concept of Colonel Punishment. The idea is
really simple, though it only works if you have more than one child. This is
how it works:
When a child does something wrong, they are brought before a
tribunal of their peers. Their peers are their brothers and sisters. I suppose
that if you only have one child, you could bring over one of their friends. The
child can admit their guilt for a lighter punishment or deny their guilt for a
harsher punishment. The peer children propose the punishment and then vote on
it. The peer children are then responsible for carrying out the punishment.
I don’t think that any punishment system can work hundred
percent of the time, but I have liked the results of Colonel Punishment. In the
two years since I instituted it, they have been less bad than they were
beforehand.
Sunday, January 18, 2015
Martin Luther King Junior Day Pancakes
Tomorrow is a big deal day for my kids. Tomorrow is Martin Luther King Junior Day. I don't know about you, but I really get into the holidays. In the morning, I'm going to make this special pancakes I make. You just add a little bit of cocoa powder, just enough change the color. The end up looking a bit burnt. The first time I made them, which was a couple of years ago now, they didn't want to eat them because they actually did think they were burnt. I told them that they were Martin Luther King Junior Day pancakes. It was a really good lesson for them. I told them not to just the quality of the pancake by its color but to judge them by how good they taste. They're actually pretty good.
Next, I'm going off to work and my husband, Richard, is going to do something with the kids, probably play laser tag with them at this place they go to out in Springfield.
Monday, January 12, 2015
Lemonade Stand
School was delayed 2 hours this morning because of freezing rain. Somehow, that made me think about when my kids had a lemonade stand.
When someone comes to the United States for the first time, especially if they are not an American citizen, such as a German, one is immediately struck by the amount of selling taking place. There are advertisements everywhere, including in many public restrooms. Even the non-commercial public television stations have advertisements between programs. The only place in America that has fewer advertisements than in Germany is in the movie theaters. When I first came to America, I was shocked and disappointed that the only thing shown before the movies were advertisements for forthcoming films and for candy and sodas at the refreshment stand. There were none of the fantastically brilliant advertisements I was used to in Germany. Fortunately, this situation has somewhat improved and there are more advertisements for products outside of forthcoming films.
Two summers ago, my own children asked if they could have a lemonade stand. They had heard from their friends how much money could be earned with relatively little effort. While I had some experience with this type of business, I had been more of an observer than a participant. With their help, we made up a list of the supplies that we would need. I came up with a spreadsheet that would
allow them to calculate the price they needed to charge for the lemonade in order to make a profit.
Their expenses were $63.65, including a cheap folding table and folding chair, lemonade mix and plastic glasses. The water, I provided free. They wanted to have ice in the lemonade but I told them no because we didn't have any, it would water down the lemonade, and I think that cold drinks are bad for you.
Profit Calculator
Total Cost - 63.65
plastic cups - 16
Total Cost/cup -3.98
Price per Glass of Lemonade
4
Profit per Glass
0.02
Total Profit
0.32
We calculated that we would need to sell 16 glasses of lemonade at 4.00 per glass for a profit of $0.02 per glass. We also calculated that if we doubled the number of packages of lemonade mix and doubled the number of plastic glasses purchased, we could lower our unit price to $2.42, with a profit of $0.58 per $3.00 glass. If we kept the purchase price at $4.00, the per glass profit would be an astounding $1.48. With the possibility of making as much as $47.36, my children, Joachim and Renate, very eagerly withdrew $77.33. At this point, Charles was far too young take part and his siblings had no intention of sharing their profits with him.
“If he doesn’t work, he doesn’t get paid,” I can remember Joachim saying to me and his sister.
I took them to the store to purchase the supplies. In America, in most states, there is a sales tax that is added to the price of the goods. This sales tax is local, leveled at the discretion of states, districts and cities. I graciously paid the sales tax for them, for which they were very grateful. I also contributed for free the water that was added to the powdered lemonade mix and the ice cubes, to make it cold, according to American tastes. If you decided to undertake this project in Germany, which I recommend that you do, you can leave out the ice cubes since it may very well inhibit your sales.
The next sunny day, we set up the lemonade stand adjacent to the park down the street from us. It is a very popular park, especially on the weekends, and they were assured good foot and stroller traffic. Summer in Northern Virginia is quite torrid, much more so than in most of Germany. I suggested that they take their business venture seriously, so they dressed up in an approximation of business attire. Renate wanted to have a uniform, but that was out of the question for financial and lack of time reasons. Joachim wore the pants, long-sleeved white shirt and nice leather shoes that he had worn for his Spring choral concert. Renate wore a dress and we did up her hair nicely. Joachim made up the sign on his computer, adding pictures of lemons and desert cacti as suggested by Renate.
For the first half hour, many customers came past, but didn’t buy, complaining that $4.00 was too high. For the second half hour, they lowered the price to $3.00, but still were not able to sell any, except to me since I was now quite thirsty. For the third half hour, desperate for sales, they lowered the price to $2.50, $0.08 over cost, but only sold two glasses. The woman who bought the glasses for her very thirsty children loudly and rudely complained that the price was too high. Her anger caused Renate to cry.
Renate was now thirsty herself but Joachim wouldn’t allow her to have any of the lemonade so as not to eat into their profits. In the fourth half hour, tired, thirsty and under threat of rain, they lower the price to $2.00, then to $1.00 as the sky darkened in the distance. They ended up selling out their now diluted lemonade, with most of the sales going for $1.00 before we were forced to pack up and rush home.
After an early dinner, as the torrential rain poured down, I helped Joachim and Renate calculate their loss. Their total cost was $77.33. They sold one glass at 3.00, two glasses at $2.50, four at $2.00 and twenty-five at $1.00 for total receipts of $38.50 for a loss of $38.83. This money was apportioned according to how much each of them had contributed, with Joachim contributing $40.00 and Renate $37.33. Joachim received $19.91 and Renate $18.59.
Both kids complained loudly about their loss and how having a lemonade stand was a horrible idea. I told them that the lesson they had learned was priceless, or at least worth the nearly $20.00 each of them had lost. The lesson they had learned was an important one for business and one that I expect that most American child instinctively know, that business is a tough business and there’s only one sure thing in life, no sure thing. They had a good product and a good location.
“Look at it this way,” I told them, “at least you have a new folding table and two new folding chairs.”
My children learned some very important lessons from their first taste of the business world. Joachim learned has decided that he doesn’t want to go into the restaurant industry. Renate has decided to save more of her money. Charles learned that his brother and sister are not very generous. They didn’t want him to have any of the lemonade unless he paid for it. He doesn’t yet have an allowance, so he didn’t get to have any of the lemonade. All of them learned that business is business and that success doesn’t come easy.
There is nothing more iconically American as a lemonade stand. Many a famous American titan of commerce learned their first lessons in business running a lemonade stand. If you have your children start a lemonade stand business, I suggest that you try to limit their costs more than we did with our little experiment. One of the things we learned was that it is a volume business, so think about greatly increasing the amount of lemonade you produce.
When someone comes to the United States for the first time, especially if they are not an American citizen, such as a German, one is immediately struck by the amount of selling taking place. There are advertisements everywhere, including in many public restrooms. Even the non-commercial public television stations have advertisements between programs. The only place in America that has fewer advertisements than in Germany is in the movie theaters. When I first came to America, I was shocked and disappointed that the only thing shown before the movies were advertisements for forthcoming films and for candy and sodas at the refreshment stand. There were none of the fantastically brilliant advertisements I was used to in Germany. Fortunately, this situation has somewhat improved and there are more advertisements for products outside of forthcoming films.
Two summers ago, my own children asked if they could have a lemonade stand. They had heard from their friends how much money could be earned with relatively little effort. While I had some experience with this type of business, I had been more of an observer than a participant. With their help, we made up a list of the supplies that we would need. I came up with a spreadsheet that would
allow them to calculate the price they needed to charge for the lemonade in order to make a profit.
Their expenses were $63.65, including a cheap folding table and folding chair, lemonade mix and plastic glasses. The water, I provided free. They wanted to have ice in the lemonade but I told them no because we didn't have any, it would water down the lemonade, and I think that cold drinks are bad for you.
Profit Calculator
Total Cost - 63.65
plastic cups - 16
Total Cost/cup -3.98
Price per Glass of Lemonade
4
Profit per Glass
0.02
Total Profit
0.32
We calculated that we would need to sell 16 glasses of lemonade at 4.00 per glass for a profit of $0.02 per glass. We also calculated that if we doubled the number of packages of lemonade mix and doubled the number of plastic glasses purchased, we could lower our unit price to $2.42, with a profit of $0.58 per $3.00 glass. If we kept the purchase price at $4.00, the per glass profit would be an astounding $1.48. With the possibility of making as much as $47.36, my children, Joachim and Renate, very eagerly withdrew $77.33. At this point, Charles was far too young take part and his siblings had no intention of sharing their profits with him.
“If he doesn’t work, he doesn’t get paid,” I can remember Joachim saying to me and his sister.
I took them to the store to purchase the supplies. In America, in most states, there is a sales tax that is added to the price of the goods. This sales tax is local, leveled at the discretion of states, districts and cities. I graciously paid the sales tax for them, for which they were very grateful. I also contributed for free the water that was added to the powdered lemonade mix and the ice cubes, to make it cold, according to American tastes. If you decided to undertake this project in Germany, which I recommend that you do, you can leave out the ice cubes since it may very well inhibit your sales.
The next sunny day, we set up the lemonade stand adjacent to the park down the street from us. It is a very popular park, especially on the weekends, and they were assured good foot and stroller traffic. Summer in Northern Virginia is quite torrid, much more so than in most of Germany. I suggested that they take their business venture seriously, so they dressed up in an approximation of business attire. Renate wanted to have a uniform, but that was out of the question for financial and lack of time reasons. Joachim wore the pants, long-sleeved white shirt and nice leather shoes that he had worn for his Spring choral concert. Renate wore a dress and we did up her hair nicely. Joachim made up the sign on his computer, adding pictures of lemons and desert cacti as suggested by Renate.
For the first half hour, many customers came past, but didn’t buy, complaining that $4.00 was too high. For the second half hour, they lowered the price to $3.00, but still were not able to sell any, except to me since I was now quite thirsty. For the third half hour, desperate for sales, they lowered the price to $2.50, $0.08 over cost, but only sold two glasses. The woman who bought the glasses for her very thirsty children loudly and rudely complained that the price was too high. Her anger caused Renate to cry.
Renate was now thirsty herself but Joachim wouldn’t allow her to have any of the lemonade so as not to eat into their profits. In the fourth half hour, tired, thirsty and under threat of rain, they lower the price to $2.00, then to $1.00 as the sky darkened in the distance. They ended up selling out their now diluted lemonade, with most of the sales going for $1.00 before we were forced to pack up and rush home.
After an early dinner, as the torrential rain poured down, I helped Joachim and Renate calculate their loss. Their total cost was $77.33. They sold one glass at 3.00, two glasses at $2.50, four at $2.00 and twenty-five at $1.00 for total receipts of $38.50 for a loss of $38.83. This money was apportioned according to how much each of them had contributed, with Joachim contributing $40.00 and Renate $37.33. Joachim received $19.91 and Renate $18.59.
Both kids complained loudly about their loss and how having a lemonade stand was a horrible idea. I told them that the lesson they had learned was priceless, or at least worth the nearly $20.00 each of them had lost. The lesson they had learned was an important one for business and one that I expect that most American child instinctively know, that business is a tough business and there’s only one sure thing in life, no sure thing. They had a good product and a good location.
“Look at it this way,” I told them, “at least you have a new folding table and two new folding chairs.”
My children learned some very important lessons from their first taste of the business world. Joachim learned has decided that he doesn’t want to go into the restaurant industry. Renate has decided to save more of her money. Charles learned that his brother and sister are not very generous. They didn’t want him to have any of the lemonade unless he paid for it. He doesn’t yet have an allowance, so he didn’t get to have any of the lemonade. All of them learned that business is business and that success doesn’t come easy.
There is nothing more iconically American as a lemonade stand. Many a famous American titan of commerce learned their first lessons in business running a lemonade stand. If you have your children start a lemonade stand business, I suggest that you try to limit their costs more than we did with our little experiment. One of the things we learned was that it is a volume business, so think about greatly increasing the amount of lemonade you produce.
Saturday, January 10, 2015
Why Write in English Rather Than German?
Meine deutschsprachige Leserschaft hat mich gefragt warum ich jetzt auf English schreibe. Meine Antwort ist, dass Englisch ist die amerikanische Sprache. Deutsch ist meine Muttersprache aber ich bin jetzt Mutter amerikanischer Kinder und deswegen muss Ich jetzt in Ihrer Sprache schreiben.
Sorry if my German is a little rusty, as they say in English. My German-language readers have asked me why I write now in English. My answer is that English is the American language. Although German is my mother language, as the mother of American children I need to speak to them in their language.
Sorry if my German is a little rusty, as they say in English. My German-language readers have asked me why I write now in English. My answer is that English is the American language. Although German is my mother language, as the mother of American children I need to speak to them in their language.
Friday, January 9, 2015
Religion
The whole shooting thing in Paris reminded me of the whole religion issue. I didn't grow up religious, even though my parents were supposedly Lutherans even though we didn't ever go to church. In America, church is important for a lot of people. My husband, Richard, and I didn't realize it at first but we were trying to fit in and find our place in the year after we moved to Arlington, Virginia and people would sometimes ask us what church we belonged to.
Our search for a church for us is a story I talk about more in my book, but the quick version is that we didn't want to go to the nondenominational Church that was closest to us because I couldn't figure out what kind of Church they were. I did like that you could go for free because nobody forced you to put money in the collection basket. At one point, we tried going to the local Jewish church because I remember that my boyfriend, Benjamin, from when I was an au pair in Los Angeles was really nice. The first time we went, which was some Sunday, they were closed, which was actually pretty annoying. The next day I called up and asked if we could join, at least temporarily to see if we liked it. The guy asked us if we were Jewish and I said, not yet but maybe we would be if we liked it. He said I was Mischugge, which was offensive. He didn't know that I speak German. You don't usually think of religious people telling people they are Mischugge. Why would he even use that word? It could have been worse. He could have called me a Dummkopf and I would have been just as surprised. I asked him can I become Jewish and he said, "You can't," so I hung up.
Despite what they guy said to me, I do feel sorry for the people killed at the Jewish supermarket in Paris. They were just trying to do their Jewish shopping and didn't go out thinking that they were going to be taken hostage and killed by some crazy gunman.
Our search for a church for us is a story I talk about more in my book, but the quick version is that we didn't want to go to the nondenominational Church that was closest to us because I couldn't figure out what kind of Church they were. I did like that you could go for free because nobody forced you to put money in the collection basket. At one point, we tried going to the local Jewish church because I remember that my boyfriend, Benjamin, from when I was an au pair in Los Angeles was really nice. The first time we went, which was some Sunday, they were closed, which was actually pretty annoying. The next day I called up and asked if we could join, at least temporarily to see if we liked it. The guy asked us if we were Jewish and I said, not yet but maybe we would be if we liked it. He said I was Mischugge, which was offensive. He didn't know that I speak German. You don't usually think of religious people telling people they are Mischugge. Why would he even use that word? It could have been worse. He could have called me a Dummkopf and I would have been just as surprised. I asked him can I become Jewish and he said, "You can't," so I hung up.
Despite what they guy said to me, I do feel sorry for the people killed at the Jewish supermarket in Paris. They were just trying to do their Jewish shopping and didn't go out thinking that they were going to be taken hostage and killed by some crazy gunman.
Thursday, January 8, 2015
Turquoise
During my teenage years, I felt oppressed by Germany, by its people, by its culture, by my parents even by my classmates and friends. I think we have all felt this way, to some degree. My first year of University was a glorious disaster. I lived in an apartment with what I thought were like minded individuals, dedicated to freedom. There were six of us in this apartment, a couple with a bird they kept uncaged in their room, a student chef, who we called Chef Koch, who never cooked for us and refused to eat meat that he had not personally slaughtered, and a lesbian couple who never wore bras at home but went out dressed in punk, bondage attire. Our politics were left wing, but anti-Communist according to the questionnaire I had to fill out when I applied for a room.
We were close to being Greens, but purposefully rejected a dogmatic adoption of all of the environmental party’s platform. We called ourselves Turquoise, in part because that was the chef’s favorite color and because it implied a more worldly point of view. We often would have meetings to discuss and decide what we stood for and once a decision had been made, a decision that had to be unanimous, there was no turning back. Our first decision was to save energy by only taking cold showers or baths. In the winter, we would fill up the tub and let the water come to room temperature.
The couples saved water by bathing together. The lesbian couple offered to let me bathe with them, so as to save money, but I declined. Soon, there was a discussion about whether or not it was appropriate for myself and the chef, who were single, to use more water than the couples. The couples didn’t think it was right and the chef also didn’t think it was right. He even said that he felt guilty whenever he or I bathed because we were using more water than we needed to. We voted to decide that he and I should bathe together. I was the lone hold out. The chef soon got a girlfriend and I was forced to move out. I was violating the group’s principals.
Chef Koch was very inspirational, even though I knew him for a short time years ago. One of his sayings was: "We should strive to improve other people's work by helping them improve our own work."
As we go through life collecting experiences, there are things we remember to remind ourselves to tell our children if we ever have them. Chef Koch's sayings, and this one in particular, I often repeat to my children, especially when they are working on their homework. Moreover, it is a standard that I have striven to live by.
We were close to being Greens, but purposefully rejected a dogmatic adoption of all of the environmental party’s platform. We called ourselves Turquoise, in part because that was the chef’s favorite color and because it implied a more worldly point of view. We often would have meetings to discuss and decide what we stood for and once a decision had been made, a decision that had to be unanimous, there was no turning back. Our first decision was to save energy by only taking cold showers or baths. In the winter, we would fill up the tub and let the water come to room temperature.
The couples saved water by bathing together. The lesbian couple offered to let me bathe with them, so as to save money, but I declined. Soon, there was a discussion about whether or not it was appropriate for myself and the chef, who were single, to use more water than the couples. The couples didn’t think it was right and the chef also didn’t think it was right. He even said that he felt guilty whenever he or I bathed because we were using more water than we needed to. We voted to decide that he and I should bathe together. I was the lone hold out. The chef soon got a girlfriend and I was forced to move out. I was violating the group’s principals.
Chef Koch was very inspirational, even though I knew him for a short time years ago. One of his sayings was: "We should strive to improve other people's work by helping them improve our own work."
As we go through life collecting experiences, there are things we remember to remind ourselves to tell our children if we ever have them. Chef Koch's sayings, and this one in particular, I often repeat to my children, especially when they are working on their homework. Moreover, it is a standard that I have striven to live by.
Wednesday, January 7, 2015
Paris Newspaper Shooting Makes Me Glad I Live in America
Every once in a while, something happens in the news that makes me stop and consider the path my life has taken. This is one of those oh so common times when I am glad that I am bringing up my kids in a country like America rather than in Europe. Today's attack on the the offices of the satirical French newspaper, Charlie Hebdo, make me glad that I am raising my kids in America. I can't even imagine something like that happening in America. That it happened in France is not a big surprise. Except for one World Cup victory, has anything good ever happened there?
When France didn't support America in its invasion of Iraq, especially after the Marshall Plan, and Congress renamed French Fries, Freedom Fries, I was all for it especially since everyone knows that France stole the idea from Belgium.
Anyway, I'm sorry for all the families and for all those that were killed. I don't mean to belittle their suffering. But really, when I heard the news this morning, I honestly was thankful that I live in a safe country, like America. The two hour school delay because of the snow the day before, I could have done without.
When France didn't support America in its invasion of Iraq, especially after the Marshall Plan, and Congress renamed French Fries, Freedom Fries, I was all for it especially since everyone knows that France stole the idea from Belgium.
Anyway, I'm sorry for all the families and for all those that were killed. I don't mean to belittle their suffering. But really, when I heard the news this morning, I honestly was thankful that I live in a safe country, like America. The two hour school delay because of the snow the day before, I could have done without.
Tuesday, January 6, 2015
Technology
Most people who know me know that I'm not a big believer in technology, especially for kids. Part of it stems from my childhood where I was the last in my class to get anything technology-wise. Also, when I was in college and, for a time, part of the Turquoise movement we shunned a lot of things. Of course it was easier then. It's one thing to shun electric lights in favor of candles in a world with only TVs, radios and telephones. Now, with cellphones and the World Wide Web, it's a lot harder.
Oh, by the way, not only is today the Epiphany, but it's also the first snow in Arlington, Virginia. School is on a two-hour delay and we had more time for opening presents. My children all got the new iPhones. My husband and I have busy schedules and can't always be home when my kids are. My yoga studio, Thanda Yoga Frozen Lotus, is only half a mile away from home (though on the other side of Route 50).
A number of years ago, my husband and I developed this point system to help keep our kids in line. Once everyone needed a cell phone to keep in touch with us and their friends, we thought we needed some way of keeping the costs in line, just a little bit, to put on the breaks just a little bit. So, what we do, and I think this has worked pretty well, is that each kid starts at zero points and then gets negative points for everything they didn't do, like do their homework on time, those kind of things. They can get positive points too, by doing things ahead of schedule or by helping their brother or sister with their homework or chores. When the new iPhone is released, the negative points are related to the number of days they have to wait from the release date till they can get the upgrade.
This year, well last year, the new iPhone was released but we were so busy that we didn't get around to getting the kids their upgrades. They were all about -20. Sometimes we just average their scores because it's easier on us to make just one trip. For whatever reasons, we didn't get around to it and so we just decided to wait till Epiphany.
Saturday, January 3, 2015
Fundamental Keys to Raising A German Child as an American Child
One of the fundamental keys to raising an American child is to do what you want as a parent and allow your children to do what they want. Free yourself from our history, our culture, our good points and our bad points. Sometimes when you have a piece of fruit, vegetable or cheese that has gone bad you can save the whole by cutting out the bad spot. When you perform surgery on your fruit, vegetable or cheese inevitably a little bit of the good gets thrown out with the bad. Sometimes you just have to accept that you have to throw out the entire fruit. Similarly, with parenthood, you should not hesitate to act. Better to let some of the bad go than to ruin the whole apple. In other words, don’t be afraid to make mistakes. We all do and we all will. One of the proofs of proper parenting is if your children come to think that you’ve made a mistake and raised them poorly. A bad parent is one whose children think they were raised perfectly.
For example, my children are always complaining, so I must be doing something right. It is only when they are adults that we can really tell how good a job we’ve done. So far, Joachim, or Jack as he now likes to be called, is the most successful of my three children. He has reach third grade and has a lot of friends. His recorder playing is near the top of his class and he is pretty good at sports. He plays soccer and has been selected for an elite, travel team. He has also begun to play Lacrosse, which is a very exciting, locally popular game played on a field with sticks with little nets at the end to catch the ball. I have encouraged him to try baseball, but so far he hasn’t shown much interest. Perhaps we can get Charles, when he’s old enough, to play baseball or American football. Renate is also doing well in school and was even selected for the honors program. She is in first grade and always seems to be the center of attention. She is also playing soccer and has scored many, many goals.
Soccer, despite what Europeans might think, is very popular in America. Practically every kid in our neighborhood, Arlington, Virginia near Washington, DC, plays the game. When you drop off your kids at school, the play yard is filled with kids playing soccer, seventeen or eighteen to a side, if there is a side. The Spanish league teams seem to be the most popular. Cars sporting Barcelona and Madrid stickers are quite common. Our car sports a VfB Stuttgart sticker. Joachim wanted a Bayern Munich shirt. Richard told him that was never going to happen. He does wear the Cacao shirt Richard’s dad got him for Christmas.
For example, my children are always complaining, so I must be doing something right. It is only when they are adults that we can really tell how good a job we’ve done. So far, Joachim, or Jack as he now likes to be called, is the most successful of my three children. He has reach third grade and has a lot of friends. His recorder playing is near the top of his class and he is pretty good at sports. He plays soccer and has been selected for an elite, travel team. He has also begun to play Lacrosse, which is a very exciting, locally popular game played on a field with sticks with little nets at the end to catch the ball. I have encouraged him to try baseball, but so far he hasn’t shown much interest. Perhaps we can get Charles, when he’s old enough, to play baseball or American football. Renate is also doing well in school and was even selected for the honors program. She is in first grade and always seems to be the center of attention. She is also playing soccer and has scored many, many goals.
Soccer, despite what Europeans might think, is very popular in America. Practically every kid in our neighborhood, Arlington, Virginia near Washington, DC, plays the game. When you drop off your kids at school, the play yard is filled with kids playing soccer, seventeen or eighteen to a side, if there is a side. The Spanish league teams seem to be the most popular. Cars sporting Barcelona and Madrid stickers are quite common. Our car sports a VfB Stuttgart sticker. Joachim wanted a Bayern Munich shirt. Richard told him that was never going to happen. He does wear the Cacao shirt Richard’s dad got him for Christmas.
Epiphany - Extending Christmas
Epiphany - Extending Christmas
You know how some families really get into the Christmas spirit and then there's that let down when it's over and you have to throw away your tree because it's a fire hazard? There's a way to solve that. It's not very American but then what is? My son Joachim once came back from school at told me that the Puritans outlawed Christmas. They didn't like celebrations and thought it was a pagan holiday. Of course, they're right but who cares? When I was a kid, the spirit of the season was Korn, which is a kind of alcohol, not the band. There was also the time when my parents were making a Feuerzangenbowle, which is a kind of Glühwein for pyromaniacs. They poured too much rum on the sugar or the rum was too strong or something anyway, the flames caught the ceiling fan blades on fire. They put the fire out so the house didn't burn down.So, back to my epiphany. A number of years ago, I told my kids, Joachim, Charles and Renate, that they still had to be good after Christmas, because if they weren't they weren't going to get anything for Epiphany. They had no idea what I was talking about. Actually, I didn't either at that point because it was something that had just popped into my head to get them to stop beating on each other, as kids do sometimes. At least I remembered that Epiphany was the 6 January. I don't know if your kids are like my kids, but I suspect they are. My kids will do practically anything for a present. Honestly, threats and bribery are some of the most effective parenting tools. Adding Epiphany to our scheduled gained me 12 more days to keep them in line. Another benefit was that I could hold back on some of their Christmas presents and buy them afterwards when everything is on year-end sale. It's worked every year, except for the year the things they most wanted were sold out. When that happened, I just brought up some bad thing they'd done and told them they hadn't been good enough.
Friday, January 2, 2015
Two Year Old Shoots Mother in the Head
Two Year-Old Shoots Mother in the Head
One of the things that amazed me, at first about America, is the important place that gun's play in the culture. This isn't so much true in my neck of the woods, Arlington, Virginia, though you never know. My yoga studio is a gun free zone. I have a sign on the door stating that and so far I haven't had anyone object.
At the end of 2014, right after Christmas, a mom in northern Idaho, went to a Walmart, which is a kind of hypermarkt, with her 2 year old son and some of her nieces or nephews. I suppose they were going to an after Christmas sale. The woman, who was a nuclear scientist, also had a new purse that had a special zippered pouch section for her 9 mm pistol. I suppose that northern Idaho is a particularly dangerous place. At some point, her son got into her purse, got into the special zippered gun pouch, took out the pistol and with perfect aim, shot his mom in head, killing her instantly. A day out shopping became a Christmas tragedy.
According to this news report, Gun Expert Surprised That Toddler Was Able to Fire the Gun, typically the fingers of two-year olds are not big enough to wrap around a gun handle and their fingers are not long enough or strong enough to pull the trigger. According to the news report, most guns now don't have external safety mechanisms. They've just made pulling the trigger harder. I can see their point. A gun is inherently dangerous, why kid yourself that they aren't. It's like when people try to make desserts healthy. They're not supposed to be healthy.
While I can sympathize with the family, a couple of things are clear to me, as the mother of two boys and a girl, now gladly far past the so-called terrible-two stage. One is that the mother, if she were alive, should be proud that her son had such good aim. He really is a natural. The other is that, as happens so often in America, she lived as an American and died a very American death. There's something to be said about that. She didn't die a German death, like being killed in a massive Autobahn crash, or run over by an S-Bahn, or choking on too large a bit of sauerkraut and wurst.
Why Raise Your Kids American?
Why Raise Your Kids American?
Everyone knows the old saying, Born Stupid and Learning Nothing Thereafter. As parents, do we want to learn nothing from our past and from the past of others? Isn’t it our responsibility to raise our children in the best manner possible? Don’t we want our children to be as successful as they possibly can be? The answer, of course, is yes. Children only ever experience their own childhood. It’s our duty to give them the best childhood we can.Why an American childhood rather than French or British or Russian or Chinese or Swahili? The answer, of course, is that America is the most successful and influential country the world has ever known. If the Chinese surpass the Americans, perhaps in fifty or a hundred years you will be reading a book about how to raise your children Chinese. I can tell you that I won’t be the one writing it.
The
Americans have the concept of World View, for which there is no German
equivalent. There is an American Indian saying that you cannot understand
another person without walking a mile in their moccasins. So, try on my
moccasins, a pair I bought at an Indian store at an amusement park in
California when I was just 19, size 10 American, though they still fit, and
walk a mile, or 1609.344 meters. You may find the ground rough at first since
there isn’t much padding on the sole, then more comfortable later as your feet
become better adjusted to the American ground they will be walking on
throughout the following chapters. When you take them off, you will have a
better understanding of how to raise your children American.
Americans, in just
a few hundred years took virgin wilderness, sparsely populated primeval forests
and created the most advanced and successful country on earth, something that
took us more than a thousand years. My children are now more inquisitive, more
successful at school, better behaved, more dynamic, more athletic, more ambitious
and even larger than they would have been if I had continued to raise them in
Germany in the German style. Living in Germany, you may not have access to all
the advantages and benefits you would have if you lived in America, but with a
few simple changes to your parenting style, you too can raise your children to
be, if not American, certainly more American.
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