The Technology Bag

I’m totally dreading the next time I have to fly anywhere with all four other members of my family. “Wait a minute,” you say. “Don’t you only have two children and a husband? Doesn’t that only add up to three other members of the family?”

Yes, that would make sense, but whenever we travel on an airplane, we must bring along our third child, The Technology Bag.

The Technology Bag is really my husband’s adopted baby. This fragile creature is actually an oversized backpack (I hauled it around Europe ten years ago if that gives you any idea) that Jeff insists on delicately carrying aboard all airplanes.

The Technology Bag generally contains the following: laptop, video camera, digital camera, files with “important” papers, DVDs, blank video tapes for said video camera, an iPod, and many cords and wires whose purpose remain a mystery to me. Oh, and snacks.

The Technology Bag is treated with the same loving care that our children receive. It is never to be left unattended, always under the watchful eagle eye of its doting father. Actually, now that I think of it, The Technology Bag usually receives better care than our human kids since the Bag is never yelled at or grabbed by the arm when it tries to flee out a secured door and onto the tarmac.

We recently began negotiating our annual Tour of Texas Grandparents vacation coming up this summer. The question remained on whether or not to deal with one day of hell and fly or possibly prolong the hellish experience by driving. When I made my pro/con list, one item loomed glaringly above all others in air travel’s negative category. It was, of course, The Technology Bag. I think that I would rather risk three days of whining and crying in the car than have to deal with one day of The Technology Bag in the airport.

The Technology Bag’s presence means that I am in charge of the Big Girl and the Baby, while Jeff constantly empties and refills the Bag through security checkpoints, double-checks the safety of its contents at every gate, and finally straps it to his body only to swing around when lunging after a child and clobber an old lady with the bulk of the humongous backpack.

And the fun of The Technology Bag doesn’t end once we board the plane. That’s when I get the children settled into their seats, unload the toys, unpack the snacks, start nursing the baby, and fend off requests for juice/potty/a window seat/etc. Meanwhile, Jeff lovingly unpacks many components of The Technology Bag in preparation of his onboard entertainment, or “work” as he calls it.

Then he stuffs the Bag under his own feet, in violation of air safety codes, until some poor flight attendant stops by and just does his or her job by asking him to put it in the bin above. Jeff grumbles and obliges, leaving the poor Bag out of sight until we land. Then it must be gingerly reloaded so that it may knock over another senior citizen.

The true bummer about The Technology Bag is that whenever we arrive in Texas I sorta like having access to its contents. It’s nice to be able to take pictures or film movies of my children with their grandparents. And, even though I rarely have the luxury of iPod time, it is lovely to take the occasional walk and listen to Jeff’s latest Gnarls Barkley upload.

I only wish that we could splurge on an extra seat for the Bag, or have the financial wherewithal to hire a nanny to help us with our travels. Not for help with the kids, but more as a Technology Bag sherpa.

Until that day comes, I’ll have to accept that we have three children on the airplane. At least The Technology Bag counts as a lap child.

Kindergarten Kalm Down

In keeping with my Klever titles, I had to go with another K. Sorry.

But I have calmed down immensely in the past week, and this story does have a happy ending for our family. In a nutshell, it turns out that the educational placement office screwed up about 10 families in my zip code, sending all of us to that sadly freaky school (which I’ll get to in a minute) instead of a school we chose that actually had spots for us.

My husband went down to the center twice and politely raised a ruckus and (guess what?!) we were re-assigned to a school on our list!!!! Jeff had to go back to work, but he stopped by our daughter’s preschool, which is on the university campus where he teaches, and stuffed the paperwork into her cubby. I was terrified that she was going to pull it out and color on it. Those tree scraps are like gold…actually more valuable than gold because they are irreplaceable.

So, anyway, I snatched up the papers and burned more gas than our hybrid should allow as I burned over several steep San Francisco hills to register my daughter at her new school.

Our kindergarten now has these qualities:

• True diversity (the pie chart reflects our city demographics in terms of race, family structure, SES, etc.)

• A great schools rating of 5 (not the best, but I know the story…and I’m not concerned.)

• Test scores constantly improving.

• An amazing community of involved families who love the school.

• A tough but caring principal who sat with me in her office to chat before giving me a personal tour of the school!

This is in comparison to our original school. We went on the tour, hoping to be pleasantly surprised. The principal did not come out of his office. The woman who gave the tour was awesome but she was not a parent. She worked there and she sends her kids to another school. And she said (very kindly and politely) that many families would not welcome the gentrification-type infusion of folks like us.

And Jeff saw a kid peeing on the playground. The teachers did not.

I’m thrilled that it worked out for us, but I am still sad for all my friends who are having to endure the dreaded Round Two. This system is a mess.

Kindergarten Krappers — Can You Say “Worst Nightmare?”

Let me recount my dream last night: I stood on a hill, overlooking the City of San Francisco. A large black shadow covered much of the City, including my neighborhood. The shadow was created by a giant black cloud. After a week of fighting with my self-absorbed 20-something neighbor because she can’t sleep til 1pm due to the antics of my children, and the ongoing struggle with shit falling apart all over our rented house and the landlord always blaming us, what happened to me on my BIRTHDAY finally put the nail in the coffin. I think the universe is trying to tell me to leave this ridiculous city.

(Note to sensitive types: I rarely curse in my writing because I think if I do it too much it cheapens the prose. I like to save the rude words so they pack more punch when I use them. Today is such a time, so prepare to endure a shitstorm.)

Not too long ago I blithely wrote a flippant article about “Kindergarten Kapers.” It has come back to bite me in the ass.

Never again will I blow off people who criticize the San Francisco public school system. Never again will I roll my eyes at people who skip the hassle and go straight to parochial or private schools. We trusted the system. We toured the schools. We thought we picked schools we could get into. The joke is on-freaking-us. And I got the letter on my birthday.

Not only did we not get into any of our 7 “choices” in the “school choice” system, we did not get into a school anywhere near our home. Let me tell you about the school my daughter was assigned to. Judge me if you will, but I have to put aside my liberal, progressive supporter of public school bullshit and be selfish. I will not sacrifice my children to make a point about changing the system.

Our school has these qualities:

A GreatSchools.net rating of fucking 2 (out of 10)
abysmal test scores
75% free lunch
48% ESL
3% white
Nowhere near our home
I don’t give a damn if I sound like an evil bourgeois hypocrite, I will not send my children to that school. And this is not about race! Our top choice school is majority Latino and it is also an excellent school.

Here’s another kicker. Most of my friends did not get into any of their choice schools either, except for (ironically) one family who can actually afford to have private school as a safety net. We’re flailing here, planning on working the system dutifully, but also researching parochial schools and homeschooling. I am not a parochial school kinda gal but it suddenly sounds like an excellent alternative.

My friend just said, “This is what matters to San Franciscans: dog issues, LGBT issues, and being kooky. Not children.” I’m starting to think she’s right.

First Food Ceremony

“That’s it! We are giving the baby solid food!” I yelled out loud to no one in particular after tossing yet another pair of ruined pajamas in the trash.

A week’s worth of exploding diapers finally did me in, and I hoped that some rice cereal might firm things up in the poop department. I didn’t originally plan to make the meal into a symbolic event, but somehow my baby’s first bite of cereal became a significant rite-of-passage for our sometimes-too-secular family.

Growing up white and Protestant, I was often jealous of the coming-of-age rituals experienced by other kids. I longed to don a white, wedding-style dress and celebrate my First Communion or stand in front of a crowd of friends and family, reading the Hebrew text at my Bat Mitzvah.

My elder daughter, Grace, lit a fire under my years-old ritual envy when I told her that we would soon be giving her little sister a taste of solid food.

“Tonight, Mommy! Can we do it tonight?” she screeched in delight and jumped up and down on the sofa. I remembered a recent conversation with a friend who is part-Bengali about her son’s traditional First Food Ceremony, and an idea slowly began to take hold.

“Why don’t you create a centerpiece for the table tonight?” I asked Grace, thinking that this would add some color to our drab dining room table and keep my preschooler busy for about two minutes.

Grace scrambled around the house and returned with a silver platter, five tiny votive candles, several small trinkets and charms, three sand dollars, and about 2,347 sequins. She piled the whole mess in the middle of a floral tablecloth and set to work. By the time dinnertime arrived, we had a beautiful kid-created focal point for our meal.

We dimmed the lights, lit the candles, pulled the highchair up to the table, and I ceremoniously dished out a couple of tablespoons of rice cereal sweetened with some expressed breastmilk.

“Um…I feel like we should say something formal,” I said. “Maybe we should sing a song?”

“How ‘bout ‘Baa-Baa Blacksheep?’” Grace chirped.

And so we did. And after serenading our baby with the chosen tune, each member of our family took a turn presenting her with a tiny spoonful of cereal.

I doubt the event in any way resembled the time-honored Bengali tradition of my friend’s family, but I felt immensely grateful for this small rite-of-passage that welcomed our baby girl, once again, even deeper into the fold of our family.

In this increasingly secular society I seek out ritual wherever I can find it, even if I have to make it up. This is why we had Grace baptized at a family church back in Texas and why we dedicated Rosemary at our church here in San Francisco. Not because we believe in original sin, but because we wanted a symbolic spiritual welcoming into a community brought together for reasons that transcend the everyday. An acknowledgement that our souls run deeper than the sum of our biological parts.

Even though our family’s First Food Ceremony may sound childish and silly on the surface, it gave me goosebumps, reminding me of the bittersweet fleeting quality of babyhood. With each new milestone for our children, we parents cross a new threshold and say goodbye to a place that will be gone forever. And therefore each of these milestones is worth a pause, a prayer, and a reflection. No matter if we voice a hymn, chant a mantra, or merely sing “Baa-Baa Blacksheep.”

For Girls About to Rock, I Salute You!

 (Drag Trooper)

Here’s something not to be missed: A new documentary called Girls Rock, to be released in San Francisco over the weekend of the birthday of yours truly! Check out their website here: www.girlsrockmovie.com/

Of course, come to think of it I will most likely miss this thing not to be missed because I won’t have childcare and the baby still needs to nurse every ten minutes. But I am already looking forward to Netflixing this one and doing a bit of rocking out of my own in the, ahem, rocking chair.

I’m already drawn to this awesome-looking doc because it taps into my musically-challenged inner geek’s need to pretend to be a wicked cool rock ‘n’ roll star, something that will tragically never happen. The film follows the experiences of a few girls at rock and roll camp and it’s billed as a real look at real girls, who just want to play music and be themselves. No sexing up, tarting up, grinding, thrusting, stereotyping, or pigeonholing here. Just pure musical goodness and good ol’ self-esteem building fun.

I’m excited about checking out a movie where performing girls are presented not as preening beauty queens or Britney Spears wannabes. As a mommy of two daughters I try hard to walk the line between teaching my girls old fashioned Southern lady manners, and teaching them to be strong and fierce and to not be afraid to kick ass at anything any boy can do.

It’s the whole nature v. nurture/ difference feminism v. equality feminism thing that I can’t begin to resolve in this little paragraph or anywhere else in my parenting. But I do try to strike a balance. To let them explore what it means to be traditionally feminine yet remain strong-willed and solid. In one sense we’ve come a long way baby…reference the latest Clinton campaign. Yet in another sense we’ve still got a long way to go….reference the many times the pundits zero in on Clinton’s emotions, stamina, wardrobe, makeup, alleged-bitchiness-for-acting-the-same-way-that-men-do-all-the-time.

Maybe rock and roll camp helps to bridge that gap for girls. I like to imagine that it helps them to feel powerful because of their XX chromosomes and not in spite of them. I look forward to seeing the movie and finding out. If you are like me and child constraints prevent escape from the house to see the movie, at least visit the website to check out the little girl channeling Joan Jett. Hats off to you, little sister!

P.S. Maybe I’m just a wee bit lacto-hormonal these days, but the trailer made me cry!

 

Hooking Up on the Campaign Trail

Just in time for Kucinch’s withdrawal from the race…at least he’s number one on somebody’s list!

Enough of all of this focus on the so-called presidential election “issues!” It’s time to get to the meat of campaign madness by assessing what matters most to the American public, SEX!

After careful analysis of the polls and a highly-scientific statistical evaluation, my husband and I have created a purely subjective ranking of which political campaign involvement yields the highest possibility for finding a little nookie, should you be in the market for some casual hooking up. Here is the list:

1. Kucinich – If you have pink hair and listen to Annie DeFranco, then your possibilities for finding all sorts of tail are endless. If you are into UFO kink and crunchy dreadlock sex in a tent that stinks of patchouli, even better.
2. Obama – Young, idealistic hormones are practically floating in the water at an Obama rally. All of that youthful enthusiasm makes people want to shed their clothes and meditate on the audacity of hope.
3. Romney – Because you never know what all of those sister-wives are up to.
4. Clinton – All logic says that Democrats should always out-rank Republicans in the sexy factor, but Hillary’s camp boasts quite a few women who take themselves way too darn seriously to even consider the frivolity of sex. Of course, when we throw Bill in, the whole equation gets blown to pieces.
5. Giuliani – The most sex in this campaign is probably being had by Giuliani himself. Maybe with his next wife?
6. McCain – No one’s even thinking about sex around him because no one gets particularly turned on watching her great-granddad lecture about national security.
7. Huckabee – The jury is still out on the hooking up factor with Huckabee’s religious zealot campaigners. That’s because the jury is still out on whether or not the women in that campaign are allowed to stop reading scripture and actually leave the house.

Oops! Just like all the Democrats, we forgot about John Edwards!

Second Baby Syndrome

Older siblings not only get to enjoy all of their toys and clothes in newly-minted, shiny condition, they also get parents’ fresh-faced idealism intact. Our first daughter was lovingly sheltered from all things we considered foul and unseemly and we felt truly superior when dining at friends’ houses full of plastic Disney garbage or a continuous TV presence.

But then preschool and the harsh reality of peer exposure kicked in, and Grace quickly discovered many well-hidden manifestations of kid pop-culture. With so much now firmly entrenched in our home, how can we possibly shelter our second baby from such perceived evils? Answer: Not gonna happen.

Things my second daughter will never know life without.

Yelling. It’s easy to always keep a calm, gentle tone of voice with a baby. It’s when they turn two and start trying to lick the sidewalk that parents start to raise their voices. Now that Grace is almost five, and a damn fine yeller in her own right, we all tend to scream back and forth across the house with sad regularity. We may still be peaceful in spirit, but less so in practice.

TV. We didn’t let Grace have the tube ‘til she was two, and even then we doled out well-supervised segments of Elmo and carefully managed her emotional reaction: “How did you feel when Elmo asked Dorothy what she likes for breakfast?” Little sister Rosemary, desperate for a peek at Little Bear or Caillou, already cranes her little neck like an owl every time we turn on the TV.

And while we are on the subject, Trademarked Characters. I have friends who still say to their four-year-olds, “Look, it’s a deer!” whenever they see a Bambi cartoon on a backpack. But that breed is becoming more and more rare with each lunchbox exposure the big kids get at school.

And to get even more specific, Disney Princesses. While I theoretically turn up my nose at the toys ‘r’ landfill marketing juggernaut that is the princess phenomenon, I have given in to small increments of princess presence in our feminist home. What may be a tiny, controlled princess infusion for Grace could no doubt turn into a full-scale plastic battalion by the time Rosemary is old enough to ask for Disney crap by name.

Things I’m still holding out on for both girls.

Barbie. My friend Leilani said it best: “Barbie is weird.” We all know it. We all know that study that says that if Barbie were a real woman she would have to walk on all fours to support her freakish body. Grace plays with Barbie at a friend’s house and she once begged for the doll on a mismanaged outing to the Big Lots! in the Mission. But for now we have kept the weird doll out of her innocent hands, removing one of the million cultural catalysts for body image issues. We’ll see how long we can hold out.

Bratz. With apologies to all the Bratz loverz out there, I’ll never give in on this one. A couple of years ago, Jeff stumbled across these slutty dolls in the aisles of Target and about had a Daddy stroke. “Are you kidding me?!” he yelled across his red cart, startling the other shoppers. “This doll looks like she’s auditioning for Coyote Ugly!” We both stared, jaws agape, at the collagen-lipped doll who wore a halter top, mini skirt, and thigh-high stripper boots. We both decided on that day that we’ll stand firm on the Bratz toy boycott, along with any other hoochie-mama preteen toys or clothes.

Those of you who have more than one child may feel the same, or maybe you try to offer your younger one the same gift of being sheltered. Maybe you threw in the towel with your eldest from day one, figuring it is impossible to fight the tide and you may as well roll with it.

Either way, at the end of the day, unless your child goes to Waldorf school or you tossed all media exposure and moved to the country, the little one is going to learn about all kinds of goodies from her older sibling. I’m just looking forward to the day when Grace discovers the birds and the bees. That will be quite an interesting hand-me-down.

The Great Middle Class Migration…Out of San Francisco

The cliche has begun. It is official. Our San Francisco friends with children are slowly beginning the inevitable shuffling off into two distinct categories: those who are settling into the City for the long haul and buying houses, and those who are admitting defeat and leaving the City for more affordable digs.

As renters who have small children, our numbers are dwindling. We are part of the oft-bemoaned, ever-shrinking group of middle-class San Francisco families, not poor by any relevant measure that makes sense in any other part of our nation, but not quite affluent enough to buy a house and put down roots. I’ve self-named our family as part of the “Left Behind” cohort in homage to those creepy books about all of the sinners left behind after God takes his chosen up to heaven in the Rapture.

My Left Behind demographic is a hodge-podge of educated, professional people with children who watch their friends move into that charming renovated Bernal Heights cottage, or else wave good-bye to yet another family who has packed it in for Concord or Sacramento or North Carolina.

The other issue that separates the wheat from the chaff, so to speak, is Kindergarten. Our City’s bizarre Kindergarten application procedure scares some parents so badly that they dare not even try to figure it out. They rely strictly on the gossip that goes, “Public schools here are bad. Because everyone I meet at playgroup in the Marina says they’re bad. So therefore they are bad. Even though I’ve never actually visited a public school in San Francisco.” These folks either throw in the towel and hightail it out of the City or else shell out more money than many hard-working people earn in a year to ensure their progeny remain unsoiled by the children of those who work their heinies off in service to the San Francisco wealthy.

Those of use who are Left Behind, must go through the public school application process. And, guess what? I’ve learned that there are many, many excellent San Francisco schools out there. The naysaying mommies at Day One have no idea what they are talking about on this one. I am actually looking forward to learning which school my daughter will attend and embracing a new phase of this adventure that is San Francisco parenting.

Or am I just trying to convince myself that everything is super because we have no other choice?

San Francisco Kindergarten Kapers

I remember my fourth grade art class. Every day Mrs. B passed out sheets of plain paper, said, “Draw a house!” and then proceeded to take a nap at her desk. We spent the entire 45 minutes running amuck with crayons or watching, mouths agape, as Mrs. B’s wig slid slowly down her forehead with each snore.

I remember a lot about my elementary school experiences as of late because I am in the midst of touring kindergartens.

Yes, I am touring kindergartens. If you live inside the city limits of San Francisco you can skip this next explanative part because you know, all too well, my pain and heartache.

I am touring PUBLIC kindergartens. Regular old public school kindergartens! This is not some fancy-pants Manhattan-style, private, prep-school process, although that can definitely be found here too. (Some of my friends have even gone through kindergarten counseling sessions with their preschool directors to see which private school will be the best fit for their child’s temperament.)

But let me say it again while you pause to think about what I am telling you. I am touring many, many PUBLIC KINDERGARTENS so that I can decide on my favorite schools before the January deadline.

Isn’t that the most ridiculous thing you have ever heard? In an effort to prove, once again, that San Francisco is the most unusual city on Earth, the public school system here makes families go visit a million kindergartens then apply for their top 7 choices. A lottery system that seems trickier than a Florida election then sorts everyone out and dumps children into elementary schools around town. No neighborhood elementary school down the street will do here in San Francisco. We like to keep things complicated.

I’ll give you a moment to let that weirdness sink in.

On one hand, this is a great system that allows for school choice. We are not stuck with a rinky-dink assigned school with busted playground equipment and snoozing art teachers. On the other hand, there are around 60 public elementary schools in the city and every family only wants to go to 7 of them. So what happens is that several thousand people list those top 7 schools as their 7 choices and the other poor schools get neglected, underappreciated and underfunded, creating a huge gap between the “good” schools and the less endowed schools.

It is incredibly stressful and preoccupying. So much so, that I have considered creating a whole blog about the San Francisco kindergarten application nightmare. However, I am afraid that a secret cabal of principals will catch wind of it and blackball our family from all the decent schools.

I also notice, with each school tour, that even “bad” public schools are so much better than when I was a kid. Most of the schools offer the likes of musical theater, on-site kilns, artists-in-residence, yoga, martial arts, orchestra, and foreign language. When I was a kid we had paste. And if we were lucky, it was edible.

To tell you the truth, I am not actually touring the truly “bad” schools, the ones in the tragic parts of town where young people regularly shoot each other on the streets. And I feel guilty and sad about this. Guilty because, although I am a full-on public school advocate, my child’s safety supersedes any need to make a point about changing a broken system from within. Sad because I know that there are many precious little children in those parts of town near the “bad” schools who will have no choice, who will be systematically assigned to classrooms with windows overlooking violent streets.

Does my daughter have a greater right to a decent school than those kids? Of course not. She is just lucky enough to have parents who are doing their research and learning about all of her supposed school choices. She is part of a great swath of San Francisco children whose parents are involved and concerned, yet lack the extra annual $20k necessary to send a child to one of the lily-white private schools where everything is always clean and lovely and well-funded.

Besides, even if we had the cash for a private education, rumor has it that the admissions process is on the level of getting into Yale. We would be competing with eighth-generation San Francisco families who are descendents of Napoleon or who have been donating rubies to the school since their child was a fetus.

I will say this for sure. You have only heard the beginning of the Kindergarten Kapers. (Apologies for the cutesy title. I usually hate names like “Kozy Kabin” or “Kountry Kitchen” but this time I need a little frivolity to take the edge off a hair-tearing situation.) As this saga continues, I will certainly need to relieve my anxiety with more than a mere glass of red wine.

Keep your eyes peeled for more Kapers.

It’s Here! It’s Here!

I’ve finally started The Foggiest Idea blog! Look for witty repartee and stunning insight on all ends of the San Francisco parenting spectrum. Stay tuned…