November 13 letter

November 13, 2006

Hullo

The letter writing loony is back again. We will see how long this letter goes on, shan’t we?

News: Well, the winter colds have descended. Alexander and I have had the bug for the past eight days – I started off with Laryngitis which then progressed into chest congestion. Nasty stuff that – I have a cough that hits hardest when I first lie down. For three nights, there, I was coughing so hard that I just didn’t sleep. Indeed, Tom went into the guest room because the violence of my coughing was keeping him awake. Now I still have the cough and a sore throat has set in. Sigh. Xander, on the other hand, has a slightly different scenario going. He never developed the laryngitis nor the lying down cough. In his case, the cough hits when he exerts himself. Indeed, when we took himself and his brother to the playspace at a nearby mall, Xander, after running for about 3 minutes, began to cough. He coughed so hard that he threw up! Poor baby. He was very upset by the whole thing – especially when his parents then stopped him from playing. Parents can be such irrational beasties, doncha know!

The good news (knock wood hard!) is that, so far, neither Tom nor Jason has succumbed to the bug. Jason skirted the edge of it but managed to keep his balance and did not fall off the precipice. Tom also seems to be doing a fairly good balancing act. He was sneezing a bit and complained briefly of a sore throat but appears to have recovered. We can but hope.

Meanwhile the weather continues to make me dream of Hawaii – rain, rain, endless rain. Indeed the rivers around Washington have been flooding and shall continue to do so if the rain continues. Luckily we live well above the nearby river/lake so our house, at least, is not at risk. There are advantages, it seems, to NOT owning river front property. Grin. And of course the skies are grey as grey can be. Xander longs to go outside and periodically we take him out. The problem is that the cold air makes his breathing rougher. Jason, on the other hand, is generally NOT inclined to go out – at least initially. Once out, he plays quite happily. Of course, the fact that his normal speed is full speed ahead means that he generally does not get cold.

Jason is a precocious child but for all that he is five. He has developed (since starting kindergarten) a distressing fascination for the word ‘poop’ – especially since saying the word is guaranteed to make his littler brother giggle. One should never underestimate the power of brotherly amusement. In an attempt to improve Jason’s attention to parental wishes, we have started a points system. (We are also using it to teach Jason arithmetic.) For each time he listens and responds promptly and appropriately, Jason receives one point. For each time he argues, ignores or drags his feet, he loses one point. At the end of the day, we tally up each column then subtract the latter from the former. The points are tracked for a week. At the end of the week, the points are once again tallied. Jason then has options: he can get the same amount in pennies (for his piggy bank) as he has points, he can save up points for a monthly tally, or he can get a small reward (a book, a tool, a plant for his garden…). He is fascinated by the process and is, I think, actually learning his math. He is also learning to make decisions about how to ‘spend’ his points. Moreover, the process seems to be working – it keeps us aware of how generally helpful and agreeable Jason actually is, it rewards him for being so and at the same time, it provides a graphic representation of misbehavior. We will see how it fairs in the long term: at the moment it seems to be working.

We are also still thinking of taking Jason out of Kindergarten. The reasons for doing so are many: He has indicated that he would prefer to not go, his brother would definitely prefer he not go, and I am concerned about what precisely he is learning. It seems to me that the primary purpose of schooling at this age is to train children to be still. That is just plain unnatural and in a country with a growing obesity epidemic, it seems to me to be criminally foolish. Though it may sound egoistical, I think that, when it comes down to it, Tom and I can provide a better academic atmosphere – and with the time freed up, we can enroll Jason in classes from which we know he will benefit (swimming, karate, piano). We have a parent teacher conference coming up on the 14th. We will make our decision after that. All I can say is that I am definitely leaning in the direction of removing him. I wanted him to go so that he would have children of his own age with whom to play but since they only get to ‘play’ for about 15 minutes of the time they are there, that seems to be less of a success. I just need to be more aggressive about finding play dates for him.

Shrug. My shoulders hurt. I did something to the bicep of my right arm – and of course, it hasn’t really had a chance to heal since I am constantly picking boys up and swinging them (or other heavy items) around. Besides, I tend to carry all my tension/stress in my shoulders. Was told by a PT once that I was the only person she’d ever met who walked with her shoulders. (She had asked me to rotate my ankle and I had tensed my shoulders first). I figure it has something to do with the braces I wore as a child and with the three months I spent on crutches learning to walk when I was a pre-teen. Nothing to be done about that now except to unlearn those behaviors. Easier said than done, however. There really is something to that old saying: Begin as you mean to go on. Much easier to learn to do things the right way than to have to unlearn bad habits and then learn new ones. And that is something I try to keep in mind when dealing with the boys… not that I always succeed, of course.

Jason has developed a passion (as has his father) for a series called ‘Captain underpants.’ I think Tom gets as much of a kick out of reading the books as Jason does listening to them. At any rate, they have inspired Jason to begin writing his own comic book. Should be an interesting one, if he keeps it up. He has an enormous imagination and, when he focuses, quite a bit of artistic ability. His little brother is also delighted by the idea of Captain Underpants – though in Xander’s case, Captain Underpants has become ‘Captain Underwear!’ He loves to strip down to his diaper and then to run about the house shouting ‘I am Captain Underwear!’ It does make for a change from his being Nemo…

November 14, 2006
Early morning computer time – though I keep hearing baby noises.. it is 5:11 am. Amazingly enough, Xander had one fussy period last night – around 2 am. He settled though, after I draped his bean bag bunny over him. They are really amazing things, those bunnies. One puts them in the microwave, heats them for two minutes and they come out warm and smelling of lavender. They stay warm for hours and thus make wonderful bed buddies… so wonderful, in fact, that I am going to get one for each of the children on my Christmas list!