Parenting | Annie Fox's Blog - Part 99 Annie Fox's Blog

Happy Dad’s Day

June 21, 2009

Don't worry. I've got you.

Any fool with sperm can be a father, but it takes a real man to be a dad.

Yesterday in Golden Gate Park, the place was swarming with them. From an outsider’s perspective the park dads were just hanging out with their daughters and sons. Nothing special. But what do outsiders know? Bupkis. Except for this blogger, who could plainly see that those dads were transmitting powerful messages to their kids:

You are good.

You are capable.

You are fun to be with.

You are worthy of love.

You have my heart and I’ve got your back… always in all ways.

Obviously having a dad like that benefits a human being’s development. Multiply it by millions of dads and kids and we’re also looking at a tidy payoff for society. Way to go, Dad!

Twenty years down the road, those messages will have infused themselves into the DNA of a new crop of parents. Think I’ll come back and take some more pictures.

Happy Dad’s Day to you and to the kids lucky enough to know you.

Boy and Dad

Girl and dad.

On our own... together

Young super hero and his dad

Filed under: Holidays,Parenting — Tags: Dads Day, Father's Day, Golden Gate Park — Annie @ 9:24 am

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Day 10: I don’t want to be here

June 18, 2009

Now that's a safe place to park

My Annoyance Challenge continues. (Huff, puff, grrrrrrr, $#@%! ) David’s getting with the program too. The other day while we were driving, I was grumbling about something. What was it? Hmmm. Ah yes! Well, now that I actually remember, it’s too embarrassing to mention…. too petty and infantile. You say you want to hear it anyway? Allll-riiiiight. Might as well. Otherwise my good standing in Bloggers for Ultimate Truth-Telling (BUTT) might be unseated. (NOTE: This sentence doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but wouldn’t it have made a great image if it had?)

Here’s what happened: We were on our way to meet Ezra and Sarah to check out a possible wedding venue. We were early and had temporarily parked a few miles from the place while David fiddled with his iPhone (yes there’s an iPod app) trying to cue up the book on CD we were listening to. Because it’s got 211 tracks and lost the bookmark where we’d left off in the story we had a problem.

D: “Was this the place?” (narrator reads…)

A: “No, we already heard that part about the decomposed yellow dress.”

D: “How about this? Sound familiar?” (narrator reads…)

A: “Uh… Franks’ ex-wife the manicurist? I don’t think so. No, wait. We did hear this.”

D: “How about this?” (narrator reads…)

A: “I dunno. Whatever! It’s fine.”

D: “No. No. I remember that part with the old guy’s coughing fit.”

A: “So we’ll hear it again!! Who cares, David?! Let’s just get going!!!”

A bit over the top, I’ll admit it… now. Then, I was just, you know, completely unconscious and irrational, like most of us are too much of the time. But my sweet guy didn’t get sucked into my nastiness. He just calmly looked up from his iPhone and said, “You’re annoyed. Why don’t you do whatever you do when you’re annoyed (so you can drop it)?”

His pointing out the obvious actually woke me up. I took a slow deep breath, then let it out slowly. (That diminishes my embarrassment after I’ve made a fool of myself.)

A: “Honey, I don’t feel safe parked here. I want us to drive to the wedding place… now.”

Telling the truth has a way of getting me back on track. Coincidentally, at that same instant David located the right track. With our story cued up, we pulled away from the curb and moved on into the next chapter.

Filed under: Annoyance Challenge,Parenting — Tags: Annoyance — Annie @ 12:12 pm

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Day 9: Asking teens to weigh in

June 16, 2009

Hey! Whachoo lookin' at?

Yesterday I expanded my Annoyance Challenge exploration by emailing a survey to one hundred tweens and teens. The topic: annoying behavior at school. Here are the six straight-forward questions.

At school what things annoy you? (Lots of details please but no names!)
When someone’s behavior annoys you, what do you usually do about it?
At school, what do you sometimes do that annoys OTHER PEOPLE? (whether you mean to or not)
At school, what do you sometimes do that annoys YOU?
How have you tried to change your own behavior so that it’s less annoying to others or yourself?
If someone else’s annoying behavior didn’t get to you so easily, how would school be different?

So far I’ve heard back from twelve students. I’m thinking 12% teen response to a random email questionnaire is pretty good. This may indicate either that the topic of annoyance is a hot one and they’re eager to vent or that even though school’s only been out for a week, they’re already bored and willing to reply to anything that wafts into their IN Box. Maybe it’s a little of each. Anyway, I’ve already gotten some really interesting answers. I’ll be sharing the results over the next several days.

In the meantime, if you’ve got a 10-14 year old in your house and you can manage to get them to respond to these questions (anonymously, of course) I’d really appreciate it. They can email me here. If they’re not up for it, that’s cool. I certainly don’t want to annoy anyone!

Filed under: Annoyance Challenge,Parenting,Quizzes,Teens — Tags: school, teen survey — Annie @ 6:56 pm

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Day 8: Art = Annoyance Relief

June 15, 2009

Thanks, Leonardo and friends!

Yesterday, the end of the first week of The Annoyance Challenge, was annoyance-free. Seriously. David and I made our annual pilgrimage to the Italian Street Painting Festival in the neighboring town of San Rafael and everything about it was cool. The weather. The crowds. The music. And, of course, thanks to the artists who sat on the asphalt for two straight days drawing… the street was transformed into a patchwork of glorious images inspired by Italian Renaissance Masters, the Impressionists, Mother Nature, portrait photography, animated heroes, and pure imagination.

What a show!

I’d gladly give you the exact location so you could come check it out for yourself, but the annual Street Painting Festival, a fundraiser for Youth in Arts, is a bit like Brigadoon. At 8 pm on the second day, everything is washed away. Vanished into memory. I guess that could be annoying, except that’s the brilliance of the whole deal. 48 hours of totally focused energy on the process of creating art for public consumption. And boy did we consume… walking through the space, drinking in the vibrant colors, congratulating the artists and sharing the whole scene with people who appreciate such devotion to art.

See you next year.