Things I Learned in 2011

http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=3585

"Things We Learned in (fill in the year)" is the title of my friend Heather's annual letter  included with her family's Christmas card. So beloved is this note, my daughters have often asked during December, "Is it here yet?" 

It is the best holiday letter we receive. Every. Single. Year.

So, with most sincere apologies to Heather, Dan, Andrew, Grace and Julia, I am hoping that they subscribe to Charles Caleb Colton's aphorism: "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery" while I steal their idea to close out 2011.

What I learned in 2011...

~Woody Allen is back with his movie "Midnight In Paris."
~Flying business class for the first time has ruined any other flight I will take - forever.
~High school students maintain a black hole of excuses for missing assignments.
~The car has been the scene of some of the finest conversations and most hateful arguments with my teenager.
~Forgiveness is always an option.
~Older people consistently offer a greeting when I am walking.  Younger people rarely do.
~I am on a mission to give and receive greetings for all walkers I see on my way (regardless if they are wearing earbuds)
~I, too often, give fear my internal steering wheel.
~Stopping in Armonk NY for a hot vanilla chai tea removes my 'inner cranky' during car rides to and from Boston.
~There is no end to delicious Italian food in the North End.
~Farmers markets provide much more than just good food.
~Teaching your teen to drive is one of the five bravest things a parent does.
~(The other four bravest things are shifting everyday)
~Joni Mitchell is right...we are stardust.
~Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson details our stardust origins with gorgeous passion and humor (Take a moment and watch him explain this to Stephen Colbert from minute markers 21:21 to 25:30 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXh9RQCvxmg)
~You can never see the Macy's Holiday Light Show too many times. 

Have a peaceful, joyful, healthy 2012 full of learning...

A Favorite Thing

My $5.00 gift to myself this Christmas has brought me more joy, laughter, and vocal challenge than I could imagine.  And I was thrilled to be sharing it with 349 other joy-seekers for a third year.

I sang with the beloved Julie Andrews.
And the dashing Christopher Plummer.
And the incomparable Peggy Wood.
Even sweet Angela Cartwright (the actress I wanted to become aside from Marlo Thomas!)

I attended Bryn Mawr Film Institute's annual screening of "The Sound of Music." What makes it one of my favorite things is that it is a sing-a-long.  It's a sort of G-Rated Rocky Horror Picture Show with audience members in costume, and lots of interacting with the action on the screen, family style.

Nuns, kittens (with whiskers), several "Do-Re-Me" choruses, two brides in full wedding garb, brown paper packages tied up with string and girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes filled the theater to participate in the holiday ritual. There was even a group who came as the hills - very much alive! My friend Susan, daughter Ali, her friend Tori and I donned our restrained, literal costumes - a single sparkly snowflake on each of our noses (could not figure out how to get them on our eyelashes). One friend noted it was a sort of Halloween inspired Christmas.

Just watching costumed people file into the theater was fun enough. But the best was yet to be when the lyrics appeared on the screen to the title song (and the others to follow.) The exuberant "Do-Re-Me" captivated us while the innocence of "Sixteen Going On Seventeen" belied what was to come.

Hearing a theater-full of patrons wholeheartedly join Mother Abbess (the amazing Peggy Wood) in climbing every mountain and fording every stream gave me chills.  I teared up wondering about the collective burdens we all carry and the dreams we try to follow. In those brief three hours, we set them aside and let movie magic take over.  

Two women and their daughters sat beside us and were our favorite reincarnations.  One was a dead ringer for Max Detweiler (with a superbly drawn on pencil mustache)  and the other, a fur toting Baroness sporting a tiara.  Their daughters dressed in old curtain fabric with kerchiefs to match. Perfection!

ss-110207-romantic-movies-The-Sound-of-Music.grid-6x2.jpg

We cheered for the 'problem' Maria, booed and hissed at the unrelenting Nazis and the universally misunderstood Baroness, and waved goodbye with the real party goers in the palatial VonTrapp foyer. None of the unwritten rules of movie etiquette were observed - we were unleashed to connect with our inner VonTrapp. We unabashedly displayed our silly selves and made Neil Young proud by letting our freak flags fly.

The sing-a-long opened up some thoughts on my favorite things - they are always changing, but right now they include:

The moment I feel fear unlock its grip.
The understanding from a friend.
The understanding from a stranger.
Music that pricks at our unlimited emotions.
Our Christmas Eve 'Seven Fish' tradition.
Feeling loved.
Giving love.

And, of course, being a Von Trapp for one silly little evening.

The Elf on the Shelf

My shelf is elf-less. 

Why?  My kids are older teens, so I think I missed the boat when this popular little fella and his book hit the store shelves (at $30 a pop - another clever, financially rewarding idea that slipped by me!)

"The Elf on the Shelf," by mother/daughter duo Carol Aebersold and Chanda Bell, made its way to me not from browsing bookstores or libraries but from my daily Facebook check. Several posts of harried mothers forgetting to relocate an elf in their home caught my eye.  The elf apparently is Santa's watchful home spy noting the behavior of children between Thanksgiving and Christmas.  By my count that is about 30 days of diligence during one of the busiest times of the year.  It's a daily "to do" that, according to many Facebook posting parents, can be easily overlooked.
 
At first blush this elf does not sound very parent friendly, but it has nonetheless emerged as an extremely popular 'new-ish' tradition.  The Shelf Elf has a ring of Tooth Fairy as parents inevitably forget to move the fella around the house. (Oh for the nights when the last words spoken between spouses were "Did you, Tooth Fairy, put a dollar under her pillow?") Remembering to turn off the tree lights and brush my teeth max out my current capacity for daily things I must not forget to do.

Still, the elf serves a noteworthy purpose in keeping anxious, overtired kids aware of their actions.  The elf is watching.  Always.  It's sort of a nanny cam for Christmas. But the twist is that the elf must move while everyone sleeps.  Sounds like it removes some sleep from the mover - Mom.

There are blogs galore regarding the shelf sitting sprite - some sweet, some downright hilarious, some crass - there's room at the table for all types of elving. 

http://www.mamacheaps.com/tag/elf-on-the-shelf

In the 'sweet' category, "Home Stories A to Z" gives ideas on mischievous things the elf can do during the night after reporting back to Santa. I am picturing the elf, on one hand, tweeting Santa the behavior update while, on the other hand, acting as a sort of poltergeist in the wee hours. (Yes, there is a Twitter handle for Elf on the Shelf: @elfontheshelf) The possibilities for elf rascality seem endless as long as the parent has energy and a memory.  http://www.homestoriesatoz.com/2011/11/elf-on-shelf-ideas-elf-on.html

http://www.twopeasinabucket.com

Another blog titled "People I Want To Punch in the Throat" is side splittingly funny in its elf treatment.  Some of the other posts are rougher, but the blog title lets readers know what they are in for: posts are light on the sweet and heavy on the sarcastic.  Jen (with no last name) dispenses disbelief for parents who go the distance with creating scenarios of elf pranks (taking all the ornaments off the tree, baking cookies at 3 AM and leaving the mess, etc.)  The often snarky humor may not be for everyone, but Jen gets her point across like, well, a punch to the throat.  I think "Jen's" anonymity raises a flag re: who is behind the blog, but it is funny just the same.
http://peopleiwanttopunchinthethroat.blogspot.com/2011/12/over-achieving-elf-on-shelf-mommies.html

www.orientaltrading.com

I think if my kids were small I would be a moderate elf sitting supporter. I recall elaborating on a pre-school project my daughters brought home one year. It was a chain of 24 red and green construction paper links, making it a very, very simple, yet clever, Christmas countdown for little ones. Each day, they removed a link setting their toddler sense of time closer and closer to December 25. I tampered with the ingenious project in subsequent years, writing something for each girl to do on each link, to give it more meaning. I ignored my inner Thoreau. It was a struggle concocting different suggestions for both children (that's 48 'unique' ideas!) Thoreau chuckled and I eventually relented, albeit stubbornly, as the girls got older.

Parents eventually have to wrestle with questions about the elf's "realness" as they are heaped on the stockpile with Santa and the Tooth Fairy.  Alas, no good deed goes unpunished. I think it's worth the effort.

Christa Pitts with authors Carol Aebersold and Chanda Bell. Ms. Pitts
is co-CEO of CCA and B and Ms. Aeberold's daughter.

It is noteworthy that the authors, both former teachers, first published "The Elf on the Shelf" in 2005  by forming their own publishing company, CCA and B, LLC.  According to the 12/9/11 article titled "How I Became a Best-Selling Author" in the Wall Street Journal, "Self publishing is upending the book industry" as authors with a fistful of rejections use their savvy and strategic pricing to invest in their work.  Darcie Chan, author of "The Mill River Recluse," used a nuts and bolts approach to digital publishing that resulted in her work "attracting bids form foreign imprints, movie studios and audio-book publishers, without selling a single copy in print."  The ebook explosion has brought self-publishing into a small but intense light of recognition, bypassing traditional steps to a book deal.  Notes the WSJ article, "Ms. Chan bought some ads on Web sites targeting e-book readers, paid for a review from Kirkus Reviews, and strategically priced her book at 99 cents to encourage readers to try it."

Ms. Bell and Aerbsold's company web-site goes a step further to support 'innovative and family focused products' offering guidelines on how to submit work for publishing.  They straddle the worlds of striving authors and publishing companies using their recent success as concrete guideposts.    http://www.ccaandb.com/submis_strt.php

The Elf on the Shelf seems like a sort of guardian angel who tattles. I'm for ideas that help parents raise kids to think about their actions. How about something more tech-savvy  that removes the parental 'to do" - like an elf-cam?  George Orwell would love it. Thoreau? Not so much.  

Of course, there's an app for that.  http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/beyond-the-shelf-where-to/id484472828?ls=1&mt=8 

Sideways

Perspective can split the truth.  One eyewitness point of view can be drastically different from another simply due to perspective.  The same scenario can be cut into different, and opposing, pieces depending on who saw/heard what.  The answer to "Who done it?" often depends on the point of view of "Who saw it?"

This holds true whether we are witnessing a crime or an accident, viewing a work of art or watching a live performance.

http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=851

With two daughters involved in the arts in some form, I, like many parents, have clocked significant time sitting as an audience member in theaters, auditoriums, gyms converted into performance spaces, studios, outdoor amphitheaters, and even parking lots used for performing. Those of us watching assume the posture of witnesses as we see a performance unfurl before us from the traditional perspective in front of a stage.

I thought about being a witness this weekend as I stood backstage at my younger daughter's dance school's Nutcracker performances.  I had a new perspective because I was tucked in the theater wings intermittently viewing the colorful cyclone of dance that is Nutcracker.

"Whooooosh" best sums up the pace of entrance and exit sounds as the lithe, enthusiastic, powerful athletes hit that stage.  My side view was a half view of luminous dancers performing full out as the spotlight bathed them in white. Once they hit the darkened wings, their exhales temporarily broke the magic.  Breathing (often panting) in huge gulps, they spun around back onto the stage reclaiming their performance personas - never flinching, always smiling, looking effortless.

http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=2009

Of course, it is anything but effortless.  I've seen a dance sweatshirt that teasingly proclaims, "If dance were any easier it would be called football."  Dance has many expressions and athleticism is a main ingredient.  What I realized as these fit performers pranced to and fro was another aspect of sports that had little to do with the performance - it was team spirit.  My view from the wings went beyond the stage and into the faces of dancers in the opposite wings. They reminded me of teammates on the sidelines of any sporting event.  Just as in football or soccer or baseball, the team on the sidelines cheered for the team on the field.  

Dancers watching their own perform is a mini spectacle.  Their eyes are wide with wonder, their hands mirror infinitesimal foot motions, their mouths are gently agape as they hold a momentary breath of anticipation.  Once the performers exit the stage, they face a rush of support for their latest effort. And, if the performance has problems, support greets them just the same because every dancer knows the feel of missteps and falls. 

They dance equally in the language of perfection and empathy.

Regardless of age, these ever watchful athletes, earnestly pull for whomever is on stage as they applaud particular moments of success. They often mime the performance in minute mirror movements. They understand what it is to be under the lights.  From my sideways view, I realized dancers offstage either see themselves in roles past or roles future while they witness someone else's onstage efforts - in the present. 

This was an unexpected slice of magic to come from this weekend's Nutcracker.

Dancing is about mastering a progression of small steps.  I am most definitely not a dancer, but this weekend I learned more about the heart of dance than the mechanics.  It provided a precious perspective.

A Blue Christmas

"I'll have a Blue Christmas without you

I'll be so blue thinking about you

Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree

Won't be the same, if you're not here with me"

Lyrics to "Blue Christmas"

by Billy Hayes and Jay Johnson
 

December packs a powerful punch.  It does not so much unfold as it explodes with holiday preparations and expressions. (I've already noted the shopping aspect in my last post: http://asubjectforconsideration.blogspot.com/2011/12/case-of-gimmies.html#!/2011/12/case-of-gimmies.html)

http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=659

In these swirling 31 days, it is important to hit the pause button on the spinning and ponder the equally real difficulties experienced with mourning,  illness, unemployment, depression - hardships.  The calendar has no conscience for these realities but we do. 

Boston University is approaching this subject head on with a special Sunday service this month aptly named "Blue Christmas" as an outlet for those who need to unmask a sadness or difficulty in the quiet support of a spiritual setting.  The idea for this specific type of event began in Canada in 1996. Churches, temples, and community organizations have embraced its creed since, molding the services to their audience needs.  Creating a safe zone for sorrow seems to be the essential intention of the timely program.  And who doesn't want to feel safe in grief, as well as joy?    http://www.bu.edu/today/2011/blue-christmas-comes-to-bu/

As noted in BU's online magazine, "BU Today," Christ's birth, while dignified in the hymn Silent Night, sparked a bloodbath when King Herod murdered male infants in an effort to eliminate the threat of this newborn King.  Those deaths are as real as His birth.  As we celebrate the soul of this holiday, however, we struggle to make room for pain, I think, because the darkness shifts the picture into an unbalanced and out of kilter state.

Rev. Victoria Gaskell, chaplain associate for Methodist students at BU's Marsh Chapel, noted, with other campus clergy, there was a significant number of students who sought solace from the campus ministry last year at this time. It was decided to offer this service to open up a place that says it's okay to be sad, even at Christmas.   
   

http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=152

"This is just something that we are offering for people who find spiritual challenges in this season," notes Rev. Gaskell in the article. "The people who are participating in the service are chosen in part because the work that they do at BU addresses some of the challenges that people might be facing."

When I was newly pregnant with my youngest daughter over 16 years ago, it was a December day I recall twisting in a cyclone of anxiety .  I was considered a high risk pregnancy due to my age and had received an upsetting test result early on in the pregnancy suggesting something was terribly wrong with the baby.  The day after getting the news (at work no less), I shuffled among several doctor appointments for more testing and lots of conversation.  In the bustling OB/GYN waiting room,  I sat next to a pregnant woman and her mother.  Their conversation was most common in that setting yet it pained me in every way.  The mother/daughter pair savored the anticipated birth of the child, giggled with excitement over choosing names, planned for decorating a nursery etc. 

Their mutual hope flowed in a stream of easy awareness. Conversely, I was frozen by a glacier of fear.  I had known their joy on other days, but until that moment, I never considered the possible sadness that could also be present in an OB/GYN waiting room. How many others wrestling with life changing test results, or experiencing a recent miscarriage, or battling with severe gynecological issues shared that space along with the elatedly expecting?

I wondered how many times my joy had thoughtlessly spilled over with no regard to someone else's sadness.  The mother/daughter duo did nothing wrong. Their waiting room experience was as true as mine.  They, in fact, blindly gave me the priceless gift of awareness.  Their joy perfectly countered my sadness and continues to remind me to consider both in all circumstances.  I think of them, grateful for what I learned in one of my darkest moments.  It is a comfort.

As I listen to the exquisite Shawn Colvin's rendition of the carol/hymn "In the Bleak Midwinter," I hear her echo these piercing emotions with perfect pitch, specifically in these two stanzas:

"In the bleak midwinter, icy wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;
Snow on snow had fallen, snow on snow on snow,
In the bleak midwinter, long ago.

What then can I give Him, empty as I am?
If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;
If I were a Wise Man, I would know my part;
What then can I give Him: I must give my heart."*

While often uncertain, the giving of our hearts is essential no matter what the tremors of fear signal us.    

The BU Blue Christmas service will include a reading from Isaiah 40:1 which begins with "Comfort, O comfort My people." Yes, amid December's joy and celebration, it is this feeling of ease that I seek; to rest in the comfort of knowing I am loved and that like love, pain and darkness also need attention and a safe harbor, especially during "the most wonderful time of year."

*"In the Bleak MIdwinter" is a carol adapted from a poem written by Christina Rossetti circa 1872.

A Case of the Gimmies

"Dear Santa,"

This timeworn salutation is precious especially when I think about letters prepared by my girls in the not so distant past.  I remember paging through the toy section of the hefty Sears catalog fantasizing about my choices when I was a kid.  I also remember the trek to Wanamaker's in Center City to deliver the news directly to Santa Claus (and ride in the train that cruised high above the grand store's famed 8th floor toy department.)

Wanamaker Monorail now at the
Please Touch Museum in Philadelphia
http://www.pleasetouchmuseum.org

Whether we use a child's wish list or one supplied by Amazon.com, we try to make someone's gift wishes come true during the holidays. Somewhere at the crossroads of Christmas giving and Christmas receiving lies the question: what are we really asking for?

Well, according to surveys done by the National Retail Federation, gift cards have been the #1 gift request for the past five years. http://www.nrf.com/modules.php?name=News&op=viewlive&sp_id= 

Are gift cards personal? No. 
Specific? Possibly.
Worthwhile? Certainly.

But is the nature of gift giving only fulfilling pre-ordained desires? Just checking off items on a list? Is gift giving soley about hitting the wish list target or can it be, well, more?

In her NYTimes article titled "The Gimme Guide," Penelope Green offers a scant view into the psychology of giving. Citing studies done by two professors from Harvard Business School and Stanford Graduate School of Business, the article looks at both what we want as receivers and what we want to give. Titled “Give Them What They Want: The Benefits of Explicitness in Gift-Exchange,” the study "demonstrated that people accrued more pleasure from a gift (and were more appreciative of it) if it was something they had requested. What’s more, the study’s subjects rated givers as more thoughtful if they gave from a wish list.   Yet the givers (poor saps) wrongly imagined that their giftees would be equally appreciative of gifts that hadn’t been solicited. They were also mistaken in believing a gift of cash would be less welcome."  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/01/garden/the-holiday-gimme-guide.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp

Cash = good.  Creative gift = bad. 
It makes for easy shopping but, boy does that sting.  We want what we want, I guess. 

The article cites Kit Yarrow, a consumer research psychologist and a co-author of “Generation Buy: How Tweens, Teens and Twentysomethings Are Revolutionizing Retail” who identifies our personal lifestyles as something we define in our homes and in how we dress.  So we want gifts to "match our taste, style and identity."  This is equally true in the broader view if we look at themed parties, showers, and weddings.  And think about a destination wedding -  it's the ultimate specific "want" as we ask those invited to travel wherever to witness a ceremony that can take place in our backyards.

This intrigues me as I look on the walls of my home and see mostly photos, a couple of charcoal portraits, or personal items hung on them.  Like many, I did not just want generic decorative things displayed but very specific images that represented the family living here. I recall my husband's maternal grandmother, Odie Moore, rummaging through old blankets about 20 years ago as she pared down her life and prepared to toss out a drab, spare, mostly shredded in spots, quilt sewn by her grandmother! She chuckled at why she would ever keep such a thing - utility came first with her generation and this blanket would not serve keeping anyone warm.

I, on the other hand, saw the handiwork as something precious that had a family history.  I remember Odie's quizzical smile as I asked to have the discarded item.  She may not have understood my wants, but she understood my need to feather my nest with family articles.  It was a treasured, unexpected gift, a section of which hangs in my family room and makes me think of Odie as a young girl watching her grandmother sew.

Miss Manners aka Judith Martin, weighs in heavily on gift lists, noting, “Blatant greed is the No. 1 etiquette problem today.” Ms. Martin blames bad etiquette training and the widespread idea that being honest means expressing your every wish. "Most of my mail boils down to that,” she said, meaning greed. “It’s either from people who think there is a polite way to go begging, or victims who feel they have to comply.”

As an employed early gift buyer, I would become so frustrated with my parents as they consistently answered the gift question with, "We don't want/need anything." I now understand clearly what used to vex me years ago. Last month I gave my dad his Christmas gift early - we attended the one man show, "The Philly Fan" together. 

So, is all my gifting this season in this style? Well, only Amazon.com knows for sure.  
Happy shopping!