Saturday, July 17, 2004
Watch out world, Hannah's racing your way
By Russell King
This past week, Hannah, 12, competed in a summer track meet and finished first in the 80-meter hurdles and the 100-meter dash. Her best time was just a second slower than the best time of the fastest local high school girl, and she’s not yet started the 7th grade. You’re thinking: “Sure, proud parent of the kid who won, yada, yada, yada.” Hang on, there’s more to it than that.
Whitney Young’s observation, which warrants adage status, is that the only true nobility is in being superior to your former self.
It’s no big deal that Hannah beat the other girls; it is a very big deal that Hannah beat herself. Between the first and final heats, she cut a second off her time. She’s never done that before. In the 80-meter, she gracefully floated over each hurdle (with such athletic elegance and ease that both she and the audience remarked on it). She’s never done that before. In the 100-meter, she found herself neck-and-neck with a girl whose stride seemed to eat up twice the space of Hannah’s and she had to reach inside to find that extra bit of fire to pull ahead at the end. She’s never done that before.
We’ve seen her run well before, but never like this. We require four kinds of involvement in our home: in the family and in some activity that exercises brain, body and spirit. There have been meets to which Hannah, pouting and griping all the way, has been dragged by Rhonda after which Hannah has unexpectedly thanked her mother for kicking her butt into gear. This was different. This time, Hannah kicked her own butt into gear.
This past school year, Hannah brought home one report card that had nothing but A’s and B’s. She also took up the flute and performed in public with the school band. She went to weeks of jazz dance rehearsals, culminating in a beautiful public performance. She found her way through a rough social time, learning to listen less to peer pressure that promises her popularity if she pretends to be someone less than who she is, and discovering that she’ll not be lead astray if she follows the call of her own heart.
You’re thinking, “OK, proud papa, settle down.” There’s more to it than that.
Hannah was our second special needs adoption. Her birth mother, a mere child herself, hid the pregnancy until the day she delivered and, according to the hospital staff, used cocaine. Hannah was in foster care for her fist 15 months, and her foster mother was ill, nearing retirement and disinclined to hold, snuggle and otherwise give Hannah the fawning attention babies require for proper development. “Special needs” children are those deemed unadoptable by private agencies and handed off to the state, where most of them spend their entire childhood without a permanent home and family.
I pause to note that, at the time, politicians were making noises about the hopeless drag on society represented by cocaine babies. One of our local school board members—a physician who should know better—suggested these children should be removed from public schools, because they would forever be a drain on resources. At the time, I was editing a medical journal and working with our state department of health on an article that looked at the data and concluded: Hogwash, most cocaine babies catch up to the other kids by about 2nd grade. The article, however, was killed by politicians within the state administration, led by Gov. Tommy Thompson, now head of the federal Health and Human Services.
Not only did Hannah start life with health and politics stacked against her, because she is black and female she started with history and culture against her as well. That we still load our culture with messages, images and assumptions that teach, even encourage, black and female Americans to be weak, dependant victims is as shameful as it is obvious. It’s also why I see one of my main roles, as my daughters’ dad, as helping them grow to be strong and confident.
At 12, Hannah is well on her way. She’s showing signs of wisdom, of being open to learning and loving, of possessing self-discipline, creativity and a zeal for life. Perhaps best of all, she’s showing that she can have enough grit to gut it out and push herself to exceed herself. If nobility is being superior to your former self, Hannah just might one day be Queen of the World.
She already is of mine.
By Russell King
This past week, Hannah, 12, competed in a summer track meet and finished first in the 80-meter hurdles and the 100-meter dash. Her best time was just a second slower than the best time of the fastest local high school girl, and she’s not yet started the 7th grade. You’re thinking: “Sure, proud parent of the kid who won, yada, yada, yada.” Hang on, there’s more to it than that.
Whitney Young’s observation, which warrants adage status, is that the only true nobility is in being superior to your former self.
It’s no big deal that Hannah beat the other girls; it is a very big deal that Hannah beat herself. Between the first and final heats, she cut a second off her time. She’s never done that before. In the 80-meter, she gracefully floated over each hurdle (with such athletic elegance and ease that both she and the audience remarked on it). She’s never done that before. In the 100-meter, she found herself neck-and-neck with a girl whose stride seemed to eat up twice the space of Hannah’s and she had to reach inside to find that extra bit of fire to pull ahead at the end. She’s never done that before.
We’ve seen her run well before, but never like this. We require four kinds of involvement in our home: in the family and in some activity that exercises brain, body and spirit. There have been meets to which Hannah, pouting and griping all the way, has been dragged by Rhonda after which Hannah has unexpectedly thanked her mother for kicking her butt into gear. This was different. This time, Hannah kicked her own butt into gear.
This past school year, Hannah brought home one report card that had nothing but A’s and B’s. She also took up the flute and performed in public with the school band. She went to weeks of jazz dance rehearsals, culminating in a beautiful public performance. She found her way through a rough social time, learning to listen less to peer pressure that promises her popularity if she pretends to be someone less than who she is, and discovering that she’ll not be lead astray if she follows the call of her own heart.
You’re thinking, “OK, proud papa, settle down.” There’s more to it than that.
Hannah was our second special needs adoption. Her birth mother, a mere child herself, hid the pregnancy until the day she delivered and, according to the hospital staff, used cocaine. Hannah was in foster care for her fist 15 months, and her foster mother was ill, nearing retirement and disinclined to hold, snuggle and otherwise give Hannah the fawning attention babies require for proper development. “Special needs” children are those deemed unadoptable by private agencies and handed off to the state, where most of them spend their entire childhood without a permanent home and family.
I pause to note that, at the time, politicians were making noises about the hopeless drag on society represented by cocaine babies. One of our local school board members—a physician who should know better—suggested these children should be removed from public schools, because they would forever be a drain on resources. At the time, I was editing a medical journal and working with our state department of health on an article that looked at the data and concluded: Hogwash, most cocaine babies catch up to the other kids by about 2nd grade. The article, however, was killed by politicians within the state administration, led by Gov. Tommy Thompson, now head of the federal Health and Human Services.
Not only did Hannah start life with health and politics stacked against her, because she is black and female she started with history and culture against her as well. That we still load our culture with messages, images and assumptions that teach, even encourage, black and female Americans to be weak, dependant victims is as shameful as it is obvious. It’s also why I see one of my main roles, as my daughters’ dad, as helping them grow to be strong and confident.
At 12, Hannah is well on her way. She’s showing signs of wisdom, of being open to learning and loving, of possessing self-discipline, creativity and a zeal for life. Perhaps best of all, she’s showing that she can have enough grit to gut it out and push herself to exceed herself. If nobility is being superior to your former self, Hannah just might one day be Queen of the World.
She already is of mine.
Sunday, July 11, 2004
On murder, suicide and fatherhood
By Russell King
Two fathers were in the news recently, but coverage was so thin that I’d like to make special note of them here. What these American Dads said is worthy of our attention.
The first is U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith, a Republican from Oregon, who did what seemed impossible: He injected a healthy dose of real fatherhood into the Senate and brought the incessant partisan pettiness of his peers to a brief halt.
For a few moments this past week, Senator Smith quieted the Senate chamber, except for the sobs of a grieving father, as he introduced a youth suicide prevention bill named after his own son. Smith’s 21-year-old son took his own life last September.
Smith recalled a "beautiful child, a handsome baby boy" that he and his wife adopted a few days after birth. He had vast intellectual gifts but struggled with learning disabilities, dyslexia, and bipolar disorder, sometimes called manic depression.
Nevada Democrat Harry Reid recalled attending Garrett's funeral, and hearing everyone speak so openly about the suicide. After his own father shot himself, Reid said, he was too ashamed to discuss it for years. If a bill like Smith's had been in effect when his father was a young man, Reid said, "my dad may not have had all the problems that he had as he proceeded through life."
Smith’s bill would help states develop prevention strategies and fund more mental health services on college campuses. More than 30,000 Americans kill themselves each year and suicide is the third-leading cause of death for people aged 10-24.
As a fellow adoptive father of a son with serious mental health issues, I’ll offer the observation that Smith’s bill is a necessary fire extinguisher, but it’s not fire prevention. I live in a capital city, home of a major university, where the health care system is one of the community strengths, but even here mental health treatment for children is in shameful disrepair. It’s almost impossible to find, it’s marked by ignorance and ineffectiveness when you can find it, and good luck getting your insurance to pay for it.
During his remarks, Smith broke down, stopped to regain his voice, and said “Forgive me.” No. We cannot forgive Senator Smith. For his courage in sharing his grief, for his leadership in refocusing our collective attention, and for his strength in making us do the right thing, we can only honor and thank him.
Aside: What does it tell us that in response to the deaths of 3,000 on 9/11, we change the nation’s priorities and spend $151 billion (and still counting), but in response to the deaths of 30,000 we spend less than 4 percent of that amount and then go back to whatever else we were doing?
New Mexico Republican Pete Domenici, who has been very public about his daughter's struggle with schizophrenia, sympathized with Smith. Domenici said he would make another push for the bill he's advocated for years that would require health insurers to treat serious mental illness the same way they treat physical illness and lashed out at fellow Republicans who had anonymously used a procedural move to block it. "I don't know who you are yet," said Domenici, "but I'll find out."
The second father—another grieving father—recently spoke out on his son’s gruesome public murder. Here, as reported by the Reuters news service, are the words of Michael Berg, whose 26-year-old son Nick Berg was beheaded by Iraqi militants:
"People like George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld don't see the pain that people have to bear, they don't know what it feels like to have your guts ripped out."
"What I'm trying to do is show to the American people and the British people ... that war has a wretchedly horrible face."
"There are 11,000-plus Iraqi citizens that are dead and each one's family is as affected as I was, but the American media doesn't cover these people. It doesn't cover the people who are suffering the most."
"Observing someone's pain just makes you think just how can they (Bush and Blair) possibly do this. There isn't enough money in the world that could ever make this worthwhile."
I am disappointed that the news media gave such little attention to these American Dads, but I am fascinated that Berg, Smith and even Domenici have reacted to their fatherhood pain by reaching out to help others. In a way, they’re helping to prevent other dads from enduring the same. Hats off to them for that.
By Russell King
Two fathers were in the news recently, but coverage was so thin that I’d like to make special note of them here. What these American Dads said is worthy of our attention.
The first is U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith, a Republican from Oregon, who did what seemed impossible: He injected a healthy dose of real fatherhood into the Senate and brought the incessant partisan pettiness of his peers to a brief halt.
For a few moments this past week, Senator Smith quieted the Senate chamber, except for the sobs of a grieving father, as he introduced a youth suicide prevention bill named after his own son. Smith’s 21-year-old son took his own life last September.
Smith recalled a "beautiful child, a handsome baby boy" that he and his wife adopted a few days after birth. He had vast intellectual gifts but struggled with learning disabilities, dyslexia, and bipolar disorder, sometimes called manic depression.
Nevada Democrat Harry Reid recalled attending Garrett's funeral, and hearing everyone speak so openly about the suicide. After his own father shot himself, Reid said, he was too ashamed to discuss it for years. If a bill like Smith's had been in effect when his father was a young man, Reid said, "my dad may not have had all the problems that he had as he proceeded through life."
Smith’s bill would help states develop prevention strategies and fund more mental health services on college campuses. More than 30,000 Americans kill themselves each year and suicide is the third-leading cause of death for people aged 10-24.
As a fellow adoptive father of a son with serious mental health issues, I’ll offer the observation that Smith’s bill is a necessary fire extinguisher, but it’s not fire prevention. I live in a capital city, home of a major university, where the health care system is one of the community strengths, but even here mental health treatment for children is in shameful disrepair. It’s almost impossible to find, it’s marked by ignorance and ineffectiveness when you can find it, and good luck getting your insurance to pay for it.
During his remarks, Smith broke down, stopped to regain his voice, and said “Forgive me.” No. We cannot forgive Senator Smith. For his courage in sharing his grief, for his leadership in refocusing our collective attention, and for his strength in making us do the right thing, we can only honor and thank him.
Aside: What does it tell us that in response to the deaths of 3,000 on 9/11, we change the nation’s priorities and spend $151 billion (and still counting), but in response to the deaths of 30,000 we spend less than 4 percent of that amount and then go back to whatever else we were doing?
New Mexico Republican Pete Domenici, who has been very public about his daughter's struggle with schizophrenia, sympathized with Smith. Domenici said he would make another push for the bill he's advocated for years that would require health insurers to treat serious mental illness the same way they treat physical illness and lashed out at fellow Republicans who had anonymously used a procedural move to block it. "I don't know who you are yet," said Domenici, "but I'll find out."
The second father—another grieving father—recently spoke out on his son’s gruesome public murder. Here, as reported by the Reuters news service, are the words of Michael Berg, whose 26-year-old son Nick Berg was beheaded by Iraqi militants:
"People like George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld don't see the pain that people have to bear, they don't know what it feels like to have your guts ripped out."
"What I'm trying to do is show to the American people and the British people ... that war has a wretchedly horrible face."
"There are 11,000-plus Iraqi citizens that are dead and each one's family is as affected as I was, but the American media doesn't cover these people. It doesn't cover the people who are suffering the most."
"Observing someone's pain just makes you think just how can they (Bush and Blair) possibly do this. There isn't enough money in the world that could ever make this worthwhile."
I am disappointed that the news media gave such little attention to these American Dads, but I am fascinated that Berg, Smith and even Domenici have reacted to their fatherhood pain by reaching out to help others. In a way, they’re helping to prevent other dads from enduring the same. Hats off to them for that.
Monday, July 05, 2004
It's not OK to say 'moose' in public
By Russell King
Rhonda and I were out to dinner, just the two of us. The food was good, the conversation was great, and the woman across the table still made my heart race: The perfect evening. Perfect, that is, until the conversation at a neighboring table grew loud enough for us to hear.
Two young men (early 20s, I guessed) out with two young women: The first I heard was one gentleman excusing himself for a moment, apparently to address one of life’s necessities. “I gotta take a wiz!” he growled in a way sure to win a lady’s admiration
When he returned, the gentleman engaged his comrade in an animated exchange of anecdotes, doubtlessly calculated to entertain the ladies. The odd thing was that the conversation was punctuated with a singularly ugly word for an act of intimacy. The word has four letters in both its noun and infinitive verb form, and the men used it as both a noun and a verb, and in the infinitive, participle and gerund forms when a verb.
In case you’re still wondering, it is the word the vice president unapologetically used to express his uglier feelings toward a U.S. senator, but this is a family column, so let’s say the word was “moose.”
I said to Rhonda, “I think I’ll have a talk with our daughters about this: If they’re on a date and the boy they’re with uses the word ‘moose’ loudly, repeatedly and in public, the boy is probably unworthy of dating them.”
To my mind, the issue of public vulgarity isn’t one of manners or morality, or even of vocabulary. It’s an issue of dignity, of self esteem. If you think of yourself as a good and worthy person, it’s likely you’ll not wish to be the sort of person who engages in such ugliness. It’s not that such words are almost universally considered offensive and will reflect poorly on you, it’s more that you think so highly of yourself that you will not allow yourself to stoop so low. What matters is what you think of you.
Relationships are tough enough. If my daughter’s beau is of such low self esteem that he allows himself this degradation, what else will he allow himself--and subject her to? Will he allow himself to be a man who lies? Who cheats? Who is violent? It’s not a sure progression of character flaws, but it seems a sign of potential danger ahead.
A coupe of days after my dinner with Rhonda, I was taking Jaden, 4, and Logan, 10, to see the Spider-Man 2 movie. It was opening day in our town, and inside the theater, some of the crowd got a little pushy to reach coveted seats. One of them, another college-age man, pushed by Logan with a curse, “You little ‘mooser.’”
Three things compelled me to respond. First, I don’t want Logan growing up thinking it’s OK for bigger people to bully smaller people. Second, don’t want Logan to think it’s OK to use that sort of language in public. Finally, this young man needed a substitute dad to step in and teach him what his father had not.
I made my way to his seat, put my hands on the arms of his chair and leaned my face in close to his. I hoped that my size advantage of about 50 lbs. would deter any physical response he may consider.
“Despite the example set by the vice president,” I said without a smile, “it is not OK to say ‘moose’ in public.” He leaned back into his seat. “It’s especially not OK to say it to a 10-year-old child.” His eyes grew wide. “And it’s a terrible mistake to say it to my son.”
The next Sunday, our pastor told the story of a young prince who, after his parents were executed during the French Revolution, was handed over to a witch for corruptions and eventual damnation to Hell (apparently, they were better than we are at delayed gratification). But when the witch tried to lead him astray, including with the use of foul language, the prince refused with the declaration that “I am the son of the King.” Because he valued himself, he would not allow himself to debase himself.
That’s what I’m talking about.
How are we doing, my fellow dads? Are we nurturing the healthy self-esteem that will inspire our children to insist on being the best people they know to be? Are we setting the honorable example that will inspire our children to refuse to disgrace themselves? We know we’re surrounded by those, famous and common, who are not. But the important question isn’t about them, it’s about us.
Next time you blow the steam off your morning coffee, consider the dad reflected there. What sort of man is he? The future hangs in the answer.
By Russell King
Rhonda and I were out to dinner, just the two of us. The food was good, the conversation was great, and the woman across the table still made my heart race: The perfect evening. Perfect, that is, until the conversation at a neighboring table grew loud enough for us to hear.
Two young men (early 20s, I guessed) out with two young women: The first I heard was one gentleman excusing himself for a moment, apparently to address one of life’s necessities. “I gotta take a wiz!” he growled in a way sure to win a lady’s admiration
When he returned, the gentleman engaged his comrade in an animated exchange of anecdotes, doubtlessly calculated to entertain the ladies. The odd thing was that the conversation was punctuated with a singularly ugly word for an act of intimacy. The word has four letters in both its noun and infinitive verb form, and the men used it as both a noun and a verb, and in the infinitive, participle and gerund forms when a verb.
In case you’re still wondering, it is the word the vice president unapologetically used to express his uglier feelings toward a U.S. senator, but this is a family column, so let’s say the word was “moose.”
I said to Rhonda, “I think I’ll have a talk with our daughters about this: If they’re on a date and the boy they’re with uses the word ‘moose’ loudly, repeatedly and in public, the boy is probably unworthy of dating them.”
To my mind, the issue of public vulgarity isn’t one of manners or morality, or even of vocabulary. It’s an issue of dignity, of self esteem. If you think of yourself as a good and worthy person, it’s likely you’ll not wish to be the sort of person who engages in such ugliness. It’s not that such words are almost universally considered offensive and will reflect poorly on you, it’s more that you think so highly of yourself that you will not allow yourself to stoop so low. What matters is what you think of you.
Relationships are tough enough. If my daughter’s beau is of such low self esteem that he allows himself this degradation, what else will he allow himself--and subject her to? Will he allow himself to be a man who lies? Who cheats? Who is violent? It’s not a sure progression of character flaws, but it seems a sign of potential danger ahead.
A coupe of days after my dinner with Rhonda, I was taking Jaden, 4, and Logan, 10, to see the Spider-Man 2 movie. It was opening day in our town, and inside the theater, some of the crowd got a little pushy to reach coveted seats. One of them, another college-age man, pushed by Logan with a curse, “You little ‘mooser.’”
Three things compelled me to respond. First, I don’t want Logan growing up thinking it’s OK for bigger people to bully smaller people. Second, don’t want Logan to think it’s OK to use that sort of language in public. Finally, this young man needed a substitute dad to step in and teach him what his father had not.
I made my way to his seat, put my hands on the arms of his chair and leaned my face in close to his. I hoped that my size advantage of about 50 lbs. would deter any physical response he may consider.
“Despite the example set by the vice president,” I said without a smile, “it is not OK to say ‘moose’ in public.” He leaned back into his seat. “It’s especially not OK to say it to a 10-year-old child.” His eyes grew wide. “And it’s a terrible mistake to say it to my son.”
The next Sunday, our pastor told the story of a young prince who, after his parents were executed during the French Revolution, was handed over to a witch for corruptions and eventual damnation to Hell (apparently, they were better than we are at delayed gratification). But when the witch tried to lead him astray, including with the use of foul language, the prince refused with the declaration that “I am the son of the King.” Because he valued himself, he would not allow himself to debase himself.
That’s what I’m talking about.
How are we doing, my fellow dads? Are we nurturing the healthy self-esteem that will inspire our children to insist on being the best people they know to be? Are we setting the honorable example that will inspire our children to refuse to disgrace themselves? We know we’re surrounded by those, famous and common, who are not. But the important question isn’t about them, it’s about us.
Next time you blow the steam off your morning coffee, consider the dad reflected there. What sort of man is he? The future hangs in the answer.
