Buddy VS Sweetie

I can’t stop myself from calling my daughter “Sweetie” and her friend (who is a boy) “Buddy”. I don’t do it on purpose.  I realize that I’m perpetuating the assignment of gender roles using the terms “buddy” and “sweetie”. But it’s involuntary. No matter how much I tell myself that I won’t play into gender stereotypes, it happens.  So much for being the self-actualized, twenty first century feminist papa.

Today was the first time I actually stopped myself and used the word “buddy” when getting my daughter’s attention.  Thankfully, she either didn’t notice or didn’t mind because she didn’t say anything.  In the past she has vehemently declared that I cannot call her “buddy”.  But only in the same way that she tells me we can’t “like” each other because we’re father/daughter.  We can only “love” each other.

 I try not to beat myself up over the buddy/sweetie thing.  But it’s hard not to hold myself accountable when I see some of the abhorrent shaming and bullying that happens online and what mostly likely occurs in the real world.  Unless I can make the change happen in myself, how can I expect the rest of the world to stop being an ass towards women and little girls.

Privilege

There are a lot of different kinds of privilege.  Being a white middle class male I am keenly aware of the advantages that I have in life. 

                It’s the privileges that I need pointed out to me that hit me in the gut like a ton of bricks.  Usually it’s my wife pointing them out to me.  Like being able to change shirts in public, for instance.  As a man, I would never be in danger of being arrested, chastised or otherwise berated if I decided to change shirts in public.  Women are not offered the same luxury.  At least not yet, for those of you paying attention to the “Free The Nipple”(Wikipedia link) movement.  But that’s a whole other topic.

                This privilege of being able to change my top in public seems obvious but I hadn’t really thought about it until recently.  I wonder what other privileges I have taken for granted.  I wonder what privileges my daughter will and will not have due to her status as a female.

Turning 40

I wrote pretty consistently here before and after my daughter was born.  Then somewhere along the line I stopped.  I’ve written a random blog entry here and there promising myself to get back into it more consistently again.  Here goes another try.

                I turned 40 this year.  I think 40 is a pretty big deal.  I wasn’t expecting it to be, but it is.  I remember turning 30 and thinking the whole world was going to change… then it didn’t.  So I assumed 40 wouldn’t be any different.

                It is SO different.  And I’m not sure I can adequately explain it.  Maybe it’s the extra hair growing out of my eyebrows. (and other places)  Maybe it’s the white hairs mixed in with the brown.  Maybe it’s the click I feel in my right kneecap when I walk.  Maybe it’s watching multiple individuals of my grandparent’s generation disappear one by one.

                Besides all that, it just feels different.  Maybe it’s also having a 3 year old daughter now and trying to be an engaged, emotionally close father and husband. 

                I’ve also had the same job for going on 8 years now.  The longest I’ve ever lived in any one place was 5 years from 8^th grade to 12^th grade.  Not like I had much choice back then.  But in the 13 years after getting my undergraduate degree, I’ve never lived anywhere or had a single job for more than 2 or 3 years.  So that’s another thing that’s different now. 

                I still have at least 27 years to go until retirement so I’m not even halfway through my career yet.  But I have been watching my retirement savings accounts increase in value which contributes to making me feel all “growed” up and might also have something to do with 40 feeling like a milestone.

                I’m not sure where I’m going with all this.  I think I had a point that I wanted to make but it turned all stream of consciousness on me. 

                Turning 40 has felt like a big deal to me.  Not in a bad way.  In fact, things are pretty darn good… and… different.  Turning any age won't be a bad thing as long as I have this in my life:

 

Menenism (aka: douchebaggery)

     I try to be as objective as possible when confronted with opinions I disagree with. But I might make an exception for the fatuous blowhards who call themselves 'Menenists'. What a bunch of pompous narcissistic buffoons.

     When I hear these guys start to whine about the unfairness of their lives, I want to pull out a scanning electron microscope to find the worlds tiniest violin so I can play them a tune.

It takes a monumental effort to keep my eyes from rolling back towards my brain when they spout vitriol towards today's developed countries where there's no 'need' for femenism because women have equal rights. (right!) Because... they can vote. Isn't that enough?

     The 'rights' that these so called menenists are fighting for aren't even the kind of rights that would promote any kind of sexual revolution for men. They would be perfectly content maintaining the status quo. Defending the right for men to act all macho isn't something that needs to be justified because it's already ubiquitous in today's society. (sadly)

     If we really want a sexual revolution for men (and some of us do) we would be fighting harder for paternal leave and shamelessly choose to stay at home while our spouses work. We would be building up our confidence so that we can wear pink skirts with our daughters without feeling embarrassed. We wouldn't be 'threatened' just by sitting in a Chevy Aveo. Yes, someone once told me that they wouldn't be caught dead sitting in a Chevy Aveo. It's sad to think that a male ego is so fragile that simply sitting in a small car would be enough to shatter it.

Thoughts of her getting older...

On my way to dropping E off at school this morning, she excitedly told me that on her next birthday she will be 4!  "And how old will you be after that?" I ask.
  "5!"
We went on doing this until she got to 25 or so.  She may have skipped a number or two.  I'm not sure because then my head started spinning with the thought of her at those ages.  For some reason 13 and 25 particularly jumped out at me.  I thought of her as a middle school 13 year old trying to navigate all the challenges this will bring to the both of us.  And again at the age of 25 when she will presumably be on her own doing whatever it is she wants to do. (Hopefully happy doing what she loves)
   There's a reason it takes a couple of decades to raise a child:  Because fathers and (I assume) mothers need a little extra time to come to terms with their children growing and maturing right before their eyes.
   I think my dizzy spell of imaging my daughter as a 13 year old hit me as hard as it did because I know now how much has changed in the last 3 years.  Trying to extrapolate that through the next 10 made my brain hurt.
   Then my day was topped off listening to a story on NPR about Molly Parks.  A heroin addict who died of an overdose at the age of 24.  Her father, Tom, who I think is not an ass had some very good things to say.  It's worth a listen and you can check it out HERE.
   I couldn't help wondering a couple of things listening to this.  How could a young woman become addicted to drugs if her father is engaged, devoted and loving?  I found myself wondering what Tom Parks missed that allowed his daughter into a lifestyle like this.  But Tom sounds like a pretty good guy.  What if there was not a single thing he could have done to prevent this?  Which of course brings me to my other thought that will feed my nightmares in years to come.  What is to keep my daughter from the same fate?  This makes me feel angry, incensed and hopeless all at the same time.
   Here I am now at the end of the day trying to sort out these feelings as my 3 year old daughter lies asleep on her Frozen bed sheets at 9:30pm.  At least now I know where she is.

Public Easter Egg Hunt..E

We're never doing THAT again.
   After participating in our first and last public Easter Egg hunt I have a few observations.  Just to warn you this is going to make me sound like a pretentious socialist dad who would look down his nose at pretty much every parent that will never lay eyes on this blog entry.
   I found myself on the front line of the first hole at a golf course where a couple of thin ribbons stood between a couple hundred kids aged 3-6... and a fairway of colorful plastic eggs about 50 yards away.  A couple of sandwich boards indicated the "rules" of the hunt:
  No running
  Parents can help but are not to touch the eggs
  No pushing
  One golden egg per child
In addition to these rules, an employee with a megaphone communicated (or tried to communicate) that due to the large turnout of tots, there is a 3 egg limit per child.
  Right.
  You can probably imagine how this turned out.  Needless to say, the rules were broken and there was much crying.
   My daughter, despite obeying all of the rules and only coming up with a single empty egg that a random mother was shamed into dropping, stayed surprisingly calm.  She handled the whole situation like a champ.  Not bad for a 3 year old.

   I'm not sure how this chaos could have been prevented.  I'm not sure why there were kids with baskets and bags full of eggs unwilling to share after noticing the crying kids around them.  I'm not sure why a dad I overheard tell his son not to cry if he doesn't get any eggs.  I suspect the emotional damage that has been done to this poor boy has left him more desperately needing to cry than anyone else.  (But that's another blog post.)
   As I carried my daughter away in her pastel blue and yellow Easter dress, I felt like this is a perfect model of capitalism... and why pure capitalism doesn't work.
  First, the kids who worked the hardest (ie. ran the fastest) ended up with the greatest number of eggs. (Let's call this group the 1 percenters)  Those who followed the rules, least willing or unable to work (run) ended up with nothing. (Egg poverty) The greatest percentage of kids in between ended up with a handful of eggs. (The middle class)  Not surprisingly, the 1 percenters were the ones least willing to share their abundance of eggs.  Why should they.  They 'earned' their eggs, right?  If they want to gorge themselves on chocolate and candy it's their choice.  I watched my daughter's friend give her one of his 3 eggs.
   Just imagine if the one percenters gave up a third of their eggs to those who were just a little bit too slow in joining the fray.  There would be a lot fewer criers.
   This blunt metaphor brings up a lot of questions that my wife and I discussed on our drive home tonight.
   Why are some people more willing to share than others?  Why is it easier to share with those of your own community or family structure?  Is it human nature to be kind or is there some philosophical ulterior motive to acts of kindness that only benefit yourself.
   And why the hell are so many bratty kids unsupervised by ass-parents who probably don't live by societal and moral rules themselves!

***Update***
Case in point:
THIS!  A short article about an attempted world record egg hunt in Sacramento.  This reeks of the holiday "spirit" that is now common around the Thanksgiving weekend.

Teething?

It's been a rough couple of days although you wouldn't know it from looking at this video:

VB has been home from daycare for two days now.  My wife has been taking most of the responsibility by taking time off work to be at home.
   VB was running a high fever Sunday night and wakes up pretty miserable with a hacking cough that scares me into thinking she's going to vomit all over the world.  Every hack I squint my eyes dreading what might come up.  So far, though, she's managed to calm back down before it gets to that point.
   The temperature is normal now and based on the stuffy nose, runny stool and jamming her fist down the back of her throat, I am assuming that those 2-year molars are the cause of all our torment.  I looked in there with a flashlight today but sadly, there is no sign of enamel.  I think this means we have a long way to go.  Ibuprofen to the rescue!  She reliably perks back up for a few hours after administering a dose.  Maybe I'll try to get a video of her waking up so we can compare and contrast.
   I love that the ball swishes right through her legs at the end of this video.