Very profound

I was first going to write this blog back in January. A news article in the local paper got me all riled up and I was going to write right away! Then I took a little time off to rest my arms from a bad desk set up and too many days in a row writing, then a book was released that made me think about ways it might tie in to this blog, then I started writing about other things, blog and otherwise and now I am finally getting back to this train of thought.

I wrote a few years ago about my feelings on "Fair" and this sort of ties back to that one. In fact I mentioned the changes to C's high school that were made to make it more "fair" to everyone. This is about a group of parents that want to see the same sort of changes made to the middle school he went to as well.

Most of you know that C is very smart. The definition is profoundly gifted. He scored in the top 99% of both reading and math standardized testing in school. In the 6th grade he took the SATs for a Johns Hopkins study and scored higher than 90% of graduating seniors that year. He is smart in a way that is hard to comprehend at times. Now any parent of a child that is an outlier on either end of the spectrum will tell you that the public school system is not set up to deal with kids like theirs. And really they can't be. The resources are stretched too thin. So parents of kids with special needs (and being extraordinarily intelligent is a special need just like being mentally handicapped is) have to find ways of dealing with their child's special needs outside of the school system.

Sure there are TAG programs in the school and teachers will try to find "enrichment exercises" for bright kids who are bored in class but what this often boils down to is extra worksheets. So more homework covering concepts they got the first time through in class, or more likely when they read ahead in their books waiting for everyone else to catch up. When C was in middle school we reached a head with the frustration levels. Seeing that he was going to be going back and forth between the high school and the middle school within a year to try and get classes that were keeping pace with him we looked for alternative programs. Portland has a school called ACCESS and they will take a certain number of students outside of their district. Criteria to get in are test scores (99% in either reading or math), filling out a questionnaire and teacher recommendations. So we got C a spot in this program starting his 7th grade year.

Then Beaverton finally caught up to Portland, and passed it really. They opened Summa. To qualify for admittance in Summa you must score in the 99% for both reading and math. They started C's 7th grade year and now have full middle schools (6-8) in two locations. It's a wonderful program. Fast paced, challenging, filled with only students who score the same high percentages. It was a wonderful help. The year it opened it was also a huge controversy. Parents whose kids missed the cut off by a percentage or two were not happy. I can understand this. To a point. I know the frustration of taking your kid to extra classes and finding activities to keep them interested and taking on their education in a way that feels like you put them in school for 6 hours a day for their amusement but their education is all on you.

But there is a big difference between a student who scores in the 97% on one test and one who scores in the 99% on both. The pace at which these kids were given information was faster than many college courses. The ideas they were exposed to, the freedom they were given in "figuring it out" in finding the next direction that they wanted to take in a science experiment for instance, was amazing. I have likened it to owning a Ferrari and for years being restricted to driving on a crowded freeway where even though you COULD go much faster everyone around you can't so you are stuck and then all of a sudden the road opens up and everyone around you is in a Ferrari and you get to race open road.

So back to January. It seems as though a group of parents have gotten together to hire an expert on gifted students to try and change Beaverton's policy. The reasoning is that there are many different types of gifted and the program should include all of the TAG students so everyone gets to participate. Because the way it's set up now just isn't fair. This would mean expanding the program from the 326 profoundly gifted students it has right now to 1400 smart kids of varying degrees. Then they want to group those students by ability in the program. Now, I am not sure if the schools in your area do this, but this is the standard way most schools work already. The first week or two of school is placement tests and then you are put in groups Red, Blue, Yellow based on your scores. The same system that wasn't working for these profoundly gifted kids in the first place. And then what happens if you do get your way and your kid is in the slow group all of a sudden? After years of being in TAG, being in the most advanced group all of a sudden in Summa they are the slow one? How do you think that is going to work out?

One of the wonderful things about how Summa works is that the tests were done ahead of time. To get in to Summa you had to place at a certain level so no further dividing is necessary. They start first day learning at a rapid pace. And they all know that they are all profoundly gifted. There is no stigma for being smart or for not being as smart. You wouldn't be there if you didn't meet the rigorous admittance criteria. Still, I get it, everyone wants the best for their child, but this isn't for your child. I am sorry, but they didn't test high enough. It sucks. It's worse to miss something by a small percentage than a large one. I am sorry that you will still have to handle the enrichment and extra learning on your own, but this is not the way to fix it.

One of the quotes in the article had me shaking my head, "We don't want to change the program, we want to expand the number of people who participate in it." Excuse me? Isn't that changing the program? That to me is like saying, I love everything about you except your personality. We don't want to change the program, we just want to lower the requirements for getting in, increase the number of students in the program and then divide the groups by levels again instead of group learning. But other than that...no changes.

This ends the rant blog. Tomorrow I will write the other part of it that I can't figure out how to mesh nicely with this one. Just for a sneak preview hint..."Rawr!"

See if you can figure that one out!

That guy...

So last year I blogged about Valentine's Day, or rather the fact that I am anti-Valentine's Day. So this year I figured I would give equal time to the other side of the equation.

I am friends with "that guy". All of the married or even just dating couples out there know what I mean. At least the male half of the relationship does. "That guy" is the one that messes it up for the rest of you. He is the one that does the romance thing without being reminded or guilted. The one that plans ahead and seems to actually enjoy doing so. So if you are friends with a couple that has "that guy" in it, you are screwed. You bring home your dozen roses and your wife is THRILLED until she calls her buddy to talk about it and finds out "that guy" had a rose bush named after her in the Rose Gardens. You get reservations at the newest romantic restaurant in town and are pretty pleased with yourself until you find out "that guy" had a private chef come to the house and cook a gourmet meal while his wife spent the day in a spa getting pampered.

"That guy" doesn't even do it to make you feel bad, which makes it so much worse! He's just doing what comes naturally to him. He's not trying to out compete you. He is just trying to make sure that he is doing all that he can do to make his partner feel special. Now the particular "that guy" in my life is like this for all holidays. He and his wife have been married just a few years longer than Brent and I have so if I weren't so anti-celebration Brent would be in huge trouble. For their 20th Anniversary he booked a romantic week away in wine country where they did tours and tastings and a hot air balloon ride. (I actually have two "that guys" the other one did a tour of Italy for their 20th but he is only "that guy" when it comes to travel instead of a general all over "that guy")

Anyway...he also takes off her birthday from work so he can spend the day with her every year. When we first became friends I remember scheduling a meeting with him and him having to move the date because it was on his wife's birthday and he would be out of the office all day. He was shocked that not only do I not have Brent take my birthday off, I didn't even take it off myself. To be fair, I do celebrate my birthday for an entire month, so it's not that unusual to expect I would take the day off. But my idea of celebrating my birthday is people bringing me sweets and telling me how young I look. That's it. His idea of a celebration is a day doing what ever his wife wants, pedicures, massages, dinner out, maybe a weekend trip away to a bed and breakfast. See? He is "that guy".

So Valentine's Day for "that guy" is like the ultimate day. The "that guy" in my life, even proposed on Valentine's Day. This year because his wife's job requires that she get up early dinner out on Monday night would be inconvenient so he moved Valentine's Day to Saturday. But I guarantee you that he will not let the day pass without letting his lady love know she is still his favorite Valentine. In all the years that I worked with him I would marvel at his Valentine's Day efforts. He is the father of three daughters so not only would he do something special for his bride, but he would then do a lovely gift or dinner with his other girls. And then he spreads out from there.

I can remember being in a business meeting with him the week of Valentine's and he took the time out to tell people how he felt about them. Reduced the biggest bear of a man I've ever met into a blubbering baby. It was really something to see. And he does it all very unselfconsciously. You would expect one grown man telling another how much he respects and cares for him to be awkward, but it was a lovely moment. When it came time that same meeting for my turn in the spotlight, he first told me to shut up and sit still, he knew I wasn't comfortable with speeches or praise but wanted to let me know that he appreciated everything I did for him and his business and then he gave me a cookie. Which as you all know, baked goods are the gift of choice for me. See? He is "that guy".

As much as I am not into the celebration I enjoy hearing about what he is doing and how he is doing it. It's a view into a world that though I don't understand it or need it I can appreciate why he does it and how it makes him and his family feel. So for all of you out there whether you are like me and would just rather not celebrate, or if you are "that guy" or aspire to be "that guy" or fall somewhere in the middle I hope the day is filled with all of the things you like best. And if you are looking for gift ideas...remember baked goods!

Stop and enjoy the perfection

This morning is gorgeous. It was very windy yesterday and it's not stormy today so the air is crystal clear. Bright and sunny. The sunrise is spectacular.

After taking Brent to work this morning I was sitting at a stop light looking up at the sky and there was a jet flying...the trail was hit by the light of the rising sun in such a way that it glowed bright white in the sky. So below the contrail line was the bright orange, pink, yellow of the sunrise then blue sky then the glowing white of the contrail itself. It was beautiful and I thought I would like to be able to sit and watch the whole time the jet flew but knew eventually the light would change and the cars behind me would not be happy with my choice. For a second I started to regret the leaving instead of enjoying what I could watch while I waited.

Then the light changed and I had to turn and focus on the road ahead. Leaving the beauty of the sky behind. The morning radio show I listen to went to commercial right at that point and I changed the channel only to hear Jeff Buckley singing "Hallelujah....hallelujah..." and my heart filled with the beauty of the moment. Perfection.

By the time I got home the trail in the sky was a broken patch of vapor trail in the blue...moments of perfection are fleeting, but they are all around us waiting to be found. Just remember to enjoy them while they are happening instead of looking past them.

Choosing Happiness

I know I've mentioned this in past blogs but I wanted to expand on it a little more. I tell people quite often that I choose to be happy and I've realized that it's a little confusing to people. Sort of like the fact that I don't do guilt. I also wanted to blog on this to get it out of my head. It's one of those odd things, sort of like when you buy a new car and then you suddenly notice all of the cars just like it on the road. It's not that they weren't there before it's just that you had relegated them to background noise. When I first thought about writing this blog I pushed it to the side, I was taking a week off from writing to rest my wrists, but then all of sudden this subject kept popping up everywhere I turned. So now I am writing, for clarity and to get it out of my head!

So the start of this particular blog bouncing in my head was last week. Something happened (details aren't important) that really really really made me angry. Everyone who knew me knew the second they saw it that I would be mad. And I was. I was mad enough that I wrote letters to the people that could change things, I was mad enough that I spent the better part of a day talking with others who felt the same way trying to figure out what we could do to change things. I was mad enough that I spent the day with a perma-scowl on my face. And then I was done. I had one small flair up of angry over it the next evening when some new information came out but that didn't last long. And the other people around me who were angry were a little confused on how I got over it so quickly. So I told them, I choose to be happy, this does not make me happy so I am done dealing with it now.

Holding a grudge, staying angry about things, dwelling on things that do nothing but piss me off is a waste of time for me. That is not to say I don't get mad. You have all read blog posts about things that make me really mad. In fact there is another one coming soon about a subject that makes me angry. It's not to say I have never spent time dwelling on something that made me mad or sad, I have. But what I mean is that I know I can make different choices and I do. Sometimes it's easier than other times. Sometimes I have to consciously make the choice over and over until it sticks. But I prefer to be happy. And the people that have to deal with me on an ongoing basis prefer that I am happy as well.

So what that means for me is that once I have done what I can (written letters, given feedback, talked it out, made the choice to ignore it) I am done and ready to move on to the next part of my life. It seems really simple to me. But apparently it's not. I see people every day doing things that seem like the only reason to do them is to make yourself angry. Yesterday, for instance, I had a friend who is very left leaning in their politics post a Sarah Palin video with the comment..."Watch this, it will make you so mad!" and then two posts later a right leaning friend posted a Bill Maher clip with the comment, "How dare he!" Okay, so here is my basic question why are you searching those out and watching them? Sarah Palin makes you angry? Don't watch her. Bill Maher is a jerk. Don't pay attention to him. Why actively seek out things that make you angry?

I asked a friend a couple of weeks ago why they would post something they said was awful and the response I got was that they felt it was important for people to see. Why? If it's one person's opinion and that one person isn't very influential and you posting it is just going to make you mad and make other people who feel the way you feel mad, but it's not going to change anything, why do it? If you are conservative why click on the Huffington Post? If you are liberal why read the Weekly Standard? I see clips from Fox News in the context that amuses me, The Jon Stewart Show, and that works for me. I don't watch Fox and Friends because it would make me mad. See the difference?

Again, I am not saying I don't get mad when something deserves to make me mad. But I don't seek things out just to make myself mad. I don't read blogs by angry people. I don't watch TV shows with political rhetoric I don't agree with. I skip books and articles that the only reason for reading them would be to work up some sort of righteousness indignation. If I need to know the facts on an issue so I can be well spoken on the subject, I will read a few pieces that are not my belief, to try and see the other side, but I won't read anything that starts out with hateful rhetoric and no facts. And once I am mad, I don't stay that way very long.

Last week while talking to someone about being mad and holding a grudge they used an expression that I really liked. It takes both hands to hold a grudge. Which means if you are holding a grudge you cannot hold anything else. It's a waste of time and energy. So choose to put it down, choose to get over what ever is making you mad. Once you have done all that you can to change a situation, then get over it. There are people in the world I will never like, situations that I will never agree with, circumstances I would love to change. But I can't. But what I can do is control how I react. How I respond. What I do about it.

So when I say, I choose to be happy, it doesn't mean that I choose to be oblivious to the things out there that aren't right. To the people that aren't okay. To the situations that are out of control. What it means is that I choose to do what I can then I choose to move on. No dwelling. No wallowing. No seeking out things for no other reason than to make myself angry. And if I fail, if I find myself doing something that I realize is just making me mad, then I choose again. I choose to be happy. It's a choice that works for me.

Politics and angry people

I wasn't going to blog about the tragedy in Tucson or at least not until we had more facts about the situation but then I was involved in three different conversations about it yesterday from three wildly different points of view so I sort of felt compelled to. And truthfully this will only be about that particular event as it relates to the point I want to make.

You know my politics I was registered Independent until someone decided to co-opt the name for a political party, now I am officially Unaffiliated. You also know from my Strengths blog that one of my top strengths is Empathy. Those two end up tying together and I didn't even realize it until yesterday when I really stopped to think about why and what I believe. And why I get so frustrated with people when I am talking to them about politics.

You know I have linked this article before about how it is not only not likely but virtually impossible for the two sides to see eye to eye on any issue. But it never stops me from trying to make a point. The crazy thing for me is that I can usually see where someone is coming from, I might not agree with them at all, but I can understand and grasp why they feel what they feel. And it frustrates the heck out of me that they cannot see the other side as well. This is where the empathy light came on for me yesterday. See the deal with Strengths (talking Strength Finders Strengths here specifically) is that they are just who you are. You operate from that base continually and could never explain how you do what you do and you (this is the key part here) don't understand how others cannot.

So here is where the Tucson issue comes in to play. On Saturday the story started unfolding while I was away from the house. I watched my Facebook feed start lighting up with the story. Pieces were trickling out of Arizona, lots of false information, lots of panic. And then the blame game started. This was obviously the fault of the Tea Party! This was obviously the fault of Obama and his government takeover of everything policies! This was obviously...what ever your particular political bent was that's where you went. And then the rebuttals started, it wasn't Palin's fault, those were surveyors marks not targets for goodness sake, and when she said reload she wasn't talking about a gun...and again when discussing Second Amendment remedies didn't mean people should shoot someone. It's the left and the lamestream media's fault for blowing this all out of proportion! It's the fault of Faux News and Glenn Beck and the like for stoking the fires of fear! The left always wants to blame the right! Did you see this video clip that was just as bad as the one the opposite side just showed? And on and on and on...

You know who was really responsible for all of this? It was Jared Loughner. He did it. He bought the gun, he bought the bullets, he went to a crowd of people and he opened fire. He killed people. He wounded many others. And I am perfectly comfortable calling him crazy, though there was an opinion piece released right away about how it's wrong to say he was crazy because we don't know that he is. Guess what? I do know, want to know how? He bought a gun, bought the bullets went in to a crowd of people and started shooting! That's how I know he was crazy. No, not all crazy people are violent, but all super violent people are crazy.

And now that we are a few days out from the shooting we are starting to see more of the blame game and the it's not my fault game starting. What I would rather see is some time for self reflection. And network reflection. And political reflection. Do I believe that Jared Loughner was some sort of killing machine designed by the Tea Party movement? No, I don't. But my opinion is that he was already unstable and latched on to the hate factor that is brewing in this country and took it to an extreme. I actually believe that it would not have mattered if it were Giffords or Jesse Kelly at that rally he would have gone and he would have started shooting. Obviously I have no way to prove this, but what I have read about him, he was anti-government. Not just anti-Democratic party.

So where do we go from here? How do we dial down the arguments and turn it back into a conversation? How do we stop with the derisive, divisive, defensive talk and start in on open dialog? Because you would have thought a Judge being killed, a child being gunned down and a member of Congress in critical condition would have been a big wake up call. You would have thought. But you would have been wrong. Instead it seemed like another opportunity to scream at each other about how horrible the other guy is. But we have to stop that. We really do.

One of the conversations yesterday was on a Facebook status for a friend who does not live in the United States. He is overseas and the people posting were all overseas. I read all of the comments with growing sadness and frustration. The picture we are painting to the world is that we are all crazy. We pack our guns, we pack our rhetoric. We scream at each other and we get nothing done. It's a cartoon. But sadly, it's not that far off. We need to stop identifying our differences and start looking for common ground. And we need to stop letting the fringe define us.

When Christopher was little he would throw temper fits and then he would whine when he didn't get his way. The same as any other child. The difference is he got over it pretty quickly. You know why? Because it didn't work. I would tell him, I cannot understand you when you whine at me. And then I would ignore him until he stopped. He would follow me around for a little bit and I would completely ignore him. No response. Not a negative one or a positive one, just nothing until he used a normal voice and would talk to me reasonably again. If this worked on a two year old don't you think we could get it to work on adults?

But here is the deal, we all have to do it. We have to stop posting video clips that make our side look good and their side look bad. We have to stop watching Glenn Beck and his chalk boards and puppet shows and fear mongering. We have to stop letting Keith Olbermann and the Daily Kos define the left. We have to let people know that the Tea Party is not just a group of nut jobs who like to dress up funny and carry misspelled signs but actually started as a group of citizens who were tired of seeing money go in to the system without any discernible benefit coming out and the bulk of the movement is still that group.

And those of you reading this right now who are looking for clips to show me how I am wrong, how the left is at fault or the right is to blame, or the Tea Party is evil or it's not the fault of the crazy man...stop it. I am not arguing with you. I am asking you to stop and think and help to redefine the discussion. Before you post that link to the video showing how horrible the opposing side is, stop and think. What good will this do? And then think again. If you know KNOW that the clips showing how awful your side is were edited and taken out of context then can you not see that this one probably was as well? If you see someone using language that is designed specifically to incite an emotional angry reaction (death panels instead of end of life counseling for instance) ask yourself why you use it? What good does it do? What is the point? Are you trying to have a discussion or start an argument? Stop voting based on sound bites. Stop allowing the anger to overtake the message. Just because you don't agree with something doesn't make it evil, it just makes it something you don't agree with.

And if you are in a discussion with someone whose views you disagree with and you are interrupted by someone who is spouting rhetoric and posting clips to incite a fight treat them like you would any child having a temper fit and ignore them. The grownups need to talk now. We need to figure this out. I might not agree with what you have to say but I need to hear it and try to understand it and you need to do the same. That is the only way true non-partisan co-operation works. And I believe that is the only way to help turn our country back around.

And if you are ever in a position like the Sarah Palins, Glenn Becks, Keith Olbermanns of the world where you have a devoted fan base that listens to every word you say. Please please take the time to weigh those words before you say them. It's much easier to be clever and cutting than it is to be kind and considerate. It's much easier to pick a sound bite or two and make it a catch phrase than it is to actually research an issue and find out how to either agree or disagree rationally. Please remember that part of your fan base might just be on the more fanatical side. Is it your fault if a crazy person acts in a crazy manner? No it isn't. But wouldn't it be much better if you never even had to ask yourself that question?

Appropriate?

This is a mishmash blog. It started out in my head thinking about books, then went to thinking about parenting, then went to differences in what each person thinks is appropriate and what isn't. So bear with me as we work our way through the tangles together....

I am reading a teen book series right now. It was one that came recommended from three different sites where I have purchased books in the past. It took me a long time to actually buy the first book though. You want to know why? It wasn't that the books were marketed to teens, I have read some very fine books that were geared towards that age group. It was something even worse. The cover. I know...don't judge a book by its cover and all that but these covers are awful! They look like teen harlequin novels. Long flowing locks and dramatic lighting...I just couldn't imagine taking the book up to the counter and checking out without being deathly embarrassed.

The tipping point came when I was looking at them and talking to Brent about how they had been recommended but the cover made me wary and this soft voice from behind me said, "I really like them." I turned around and there was a young teenage girl, wearing glasses, hair in a messy top knot, jeans, hoodie, holding a stack of books she was trying to decide on and I thought...okay, you I will take a recommendation from. I told her, "Alright, I am trusting you," then I picked up the first book. Her smile would have made the whole thing worthwhile even if the book would have sucked.

The books don't suck. They are good enough that I have been back to the bookstore for the next two in the series and it's sort of killing me a little that there are two more out there that I can't read RIGHT NOW and I would guess before the week is out I will have trudged back to the bookstore to pick them up. I want to know what happens with these characters, I am interested in their lives. These are read it in one day books. This is the mark of a good story for me. Now, are they classic literature? No. They are teen romance/action/supernatural stories. But they are well done. Sort of a cross between Harry Potter and Buffy. You might hear teenage Vampires and think Twilight, but the only thing they have in common with that series is the author took some liberties with the Vampire mythology. Took what we all KNOW about Vampires and turned some things around.

These books also have some basic changes in what the teenagers are like and that is what got me thinking about parenting. As the mother of a boy I have obviously never worried about presenting C with strong female role models. It's just not something that I have to worry about. He has me, what more does he need. :-) But I wonder what I would have done if I had been the mother of a daughter instead. The characters in this book series drink underage, they have sex, they break rules. For those not familiar with the Twilight series (where have you been in the Pop Culture world?) they do not. The entire Vampire mythology is tweaked to represent abstinence in that world. Not an entirely bad message for kids right? But I still believe I would be more comfortable with any child of mine reading The Vampire Academy books and taking role model cues from Rose and Lissa than I would any daughter of mine taking cues from Bella.

I read the entire Twilight series, but only because a friend of mine lent me the entire group at one shot. She also is a Pop Culture Book junkie. If the world is talking about a series, you sort of feel like you should read it. Who knows it might just be great right? Look at Harry Potter after all. Excellent series, story telling improved with each book. So this could have been one of those as well. So anyway, I read the first Twilight book and thought...really? Did I really need to read paragraph after paragraph about how perfect Edward was? How gorgeous and perfect and awesome and did I mention perfect he was? Then the series got worse for me. The point where the entire thing went from silly to "Why do you let your daughters read this??" for me was when Edward leaves Bella and she lays down in the forest and doesn't move. Her boyfriend left her and she lays down to die!

The entire series this main character defines herself by the boy she is interested in at the time. She is willing to give up her life, literally, when he leaves her and then again to be with him. She only gets interesting in the last part of the last book where she learns how to fight. I told people after reading the books that my biggest problem with the series was Bella. I didn't like girls like her when I was younger, I don't like women like her now. If you define yourself by your man then who are you? What happens if he leaves? In Bella's case we know, you lay down and prepare to die.

So then we come to Rose and Lissa. Rose wants to be involved with a much too old for her man. The book addresses it, talks about it, explores it and deals with it in a pretty satisfactory way. When you do the math you realized that Lissa lost her virginity at 15 years old. Much too young really. But I am so much more comfortable with the two of them as role models than dear sweet Bella. Why? It's because Rose is a bad-ass. That's part of it. She is training to be a bodyguard. She is tough as nails. She is just as strong, smart, resourceful as any male character and really more than most. Lissa is a force to be reckoned with in a different way. She uses diplomacy, charm and her own magic to make the world around her work. Bottom line for me is that these two female characters that the books center around are making their own choices and the books talk about what that means. Yes, there is boyfriend drama, there is teen angst, but there is more to it than just the boys. Just the clothes. Just the perfectly awesome awesomeness of Edward. So I think I can safely say that if I had had a daughter I would let her read this series and have the conversations with her about drugs, alcohol and sex and those consequences and been much more comfortable than if she had fallen in love with the other and I had to have conversations about defining yourself by a boy.

As the mother of a boy I have had to deal with choice like this, but in different formats. As you all know C wants to design video games. He has wanted to do this since he was very very young. Part and parcel of this is that he plays a lot of video games. He has more systems than I can remember and games on each of them. And we were some of the few parents who actually paid attention to the rating systems on games. The ESRB ranks games based on age appropriateness like the MPAA rates movies. When C was younger he didn't get to play M rated games. He had friends as young as 7 who were playing games rated M. Just didn't happen in our house. As he got older we got a little more lenient. But what that meant is we checked out the game he wanted. Websites, game store employees, friends who had played, we wanted to know why it was rated what it was rated and if we were okay with C being exposed to the game.

Poor kid had to pass two barriers. The sex and violence barriers. Brent was okay with a higher level of violent content than I was and I was okay with a higher level of sexual content than Brent was. So a game had to be okay on violence with me and okay on sex with Brent. Needless to say there were a lot of games that C had to wait longer to play than some of his friends did. But I have never been Johnny's mom so I didn't ever care what Johnny got to do. That's not to say I couldn't be convinced I was wrong.

Bioshock was a game I was NEVER going to allow in my house. I didn't care if he was 18 or 21 he could play it at school, he could play it in his own place but I wouldn't buy it, wouldn't have it under my roof. And then enough people told me that the description of the game wasn't exactly right and that the advances in game play were something he needed to experience and know about if he was going to design games. So I changed my mind. Reluctantly and with much trepidation, but I figured that I had raised him with a pretty strong set of values and this game wasn't going to affect those at all even if it was as bad as I had feared. And he was 17 at the time. Really by that point who you are is pretty set and you just spend the rest of your life refining it.

So as a parent where do you make your decisions on what is and what isn't appropriate? And how do you keep from making the things you don't approve of forbidden fruit to your kids? How do you guide them and bring them up to believe what you believe is right? And that's the answer. You don't. C will have his own beliefs. The best I can do is what I have done. Explain to him why I make the choices I do. Why he couldn't play Blood, Death and Destruction at age 10. Why taking drugs is a bad choice. Why drinking underage is pretty big risk and what all he is putting on the line if he chooses to do it. And then I sit back and watch. Ready with advice if asked (or not asked, who are we kidding?), ready to help if he needs it, and praying that he brings home a Rose or a Lissa not a Bella when the time comes!

Defriending

I've written about Facebook a few times before. I wrote about the amusing relationship status here, I've written about going to meet friends I made online here and here. But today I am going to write about something that is truly a Facebook experience. Friend requests, friending and defriending.

The fact that you know what I mean when I say friending and defriending shows you are part of this brave new online world. Remember when you used to make friends with people instead of sending a request? Or have a fight, a falling out, a drifting apart instead of defriending? Now we get a little message from someone who wants to be our friend and we get to say yes or no.

The online game I play is easier with more people on your friend list so I get random requests for adds. I don't take them. A lot of my online friends will add anyone and then hide them. That means they are there, they help them with the game, but they don't ever see their status updates or pictures or anything like that. I just don't add someone unless I have "talked" to them through the game. And talked to them for awhile. And I will also "clean" my list every once in awhile. Drop off people that I don't talk to after all, that have stopped playing the game or that I cannot remember how they were added in the first place.

Real world friends are a little different. I am always amazed to get a request from someone I knew in high school. With my attendance record and my drifter tendencies I am always shocked that anyone remembers me. I tend to remember them, I have a good memory for faces and names and I can usually pick out at least one memory with that person, either in one of my classes or at some event or another. But I am still amazed when I get a request from someone who actually remembers who I was in school. Those I accept. And then I sit on my hands so I don't send them a message to see if they really remember me or if it's Brent's last name that they remember!

Spouses of people that are already on my list get an automatic add if they send a request. I figure if I saw them on a daily basis they would be a package deal so they get to be the same online. If someone I am friends with recommends a friend of theirs, sort of an online introduction I will add them. I have two friends on my list right now that I have never met in real life, I don't play the game with them, but they are friends of friends and so they got an add to the list.

So that's how you get on the list. But what happens when you need to get someone off the list? And why do you choose to do it? What is your line? I mentioned the house cleaning aspect of the game friends. I will clear off people that I haven't talked to outside of the game, that I am not sure how they were added after all or that you find out are just not your cup of tea. I have been defriended and have defriended people over online arguments as well. Twice by people who were mad at me because I didn't defriend someone they were fighting with and they thought it was some sort of betrayal. To which I responded, are you 12? So yeah, they dropped me off their lists. Once I was caught in the crossfire of someone fighting with a group of people and since I was in the group I was wiped with everyone else. Once I was defriended by someone after I told them to grow the fuck up. I will take that one. :-)

And I have hidden one person and dropped two off of my lists from people I talked to as well. The person I hid I didn't want to defriend. They seemed nice enough, but they had a lot of drama in their lives on a daily basis that I just didn't want to see so I clicked the handy little hide button and off they went. One person I defriended because she ended up being more than a little crazy. In that stalker sort of way. I'd never met her in real life, played the game with her and volunteered to help her out since she was a little confused on how to play. Then she started sending me messages about who I was talking to and when. If I didn't answer a PM from her she would send me another telling me she KNEW I was online...it was just a little too much so off she went.

The last person I dropped from my list was a different choice. And it was actually one I didn't make as soon as I should have. Sometimes you add someone that you have "met" online and then once they are on your friend list and you see their status updates and they see yours you get a much fuller picture of who they are. Like stalker woman who then was bounced from my list. Sometimes it takes time though to get a full picture. And then you start to doubt yourself. A comment here and there that doesn't agree with my political/social/religious views doesn't bother me at all. To use a cliche..."some of my best friends are Republican" but it is true. I don't have to agree with you on everything to like you. But what I do need from you is respect.

My friend list is much like my music list (I know I think I talked about a music blog two years ago, I will get to it!), it's varied and mixed and some songs work well together and some don't. But I like them all. My friends must behave the same way. I have liberal/conservative/Christian/Muslim/Atheist/I'll figure it out laters all posting together, I have all ages and people from a variety of countries as well. And as long as you are able to keep the discourse civil I keep you on my list. But if you step outside, you get a warning, a comment deleted, a PM telling you to please be respectful, and then you are gone. Don't treat someone with an opposing viewpoint as an idiot. Don't argue with what C calls the Amazon.com method of arguing. "Other people who have made this argument have also made the following arguments, would you like to argue these points even though they have not been made in this discussion?"

And as far as the religious argument goes, I will hold you to no greater standard than anyone else until you decide to take higher moral ground based on your religion. If you are standing at the pulpit preaching down at the masses you better lead a pretty pristine life or I am going to call you on it. If I see that the entire reason you are up at that pulpit is so you can look down the blouse of the woman in the front row you have lost your moral high ground. And yes, I have less tolerance for the religious hypocrites because I know their rule book pretty well and I know what they are supposed to be doing, so don't tell my other friends their life choices are wrong when you aren't even playing by your own rules.

So what do you do when someone on your list is breaking your rules of life? Do you ignore it? Do you drop them? Do you block them? It's an interesting place to be in. In the real world you wouldn't be friends with them. If you worked with them you would avoid the lunch room when they were there. What if you share a lot of friends in common so you are going to run in to them? Again, in the real world you might not like all of your friends friends so would you skip a party if there was a chance that person would show up?

Facebook has a handy feature called blocking. If you REALLY don't want to see someone ever again you block them. Then they cannot see you, if you post on the same status, comment on the same photo, they can't see you and you can't see them. It's handy but can be confusing if you've blocked or been blocked. Everyone else can see all of the posts and people have conversations that end up looking one-sided. So blocking is a tough one to use if you share a lot of friends. And it also makes me laugh to think of if you could use it in the real world. "I can't see you...I can't hear you...You don't exist to me!"

So I dropped one person and then blocked them when they reached the point that I couldn't even stand to see their name. I knew a post from them meant preaching/lecturing/hypocrisy or some combination of them all so I dropped and blocked. But the funny thing is I waited for a much longer time than I ever would have in the real world. I made a lot of excuses why it wasn't that big of a deal (it's just online, it's not really real, it's not that big of a deal, we have a lot of friends in common)and the whole time my husband and one of my close friends were telling me, "Drop him! He's an idiot/tool. He pisses you off. He's a jerk masquerading as a good guy. He's an intellectual fraud!" They were both hitting all of the things they knew I wouldn't stand for in my life, but for some reason I let this guy slide. Then he committed the two unforgivable acts in one day. First he argued over a post that he didn't even bother to read first, just saw the caption, made the assumption that he knew what it was about and went in with his Amazon.com style. The second was he was condescending to C.

Did you all just gasp out-loud? Yep, he thought that he could get away with being rude to my son. That finally snapped me out it and BOOM! Off the list, blocked out. Probably best that it was online since in the real world it might have equated to a slap in the face instead of a delete. And I felt much better. Eventually I lifted the block, the one-sided conversations were annoying. And we still share a large number of friends, but I just treat his posts and ramblings like they aren't there.

I learned a lesson with that experience and that's all you can really hope for out of a bad situation. I won't ever try to discount an online experience as less than real again. For one thing I have now had the opportunity to meet a lot of the folks I talk to online in the real world and they are just like they are online. So if someone is a jerk online you can bet they are a jerk in the real world too. Like my brilliant son says..."The people in the magic box are real" and the people I choose to interact with through the magic box are really awesome.

And then this blog brought this clip to mind so enjoy!