Category — Uncategorized

We are barreling towards the end of the school year, and with it, the end of elementary school.  When I flipped the calendar over to May last week, I thought back to a moment one month into the school year back in October.  I was talking to someone in the front office, and I commented that my stomach clenched as I turned the calendar to the second month of school.  “Soon it will be winter break, and then spring break, and then we’ll come back to school and race towards graduation.”

I was right.

It went by so quickly.

I don’t feel like I blinked and I missed it.  It’s more that I feel like I started off dessert with a big bowl of ice cream and the knowledge that once the ice cream was consumed, it was gone.  And now I’m scraping the melted ice cream drops off the bottom of the bowl and wistfully wishing I had more ice cream.

I am so lucky that I got to have these years, but that knowledge doesn’t really make the fact that the ChickieNob is almost my height and it’s really hard to brush her hair any less bittersweet.  Or that when the Wolvog jumps on my back that he does so ironically — a preteen’s “isn’t this so funny?” moment rather than a little kid not wanting to walk.

Every other level of school will happen at shorter intervals.  Middle school, 3 years.  High school, 4 years.  College, 4 years.  But for the last 6 years, they were in one, cozy cocoon.  Sure, the kids there were kids, which means the kids were sometimes mean.  (Let’s not sugarcoat this and pretend it was an elementary school of cherubic, perfect children.)  But with such a small and young group, the expectations were woven tightly around them, both protecting them and stifling them.  Next year is the next stage, where the community grows and the rules soften, and you wonder whether you’ve prepared them.

Have you prepared them for the truly cruel moments?  The huge disappointments?  The failures?  Have you prepared them to make good choices that balance rather than overwhelm their schedule?  To try new things?  To learn from mistakes?  Have you taught them how to be a good friend?  How to reach out to someone in need?  How to get past their personal imposter syndrome and own what they know and what they can do?

My ability to deeply influence the way they see the world is coming to an end.  The opinions of their peers will start to trump the opinions of their parents.  Their need to fit in will trump following the beat of their own drummer.  I can only hope that we made our messages loud enough that they drown out the bad ideas and self-esteem crushers.

I love them.  In a way that they will never understand because I don’t think we can ever fathom how our parents feel about us, and, frankly, no matter how well you can play with words, I don’t think these types of feelings can be contained with consonants.  But I hope that I’ve conveyed this message to them; that it has burrowed underneath the skin, sunk into their blood and bones.  I love them, and I hope that they carry that love with them as they navigate the world, as they take another step toward coming into their own.

It’s selfish, I know, piggish after getting 6 years of elementary school.  But I want more.

Back when I started in the IF blogosphere 10 years ago, people would write “Children Mentioned” at the top of a post if children were mentioned.  Some people thought this was silly and there were a lot of comments or posts about how people should assume that parenting after infertility blogs might mention children.  Some people thought this was good practice; if people weren’t up to reading a post about teething, they could click away.

I was in the latter category, and I put up “Children Mentioned” before posts that mentioned the twins.  Over time, everyone stopped doing it, myself included.  Most people knew how much I spoke about the twins, and either they weren’t bothered and would put up with the occasional post, or they were bothered and wouldn’t read my blog at all.

Plus, I realized that there were ways to give people a heads up about trigger warnings that fit naturally into the flow of the post.  If you look at the Roundup each week, I try to mention a child in the description if there is a child in the post.  If no child (or parenting itself) is mentioned in the blurb, it’s a pretty safe bet that you can click over and not encounter a story about a baby.

When I can’t figure out a way to weave it into the blurb, I write the words “trigger warning,” as I did for one of the posts last Friday.

While I am not upset when a post or movie or book or game comes without a trigger warning, I appreciate the creator taking the time to give consumers a warning before they dive into the experience.  I think it shows a sign of respect between the creator and the audience, and it sends a clear message that the audience’s experience with the piece is important to the creator.  It’s not that the opposite is true: that people who don’t post warnings don’t care about their audience.  But I do see the inclusion of the word “trigger warning” to be a concrete way of saying, “I care.”

I care that my piece adds to your life instead of detracts from it.

I care that you can ready yourself if you need to ready yourself.

I care about what you’re going through, and I appreciate you taking the time to read my words or watch my film or play my game.

I care that you are a human being and not a bot, so I treat you like a human being with feelings and thoughts and baggage you may carry into an experience with what I created.

There are universal moments that need trigger warnings such as rape or hate speech.  And then, within communities, there are specific moments that need trigger warnings.  In our community, I think it’s loss as it is happening (as opposed to generally discussing the concept of loss) and babies.  The absence of someone who was once here, and the existence of someone who is here.

I don’t know if we need to slap “Children Mentioned” at the top of every post on a parenting after infertility blog.  I tend to agree at this point that the network is such that people generally know what they’re getting before they click over to read.  (As opposed to when the community was so new that you were meeting new bloggers on a regular basis.)  But I still support the idea of giving people a “trigger warning.”  Just as a sign of respect.  Because I care how they feel after they read a post.

Where do you fall on the spectrum of giving trigger warnings?  Do you wish posts in the community still came with a “Children Mentioned” note at the top?

Do you need a distraction? It sounded like people needed a distraction from this day.  So I present to you the most fun article from Mental Floss this week: Cool features in people’s homes.

Think hammocks as floors or slides instead of stairs.

Which makes me think about what I’ve always wanted in my future home: A dolphin pool like the one in the movie 2010.  I may be misremembering this scene, and Googling has not brought me a clip, but I have vague memories of the family having breakfast in the kitchen, and the floor opening up into a dolphin tank.  The dolphin could swim right up to the kitchen table.  How amazing would that be?  Or what if there was a thick glass floor overlooking an aquarium, and you could lie on your stomach underneath the table and look down at the fish while you read a book?

I know this is in direct conflict with my desire for a tiny home, but… you know… dolphin pool filled with dolphin friends.  How cool would that be?

The only other thing I really want is a window in the shower.  I had that in an apartment in Rome and have wanted it ever since.

What feature would be in your dream home?

Image: Angela via FlickrMother’s Day in the UK happens 2 months before our Mother’s Day in the US, so I read this post about JK Rowling back in March and then remembered it today.  She had a bit of brilliant advice, one that twists the holiday in my mind.

She writes, “If your mum isn’t here to treat, do something nice for yourself, because she’s part of you.”

Today’s Mother’s Day in the UK. If your mum isn’t here to treat, do something nice for yourself, because she’s part of you. Take a hug, too” class=”emoji” draggable=”false”>

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) March 6, 2016

I love this sentiment because she didn’t write, “Because you came from her,” which would have ignored a chunk of the population that has built their family through non-traditional means.  She didn’t write, “Because she raised you,” because that may not be true, either.

“Because she’s a part of you.”

And regardless of your situation, the person you consider your mother is a part of you, even if you’ve never met her.  Maybe she contributed genetic material.  Maybe she contributed the right words.  Maybe she contributed perfectly timed hugs.  Maybe she protected you from the larger world.  And because that woman has touched your life, her actions or her words live on inside of you.  Every single human being in this world is tethering, in their own, small way, the generation before them.

You can make the day about looking ahead, or you can make the day about looking behind.

I am very lucky that I get to celebrate Mother’s Day with my mother this year.  But I also like this idea of taking time to honour yourself because, in doing so, you also honour her.

So I am going to do something nice for myself this weekend.  I’m going to go to a comic book store — something my mother has probably never stepped foot inside because it really isn’t her thing.  But in doing so, I’m honouring the woman who encouraged me to march to the beat of my own, very loud drummer and not give up the things I love to fit into someone else’s idea of who I should be.  So I’m spending some time with my Marvel friends before heading to her house to say thank you.

So do something nice for yourself this weekend.

Lauren Marie Fleming (otherwise known as Queerie Bradshaw) wrote a fantastic post on BlogHer about not having a lot of followers but her blog and social media accounts still having worth.  The irony is that I read the post, and ultimately ended up featuring the post, because her name caught my eye.  It was an instantaneous, “what does Queerie Bradshaw have to say?” moment of recognition.  Which is ironic since she was told by publishers that her platform wasn’t strong enough:

Four years and one major brand redesign later, my numbers are still not impressive to many people. On a regular basis, I am still shot down, rejected, and denied simply because I am not famous enough.

Clearly famous enough in my world.

*******

I know that publishers and PR people and the gatekeepers of the world need to start somewhere, but numbers are such a bizarre way of determining a person’s worth and reach.  A person could write hateful, anger-producing things and ultimately gain a lot of attention by trolling people.  So big numbers, but do they really have big reach and big influence?

The people who get under our skin, who ultimately influence our spending habits or move us to action, are rarely the big names associated with far reach.  That type of influence is personal, and because it is personal, it usually happens on a smaller, more intimate level.

For instance, JK Rowling can tell me to buy something, and maybe I will if I was already inclined to buy the product anyway and was looking for a reminder to push me over the edge.  Or maybe I won’t because in the back of my mind, I just don’t feel that sort of connection to her because I’ve never interacted with her.  I’m sure she’s a great person and I certainly love her books, but there is a piece missing in that relationship.  It is entirely one-sided.

On the other hand, my mother can tell me to buy something, and even if I wasn’t thinking about buying that thing at first, it’s now in my mind because I trust my mother’s opinion.  We have a personal connection.  The same goes for other family members, friends, and bloggers I loyally read.  If you’re in my feed reader, it means I trust your opinion and am interested in hearing what you have to say.

True reach is having a small core group of people who are so smitten with your words or thoughts or product that they’re willing to use their reach to extend your reach.  And those big names who have never gotten a chance to connect personally with people skip that step.  There is no foundation to their reach so it folds like a card house once the wind changes.  But a small, steady blogger like Lauren Marie Fleming — I would argue — has farther, longer-lasting reach because she has loyal readers who are willing to extend her reach by letting her indirectly use their reach.

Like this post.

Listen, I don’t know Lauren personally, and I’m sure she couldn’t pick me out of a crowd.  But I spoke to her once at BlogHer and clearly was impressed enough to retain the name and read her online.  And now I’m writing a post about her post, which means that her words are spreading to a new audience (or, at least, partially a new audience since I’m sure we have some overlap).  THAT is more important — being able to get people to lend their reach — than having that reach yourself.

Because here’s the thing: you can have 1 million followers on Twitter.  Unless all 1 million followers are invested in your words and want to support you, that enormous number is meaningless.  Remove the bots and spam accounts and you still have a large chunk of those followers who are as insubstantial as air.  They are going to drift away the moment they don’t feel like they’re getting any value from your words.  Easy come, easy go.

But a person with 1000 followers, who has built personal relationships and supported the people who support her, has lasting power.  And when she needs to use her reach, she not only has 1000 followers.  She likely, with a simple request, has their followers and maybe even those follower’s followers.  THAT is true reach, and that is something the people mentioned in her article don’t really get because it’s difficult to measure.  It’s easier for publishers and PR people to flock towards the person with 1 million followers because they can point at a number and say, “See, people listen.”  And sometimes that does pay off, but I’m willing to bet that a lot of the time, it doesn’t pay off for the long haul.

But there is no clear way of measuring lasting power and extended reach.

Her post is food for thought, and the end message is simple: keep writing.