I’m going to admit it: I’m totally fascinated by the on-going discussion of selfies at funerals kicked off by the Atlantic post this week, just in time for Day of the Dead.  It almost feels like they created this trend JUST to have Halloween/Day of the Dead programming.  I can just imagine writers covertly nudging teens in graveyards and whispering to them through their tears over their loved one’s coffin, “this would be an excellent time for a selfie, don’t you think?”

Not that I’m cynical in any way.

Image: Elvert Barnes via Flickr

The Atlantic article introduced the aptly named Tumblr site, Selfies at Funerals, which posts selfies taken on the way, at, or after funerals.  I’m sort of enthralled that there are enough people doing this to build a site around it.  I’ll admit that taking a selfie in general is the last thing on my mind, but especially at funerals.  I mean, in Judaism, we don’t even look in mirrors while we’re in mourning.  I can’t imagine thinking, “I would love to capture these swollen eyes and runny nose for the world to see.”  Though no one looks very tearful in any of the images on those sites.  I’ve personally never been to a funeral and not cried.  So I think I may be on a different playing field.

Which is why I was glad to see Jezebel tackle this topic with a defense of the funeral selfie.  Finally, someone was going to make sense of this for me.  And I’m not being sarcastic when I say that Jezebel gave me a very different way of viewing the act of self-documenting your life by snapping a photograph at a funeral (which, when you think about it, isn’t that far off from writing poetry or non-fiction or blog posts about funerals).

The Jezebel article points out that we as a culture created our disengagement from death and subsequent inability to deal with mortality.  The author asks,

Funeral homes come and immediately take our dead bodies away. Would these teenagers have the time to take a selfie in Japan, where after the cremation the family members gather around the bones and place them in the urn with chopsticks? Or in traditional Jewish culture, where the body is washed, purified with water, and dressed by men & women of the community? Or in Madagascar, where the whole family disinters the corpse, wraps the bones in new cloth, and dances with the bones to live music?

I don’t buy the whole argument since I have never prepared a body and yet understand the gravity of a funeral (and have since a young age).  But I do agree, as I said yesterday, that I think on a whole, the vast majority of the secular, Western world is so squeamish in discussing death that we sometimes can’t even tell strangers the truth about our lives lest we distress them.  We are disengaged; and cameras, computers, blogs, Twitter — they’re all ways of documenting, but they’re also ways of disengaging from the moment with the idea that you will revisit later.  I am a notorious documenter; taking photos everywhere I go and thinking up how I want to write about it as I live it.  Life is huge, messy, emotional, overwhelming.  Taking that step back helps keep the world in perspective.

Or they’re just self-absorbed jerks.

I also liked the New York Times piece on selfies a few days ago, which sums up the trend thusly:

Rather than dismissing the trend as a side effect of digital culture or a sad form of exhibitionism, maybe we’re better off seeing selfies for what they are at their best — a kind of visual diary, a way to mark our short existence and hold it up to others as proof that we were here. The rest, of course, is open to interpretation.

The rest, I’m assuming, is context.  Selfie on top of a mountain to mark that you got to the summit, okay.  Selfie at a funeral… maybe not so much.

Of course, for all we know, the deceased who are being buried in those photos could be HUGE selfie takers (as grandparents usually are these days) and love the thought of other people marking their passing in that manner.  Maybe they expressly asked their loved ones to take pictures of themselves at their funeral, and then don’t we all have egg on our face for judging another person’s dying wishes?

I am being only a little tongue-in-cheek because the conversation this week around selfies and funerals reminded me of Kathy’s post about live tweeting a funeral; something done with the widow’s permission and love, allowing people who lived far away to be there in spirit and know what was happening at the service.  Social media is in the delivery room, marking the moment of birth.  It seems fitting then on some end to have social media at the funeral, marking the death.

Though I sort of hope my loved ones leave technology at home for the shiva.  Just be present in the moment so you can appreciate the totally awesome soundtrack I put together to mark the occasion.

How would you feel if you saw someone taking selfies at a funeral?  Would you not care if people took selfies at your funeral or would you haunt them from beyond?

Happy Halloween, everyone.

I read the David Sedaris piece in the New Yorker about his sister Tiffany’s suicide.  I found it very moving but difficult to get through.  But it’s good to be challenged; it’s good to read something that shakes you to the core every once in a while.

The article begins and ends with a thought that resonated with me.  He explains that part of his identity is that he is one of six kids, and his sister’s death took away that part of how he defined himself.  He writes (and in the interest of space, I replaced sentences with ellipses, so you’ll need to click over to read the whole passage on the first page),

“Six kids!” people would say. “How do your poor folks manage?”

…

Now, though, there weren’t six, only five. “And you can’t really say, ‘There used to be six,’ ” I told my sister Lisa. “It just makes people uncomfortable.”

I recalled a father and son I’d met in California a few years back. “So are there other children?” I asked.

“There are,” the man said. “Three who are living and a daughter, Chloe, who died before she was born, eighteen years ago.”

That’s not fair, I remember thinking. Because, I mean, what’s a person supposed to do with that?

First and foremost, I would argue that he’s still one of six, even if one of the six is no longer here in the same way that he is a child born to two parents, even if his mother has since passed away.

Death is common.  In fact, every single person on earth will experience death, even if they live completely separate from the rest of society.  105 people die in this world every minute.  In the time that it will take you to read this post, there will be hundreds of people gone from this planet.  And there will be people who will know those people.

I guess his sentence gave me pause because I couldn’t see how bringing up death isn’t fair; how not discussing death got chosen as a societal norm.

He asks what are they supposed to do with the news that his sister is no longer here?  They’re supposed to understand him better.  They’re supposed to think about mortality.  They’re supposed to be clued in to the realities of this world.  People die.  Sometimes people die because they take their own life.  Sometimes people die before they’re even born.  Sometimes people die of old age.  But in all cases, those people deserve to be discussed, because being discussed is a way of being counted, of saying, “they were here” whether it was only for a few months inside a woman’s womb or for 80 years, walking around this planet.

He ends his piece with a conversation with a realtor, returning to this idea of now being one of five.

“So is that one of your sisters?” she asked, pointing to Gretchen.

“It is,” I said. “And so are the two women standing on either side of her.”

“Then you’ve got your brother,” she observed. “That makes five—wow! Now, that’s a big family.”

I looked at the sunbaked cars we would soon be climbing into, furnaces every one of them, and said, “Yes. It certainly is.”

It is his choice whether he chooses to bring up Tiffany or not, especially with a stranger.  But it makes me sad to think that he felt it was polite to refrain from explaining that there was someone missing from their group.  No one should ever feel that they need to refrain from bringing up someone they loved.

This concept of shifting identity is familiar to those experiencing infertility or loss.  Everyone who experiences death experiences a loss of their personal definition; of who they are in relation to the world.  Sedaris says that he was one of six and now needs to redefine himself as one of five.

The childless mother requires a similar redefinition: especially if in your head, you have been thinking of yourself as a mother-to-be-to-a-live-child for months or years.  The definition may come about early on: I thought I would be a mother, but this is not happening as I thought it would.  I thought I was fertile, but I’m actually infertile.  The definition may grow in length as much as it loses in specifics: I am now a mother to a child via adoption.  Or it may change completely: I was a mother-to-be-to-a-live-child and now I am a woman living child-free after infertility.  The definition may be written by circumstances beyond your control, or you may rewrite the definition yourself.  These are only three examples; any life crisis requires the person to redefine themselves over and over again.

Sedaris’s article is a beautiful piece if you’re up to reading it.  And its existence and this post prove that we should talk about death when we want to talk about death; because in doing so, we start important conversations.  I would have never written this if he hadn’t brought up the fact that he used to be one of six.  It’s okay to make people uncomfortable; to shake them up a bit.  It makes them think.

Thank you for your advice yesterday about school.  It was interesting to hear — first and foremost — how other places approached education but also, the wide range of experiences with school — either your own education or what you were now doing for your children.

I should have also told you that I am the product of public schools.  I was never a fantastic student.  Actually, I was such a terrible speller in fourth grade that I had to go down to a third grade spelling group because the lowest spelling group in my fourth grade classroom was still too advance for a child who could not tell the difference between “flour” and “flower.” (And to be fair, could spell neither one correctly.)  I was in a few honours classes later in school, and one or two AP classes.  But mostly I was an average student in average classes who daydreamed way too much to follow what was happening in the classroom and who didn’t ever want to sit in her chair.  I wandered the room; and when I wasn’t wandering the room, I was making glue sculptures inside my desk.

And look, I turned out okay.

I always point that out to kids — my own and other people’s children.  That the fully functioning adult you see before you once struggled with math and French.  The person who has published four books wasn’t in the highest English classes.  That doing school well doesn’t always translate into doing life well.

And I think, whatever shortcomings I had during my school years — nursery school through graduate school — I have done life well.

*******

Let me tell you a story about a lollipop.  I once took a lollipop that someone offered that was in the shape of a flower.  I took it because it was pretty and it was candy.  As a kid, I always accepted any candy offered because you never knew from where your next dose of sugar would come.

I kept said lollipop in my room, looking at it all the time.  I was really psyched that I owned such a cool lollipop.  At some point though I realized that I had no intention of eating it.  I’m not really a fan of lollipops, and this one looked particularly vile.  The clarity reminded me of a Jolly Rancher, another candy I dislike.  But I had this lollipop because how the hell do you say no to a lollipop?  And this single piece of candy drove me crazy because I didn’t want to eat and I didn’t want to throw it out, and in the end, it became clutter.

I feel like we’re supposed to want to apply to that GT school because who knows when our next educational hallelujah will come about?  Turning down the opportunity feels like rejecting the lollipop; it just isn’t done, not by people who care about sugar and worry where their next treat will come from.  But I also know that I don’t really want that lollipop.  And I’m not getting a strong sense that the twins want the lollipop.  All four of us in this house only know that we’re supposed to want the lollipop… by which I mean school… and I guess the two adults don’t know why we are so reluctant to push the kids ahead.  To nudge them towards the greatness that these schools silently promise by their mere existence and exclusivity.

*******

I have no clue how we got here.  I know rationally that I celebrated my 7th blogoversary last June, and that the twins were giving up the bottle around the time I started this blog.  Along the way they moved from cribs to toddler beds to real beds to separate rooms.  They learned how to build a sandcastle and tie their shoes (sort of) and bake cookies and write stories and program computers.  They cut their hair for the first time, and then they cut it again and again — the Wolvog more often than the ChickieNob.  They lost teeth and grew new ones.  They’ve said hello and goodbye to 6 teachers.

Along the way, they’ve become these amazing, inquisitive, funny human beings that cry over iOS changes and friendship slights, and then turn around the next day — all smiles — and spit out the answer to 3 x 9.  They are third graders in the largest sense of the word: excited pleasers who feel things intensely.

What I am worried about is that things are moving so quickly that every day feels like a blur.  And when time moves like that, to the point where you don’t know how you ended up with two third graders, you wonder if you’ve missed things along the way.  Have we instilled in them all the values and ethics and information they need in order to keep succeeding?

Sometimes life feels a little bit like a sick day, when you come back to class and have no clue what is going on because you missed a vital lesson and now nothing makes sense for a while.  I show up every single day in their lives — overly present some might say — because I don’t want to miss one minute of them, and I don’t want them to miss one minute of whatever vital lessons I can instill, mostly because I feel if I don’t, I am sick-daying their life.

And then how will they catch up?

*******

Nothing is broken right now.  They are not bored — as far as I can tell.  They are just regular kids doing regular kid things with their regular kid friends.  They like school enough, though they really come alive during after school activities.  They are curious.  They are sensitive.  They are obsessed with fairness as well as trying to figure out how they’re perceived.  They’ve got a great group of friends.  As Somewhat Lower told me in regards to her own education decisions: “”if it’s working, then there’s not a problem, and if it stops working, we’ll make a change.”  That’s really smart, and maybe instead of looking at what we’re getting or giving up, I just need to see it as not trying to fix something that isn’t broken.

I guess if I had one moment that I wanted to serve as a snapshot for their childhood, it would be this great moment that came during their book club recently.  We were reading aloud Percy Jackson after the kids had finished shouting out answers to my etymology quiz in exchange for Hershey Kisses.  The ChickieNob went into my bag and doled out more candy to everyone else while I read, and the kids were flopped on the floor or sofas or each other.  And everyone was silent as I read the moment with the Minotaur; collectively holding their breath during a great moment of fiction.  And it was just getting cold outside but the doors were open to let in the night air.  And I thought: this moment is exactly how I want learning to be.  This is the sort of moment that will turn them into writers; that will make them love books.  And sure enough, when I told the kids I was only going to read until the next page break, one of them screamed out, “no!  I need to know what happens.”  And I jokingly told them that we were going to pull an all-nighter then.  And they looked at me, totally earnest and said, “really?”  There was this popcorn chorus of kids saying “really?” with such hope that maybe I wasn’t teasing; that we were really going to stay up all night reading Percy Jackson together.

That’s what I want learning to be; something more akin to the old Greek tutors except with perhaps a bit more cheekiness.  I love that the ChickieNob felt comfortable to help herself and others to the candy.  I love that they were all flopped on the floor and furniture like puppies.  I love that they were so engrossed in the story that they wanted to stay longer.  I love that even though I’m the twins’ mum, in that context, I’m just Mel, the bringer of the books.

An education well played should always make the person ask for just one more chapter.

This is a long post where I muse aloud, trying to make sense of the conflicting thoughts in my head and heart.  If you have no interest in the education system, you may want to skip it.  If you do have kids, even if they’re young, it’s worth thinking about these things now, before you get to the place where you need to make a decision.  If your kids are older than mine, you may have already made these types of decisions.

I’ll start by saying that we’re lucky: we have a decision to make.  I mean that in the sense that we lucked out with having kids in general, but also that they are intelligent, thoughtful human beings who excel in the classroom.  But there is so much more that we want for them than admission to the college of their choice.

*******

First they are babies and you worry about what to feed them.  You worry about brain development and weight gain.  You pepper the pediatrician with questions; you stress over the milestones listed in popular baby books.  Then they grow a bit and you worry whether you’re providing them with the right toys, the ones that will develop that part of the brain that can do high level math.  You worry about their classes and whether they have enough play dates and whether they’re really playing with other kids or engaging in sideways play beside them.

I’ve learned by this point that the worrying never ends; it just changes in shape with each stage.

Because this is it.  This is their foundation, the brain and body on which they’ll build the rest of their life.  I mean, what if a choice you make now negatively impacts them in the future?  What if Cheetos are found to stunt reading ability or you discover that your child has behavioural issues later in life because you never soothed them with Baby Einstein?

We may worry about different things, but I think all parents worry that we are fucking things up.  That we are in charge of raising another human being towards adulthood, and we are accidentally screwing up some piece of it.

*******

We’ve hit that education turning point year, third grade.  For those unfamiliar with the American school system, third grade is a transition year where students start getting sorted in categories.  GT is code for gifted and talented. (Not, as the Wolvog thought, short for GT Racing, one of his favourite video games.  He thought perhaps those initials meant that the teacher had figured out just how much he loves cars.)

In third grade, students have the opportunity to apply to a GT public school.  They are specialized programs in the county, usually placed inside a school with lower test scores in order to raise the profile of the general school.  In exchange for parents lending their children to another school in order to raise their scores, they are given extras through the program.  I know that is a very bitter, very negative way of viewing these programs, but there is a lot to feel bitter and negative about when it comes to these programs.  Unless activities can miraculously be scheduled around that school schedule, many programs preclude kids from having the well-rounded life we want them to have outside of academia.  They may be with like-minded kids, but those kids don’t live in their neighbourhood making it difficult to continue the friendship outside of school hours.  A 45-minute commute is tacked onto both ends of the school day making school pretty much the only thing that happens from Monday through Friday.  Admission to these programs means moving from school to school (and new set of kids to new set of kids) every few years, applying and holding your breath over and over again.

Moreover, the school is dangled before parents like a jewel, and as we reach out to touch it, our hand is slapped and we’re reminded that maybe two kids will get in.  30 may apply and two will get in.

I don’t know how I feel about GT schools.  Actually, I’m not sure why I said that.  I obviously know how I feel: I feel like labeling has just as many drawbacks as it has advantages.  That for every kid who feels great about themselves in the moment, that they will also feel the sting of that label in the future when their preciousness is not cherished or recognized.  Because it won’t.  There will be future endeavours where they will fail because everyone has endeavours where they fail.  And kids who have been set up to believe that they are better, smarter, more capable are more likely to suffer from greater hurt and a deeper fall than those who believe that they are no better, no more deserving, no more fantastic than anyone else on this earth.  That we all have strengths and weaknesses, and it’s better to stick together in a diverse community.

I know what you’re thinking right now.  You’re about to suck in your breath and skip right now to the comment section to tell me about how brilliant your child is, and how they can’t possibly function in a regular classroom.  And if they can’t, then the GT school is right for your kid.  But my kids can thrive in a regular classroom.  They’re happy learners at the moment.  They have good friends.

And this is my blog, and right now, we’re talking about my kids.  So…

*******

I want my kids to be more than book smart.  Book smart I can teach at home.  There is nothing they can learn at this point that I can’t teach them better in this one-on-one space after school.  I am foolish enough and lucky enough to be able to fit my life around theirs and give them that attention.  I know that isn’t usually the case.

What I want them to be is life smart, because life smart is applicable beyond academia or their future career.  Life smart will carry them through all their relationships.  It will teach them when to stay somewhere and when to leave.  It will help them read people (and not just books).  It will make them into good spouses should they choose to get married or good parents if they choose to have children.  Those are the skills that when applied to problems change a community.

I think that sucking it up and learning to roll with things is part of growing up into an intelligent, wonderful human being.  That when we constantly snatch kids out of their current environment, telling them they are ultra special and therefore destined for special spaces, we don’t teach them how to make the best of a bad situation or how to be the change they wish to see.  I want my kids to learn to get themselves interested in something, even when it seems overwhelming or dull at first glance.  And I want them to learn how to do something well even when it’s boring since all jobs have boring parts.  Can you imagine teachers saying to kids, “you know what, I didn’t do your report cards since assessments are boring.  I just like the teaching part of teaching.”  There are always going to be things we don’t want to do, meetings we don’t want to sit through, and minutiae that bores us.  But we learn to slog through.  And I guess I want the twins to learn that slog.

I want my kids to love learning.  I want them to be almost 40 years old and learning something completely new.  I want them to have life-long curiosity.  I don’t want them to ever accept the first answer; I want them to be question-asking information seekers.  I want them to get as excited about books in their middle age years as they do in their mid-elementary school years.

Those are all the things I want.  And I want my kids to have the best childhood filled with amazing opportunities.  You see the conundrum.  Because it all goes back to those early fears: am I giving my children the best nutrition, am I signing them up for the best classes, am I providing them with the most mind-enriching toys?  Do I turn my nose up at those programs just because they’re elite and I don’t think they send a great life message to kids?

Or do I join with the panting masses, hoping that the GT school will give my children the best education possible on our budget?  I don’t want to ever look back with regret at the road not taken and say, “crap; I wish we had chosen that path.”

We all want what is best for our kids, and I think all parents need to do what is best for their kids.  That may translate as sending them to private school or applying to a GT program.  And it may translate as keeping them where they are and doing enrichment outside the school.  That’s what we’re still trying to figure out.

*******

Maybe we just need to be our own GT program operating like a bubble within the general population of our local public school.  A GT program for two, mostly held during after school hours.  Maybe with a program that small, we could do it even better than the main GT program, even if our homespun one comes without the prestige of the formal one.

A case in point: Josh took the ChickieNob downtown to meet Lemony Snicket (fine, Daniel Handler).  The GT school also attended the event.  The school left at the end of the event in unison after hearing him read.  The ChickieNob got to stay and speak to him for a bit, and he signed all her books.  Doing it our way resulted in a better experience than if she had been part of the school.  Granted, mileage may vary, and what we may be willing to do or can do is different from another family.  But again, I’m not making this decision for anyone else.  We’re just making it for ourselves, and we’re struggling between a dislike of the system and feeling as if we can’t leave any stone unturned.

And I guess the long answer is that I don’t know.  I know how detrimental that GT program will be to our overall happiness as a family — the long commute, the separation from friends, and constant judgment — but I don’t know how beneficial that GT program could be.  I guess I’m throwing this out there because I’m looking for any thoughts I haven’t yet considered or your thoughts on the ones I have.

All of this comes to a head with Marjorie Ingall’s excellent article on ethical parenting and schools that Josh sent my way as we debate this out at night.  I agree with her wholeheartedly.  And wherever we go, I will give that school my 100% to help instill the wonder I want all the kids to have.

The application deadline draws near.  I am 99% sold on staying put.  Of doing the extras our way.  But it’s that 1% that is ruffling my mind, even if the whole thing is a moot point since, you know, it’s all about judgment and gatekeeping.  I could go through all of this worrying and in the end, if they don’t get in, there is no choice to make.

Welcome back to IComLeavWe. It stands for International Comment Leaving Week, but if you say it aloud, doesn’t it sounds like “I come; [but] leave [as a] we”? And that’s sort of the point. Blogging is a conversation and comments should be honoured and encouraged. I like to say that comments are the new hug–a way of saying hello, giving comfort, leaving congratulations. Here is the vital information, pure and simple (a more detailed set of rules follows below the list):

• The list opens the 1st of every month. It remains open until the 21st. You can add yourself at any point. The list is open to everyone in the blogosphere–blog writers and/or blog readers.
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32. Just Another Infertility Blog (infertility loss ivf)
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36. all i ever wished for… (infertility, IVF, twins)
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38. The Empty Cookie (loss, disabilities, living children)
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A: Not for the faint-of-heart. People who wish to be an Iron Commenter and be entered on the Iron Commenter honour roll need to leave a comment on every blog on the participants list (exceptions are blogs that require you to have a special log-in, such as some LiveJournal accounts or other similar situations). You can spread out this commenting any way you wish over the whole week, but the final comment needs to be left by midnight on the 28th (EST). Reaching Iron Commenter status is done on an honour system. Please email me if you earn Iron Commenter status so I can add you to the wall of honour.

Q: Why do I have to add that bit of code to my sidebar?

A: The code is the latest icon (the icon changes colour every month so you know that you’re on the right list). This month, the icon is navy blue, the next month it will be red, etc. The reason is two-fold: (1) it enables more people to find out about IComLeavWe and (2) it gives you easy access to the current list once the commenting week actually begins and better ensures that you’ll use it. Too many times, people sign up and forget to actually do IComLeavWe and this icon gives you a daily reminder (with the dates on it) every time you open your own blog. The icon is linked back to the current list. On the 28th, remove the icon from your blog. A new one will be created for the next month.

Q: It’s the 23rd and I just saw this for the first time on my friend’s blog! I want to join the list–why can’t I?

A: Because IComLeavWe happens every month, once the list is closed, it’s closed. If you’re finding out about this on the 23rd, you can’t join the current month. But leave yourself a note to check back in a week on the 1st and you can sign up for the next month.

Q: You said the list closes on the 21st. Well, it’s still the 21st where I am. Why aren’t you moving my information onto the list?

A: All dates and times are U.S. Eastern Standard Time (UTC/GMT -5 hours). The list closes around 11 p.m. EST on the 21st.

Q: What if no one comments on my blog and I have no comments to return?

A: Well, that really doesn’t happen for the most part, but in that case, simply choose another blog and add an additional comment. The goal is to hit 6 comments daily as a minimum. Going over that is fantastic and encouraged.

Q: Mel, my question wasn’t covered at all. What do I do?

A: Email me; I’m quite friendly. It helps to place “IComLeavWe” in the subject line. You could also check this post which contains the history of IComLeavWe and see if you can glean anything there.

Looking for the comment section? It has been closed on this post. Use the form in the directions to add yourself to the list.