Major Milestone

Child One learned how to ride a bike today. We had tried last year and she and I had had some epic battles on the local playground. I think that neither of us was ready. We put the training wheels back on her bike and she puttered around the neighborhood all summer and fall, perfectly content. Perfectly content that is until she realized, in early fall, that she could not keep up with the other kids who had all learned to ride two wheelers that spring and summer.

This winter we've been talking about getting out and learning so she could buzz around this spring and afterward. Today was a beautiful day, crystal clear but blustery and cold and we headed to the playground to give it a try. Within 20 minutes of trying, and one break to goof around on the jungle gym and swings she'd mastered it. The whole family was there and it was a great moment. She was beaming and proud and a bit amazed that she'd figured it out. I was totally psyched for her, and little bit for me -- I'd completed one of the mandatory tasks of fatherhood and taught a child to ride a bike.

It was interesting to watch her buzz around and see how far and fast she could get away from me. Learning to ride a bike is a major milestone, truly one of the instances when you realize as a parent, in a very concrete way, that your children are free in the world and will explore much of it without you. We teach them to explore this world. We teach them to ride a bike. We give them the tools they need to go out on their own. Amazing.

Team Spirit

Mrs. Agricola recently bought the kids some Red Sox gear. Child One got a pink Pedroia shirt and Child Two got a blue Matsuzaka shirt. Each got a hat, one pink, one blue for C1 and C2 respectively. To state the obvious, they are very cute when decked out in their shirts. C1 now claims her favorite player is Pedroia and C2 says he wants to wear his "Mazooka" shirt.

What's interesting to me about this is that with these little purchases my kids have embarked on an affiliation with a team. That the team is the same team that I follow, my father follows, my grandfathers followed, and my great-grandfather followed is very cool. There is no guarantee that my kids are embarking on a life of Red Sox-fandom but it's interesting to be a father and see the seeds of this planted. It starts with a shirt and a hat.

Children's Hospital Boston

Yesterday, we took Child One into Children's Hospital for an open challenge to determine whether or not she is still allergic to peanuts. She had a reaction a couple of years ago, and since then has blood tests and skin tests that were inconclusive, hence the challenge. What happens is this: we sat in a room and she ate 1/4 cup of peanuts starting with half a peanut, then a full peanut and ending with basically the full quarter cup -- all within a couple of hours. There was a slight chance that she could have gone into anaphylactic shock but there was a greater chance -- given the blood and skin tests -- that nothing would happen. Nothing did happen, thankfully, and the trip into the hospital was very perspective changing for me.

We got good news -- a potentially serious allergy seems to be in abatement. Our child is healthy (knock wood). There were many kids, that I saw, in the lobby, who are not so lucky. They and their parents didn't get good news, at some point in their visit to this place, or someplace like it. While not all were in a horrible way there were many who were visibly not well and suffering with serious ailments. The extraordinary folks at Children's were working to cure them, so they were in the right place. My problems are minor compared to what those kids and their families are going through. I'm damned fortunate. I've had a few miserable days at work -- today is another -- but thinking back to my stroll through the lobby helps keep everything in perspective. I've got a gig, I've got healthy kids (more wood knocking). I count my blessings and say a prayer for the kids and their families that I bumped into in the lobby.

In A Hardwood Forest

This past weekend we took our children into the Green Mountain National Forest Moosalamoo Wilderness Area for one night of camping. It was our maiden camping voyage with the kids and it was a tremendous success. Back in our pre-child years Mrs. Agricola and I used to camp out on occasion and we're not unfamiliar with the joys of sleeping in a tent, and living en plein aire.

We purchased a roomy tent at a summer clearance sale, bought each kid a sleeping bag, that Child Two calls his "hammock," and a nice little camp stove. We met another couple and heir daughter at the campsite and after setting up camp and getting stowed we went to the Robert Frost Interpretive Trail on VT-125 for an easy hike through the woods and the blueberry fields. It was a scorching day and we waded in a river to cool down. We found a snake skeleton, saw a huge caterpillar and ate wild blueberries, blackberries and raspberries that we found along the trail.

Child One is a little nature lover -- much more so than her parents -- and she really seems to be in her elements while walking along a forested path. She'll touch bugs, flowers, sticks and rocks that she spies along the way -- she's very observant with a great eye for detail. Child Two rode in a child backpack, hanging out from under the sun shield like a little train conductor, commenting on the passing spectacle. We got back to our car just as a giant mountain thunderstorm came crashing down us in a fierce, lightening-filled deluge.

Things cleared up quickly, though all night distant heat lightening flashed across the sky and small bursts of rain continued to patter down us -- though I'm not sure if it was drops from trees or actual showers. Before dinner we found a red eft -- which is a newt in the terrestrial phase of its life. We ate a delicious meal and the kids darted around the campsite, playing pirate, jumping off a log and watching the fire we had roaring in the site's pit. Bed was easy, and the kids drifted off into a good sleep as if they'd slept in a bag in a tent their whole lives.

After a huge breakfast on Sunday morning we packed up, walked across the Goshen Dam, threw rocks into the Sugar Hill Reservoir and then spent some time in Middlebury before returning to the Quarter Acre. It was an amazing experience and we had a blast. It was so wonderful to see my kids just reveling in their surroundings, getting dirty, playing imaginative games with nothing but sticks and some chalk and crayons that were brought to the site. With no TV, no electricity, none of the comforts of a house, they were completely at ease and enjoying themselves.

It was moving -- almost to the point of being beyond words. I saw my children in a new and different light and love them even more than I did before we left (as if that were even possible). They amaze me, all the time, in so many ways that each day is a wonder. But with every little moment of wonderment comes a tinge of melancholy that each new experience marks a first and a last. Time is fleeing and my babies are growing up before my eyes. I think that my children have helped to make me more aware of my own humanity -- and with that deeper awareness has come a greater sense of my own mortality. In my children, and in the accretion of events that comprise our life together comes the sense that there isn't enough time and that there never will be.

It's beautiful. It's sad. It's wonderful. It's life in the best sense of that expression. We sucked the marrow out of our time in a hardwood forest, away from the distractions of the modern-American-suburban-life. We emerged a more tightly knit, happier family.

Happy Birthday

Today is Child One's fourth birthday.
She got a bike.
We were outside at 6:45 AM riding it up and down the street.
It was a classic moment.

Happy Birthday, and many many more!

First Recital

Child One performed in her first-ever ballet recital on Saturday 9 June. As can be expected from 5 troops of little girls between 3 and 6 years of age it was incredibly cute. I'd never been to such an even before and it was interesting to see how they did it: one of the older girls at the ballet school danced in front of, and to the side of the little ones who were supposed to follow her lead. Some did passably, some did nothing except look into the crowd for their parents, and others became fascinated by things on the floor and directing their teammates where they should be.

Child one did very well (we think), and though she said she preferred her tap numbers, we all think that she did better with the ballet portions of the recital. I doubt that this was a first step on a lifelong journey that will see her feted in The New York Times at the end of a 20 year career as a Prima Ballerina. the first recital was important because it was one of those childhood firsts that bring the little one such joy -- being on a stage, wearing pretty costumes, having everybody in the family (including beloved cousins who also dance!)come out to watch. If it were not your child I could see how it would be a torturous hour-plus way to spend a Saturday. As a father though, it was a true and pure moment that won't soon be forgotten.

Attributes of Manliness

City Journal has a nice review of a book, The Dangerous Book for Boys, by Conn Iggulden and Hal Iggulden (Collins, 288 pp.), that sounds like a great little read. The reviewer says that the authors of the book, brothers, "set old-fashioned male virtues on two stout heels." He then proceeds to quote a quote from the preface that I think is good advice for boys of all ages, and something that one needs to remind oneself of:

“Don’t grumble. Plug on. . . . Don’t swagger. The boy who swaggers—like the man who swaggers—has little else that he can do. . . . Be honest. Be loyal. Be kind. . . . Remember that the hardest thing to acquire is the faculty of being unselfish,” which is “. . . one of the finest attributes of manliness.”

-- Sir Frederick Treves, Bart, KCVO, CB, Sergeant in Ordinary to HM the King (1903)

Virginia Tech

What does one say when confronted with events such as transpired today in Blacksburg, VA?

As a cynic we await the coming media-coverage onslaught. The media has already written much about this event and created multi-media content in their coverage. More will follow, no doubt, until every conceivable angle will have been covered, uncovered, dissected and reassembled until some other horrible event yanks away the media's attention. Liberals will also use this as one more opportunity to confiscate guns (we don't own a gun, the highest power in our land, Mrs. Agricola, won't permit it, so, we comply).

As a blogger we are fascinated by the user generated content especially the video phone footage, camera phone stills and the story of the journalism class that posted from inside of Norris Hall during the attack.

As a father, a husband, a brother and a human being we acknowledge the terror and the tragedy of this event. We can only imagine the pain of the parents who have suffered the greatest loss imaginable, and offer the families and friends of the victims our deepest condolences and sincerest prayers.

Fatherhood

The Boston Globe's Jeff Jacoby wrote two great articles this week -- one to each of his sons who are 10 years old and 16 days. He writes one each year, and has for the past 10 since the birth of his first son, Caleb.

They are powerful, open, honest. They embody the best hope of any parent for their child, and the highest goal of parenthood. Thank you, Mr. Jacoby, for bearing public witness to this.

A Message To My Newborn Son

Messages To My Son