The JackB

"When you're in jail, a good friend will be trying to bail you out. A best friend will be in the cell next to you saying, 'Damn, that was fun'." Groucho Marx

Archives for June 2011

Mean Girls Come From Mean Moms

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She was a five-year-old girl with who carried around a 31 year-old attitude that she called mom.

She walked over to me and said, “you are fat” and then asked why I didn’t have nicer shoes. I smiled at her and said that she made a good parrot. Her eyes grew wide and she asked me what I meant. I told her that I was sure that she tried very hard to be like her mom and she nodded. I said that I bet that she listened carefully to everything that her mom and said and that mom had talked about the other moms and dad and she nodded again.


Barefoot Dancers

She walked over to me and said, “you are fat” and then asked why I didn’t have nicer shoes. I smiled at her and said that she made a good parrot. Her eyes grew wide and she asked me what I meant. I told her that I was sure that she tried very hard to be like her mom and she nodded. I said that I bet that she listened carefully to everything that her mom and said and that mom had talked about the other moms and dad and she nodded again.

I laughed and she asked me what was so funny and I told her that cheerleaders weren’t smart enough to understand why it was funny. She looked up at me and said that she wasn’t a cheerleader but that her mommy had been one. I feigned surprise and said that I didn’t know that. We spent another moment or two talking and I told her that people who are mean to others sometimes grow up to have no friends and that it was more important to learn a lot in school than to marry well.

Most of that went over her head and that is ok. I know that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree and I am certain that her comments came from her mother. Part of me felt badly about planting those seeds. She is only five and it is not her fault that her mother thinks that the measure of people is made based upon their looks and financial wherewithal. Some people are blessed by birth and others work hard for what they have.

This girl is one of a small group of girls that are part of my daughter’s class. They all started together in preschool and have continued on together into elementary school. I don’t know if I would say that this girl is the queen bee of the junior mean girls but she is certainly a board member. I watch and listen and know that she is being raised with values that are anathema to me. I watch and listen and see that she and the junior mean girls are a minority. The majority of the kids are great but there are always a few.

Sometimes I watch and am fascinated by how different the interaction is between the boys and the girls. There are mean boys. There are boys that aren’t nice but to me the distinctions and differences behaviorally are huge. Sometimes I wonder if what I consider to be mean/rude is caused by a misunderstanding. I wonder if there is a gender issue here because I feel like I follow the boys line of thought. I feel like I can see a clear line and even when it doesn’t make sense, it makes sense to me.

But girls are different.

And in my daughter’s class I see mean moms raising mean girls. The mean moms don’t like me very much. We have had some words this year and they didn’t like it. I teach my children to be civil and try to do the same. It is not always easy for me. I like to get the last word in and I hate apologizing. Sometimes I fall short, but I am usually aware of it.

The senior mean girls collective is angry because they sent out an email that was supposed to be an end of the year wrap-up and I asked a few questions. They don’t understand why I pointed out that we fell short in a few areas and I am told that they think I am an “asshole.” I tell the mom who passed that along they don’t understand the meaning of the word unless its is wrapped in gold. She asks me why I responded as I did and I tell her that it is about setting the tone for next year.

It is not adversarial nor one upsmanship I am after. Rather I want to make sure that some of these issues won’t come up next year. I want to make sure that the parents who won’t speak up know that if they do they will be supported. And come next September when school resumes I expect that the senior mean girls collective will do a better job of communicating with other parents and will have less influence.

At least that is what the fat guy with the ugly shoes hopes will happen. Time will tell.

The Mistress of Tongue

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The story below is based upon the following prompt from The Red Dress Club:

This week’s prompt was about affection. We asked you to write how the show of affection played a part in your memory.

You were to choose a time when either the abundance or lack of affection and take us to that moment.

It is the Spring of 1988 and I am a 19 year-old freshman in college enjoying all of the freedom and benefits that university life has to offer. My initial plan to spend the year in Israel has been scrapped and I am pleasantly surprised by how much fun I am having.

There is a girl in my political science class that intrigues me. I have spent more than a few minutes trying to stare at her without getting caught. She has long black hair and dark eyes. It is quite warm in spring so I am treated to lots of sun dresses and or shorts. Some days I make a point to sit just behind her and to the side. From there I am able to drink deeply in the dreams I have of her. She has a lot of attention from men so I don’t want to be like everyone else- I need to figure an angle that will make her notice me.

Little do I know that tripping over my own two feet will be enough to catch her eye.

Class has just ended and we’re heading out of class to wherever we need to be. She is standing in front of me and my eyes are drawn downwards. I am walking but not watching where I am going and somehow I end up sprawled in the hallway. Don’t know if I grunted, screamed or if she heard the soft thud my head made when it smacked the ground. What I do know is that I find her standing over me. She wants to know if I am ok. I mumble something at her and stand up. We talk for a moment. I attempt to be cool and fail miserably at it.

But the fall has broken the ice and we start to have conversations. I am ecstatic about it and work hard to say just enough not to sound like a fool.  A few weeks pass and I gather the courage to ask her out. She takes me with her to a party at her friend’s apartment and we grab a few drinks. I am more than pleased that she laughs at my jokes. She flips her hair and touches my arm throughout the night and I begin to think that maybe lady luck is with me.

A short time later we’re at her apartment. I try to figure out how to kiss her without looking foolish. I think to myself that Jewish kids don’t have patron saints, but if I did it would be great for our Lady of Getting Lucky tonight to put a good word in for me. My silent prayer is answered and she invites me in.

Moments later her arms are wrapped around me and I am trying to hide my response. Can’t give away all my secrets so quickly. A few soft kisses lead to her neck and I feel her melt. She grabs my face in her hands and I prepare to enter heaven when I receive a sudden and rude shock.

Her tongue is everywhere and not in a good way. Apparently, my dream date has graduated from the St. Bernard School of Open Mouth Kissing. I stand there in shock trying to figure out if she thinks that my face is made of chocolate or peanut butter. Remember, I am 19 and the boys have told me that we want a woman who is a master with her tongue, but this isn’t what they were talking about…now is it.

If you are interested in reading past posts try one of these:

Am I The Father I Want To Be

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Six years ago I asked am I the father I ought to be? The man who asked that question is gone now. It would be a bit melodramatic to say that he died, but he is gone. I see remnants and fragments floating around the places he once walked. I see pieces of that guy and the reflection in the mirror bears some resemblance but he is still gone.

I don’t know if any of that is important or whether it merits any thought which I suppose is part of why I blog about it. Here in my cyber refuge I use these words to clarify my thoughts and my clear my head of the cobwebs that collect inside it. So let’s move on my friends and address the topic of this post.

Am I the father I want to be? It is something that I have been thinking about quite a bit recently. And the answer is no….I am not.

I am not a bad father by any stretch of the imagination. My children do not lack for love or attention. They have plenty of the things that they need but it is not enough for me. It is not enough because I am well aware of the dissent and discord in my life. My lack of satisfaction and my irritation make me short tempered and impatient. The current condition of things requires that I work crazy hours and in crazy conditions and that drains me.

That face I see in the mirror isn’t one that I recognize. The thoughts that funnel through my head are disconcerting. I hear things that I thought that I would never say and I find myself  feeling drained and driven to exhaustion…constantly.

But the beauty of the children is that they provide you with strength and courage to continue and go beyond. They help inspire me to keep fighting even when it feels hopeless and so I do. I fight.

I fight because that is what and who I am…a fighter. I fight because they deserve it.

But the rules of the blog dictate honesty and I acknowledge that  I am unhappy.  Most of the time it is frustration that I can’t make time move faster and I can’t make changes move more quickly than they are.

Life is not all about the shadows. There are many splashes of color but these splotches don’t appear as frequently as I would like them to so I continue to push to make the changes that will bring them with greater frequency.

I suspect that I will always answer the question of am I the father that I want to be with something like a “no, not yet.” It is good to have high standards and to push for more. But sometimes in the quiet of the night while I watch them sleep I think that it would be nice to be that guy sooner than later. They grow so very quickly and soon they won’t be here with me any more.

In the blink of an eye they will be out on their own and making their own way so I need to push harder to be more not because they ask but because I do.

The Angry Place

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Angry music fills my ears and I feel my lips pull back into a snarl. I am in that place I hit when I go beyond anger. It is my own private refuge that I keep solely for me. Fury and fire have filled my soul and I have spent countless hours trying to release it. I put my trust in people and things that didn’t come through and now I pay the price.

Devastation and destruction fill my vision and I am surrounded with the sounds of sorrow. There is no silence and no succor to be found. Relief is something that I seek yet no matter where I go or what I try the pressure remains unrelenting and unremitting. I imagine that I am slowly sinking below the waves and experiencing the crushing power of the ocean depths.

Pounding. There is pounding and I wonder from where it comes.  I have been lost at sea for so long I have no sense of what is real and what is not. Time is a foreign concept. I wonder how it is that I still feel the flames for I sunk under the waves long ago. I gave myself to the depths and surrendered my soul to whence it came.

Sustenance is something sought for but not obtained nor acquired. What I seek has been lost and now I wander where I will without direction. What was once found has been lost and until I find it within myself again I shall remain lost.

The Right Tool For The Job

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(I was the featured writer over at Studio Thirty on Friday. Some people complained about it being hard to access. So, here it is for your consumption.)

It is considered bad form by most people to try to kill a man with a butter knife. Poison doesn’t work because it is thought to be a woman’s tool and the last thing that I want is for people not to see me as the epitome of masculine.

Most of the time I don’t worry about that masculinity thing- ‘cuz that’s not how I roll. Got a voice that rumbles when I speak, a handshake that would make a gorilla cry uncle and a couple of rug rats that prove that my boys are expert swimmers.

Some might wonder why I mention the whole death by butter knife thing anyway. What makes a man who is so sure of his testosterone levels talk about such nonsense. What drives him to ignore the teachings of his own father to use the right tool for the job. What could push him to the brink and more importantly where is he now. Because the last thing that anyone wants to be is close to the guy who is about to go postal.

Well the good news for you all is that most of this is tongue in cheek. I wouldn’t try to kill a man or a woman with a butter knife nor a shrimp fork. Really us manly men prefer to use our bare hands.  It goes back to ancient times in which we responded to instinct and primal urges that drove us out of the caves we lived in because we couldn’t take the screeching any more.

“Nog, take out bones!” or “Nog, you left the cover open on hole in ground.” So we’d grab our clubs and spears to head out to kill game to provide for our families. It was man against beast. As we stalked our prey the young ones would try to taunt us with sharp remarks about hair loss and belly extensions that prevented us from properly seeing our smaller spears.

It should be noted that in those days man was smarter than now. He didn’t paint a picture of the smaller spear on the cave wall for his non mate to stare at for he knew that she was not excited by such things. A little known historical fact is that until the dark ages no man used the name of the smaller spear as their family name.

One might call me a dick for forgetting to send this useful and timely information to Wild Man Weiner of New York. Perhaps I might add that Weiner would be well served to try and make sure that no one ever refers to him as wacky as due to recent events that might be misconstrued. It would really be a shame if they called him Whacky Weiner the jerk off.

Ok, don’t ask me how I have gone from cavemen to congressmen because if you did I’d have to poke you with a butter knife. Damn, there I go with the violence again. Well, I can explain that…really I can.

I am in a bad place right now and it is not Cleveland. Life is a bit unsettled and awkward- so I am a bit grumpier than normal. Apparently people have noticed because they have written and asked me why I don’t write funny posts any more.  He signed it spit or swallow.

I promptly replied with a note thanking him for the non-sequitur and than wondered if he was hitting on me. Maybe he read one of the posts where I talked about being a lesbian trapped in a man’s body. Hell, if he is related to some of the women on the Real Housewives it is possible that he is indeed dumber than a rock.

And yes I confess that upon occasion I have watched the Real Wives of Orange County and New Jersey. I even tried watching Jersey Shore once. After my brains stopped leaking from my head I dove into some very serious therapy and spent a night reading Nietzsche followed by a heavy dose of quantum mechanics compared to Euclidean geometry.

Speaking of the Jersey Shore when I heard that Snooki was a published author I promptly tried to kill myself with a butter knife. Ok, that is not really funny and it is a serious exaggeration. But it is no exaggeration to say that I was irritated by it.

It took ten minutes to write the 730 some words that I have produced here. Surely with some effort I could pound out a New York Times best seller. That would be something. It is on my bucket list- to publish a book that is.

And now the time has come to wrap this up, but before I do let me share a few things with you. I am Jack the daddy blogger who blogs about more than children. I haven’t ever made one the Top Daddy Blogger lists but I did hit number four on Backpacking Dad’s Sexiest Dad Blogger list.

Hmmm..Maybe that is the reason Mr. Non Sequitur hit on me. Got to run now, I am Waiting for Godot and would hate to miss him.