Fathers and Dads

With the release of his new film, Will Smith is on the interview circuit with his son, Jaden, who plays his son in Pursuit of Happiness.

When asked about his children and his parenting, Smith said he and Jada "View themselves as guides rather than disciplinarians. "We feel that we are partners in their life, but they are responsible for the lives."

He goes on to say "Something we noticed in our upbringing and specifically in the black fcommunity coming out of slavery in the United States - children were dealt with in the master-slave relationship. We're trying to break the cycle of 'beat them when they do something wrong.' If you get them used to a master-slave relatiohnship, when they leave your home, they're going to be looknig for a master. We want them to be looking for partners."

The Smiths commented further that they believe the 'industrial era traditional education' most children are subjected to doesn't address certain core skills, "First and foremost [being] their ability to communicate with people. The quality of your relationships and the quality of the groups of which you are a member are more important than the Pythagorean Theorem could ever be," said Smith.

To all this, I say a hearty YAH! Followed by, can dead people read or hear the news?

My father passed away 3 and a half years ago. We had a deep relationship but not necessarily a good one. Sadly, my dad was brought up in a very protestant, children-should-be-seen, depression-era home.

He was a very smart man, but, in my opinion, for what it's worth, not always wise. He could not, or would not, acknowledge that my way of doing things wasn't necessarily wrong; it was just my way. His attitude towards me really badly affected our relationship. When he was dying, I said sorry for having been a crappy daughter. That made him cry, which I was sorry about, but it was the first time he ever said "You aren't a crappy daughter." He did say nice things to me and often about me (he very regularly forwarded my writing and other tidbits to family living away) but often the things he said directly to me came with an implied or stated "but."

I have step siblings. They lived with my dad and my other sib and I lived with our mom, who also had 'that' kind of childhood. I'm the eldest in the original family and second eldest in the blended family

I was then, am now and will always be the 'wild' one of the family. I never conformed; I didn't buy in and I didn't stick around when the crazyness got to be too much. My dad, although he meant well, critisised me endlessly about everything, but particulary about how I raise my kids and about my partner.

Between me and my three sibs, we have 10 children; 8 girls, two boys. The youngest will be 12 shorty and the eldest will be 26. Two of us are married; one is recently divorced and I am in a long term, non legalised relationship.

From eldest to youngest, here's what's going on with the kids:

The eldest has been bulimic/anorexic since age 12. At 15 years old, she was dating a 25 year old and was living with a friend in another town. By age 17, she was working, underage, in a bikini bar. She did not complete highschool. She has an amazing talent for music and songwriting; she has an album ready to be produced by a known producer but she will not tour nor will she take hold of her talent. She spends much of her energy being angry at her family members rather than being successful and throwing that in their faces.

The next oldest has graduated from University with a honours degree and is working for a national company. She has had three boyfriends in her entire life. She was with the first a year; the second she was with 2 and a half and the third 3 1/5 and going strong.

Number three kid is in third year university and has honours marks. She is a director with a radio station and has about sixty million friends. She is experimental but pragmatic. She has paid for all her schooling and residence out of her own pocket and that after travelling europe for a year following high school, also on her own dime.

Number four is in first year college and has good marks. She has participated in loads of pursuits but has stuck with none until college, which she loves. She has travelled for two weeks at the expense of a parent and a boyfriend. She spent a week living with a total stranger -male, aged 29 - in Paris. All is well with this kid though.

The fifth grandchild left home at 17 and is living with her boyfriend. She has an interesting job in entertainment. She does well in her work. She completed highschool but likely will not go on. She will probably be quite successful in her field.

Number six has just completed six years of competitive dancing and is finishing secondary school. She speaks three languages. She is going to the orient for the holidays and has been all over the world already, with friends and family. She will be going to university in another city, in another language, starting in September '07 and will attend on full scholarship due to the second language.

Next, number seven, has had a very disturbed childhood with little direction. Super smart and fearless, he has been sucked into the world of drugs and gangs and is currently living out of the city in a secure school setting. Thanks to some adults with a lot of focus, he's now excelling in school and will complete two grade levels in one year, all with honours (which is the requirement for graduating).

Number 8 is a wild child who lives at home but is never there, dates much older men, drinks too much, hates school and detests one of her parents. Scary. Chamelion

Number 9 is struggling with promiscuity, alcohol, drugs and boys. She is currently home schooled, ostensibly to keep her out of trouble. She wears tons of makeup - like Alice Cooper.

number 10 is also home schooled because of illness - except there's no illness. He played sports for a while but a pulled muscle was labled a hernia, so that was over. This child really believes he sees ghosts.

Mine are the grad, the university student and the dancer. No problems, no drugs, no promiscuity, no moving out, no dating paedophiles. Lovely kids. I'm so proud. I am essentially a single parent, although my partner has been a steady influence on my kids. He does not live with us but is here most of the time.

I hadn't ever put it into such eloquent terms as the Smiths have, but how they raise their kids is how I hope I've raised mine - as a partner who discusses with them the direction they're going, the things they're doing and the mistakes they might make, not from the point of view of master/slave or boss/employee, but as someone who knows their kids are separate, thinking humans with goals and dreams and wants and minds. Sometimes I'm wrong about things and that's ok with me. They know I'm falable. It hasn't hurt them a bit for me to be human and apologise when I screw up.

Yes, there are times when I've put my foot down and said "NO WAY" to something or some behaviour but that is accompanied by "Here's why there's no way." Once, I made one of my kids sit at the kitchen table all night because she would not tell me where she'd been between the party she was allowed to go to and the sleepover at her girlfriends (didn't happen; we brought her home). She finally broke after sitting there for 8 hours over night and she was grounded for the rest of the summer, but she got the message.

My parenting style and lifestyle has been endlessly criticised by everyone in my family and yet, my kids are doing wonderfully.

As for my dad, I think I must be moving into a new stage of mourning. I miss him but lately, I've become angry that I cannot sit him down and say "LOOK!" Look at what's going on! I'm the crazy wild kid with all the weird ideas and there are my wonderfully successful, lovely kids out there doing well, making friends, getting on and having a great time doing it and there are the other kids, struggling a bit in some cases and totally lost in others.

I'm the one who was roundly chastised for getting rid of an abusive spouse - because he was a suit and a christian so couldn't possibly do what the police report said he did. No comments were ever made on the drunk, shiftless man my sister dated and who gave her herpes... nor were there ever comments on why her 17 year old was working in a strip club at 17, but my daughter caught shit for discussing her views on censorship. She's against, for the record.

If I could have five minutes with my dad, assuming he is aware of what's really going on, and assuming, as he's dead, that he's been enlightened and can now see everything without bias, I would ask him why he subjected me to a life of slavery; why he could not accept how I did things and why he would never acknowledge that I was actually doing a really good job. And I'd ask him why he was so hard on me when other of my siblings could have used a HUGE tune up! Who lets their 15 year old date a 25 year old???

In a way, I guess it doesn't matter; my kids are my best advertisment: but it still stings and aches and I've always had a difficult time making friends out of the people who are in authority in my world - or at least until about 2 years ago.

About Fathers and Dads, nearly any man can father a child - too many do. It takes one hell of a man to be a dad. See Will Smith above for reference. If there was a law that stipulated that any man who fathers (not including sperm donors- the real kind), must also commit to being a dad and a dad that raises his kids, not forces them to grow up according to his rules. My Step dad was that man.

Learn from your kids!

CrAzyWoRld

Ok. You know the end is near when orthodox Jews attend a conference of Holocaust deniers!
Video Here

I just wanna know...

Just wanna know something: Why is this 17 year old kid at the funeral of his best friend?

Why is he in a wheelchair and why does he have a cracked pelvis and sternum?

Why is his other friend, Mike Hagar, still in a coma?

Why is their friend, Connor, dead?

BECAUSE A DRUNK HIT THEM.

It is alledged that a 24 year old guy, drank a lot and then decided to get into his truck and drive. During his drunken drive, he careened through a red light and slammed into the driver's side of Connor's car, killing Connor and slamming Mike and John into the hard, broken, twisted metal of what was left of Connor's car. It took the medics over an hour to extricate Connor from the mashed wreck of his car.

Mike is my daughter's best guy friend. He's still in a coma and it's been nearly a week. John has been released from hosptial into the hell that will be his life until he somehow finds a way to understand the sensless killing of his friend by a guy who lives in a city where there are zillions of cabs and where the police would have driven him home for free.

Honour for Connor.

Don't drink and drive.

This CAN happen to you.

Mr. Harper, the great pretender, part deux!

I just want to register my amazement at Mr. Harper’s continued theft of ideas, quotes and policies – and even of an “I’m from” (as he allows the “from the west” when he’s actually from Toronto. A few years at university does not make anyone from anywhere near the west.

Harper’s recent statement, that Quebec is a nation within Canada, is a rip off of Michael Ignatieff’s more eloquent “Qubec est ma nation, mais le Canada est mon pays,” (Quebec is my nation but Canada is my country) several months ago – in French; no wonder Harper missed it – quoted in Maclean’s Magazine on November 20 2006 in an article by Anne Kingston and from his policy primer, Agenda for Nation Building.

How long will it be before Mr. Harper adopts everything from "Agenda", rebrands it and takes credit for it? Given his inability to have creative, original thought on policy, not long I wouldn't expect.

I can hardly wait to see the demise of the poser who is this country’s current “Prime Minister.” He has the position purely by default, due to Paul Martin’s ineffectiveness following Mr. Chrétien’s handing off of a much damaged party mired in all sorts off good ol’ Canadian bullshit.

Mr Chrétien was a scoundrel and Mr. Martin was a weakling, granted: in a field of very poor candidates, and in light of the debacle that was the Liberal party at the time, Mr. Harper emerged the most convincing in a field of losers. That doesn’t make him a qualified candidate. His election only reflects Canadians’ resignation that, at that moment, there was no better choice.

Due to his many years living and working in the US, Michael Ignatieff may be perceived as the prodigal son, undeserving of a place in our Country’s leadership. He is, however, uniquely qualified for the position of Leader. He has long-term, intimate knowledge of and a very emotional love for this country’s politics, structure and goals and he as an equally intimate knowledge of the goals of the US administration

Ignatieff holds no illusions about the direction the US is taking in respect to internatinal affairs. Where Harper is happy to live in GWBush’s filthy back pocket and to be his pawn, Mr Ignatieff understands the US so well that there is nearly no risk Canada will simply become its anaemic parasitic twin.

A couple more...

Well isn't that just so convenient for Mr. Rumsfeld to "resign" if that's what it's called when the President directs you to do it....

Good timing though; apparently there's some huge report coming out in the near term. I hear this report is going to discuss the NON EXISTENT WMDS and may allude to WHY THE HELL WAS THE US IN IRAQ WHEN THE SO-CALLED PROBLEM WAS bin LADIN.

And what's up with Halliburton? How does a defense company become powerful enough to direct the actions - override the generals - of the US military??? And how come the defense contracts Haliburton has were never tendered to any other company - oh, maybe because Mr. Rumsfeld - past board of directors didn't want it to be so!? INVESTIGATE? Nope. The agency that would have investigated this mess was shut down by the current US administration.

Oh, hey, what about those voting machines? No records and no open source code? The company that made the machines refuses categorically to make any part of the source code available. Makes one wonder what they're hiding. How easy are those machines to manipulate? How many of the votes entered were the votes counted? I guess it's good that the investigation organisation isn't around to have a look at these machines either.

What a mess.

I think Mr. Rumsfeld might shortly either come under some deserved scrutiny or will quite disappear. I'm also fairly sure that whatever scrutiny he might be subjected to will be quite readily deflected and that, regardless of the so-called President's move to remove Mr. Rumsfeld, he will protect the deposed one to cover his lying ass.

On the subject of politicans too close to the US "president," I note with interest that the Canadian PM has had little to say about much recently but did a very nice job with a diversionary spectacle by his utter about-face on income trust taxation.

Very nice! that little reversal certainly protected him from any questioning on the issue of the US Administration, his very close ties to it, and his own potential loss of face.

Very shortly, and probably before the next US elections, the current admnistration is going to come under some spectacular scrutiny. Man, for us Canadians, it's going to be a RIOT watching the "leaders of the free world" go under the Free World's microscope!

At least the US president is funny - in nutty, needs meds way; at least it takes the edge off the "He's screwing with so many economies that we're all going to need about 50 years to recover. Oh and he apparently doesn't like his dad either. What a guy.

'Kay. I'm done for now.

Predictions

I want to put some predictions on here just for the record.

Saddam Hussain's trial has ended for now, with a guilty verdict and a pending hanging. This verdict will be appealed and I predict that the retrial and second verdict will happen in the months before the US elections in two years and that the result of that will serve to oust the currently "ruling" party out.

However, I also predict that, in order to save the rulling party, Mr. bin Ladin may well finally be 'found' and dealt with to offset the potential damage from the Hussain affair. If journalists and others can find and interview Mr. bin Ladin, and if there is someone collecting and distributing the occasional video tape, then why can't the US army find the guy? Because it has been instructed not to. Period.

I predict that GW Bush will also be outed around that time or shortly after, as one of the most dishonest presidents/politicians/men ever known to have held office in the US and I predict that even his father, who has developed quite a close relationship with Mr. Clinton, will have something to say in public. I further predict that Mr. GW Bush's ongoing problems with alchohol will serve to reduce him to "that poor guy" following the end of his presidency. Mr Bush has, even in the last few months, taken to various podiums very drunk. Sadly, there is little difference between the drunk and the sober GW in terms of the idiocies that come out of his mouth.

I predict that Stephen Harper, the Canadian PM is on the verge of massive unpopularity. When lifelong Conservative voters publicly state that they will no longer support their party due to its leader, one has to believe Mr. Harper's hold is in serious jeopardy. When big C conservatives say he is not to be trusted, then you have to know there are problems.

Today, finally, it was noted in our city's daily that Mr. Harper is NOT from the west as he toutes, but from Toronto.

Mr. Harper went to university in my city and even then he was only here two years. He is born and bred Toronto. He has seriously misread the minds of his constituents in this province. The changes to the income trust thing. His absolute flip on that one issue has left everyone wondering what else he's going to flip on. That was a biggie.

I predict that not only will Mr. Harper become very unpopular but that due to his reversals on significant campaign promises, that the previously hated Liberal government will be back in power within a year with Mr. Ignatieff at the helm - he of the "Next Trudeau" mantle.

I predict that in the UK, the National Rail system, British Airways, Air Canada and Cathay Pacific, which I believe are now mounting a massive and costly PR campaign against discount travel, will achieve their goals via a massive discrediting - and potentially via sabotage - hobble and, in some cases end, the discount carriers in that country.

There is a huge push to cause guilt in the minds of the UK traveller for using discount airlines - apparently nothing you could ever do in terms of reducing your impact on the planet will ever have as much impact as not flying on discount carriers - or flying at all, depending on who's speaking (and who's paying that person to speak.....)

But that belief is stupid: discount carriers use the same type of jet fuel as BA or Air Canada or any major airline. The discounters just don't make their client's bleed cash. Sadly, the British public, being very uneducated and, worse, very disinterested in reading, analysing or considering what's going on in their country, stand to be lied to and taken to 'the cleaners' because they don't give a damn.

A few more items from the UK

 

I was right! An Expert Has Written a Book...

I am thrilled to write this post. Today on The Current, a CBC morning program, Dr. Nina Jablonski discussed with Anna Maria Tremonte the concept of race as a political concept and also how and why skin colour evolves.

The way people carelessly bandy about the term race, even applying that term to religious groups (ie the Jewish race) and cultures (as they do in the UK when they refer to themselves as the English race), is distasteful at best and absolutely disgusting in the full.

I am glad to know the scandalous, misuse and sometimes criminal use of a fase concept has received high level study. I hope soon the use of the term 'race' in all its terrible permutations and for all the political reasons, will cease and the term itself will finally die out.

A link to the full interveiw follows. If that link becomes inactive, go to The Current or to the CBC website and search the program archives. CBC also provides written transcripts of its programs. Directions for acquiring transcripts can be obtained by e-mailing or calling CBC directly.

The following is a short excerpt from the interview:

(NJ) "The possession of any particular skin colour is an interesting story of adaptation but it tells us nothing of uniqueness of group membership."

(AMT) "It tells us nothing about race."

(NJ) "That's right. Exactly."

(AMT) "Does your work essentially argue that race doesn't exist?"

(NJ) "Clearly, that is the inescapeable conclusion. Mine is not the first study in which race turns out to be a biological falacy... use of racial labels in any kind of biologically usefull context is a complete nonsense and we already know from a social point of view that race has been very much maintained in our societies as a social construct. And we know, through many lines of evidence, how incredibly destructive that has been."

Dr. Jablonski goes on to point out that humans are one species wearing multiple colours, a point I also made in my post of Wednesday, December 7th. In that post, entitled Falacy of Race, I discussed this very subject.

Race as we use the term in the 'civilised world,' is a means of division, derision and stereotyping. But the values we attach to 'race' are invalid and untrue. Were people to divide and deride on the basis of eye or liver colour, most people would find such division/derision ridiculous. However do they then manage it when that division/derision is based on skin - also an organ of the body?

Here's the link to the interview. I encourage everyone to sit down and have a very good listen.

Here are some additional links:
Wikipedia: Human Skin Colour
Skin: a Natural History (Book) by Nina Jablonski
Profile of Nina jablonski

Back from England and Scotland: photos

Round two! We've just returned from a two week holiday in the UK. We spent 3 days with family in England prior to heading north to Inverness and area, where it was our intention to cycle the Great Glen cycle route.

The weather was gorgeous. With the exception of the first day we were in the UK, when it rained, but only lightly all day, and the morning of the last day we were overseas, we had exceptional, surprisingly warm weather. In the highlands, the temperatures ranged from 14 to 20 degrees C the whole time.

Oh, and also except for one afternoon, October 11th. That day it poured. That day was also the first of what we though would be two days cycling.

The Great Glen runs between Inverness and Fort William, and is bordered on the Inverness side by the Moray Firth, into which the River Ness flows, and on the Fort William side by Loch Linnhe, which empties into the sea on the wet coast of Scotland.

The Highlands are mountainous to say the least. We knew there are three climbs of some 900 ft each along the trip. What we didn't know and weren't necessarily prepared for is the rest of the route is very hilly otherwise, mostly going up - at least that's how it felt.

We had hired bikes from a place in Fort William. The owner transported the bikes up to Inverness for us - and hour's drive - and left them with his brother in law not far from where we were staying with my friend Penelope at her B&B Atholdene House (which I cannot recommend highly enough. It is GREAT).

We had also been provided an excellent, waterproof map by an on line acquaintance of mine, Steve, from Benderloch in Scotland. We had all the necessary rain gear and layering clothing and a couple off good mountain bikes, all of which was our undoing really.

My partner and I bike a lot and I run, often as much as 30 Kms a week, so we're reasonably fit for milddle aged people. We were, to be short, quite overwhelmed by the Great Glen.

The Highlands of Scotland are wild and vast and in places very scarcely populated. As we were cycling well out of the tourist season for the area, we were quite alone on our trip. Between the heavy bikes and the 10 or so pounds of gear we both had with us and the quiet and the wind and occasional rain that day, and the solitude - and the wrong turn down a 1.5 mile long, very steep hill, which we had to re-climb afterwards, we were quite overwhelmed by the time we arrived at Drumnadrochit.

Drumnadrochit is a gorgeous village at the NW end of Loch Ness. It is the home of several shops and businesses dedicated to everything about the Loch Ness Monster. It is also the village below the beautiful ruins of Urquhart Castle. By road it is 13 miles beyond Inverness - about a 2o minute drive. Via the Great Glen, it is about 32Kms, largely uphill. Add in an extra 5 Kms for a wrong turn and it's a bit of a distance.

On arriving there, 1.5 hours later than we had anticipated, we sat down at the the Glen Cafe for lunch and to assess. As we sat there, the heavens opened and delivered a deluge. Despite the rain, we decided to press on wards - we were not cold, owing to waterproof gear and proper undergarments - towards Urquhart Castle and to Invermoriston, our destination for the night. Sadly, on arriving at the castle only 2 miles on, we realised that neither of us was going to be able to manage another 32Kms to Invermoriston and so back we went to Drum in search of a B&B, where we would stay the night.

In the end, we decided to terminate the ride and go either to Fort William or back to Inverness for the night. We left our rented cycles with the very accommodating hosts of the Glen Cafe and called Martin, who rented us the bikes to explain.

During the day, we had tried to get a bus either to Fort William, our destination, or back to Inverness. None of the drivers would take our bikes - with the exception of the last guy, who was driving the bus we took back to Inverness; he said he'd be glad to take the bikes, which were already secured inside the locked Glen Cafe. Ironic.

The next day, we hired a car in Inverness - a Golf (right hand drive, standard, diesel with which I drove on the right side of the narrow, shoulderless road at 60miles an hour) drove to Drumnadrochit, loaded the bikes in the car and made our slow and merry way towards Fort William. Along the way, we discovered that the B&B we had booked for our first night was not 2 miles south of Invermoriston as we thought, but two miles south of Fort Augustus, which is itself 8 miles past Invermoriston. We would have been hooped, wet, tired and lost. Small mercy but mercy all the same.

The weather was gorgeous, warm, sunny and dry, which, although we appreciated it very much, added to our respective private chagrin at not having met our challenge to bike the Glen. However, we are realists and we knew that we were pushing ourselves beyond what was safe. We could have completed the ride we are sure but we also realised that we had lost heart.

The upside was the warm, surprised welcome back to Atholdene house by Lucy, the Angel of Coffee, and a bunch of lovely days spent tramping around the Inverness Area and fun evenings spent at the always excellent Hootenany's in Church Street in Inverness.

I have photos posted on my Flickr space. They are copyrighted so please ask me before you used them, but also please enjoy.

If you'd like more information on the Great Glen, the cycle path and the walking path, please leave a comment on this page.

I'd run, but....

This weekend, I ran in this event called "Run for the Cure," which is designed to raise money for breast cancer research and ultimately to find a cure for this disease. Those of you who've been reading my blog know my opinion on whether or not a cure 'can' ever be found (Untruths in Fundraising), given the devastation to the cancer industry a cure would cause.

But.

It was a blast. It was great fun to run down city streets with a ton - 15,000- other people. It was great. I ran with a colleague and beat my 5K time by about 5 minutes, which was great.

It's a huge event in terms of organisation and it went off without a hitch. Loads of media, tons of participants, no chaos. A good day in general.

The only thing I have to complain about is how people cannot grasp the principle of "walk to the right" and why they don't have any concept of how difficult they make it when they stand in the doorways during a very congested, busy event.

I'm sure there were a lot of people who didn't understand my look of daggers as I was trying to get from the inside meeting places to the outside....

I only have two rules for busy places but they apply to all of amusement parks, busy malls, churches, big outdoor events - anywhere there are lots of people

Walk to the right - and this includes on escalator and for entering elevators. Simply walk to the right! How bloody hard is that? In England - London - there are signs in the Tubes directing people (tourists) to walk to the right so that those who want to walk up the escalator can do so. If you happen to stop on the left, Londoners will push you out of the way. And so they should!

Second rule is do NOT block doorways. Imagine if YOU had to quickly get your child out of a busy place and all these people were blocking the doorways!

Doorways are entries and exits. They are NOT where a person should stand and talk. Neither are narrow hallways.

Remove yourself to somewhere that will not prevent others easy entrance/exit.

The bottom line is to always remember that you are not alone. Manners make YOU easier to be around.

Here's a great book by a GREAT writer, Lynn Truss, for anyone who doesn't know the rules.

Also see "Miss Manners" or anything by Emily Post.