Good article - well worth the read

Read the article; it's short and worth reading something sensible from such a secular source. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703899704576204580623018562.html?mod=wsj_share_twitter

Little Knights: A politically incorrect post

One of the most delightful things about little boys is their desire for nobility. This striving after nobility, the desire to be a hero, to protect and defend, and to do great things is something that we need to foster in our sons. Too many boys have been encouraged in mediocrity - left to fulfill their hero-status in a virtual world of video games. Rather, they need to be taught that they can be heroes in the real world by defending purity, saying no when everybody else is saying yes, caring for the needy, defending the unborn; in short, to be a man far greater than the model offered to them by the culture.

This is a difficult task, especially for young boys such as ours who, last I checked, happen to be Caucasian males (one of the most maligned groups of recent history; Caucasian males=whipping posts). As Jacob moaned the other day, "Sometimes it's just so hard to be a boy. It seems like everything is against me." Nevertheless, the modern state of boyhood, the feminisation of education and the plight of the Caucasian male are not the subject of this post.
I'm not aiming for anything lofty on a Monday morning. I'm a bit more anecdotal.

So, back to greatness. This desire for greatness is present in all of our sons. However, at the ages of almost 8, almost 5, 3 and 7 months, it is present in varying degrees. Isaac is still largely interested in milk, his mother and naps of super-hero proportions. Jacob is able to grasp the figurative image of himself as a knight in the modern world. Joe and Ben - not so much. These two boys in the middle are still operating on a largely literal level.

An example:
This morning we were reading about a young squire on the road to knighthood in a book called The Squire and the Scroll. The aspiring knight is shown many times in battle with a large and scary dragon. The dragon image is one that I want them to grasp.
Yes, there is evil and it is bad and it is scary and it is ugly and we don`t want to go anywhere near it.
However, I am finding it very difficult to explain to these two sons that the dragon is representative of evil, of the Devil, of all that they they need to do battle with as little soldiers. Metaphors are lost on these two.
So, I tried a variety of approaches.
1. "The dragon is sort of like all the bad stuff."
Looks of confusion.
2. "The dragon is like the Devil."
More looks of confusion.
3. I decided that maybe, just maybe, grown-up language might really help: "The dragon is representative of the Devil and all the evil that he does in the world. He is the animal that represents evil."
A dawn of understanding spread over Ben's young face: "Oh! You mean the Devil has a pet!!"

I think that I had better wait for some more psychological development before I attempt this subject again.

A little update

I will be posting soon with pictures of our trip to Halifax.
We arrived safely home on Sunday morning after a 20 hour drive guided by the light of the fullest moon in 18 years. It was gorgeous and completely beyond photographing by my point-and-shoot camera in the parking lot of a brightly lit Shell station.
When we got in the door the light on the answering machine was flashing with a message that the rectory of St. Casimir's (the church adjacent to the school where Dave teaches) had burned down in the very early hours of Sunday morning. The parish priest died in the fire. Quite a message to come home to. Dave had only just shaken his hand on Ash Wednesday, 10 days before.
(Such a fire is a poignant reminder of the season of Lent: Ye are dust and unto dust ye shall return.)
Within the hour, and with two hours of sleep under his belt, Dave was on the phone with his principal putting together a prayer service for the first day back at school.
Pray for this priest's soul, his name is Fr. George Olsen. Pray for the community - who knows if they will get another priest. Do you have one to spare?
Tuesday was a flurry of dental and doctor appointments and today might allow us to swing back into a normal rhythm. Talk soon.

Thoughts on the first Thursday of Lent

We're heading to Halifax tomorrow in a van filled with five children, two parents and a variety of stuff.
(Watch out Quebec: your fertility rate is going up around 10pm on Friday night; but, dear French counterpart, you can relax in the wee hours of Saturday morning when the Silver Bullet will pass speedily into northern New Brunswick.)

So, today I am packing stuff. And it's a snow day. This makes for the following equation:

Me packing stuff + the kids home on a snow day = Me blogging;

or, Me packing stuff + the kids home on a snow day = Me doing laundry, scrubbing toilets, vacuuming carpets while simultaneously trying to prevent the kids from trying to pack their stuff;
where, the kids trying to pack their stuff = kids stuffing random stuff (like three Legos, one cow, a bathtub plug, a pirate earring, a block with a painted J, ten Hardy Boy books and no underwear) into reusable grocery store bags.

Complex mathematics. Good thing both Dave and I took first-year Calculus.

But, amidst this organised chaos my mind is chewing on an acquaintance's blog post on the subject of International Women's Day, March 8th. Is that what it's called?
During my time in university, I remember big efforts on the part of the feminists to celebrate this day. I can't recall what exactly they did as I tried to avoid the Student Union Building on that day. Did they rally around abortion? I don't know. It truthfully wasn't really on my radar at that point. I just knew that, in some inner sanctuary of my under-developed soul, International Women's Day bothered me.

Yesterday I realised that I graduated from university a whopping 12 years ago. Since then, I have had time to think and mature a little and begin to understand why the celebrations on March 8th grated on my nerves.

The biggest reason is that I am not a feminist. Rather, I prefer the title that my parents have christened me and my sisters with: post-feminist. (Between the three of us, two stay-at-home-moms and a religious sister, we have eight children, five university degrees, a violin and a Franciscan habit.) For an exact definition of post-feminist, get yourself invited over to my parents' place on a Saturday night. They will explain the title and my mother will probably serve something really tasty. Two birds with one stone.

You see, I don't think that we have really achieved that much since the dawn of the women's movement. Sure, great strides have been made in certain areas; however, I think that many of these strides have been counter-balanced by a different sort of female oppression. We're still largely viewed as sexual objects, folks. And young girls by the thousands seem to know no more than how to dress to attract sexual attention. La Senza for tweens is a hit and bras now come in more colours than those that were once burned by our feminist forebears.
Is Lady Gaga progress?
Birth control and easy access to abortion have done nothing to remedy sexual exploitation. If anything, they have made things gravely worse by removing all natural consequences to our actions. Is the Birth Control pill really freeing or does it just make women sexually available around the clock?

The other thing is this: during my brief foray into Facebook I posted pictures of my four children. (My Facebook relationship ended shortly after Isaac.) An old friend from highschool who was about to deliver her first child commented on my photos.
"Wow. I imagine that I too will soon be daily feeling incredible satisfaction from being a mother. You must feel so satisfied by your children."

I laughed when I read that.

Most days I feel pretty tired. Joyful, yes. Sorrowful, yes. On the point of death, at times. Like I could do four more kids, talk to Dave. My emotions run the full gamut when it comes to being a young mother. But the last thing that I feel is satisfied by my kids. And, truthfully, I think that looking for satisfaction in motherhood is a heavy burden to place on one's children.
Because they ain't going to deliver; and they shouldn't have to.

Many will agree that the feminist movement pushed women out of the home and into the workplace where they would supposedly find that satisfaction that had "so far" eluded them. (Actually, I have no idea how the women of a few generations ago felt and I don't purport to paint them all with the same brush of disillusionment and ennui drowned in four-o'clock martinis.)
Working moms of my generation are quick to admit that the home-work balance is a killer and they can't figure out where they belong. And I am not trying to tell them to get out of the workplace and into the home. No, I am merely trying to illustrate that that satisfaction isn't found by escaping one's children and using one's university degree for pay.

My point is this: that satisfaction is not to be found in the home nor the workplace. I have found it at home but it's not raising kids or homemaking that have provided the deep joy, the rest, the satisfaction.
It's God.

St. Augustine said "Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee, O God."
I haven't read St. Augustine extensively, but I do believe that the following quotes can not be found within any of his writings:
"Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee, O children of mine."
or, "Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee, O workplace."

Neither will satisfy. Only God can do that. Only God can still the inner turmoil, the anxieties, the guilt, the shame, the what-ifs, the envy, the jealousy, the everything. Only God can provide peace while four kids are throwing up and one is calling for a wipe. Only God can give rest when the boss is a tyrant and you want to cry because you feel torn between work and home.
Only God.
So, look for Him. He is there to be found and He can satisfy.
I wish that we would celebrate that on March 8th.

(He can also help me pack; or, at least show me where to begin. And that's what I have to do now. Pray for our travels: New Brunswick can be nasty.)

Jacob and the Bee

Last Monday marked Jacob's first participation in an organised spelling bee. As the picture demonstrates, the competition wasn't large, but it was fierce. And largely female.
I believe that he was spelling friend.
The fiercest competitor, Sarah-Grace: daughter of Colin at Theology of Dad. She's sweet, quite pretty and mild-mannered; but, we had her family over shortly after Christmas and I heard her tell Jacob that she was going to beat his pants off. He actually cowered.
Once balloon was introduced into the competition kids went down like dominoes until the only two left in play were Jacob and Sarah-Grace. At that point, unbeknownst to the larger school community, the competition stepped up a notch and became a battle of the blogs.
A funny aside: both of Sarah-Grace's parents are from the Maritimes and I am from Halifax. And here are our children at a spelling bee in Barry's Bay, Ontario.
Joseph can't believe the coincidence either. (Blogger isn't letting me erase pictures.)
These two kids have no idea how tense their parents are feeling. Sarah's dad was so sick with nerves that he failed to show up.
And then Jacob got the word genuine. Except the adjudicator pronounced it phonetically so that it rhymed with feline. It was then that I knew the end was near since he had only ever heard genuine pronounced genu-in. He thrust his hands deeper into his pockets, closed his eyes and asked in a measured tone for the definition. He should have asked for an alternate pronunciation.
But he didn't, and he began to spell: "j, e..."
And the judge nodded a negative, and he bowed his head and proceeded to the back row. (See above picture.)
And then up came Sarah-Grace, and I said a short prayer that she would triumph. (Aren't you proud of my magnanimity?)
And she did, almost.
Her father tells me that rather than spell difficulty she attempted to demonstrate it: d-i-f-f-a-c-u-l-t-y.
And, I thought, "I can't believe it. I think that she spelled it incorrectly on purpose."
And so Jacob was brought back up for a second round. And they went at it again until Sarah-Grace encountered opposite and breezed through it so quickly that she left out a vowel. And she bowed her head and sat down.
And Jacob won the tournament.
But, truthfully, I think they both won because he couldn't have done it without her.
Thank you, Sarah-Grace. You are an icon of grace.
Here he is opening his winnings.
And here's his sister running out of the classroom for a photo. I told her later that I was sure she could also win a spelling bee. She replied nonchalantly, "Thanks, I know I can."

I just like these photos

The genes are starting to show

My sister, Rebecca's latest addition: Miriam Ines. She was born on January 6th and is a peaceful little babe. Looks like Jacob and Hannah aren't the only twins in this family.

Karl the Kaszubian

Hannah has discovered a love for Kaszubian folk music. Imagine polka music mixed with the Wednesday audiences of the late Pope John Paul II and you're more than half way there.

She arrived home today from school with the CD in hand - a gift from her Kaszubian teacher, Karl, who has headed back to Polish pastures. I suppose that such a gift is the equivalent of a Newfoundlander in Poland handing his English students a Great Big Sea CD as a parting gift. I envision young Poles jumping around to Old Black Rum much as Hannah is attempting to step dance to Antologia Posienki .

Kaszubian is the Polish dialect around these parts; although, I am told by native Polish speakers that they can't understand it for the life of them. I don't know who to believe. But, I do know that, before meeting Dave, I had met exactly one Polish person and now I am surrounded by skis of all sorts.

I said jokingly to Jacob, as we half-heartedly listened to the CD that his sister was blasting from the other room, "Wouldn't you like to speak that language?" Obviously not grasping his mother's mocking tone he looked up and said, "I do." Apparently Silent Night at the school Christmas concert counts as fluency.

Humour aside, we are rather impressed with Karl as the kids fluency in Kaszubian excels their mastery of French. They have been learning French over the past four years on an almost daily basis and still screw up their brows in confusion whenever I conjugate a verb. Karl, on the other hand, has been with them since September of this year and they can ream off numbers, body parts and Christmas carols in a dying dialect. Karl might not have afforded them easy access to this country's public service, but they sure have one of those obscure party tricks that sometimes come in handy.