Teddy, Massachusetts and a Sense Giving Back

We took our children to the JFK Library on Boston's south harbor last week. We waited in line to sign the condolence book for Edward Kennedy and then toured the museum learning and remembering  JFK and his family's history.  We left before Teddy's casket arrived, but still experienced an emotional and historical event I hope my children will recall as they grow up.

Standing in line waiting to sign the book, people began talking about their own connection to Kennedy. It was amazing to hear individual stories of how his office helped everyday people from this state get through life's hardest times.  It explained the huge outpouring of love and grief felt in Massachusetts. 

As I watched the funeral on T.V. and listened to the selected biblical readings I was impressed once again with the whole focus being on "do unto others as you would have them do unto you."  Certainly Kennedy wasn't a flawless man, we all know that.  I guess what came to mind for me was the explicit and implicit messages he received through the Catholic church and his own family that stressed the idea of "to whom much is given much is expected,"  and then what this looked like in the form of his life's work. 

That an era has ended with his passing is very sad, but I also wonder if there are more like him and those of his generation to follow?  I have no answer to this, I just wonder.

Off to College compared to New Years Eve

I heard screaming from my neighbors house, a daughter, college-aged yelling at her mother and the mother responding, the fight escalating.  The topic seemed to be centered around the young woman saying she would not return to college, and the mother trying to convince her she must. I didn't think "Wow, can't they get their stuff together enough to not involve the whole neighborhood?" I genuinely felt absolute empathy for both of them. Of course the understanding on my end has an element of feeling you shouldn't throw stones if you live in a glass house, but this girl did go off to college a year ago and I honestly wonder if it isn't going very well. The mother, who I only know to say hello and chit chat, nothing more, is lovely and her children important to her.  The daughter I've watched from afar leave for high school daily, books in hand, then pack for college, return for holidays and finally return home for this first summer back. She looks unhappy, the daughter does.  

While college for many is a liberating experience from family and a new lease on making friends, redoing who you are and want to be in a brand new place, for some young people it can be paralyzingly difficult.  Going off to college there are so very many expectations of you, to say nothing of the price tag attached to the whole thing.  I think it is an amazing time of life, a "rights of passage," but also for this emerging adult there is an element of expectation for them to have an amazing wonderful time, and if they don't it can translate into a sense of failure. 

Going off to college and the build up before reminds me of New Years Eve, one is expected to have a crazy, fun, love filled, joyful, happy time on that night,  but what if you don't? Like going of to college the build up is intense for New Years Eve.  Just as one is asked over and over, "What college are you going to next year?" one might be asked "What are your plans for New Years Eve?" And if you don't have any, or do and the evening is a flop does that serve as a predictor for the entire year? Isn't your favorite New Years memory related to the fit of the environment, the people and where you were at in your own head at the time?

In returning to the yelling  from my neighbors, I wish I knew this young woman well enough that I could tell her, with all confidence, that college is certainly important, but if one place makes you unhappy that doesn't mean another won't be just fine, it is about finding the right fit.  The more open one is to learning and growing the easier it is to do just that and you just have to believe in  yourself and the possibilities out there. And finally, Mom loves you so much she just wants what will make your life fuller in the end.

Moses, I Feel Your Pain

First, I'm not particularly religious but find Moses intriguing. Why? Well, Moses frees the Israelites, leads them across the Red Sea and through the desert. All along there are those that doubt him and complain bitterly, even though he's freed them from slavery. He goes up the mountain to talk with God and comes down  carrying the big heavy tablets with the Ten Commandments on them, sees his people dancing around a golden cow, and says to himself, according to me, "Are you kidding me?!!!! I quit!" Of course he didn't, but I'm sure he felt like it. Sometimes in life we feel like quitting and it is the absolute wrong decision, as it surely would have been for Moses.  There are times in my life I feel desperately like quitting too. I wonder what a modern day therapist would have told Moses to do if he'd been in a session complaining about how little he is appreciated and how hard his job really is.  The therapist might say, "You have to think of your long-term health and well-being Moses, maybe you should find another job?" 

Like Moses, mothers, in general, pour our heart and soul into our kids and while there are numerous moments that make it well worth while, there are also those that don't. How do I know that mothers feel this way? Well for one thing you should have heard the conversation between the secretary and two mothers of teen patients in our pediatrician's office today. Their teenage children were clearly driving them nuts. One said her son suggested he live at home the first year of college and she said she couldn't fathom going through another year like the one he had just put her through.  Of course, like Moses, quitting parenting really isn't an option, not the right one anyway.  On occasion though, I myself feel like Moses coming down from the mountain, instead of heavy tablets I might be carrying laundry or bags of heavy groceries.  Looking up as I walk into the kitchen I see every possible dish out on the counter, leftover from an afternoon snack.  Perhaps two children are screaming at one another and I say to myself, "Are you kidding me?" I definitely have felt Moses' pain. 

To See or Not To See - That is the Question

The NY Times had a little article discussing the way people rush through art galleries, snapping pictures but often not lingering or actually enjoying or even seeing the art. It wasn't a scientific study but rather an observation by a museum goer at the Louvre.  He compared today's museum goer to the tourist of the 18th century who prepared for their trip by studying languages and reading books before going off to really explore art.  Now people, according to the writer, use their digital cameras or cell phone cameras to take pictures of paintings instead of actually looking at the originals.  Perhaps this also reflects a deeper absence of the discussion in society about art not just as beauty to behold, but as a refection of history, religion, social or political concerns.  If you don't stop to look at any of it how would you know?

I have been fortunate enough to be at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston  a few times over this past year, a luxury for me, I am serious it is.  Part of the reason we moved to this area from the beautiful mountainous West where we had been for 9 years, was to expose our family to more diversity and "culture." Since moving here we have tried to go with our family to the MFA and create a sense that observing art is a natural and fun experience to be had by all. The fact is it can be expensive for many and you have to be vigilant if you want to take advantage of free admissions etc.  and the actually getting there can be heard up and down our streets as a child or two yells out, "Not the art gallery! How about the children's museum?" Often with our children I create improvised scavenger hunts, for example; How many pictures have animals in them in this gallery? At least I get the feeling they are actually looking at the art and they seem to enjoy it.  I was really pleased the last time we went to see the kids actually pointing out Greek Gods and the Egyptian looking statue in Sargent's wall murals, that made me feel like some of the previous not so joyful visits and pushing them to even go to the MFA were finally paying off.  They were getting the looking, really looking can reap an enjoyable experience, or at least a stimulating one. 

But to be honest, those were my younger kids.  My sweet adolescent son has told me that he hates art galleries, a very broad statement that can only be appreciated when sitting across a table from the speaker.  We looked through an exhibit one Sunday comparing 3 Italian Renaissance artists, and I found him with his cell phone (texting, not even taking pictures!) on a bench near the exit of the exhibit.  When I asked him how he felt about the art, he said he found it kind of scary! The truth is some of the pictures on second glance did have some mighty fierce depictions from biblical stories.  How to transform this lack of seeing the historical, social, religious, political or just plan asthetic  wonder into meaning for him, or for anyone, involves making it applicable to something they can connect it with I think.  My son couldn't connect the biblical dots so to speak.  

 I think interaction with people and art has taken on a new dimension in our technological world.  Kids text more then they talk at times, viewers click more then look. I guess I wonder; Do you go to a gallery to say you've been, or to be changed on some level?  I myself have found great joy and have felt profoundly touched when, for example I was at the Van Gogh museum, without kids, in Amsterdam.   Looking at some of his paintings, knowing from reading that a specific one was done while he was hospitalized for mental illness gives one an insight into not only the source of his art but his soul.  I hope My own kids can experience this and not find themselves clicking instead of seeing art.

Ockam's My Guy

Who the Heck is Ockam?

My Man studies the Sun.  I don't mean he tans himself endlessly, nope, this guy makes calculations that can tell you when we're going to experience, not directly, solar flares. He doesn't talk about his work too much with me because I start to glaze over and ask dumb questions and that isn't good for a marriage.  Occasionally we find ourselves laughing hilariously as he talks and I nod and we both know full well he lost me at atmospheric magnitudes. The man is brilliant, and I don't think I'm a slacker, but in the area of solar physics I'm fuzzy at times.

This morning my man used a theoretical idea he called Ockam's Razor, in relationship to a paper he had written. I thought to myself, hey, shaving, I'm in, this I get. I should do it more then I do, but I'm a shaver. Now if you've never heard of Ockam that's OK, let me enlighten you. Ockam was a monk who lived and shaved in 13th century England, who, according to the Sun Man, was a philosopher.  Ockam's Razor essentially tells us that the simplest solution is the best!!  I'm sure there is more to it, but I don't want to overwhelm you. Imagine someone from 700 years ago being remembered for telling us something I've been saying for years to myself!  This got me thinking, what if I come up with something so original that in 700 years from now they will call it Kathleen's Spatula, or Kathleen's Floss?

 

At this moment in time I cannot think of one thing to get myself in the history books, but when I do blog readers, you will be able to say, I read her way back when.

PS: I adore my husband the Sun Man.