Tag Archives: Teenagers

Summer Without Camp… by Steve Safran

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What all of us need this summer is a place for the kids to go where they can play, swim, and just be outdoors with their friends. A place with a lake, a baseball diamond, goofy songs and goofier crafts, paths through ancient pines… a place of their own.

They need summer camps. For parents trapped with school-aged kids, the need is bordering on desperation this year. And like so many of the things that could make any of this more bearable, they’re closed.

“Out of an abundance of love for everyone in our camp community, we cannot compromise the safety of our campers, teens, and staff … ” was written in a Camp Tel Noar email. Disappointed parents who had hoped their children would be able to trade Zoom screens for canoes in a few weeks opened similar messages. Tel Noar is a New Hampshire institution: a 75 year-old camp I attended as a kid from 1977-1981. It, along with Camp Tevya and Camp Pembroke are part of the Cohen Foundation camps, all three of which have announced they will be closed. This will leave them in serious financial trouble.

Summer camps don’t generally have endowments. Tel Noar (translation from Hebrew: “Youth Hill”) shared that they already “spent $3 million in facility maintenance, repairs, staff salaries, insurance (and) utilities.” At the same time they’re breaking the news that camp is canceled, they need to ask for donations to make up the shortfall. But, let’s face it, only a super-generous donor is going to mail the full tuition while their kids stay home. It won’t happen. Like some small colleges, a few of our beloved camps won’t survive.

However, summer camps are historically resilient, possibly because they are managed by people who provide a yearly respite from the worries of the world. Cape Cod Sea Camps in Brewster, MA is nearly 100 years old. It has seen its share of world-changing events: “Cape Cod Sea Camps has provided a camping experience every summer since 1922 and have held camp through the Great Depression, World War II, the polio epidemic and numerous other global events.”

But this year, even their cabins will be empty.

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Waterfronts are usually the hub of the summer camp experience 

In the overall scheme of world events that include a rising death toll of a global pandemic, canceling a season of camp isn’t at the top of the headlines. But it is heartbreaking for the thousands of children for whom camp life is an escape from their own world worries. It’s also a rite of passage, often the first time a kid tastes freedom and learns how to steer that privilege. Camp is where time does funny things, where the days go on forever, but it all ends too fast.

I had the joy of returning to Camp Frank A. Day in East Brookfield, MA last summer to teach podcasting, and it transported me right back to my counselor days in the mid-’80s. Everything was the same: the boathouse, the waterfront, the cabins, the dining hall– it was eternal and ruggedly beautiful. Teenage counselors haven’t changed, either, happily sharing the camp gossip once they realized I was one of “them.” I made new friends. Never before did grilled cheese and tomato soup evoke so many memories. Is there such a thing as “camp sandwich griddle grease” they order in bulk?

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Stevie teaching budding podcasters last summer

For the summer of 2020, Camp Day faced the same agonizing decision as their colleagues. The staff and its board debated, looked at the current environment, acted with the caution of the day, and emailed its community: ” …that there is too much uncertainty surrounding COVID-19 for us to confidently operate a safe and high-quality residential camp this summer.”

I still have friends from summer camp, friendships forged 40 years ago as we shared bunk beds and bug bites for only eight weeks of a handful of summers. Think about that. I’ve had co-workers whose names were forgotten after years in the same offices, if I ever knew them at all. But camp is different. It’s intense. Your bunkmates are your brothers. And the girls? So many firsts all crammed into the time it takes a ChiaPet to mature.

The first time I asked a girl to dance was at Camp Tel Noar. (It was followed shortly by the first time a girl rejected my offer to dance). The first “date” I had was at camp. I was nine. We had a field trip to Canobie Park and I asked Ellen G. if she would go with me. She was very nice. About halfway through our time there, I lost our ticket. It was a harbinger of dates to come.

Camp builds independence and the kind of self-confidence that emboldens a nine year old to ask a girl on a date. College shouldn’t be the first time a kid is really away, feels the pangs of homesickness, and learns to overcome that. Over the years, I became a happier kid at home from spending a summer in the woods.

All of these rites of passage and moments of joy and firsts are on hold. Camps that weathered wars and economic collapse have been felled by a virus. The waterfront will be still. The baseball diamond will remain pristine. The bunks, the dining hall, and the lake will be as still as they are in January.

Sound taps.

See you in 2021. I hope.

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Stevie (far left in the shorty-shorts and Hawaiian shirt) and his bunk on his first tour as a counselor.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Killing Grandma

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The children are beginning to break. Brodie is quoting from Joe Rogan podcasts and Teddy is suggesting we’re the last family on the block actually enforcing social distancing. They’re very tired of screens and…us. They are looking to adults for answers and assurances, and we don’t have them. With summer right around the corner, they fear this stunted life is going to drag on and on: a purgatory without restaurants or movies, spike ball or sleepovers. School is being overly optimistic (when they aren’t being completely cagey) and hints school in September. So if they’re going to be sharing desks and germs in the fall, why can’t they play videogames together in our basement now?

Friends, the because it could kill grandma argument has worn thin. The invincible teenager trope endures. We need a plan and real answers to the repeated question:

“When can friends come over?”

My kids have fantasized about having a “chicken pox party” emulating our own moms from the ‘70s who organized play dates with our spotty classmates so we would “get it over with.” They mused that if all teens purposely contract COVID-19 and become immune at least they could return to some sort of normalcy? In their fantasy no one gets particularly sick, goes to the hospital, dies, or inadvertently kills grandma. In this fantasy they’re also willing to sacrifice their friends with underlying conditions or other hidden and unknown risk factors. I guess. It’s just a fantasy where the invincible teenager trope is reality.

One of their friends is saving money to pay for his own antibody test, desperate for some proof that he should be allowed the free reign usually afforded high school seniors in the last marking period. The odds that any sort of tipping point of teens are antibody positive and immune are probably low; but then again, they were swapping pathogens freely until mid March and could have been asymptomatic. If we don’t test them, too, we won’t know. And because we don’t know, we’re acting out of the abundance of caution necessary in these unprecedented times—which they hear as “because I said so.”

So what do we do? Children sense hypocrisy and inconsistencies more keenly than my puppy hears the rustling of snack wrappers. Right now a reasonable person could ask why golf is allowed, but not tennis? As beaches and pools, restaurants and salons, summer camps and daycare centers open, it will get more and more difficult to justify why my kids cannot play NBA 2K on the same couch with their buddies.

SO WHAT DO WE DO?

As we move forward, we are going to need to be personally responsible for our own safety and for the havoc our kids might wreck on suppressing a second spike. Are you, or do you live with, someone who has risk factors that would predict a more severe or deadly course of COVID-19? You should probably continue to WFH if you can, limit grocery runs, hold off on social situations in confined spaces, and know if your kids are acting in less socially distant ways. If you feel like your nuclear family is at a lower risk, you might feel more comfortable getting that pedicure, braving the beach bar, or letting little Jenny’s friend sleep over. But a short week after we begin to do these things, a lot of us are going to get sick. And the ones who don’t know they’re sick–and are shedding virus all over the place– could easily be our kids.

Once we start doing normal things, we’re going to forget that the goal of social distancing was never to prevent us from contracting coronavirus at all… just not all at the same time. Basic psychology predicts that we’ll erroneously assign a lower risk of contagion among people we know. I mean, they’re our friends! No one has symptoms! But coronavirus is the honey badger of diseases: corona don’t care.

Parents are already allowing small, local quaran-teen groups, swear they are shielding them from the at-risk and elderlies, and trusting them to self-police a group with no assurances that it is COVID-19-free. Is this advisable? Low risk? Nope. And though it may be inevitable, the safety of this is pure fantasy. Also, though I love them deeply, teenagers lie all of the time. The children, and unfortunately permissive parents who let them share recycled air in rec rooms and basements, are going to push the boundaries of what is safe. Epidemiological models and tales of super-spreaders at clubs, cocktail parties, and churches predict that it only takes one asymptomatic carrier to kill grandma.

Even the strictest mandates won’t prevent everyone from contracting COVID-19: it’s too contagious. As those rules are lifted, it’s up to all of us to protect each other. Here’s what we’re suggesting for Summertime at the Lee House:

No hangouts inside. It is safer to meet up in the fresh air (on the deck, around a pool, in the backyard) where the likelihood of swapping spit droplets is minimal. Activities need to be limited to ones where they can stay 6 feet apart. Tennis? Yes. Spike ball? Riskier.

No car-pooling. If absolutely necessary, everyone is wearing a mask.

Chemo precautions. When I was in treatment, the kids had to change their clothes and wash their hands before they could see me. After (outside!) hangouts with their buddies, they need to decontaminate when they come indoors. Let’s be honest, teen boys need daily if not more frequent showers. They should also be carrying Purell in their pockets.

Honesty. This will be the tough one. Grandma & Pop Pop and A-Ma & A-Gong have been quarantining since early March and miss their grandsons. Right now we’d feel comfortable having them visit because the only place my kids have been is Zoom School. But if our boys aren’t honest with us about their own vigilance to social distancing and hygiene as opportunities arise, the elders cannot visit… not without risking killing grandma.

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My boys have already grown tired of me suggesting a walk on the beach as an activity… and it’s not even June. Good luck with your kids. xoxo

A message for young people: quit it, and stay home

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Dear Young People,

If you don’t kill us with your refusal to adhere to social distancing, we’ll all be hen-pecked to death by your annoying insistence on meeting up with friends. So quit it, and stay home.

The messaging that COVID-19 is less lethal to your age group–which is true, thank God– is being translated by some in your age group as “we won’t get it,” which is really really really untrue. Instead, because you have already been everywhere (school and sports and Starbucks) and with everybody (ditto) you’re carrying a risk of having contracted COVID-19 that is not zero. People your age are also more likely to walk around shedding virus while having no symptoms at all.

Some of you have become armchair epidemiologists and are manufacturing relative risk estimates based on positive COVID-19 reports in your area. Whatever you are guessing, you’re wrong. We aren’t testing enough people to know what the community penetrance is. Even if you arrived at the hospital right now and with the classic presentation (body aches, fever, cough, and fatigue), they wouldn’t test you for COVID-19 unless you were sick enough to be admitted. And though very few of you will get that sick, some of you will. Instead, you’re more likely to infect 2-4 people (that’s the R naught) every time you insist on going over to Emma’s.

Also, I don’t care what Emma’s family is allowing. Social distancing means you stay home. And if you have to go out–and let’s be honest, you don’t– you stay 6 feet away from other people. We’re also not buying your “I’ll go to the grocery for you” or “just gonna run up to Panera for a sandwich.” Children, please.

On Wednesday, I gave a COVID-19 overview to high school seniors who told me they hadn’t gotten much more information than, “wash your hands.” On Wednesday, which was just 72 hours ago, they didn’t entirely believe me when I told them schools would be canceled by the next day. I showed them graphs that prove how contagious COVID-19 is, and said out loud what no one is telling you: some of your grandparents will die if we do not slow its spread. You know what those kids aren’t doing now? They aren’t asking to go over to Emma’s.

Things might get grim, but right now you have an opportunity to help save lives by doing something you already love to do: stay home and play with your phone. Make some TikToks. Learn how to skateboard or practice your three-pointer. And armed with science (R naught! Homeschooling done for the day!), you can be an ambassador for public health just by telling your friends you’re not meeting up with them at Shake Shack.

Tell them to quit it, and stay home.

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Remember summertime when you didn’t know who these guys were? They are the definition of VIRAL. Related: the Hype House needs to be shut down. #socialdistancing

Mrs. Garrett

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Bow tie pasta with Vidalia onions sautéed with champagne and tomatoes; Marinated grilled chicken; Green salad with avocado and bacon, fresh herb vinaigrette

Beef stroganoff over egg noodles with grilled lemony asparagus

Three cheese tortellini with prosciutto, tomatoes, fresh herbs; Tuscan herb marinated steak tips

Grilled salmon (the good olive oil, S&P); Ina Garten’s corn salad with sherry vinaigrette

Breaded veal cutlets (lemon/egg bath), Linguini with red sauce; Green salad

Flank steak with soy ginger marinade; Pan-fried ramen noodles with shitake mushrooms and sesame caramelized onions; Cucumber salad with rice vinegar soy dressing

Burgers, every fixing, but absolutely pickles and Williams Sonoma Burger Bomb

Garlic ginger soy marinated pork tenderloin; Grilled, garlicky haricot verts and white rice

Chili lime grilled shrimp skewers

Vanilla French toast with cinnamon sugar, berries, syrup

New York crumble coffee cake

Toasted bagel with scrambled egg, pepper jack, honey ham

The best oatmeal cookies on the planet (because white chocolate and butterscotch chips)

Still warm brownies with vanilla ice cream

This is the rotating menu Chez Lee, and I’ve had anywhere from 2 to 9 teenagers in my house for breakfast, lunch, and/or dinner and dessert almost daily since the beginning of July. I’m Mrs. Garrett, running a boarding house for boys who are never not hungry.

And it’s awesome.

Summer is ending, as is my seasonal stint as a short order cook. And it is, indeed, short order. I am insufferably boastful about my ability to get a meal onto the table in 17 minutes. But the real gem of it all is the Family Dinner tradition that lends itself to fantastic conversation, often quite unguarded, as these kids break bread together. Something’s lost over a box of pizza. Scooping heaping mounds of bow tie pasta onto plates, fighting over the Asiago, and bargaining for the last steak tip or shrimp skewer is the backdrop for 100 discussions about girls (big time mysteries), horrible math, tennis triumphs and losses, embarrassing anecdotes from years past, and what movies can arguably be considered “classic.” (Not one of them has been on the planet more than 18 years, but they still think they have valid opinions, bless their hearts.)

The other moms have been checking in all summer to ask if I’m cool with them spending another night (and morning) around my dining table, and the answer is always, “Yes!” I love knowing where they are, what they’re doing, what they’re eating, and especially what’s on their minds. It’s a summer tradition that begins Memorial Day Weekend, and wraps up in only a few weeks. It’s already getting darker sooner, it’s chilly when a cloud passes, and the boys have begun talking about school, SATs, college visits, “Honors” this and “AP” that… and all the accompanying stressors.

Very wise (and equally beautiful) Sarah, who was the church school director for a generation of lucky kids, offered this sage advice when my boys were little and I was blissfully unaware of what parenting teens would entail:

Sometimes it’s our job to provide the space where the stress is lifted. Sometimes that meant we told our girls that no one was doing homework, and we were going out to dinner together.

Just because everyone is vying for competitive team spots and Ivy League acceptances doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck for them. I’ve watched an amazing kid with an already incredible SAT score study hours a day all summer in an attempt to inch up to the 99%ile… and no one is telling him not to do this. It’s not surprising that some of these kids are already burned out before they get to the quad. Probably I was a less motivated high school student, or maybe things were easier then, but I’m worried about these kids, these boys around my dining table. I feel protective of their youth.

Here at the Lee’s, summer is for talking and eating and being together. And though the shortening days and faded hydrangeas mean it’s time… there is still time for a bit more grilling, laughing, negotiating for the last brownie, and introducing these kids to Spicoli. There are a few more days to protect the space where the stress is lifted, where meals are shared. Just a few more moments for them to memory bank a time when we require very little of them… before we inevitably ask them to be perfect again.

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Dinnertime at the Lee house… 

 

Parenting 2.0… the hyperventilating torture of the teen years

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Little kids, little problems… big kids, big problems. The sage parents of teenagers told us this. While we wondered if our little ones would ever wipe their own butts or fall asleep without 10 stories, 3 drinks of water, and the theme song to Pepa Pig, they had bigger fish in the fry pan. Those parents had sympathy for us, sure. But there was a wistful nostalgia for these sorts of complaints. I wrote plenty about the sweet spot of parenting when I was in it. And though I love these budding bursting embarrassing distracted delusional occasionally noble and often lying humans, they’re exhausting.

We’re taking the radical honesty approach to parenting. My own parents put forth hard rules and likely knew we were lying to them. How often does the movie reel “break?” I wonder why they let us keep throwing good money at a theater that couldn’t get us home before curfew. But while our own teens dip toes in the deep end of teenage shenanigans, we prefer they tell us what is happening. But they won’t. Not entirely. Who does?

The smaller sins are merely annoying. Anyone who has let more than a handful of high schoolers into the basement knows the tell tale stench of vaping. Their burgeoning nicotine addiction means that any room they leave smells like grape bubble gum, stale cupcakes, or sickly sweet mint (that they swear is from chewing gum).

“Ugh, at least we looked COOL smoking actual cigarettes,” I tell them. I’ll call them out for spewing toxic vapor into our shared spaces, make them turn on the air filters, and remind them that they’re not fooling anybody. They’ll give me the usual deflections and excuses like I wasn’t at least 43% naughtier at their ages. I recall how my sister and I got away with murder, but our younger brother (likely smarter than the two of us together) was wildly incompetent at subterfuge and got caught all of the time. Odds are (hopes are?) my own teens are taking after Uncle Patrick.

“Did you ever sneak out of the house?” Brodie asked. You bet. Back in the ‘80s, few parents in the ‘burbs set up elaborate house alarms with doors and windows that beep beep beep. I met up with my girlfriends to share a furtive Marlboro Light, or made romantic plans to rendezvous with my boyfriend under a moonlit sky. Those were magical moments of borrowed time in the peak of youth. Looking back with the lens of a teenage parent, I see a too young girl risking lung and Lyme disease and sexual assault. How lucky that cigarettes are gross and took a substantial commitment to yield real addiction, and that my boyfriend was probably more scared than I was to make any sort of mileage on the old baseball metaphor.

Keeping me up at night are the larger mistakes with huge, life altering consequences. We’re excitedly reluctant to let our kids drive. Are we really giving large machine operating privileges to half formed people that still spill and leave doors unlocked and socks everywhere? Though we (okay, mostly I am) constantly harping about consent and the role of boys to protect all girls everywhere, in the moment does a teenage libido override all sense (and their mother’s voice)? Is the sharing of salacious gossip (or videos!) too tempting? Will they begin to, or ever, weigh risks and outcomes before actions? Am I expecting far, far too much from their mushy frontal lobes? SHOULD WE START HOMESCHOOLING. Raise your hand if you considered locking up your teens until they turn 21.

Recently, a pair of wise physicians of kids on the “other side” of parenting spoke with candor of the random drug tests and mandatory meetings with the Discipline Committee invoked by the actions of their then high schoolers. (God bless the parents who share these stories.) Another mom described her delightful, accomplished adult daughter like this: “She was unlikeable and awful from age 14 until last year.” I’m full of dread and anxiety about what comes next. Or maybe that’s just the pseudoephedrine coupled with the pot of coffee I swallowed while in full Mom Mode dropping wisdom on my teen that is likely landing on deaf ears and against a please-let-this-be-over closed door. If my boys are going to make mistakes (and they will), it will not be because I didn’t lay down the knowledge. Aside from locking them up and homeschooling, it’s all I’ve got.

Brodie has never been more excited to exit the house and go to tennis practice. I don’t blame him. Mom advice is invasive, embarrassing, obvious, unhelpful, trite, and irritating. Once a carefree Marlboro Light puffing teen swapping spit with boys on golf courses, I became the happy go lucky mom who enjoyed her sons’ adorable idiosyncrasies as they earned As and navigated nothing worse than the inevitable heartbreak of team sports and fickle friendships. Now all I can think about is Father Mike Dangelo’s motto for caring for these almost adults: “No life lost or created on my watch.”

In the end, I’ll need to trust my kids. They’re good kids, and if we paved the path and put up clear signage, certainly they’ll go in the right direction? (I can actually hear the snort laughs of seasoned parents just writing that.) As we navigate this next phase of parenting– the teen years– we’re also grappling with how tremendously stupid we were at that very age, how incredibly uncool our harpy warnings are to unsuccessfully thwart inevitable mistakes, how old this makes us feel in a way that crows feet and creaking joints cannot. As my kids stumble into adulthood, I admit that I thought this would be easier. Blaming an Internet-obsessed world for the shortcomings of our children feels like a cop out, and tolerating transgressions and exercising forgiveness are action verbs harder than any spin class. When once I wanted to fast forward to years when they wouldn’t need post poo help and could sleep until noon, now I’m wishing away the years until they can (legally) share a glass of Prosecco with me and confess all of the (minor) sins we never caught. Until then… no life lost or created on our watch… we pray.

 

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Cold and Hot

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The biggest compliment I ever get is, “Hey, write something again, already.” Actually, it’s not the BIGGEST compliment. That one is awarded to a certain teenager who thinks his charm will be compensated with unlimited egg sandwiches and brownie sundaes. “Britt… have you lost weight?” Sit down, kiddo, I’ve got steaks for dinner. A similar kindness was delivered during Curriculum Night Cocktail Hour, which is a thing… a very good thing. Sweet, funny, cool, brilliant Michelle reminded me that I have this little virtual journal over here that’s been languishing in the back-to-school hubbub. Michelle encouraging me to write was a compliment, indeed… and she’s not even expecting egg sandwiches.

And now I find myself with some time. I’m currently shivering in a Chicago hotel room waiting for my thermostat to win the battle against refrigerated public spaces. I loathe air-conditioning nearly as much as spin class. Even air travel is a dreaded, trapped eternity where we are squeezed into small spaces and kept chilled like Diet Cokes in a Coleman. As I wait for the room temperature to approach room temperature, I’m fondly reminiscing about my last hot yoga class. Yes, exercise and “fondly” in the same sentence. That is how much I love being hot.

Vinyasa flow landing on Yom Kippur meant most of a local high school girls soccer team could trade Trig and turf to downward dog with a room full of moms who take this class for far more frequent, physical atonement. We couldn’t help ourselves from asking them who they were. It’s unusual to see physically perfect teenagers with high ponytails and borrowed mats at the 9:15 class, filling our quiet sanctuary with poorly stifled giggles and chitchat. But goodness, they were beautiful: bursting with youth and vigor and everything-ahead-of-them-ness. It was hard not to stare at them, harder still to not want to be them for just one humidified hour in clingy clothes. Finally, places were found, the room quieted, the yogi said his ridiculous yogi things (fodder for another post), and class began.

And the girls… those toned and tanned and lovely girls… they SUCKED. And it was delightful. They were inflexible and off balance, mock chagrined and truly embarrassed. Their make-fun-of-this stage whispering we could all hear was another bonus. Young pretty soccer girls were flailing and falling and flummoxed by exercises minivan moms and AARP cardholders do regularly, with ease. There was sweet beauty in that. I wondered if the other 9:15 regulars were having similarly ungenerous, stay-in-your-lane thoughts as we toweled off in shared spaces. Or, maybe other people who do yoga aren’t horrible people. But it was my favorite power hour ever… even with the far too many ohms at the end.

I hope all of us went back to closets and mirrors and scales with a little more kindness toward our (older) selves. How odd to look through the eyes of girls in their own physical prime and find ourselves elevated in the comparison, if for only one morning on a hot mat. It’s a big enough compliment to reward yourself with an egg sandwich. Bagel. Extra cheese.

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One of the reasons I do hot yoga…

FREAK US OUT… a message to our awesome teenagers, by Steve Safran

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We have heard from our secondary principals that many of our students have reached out to them to collaborate on how best to address the student desire to walk out and express their opinions but do so in a safe manner… We are proud of our student leaders at all levels for the collaborative, thoughtful advocacy they have demonstrated.

This planned walkout, as we see it, is the “lab” experience for the teaching and curriculum we bring to our students. Teaching our students how to lead, think, propose ideas, disagree and take respectful and forceful action on issues is what we do; our students are indicating to us that they have learned and want to take action.

– Massachusetts Town Email to Parents

 

This is nonsense.

As a parent, I don’t want an email from my town explaining– in much longer detail than above– how a school-condoned walkout from classes will be arranged. I don’t want the town organizing with students. I don’t need a “heads up” that my kids are going to walk out of class.

I want them to get up and go.

Where goes youthful rebellion if it’s into the arms of those against whom they are rebelling? This is an angry generation and they have every right to be. They’re being shot at in their schools. We have let them down. We have failed to protect them in what should be a sanctuary. Don’t ask us for permission. The school is on fire and we’re offering you a hall pass for the water fountain? No wonder you’re pissed. (No wonder nothing has changed.)

I’m all for young rebellion. That’s what our country is about; it’s American in the best kind of way. Lobby for change, and let the marketplace of ideas decide. I take no issue with student protest and, in fact, I support it. At Wayland High in the ‘80s, we’d “walk out” in order to demand soda machines. IT’S NO JOKE! WE WANT THE COKE! IT’S OUR RIGHT… TO HAVE A SPRITE! (This may explain why my parents transferred me to private school, where I was once sent home for not having a close enough shave.) As a conservative, wholehearted support of youthful protest might seem out of character. As an anti-gun, pro-choice, anti-religion-in-schools, pro-women’s-rights, free-trade, anti-Trump conservative, however, these days I guess I’m what’s known as a “Democrat.”

But you can’t stick it to the man if the man sends gentle emails with sentences like, “We support this and find it a fine learning experience and we’re going to make it a lab.”

A lab?

Way to take the fun out of it, grown-ups. I officially protest the administration’s support, and will occupy their building. I will, of course, be alone, as the administrators will be outside, patting themselves on the back for being progressive as they make sure students do not wander outside of the “designated protest area.”

Personal politics aside, I think most of us recognize that this generation is creative in ways we do not understand. They are seriously skilled. I mean it– they really are. They make movies and music better than any big screen scene from the ‘90s… and they make them on a device in their hand. The best these Internet, gaming, and video wizards can do is…  walking out with permission? That might make Grandma and Grandpa Hippie sentimental, but today’s teenagers can do better.

Here’s my message to them: don’t walk out, freak us the fuck out. We’re 50. We get spooked by a 1% drop in our IRA. We’re easily panicked. You’re going to need to scare the status quo out of us. Be creative, make movies, share them with your zillion followers. Show us you’ve got more game than a supervised walkout. Take a page from your ‘60s forefathers and put a tech twist on it. Walking into a field while the principal says “Yes. Good. You get an A in civic engagement studies” sure as hell wouldn’t have ended any war. A VR vision of what it’s like to be helpless as you are slaughtered in your own homeroom, even as you have a gun that’s useless against an attacker’s armor? Now we’re talking. Get coding.

Me? I hate the damn guns. I truly believe this is the generation that will do something about it. Every generation that grows up in fear is the one that brings about change. We hated the day-to-day worry of nuclear annihilation. Anti-nuke protestors took to the streets, while conservatives encouraged Reagan just to spend the Soviets into oblivion. Whatever your macro-political view, it worked. The people who grew up watching their older brothers and classmates die in Vietnam put an end to that. These teens have grown up watching a non-stop war and “Hamilton.” They KNOW they can do something. And they’ll probably make it catchy.

So protest, kids. Skip class, but take the detention. You can’t change the world if you can’t take the hit. Don’t walk into a field and hold a sign. March in the streets. Go to state capitals. Make and share videos that answer the NRA like the Parkland Students did so poignantly and slyly. Be subversive. You have the tools to out-media the media. You can podcast and VR-simulate and disseminate your message virally. You can be so much more creative than we can imagine (we still don’t understand SnapChat stories). Where justified fear and anger meets youthful peak creativity is where change happens. We’re watching. We’re listening.

So go ahead. Freak us out. That’s how you change the world.

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United, they stand. #NeverAgain

Two More Days

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TWO MORE DAYS.

That’s it. I can make it. Belated birthday dinner with high school besties tonight, a final Friday to kill with Bernie, and then we will make our way down to JFK to birddog the airport and wait for our not-so-little kids to disembark. I hope my in-laws don’t let them travel in these tees:

 

Boys in Tees

Somehow, these were approved purchases.

The boys asked if we could just drive home to Boston immediately. Even though it will be 11pm on a Saturday night in NYC, they don’t want to waste one minute getting back to their beds and computers and stuff. I don’t blame them. Plus, they’ll feel like it’s lunchtime, so the first stop will be to place a huge order for chicken nuggets and fries. I cannot wait. I CANNOT WAIT.

I’m itching to hear their stories, study their faces, and squeeze their taller bodies. Veteran camper moms have already told me the first blush of reunion affection fades quickly, as boys are always hungry, can’t find anything ever, and have poor aim. But honestly, I haven’t felt I CANNOT WAIT excitement this strongly since I was engaged. These Lee boys have a hold on me.

Darling April invited me over last week, in a sort of typical text exchange for us:

Her: What are you doing now? Want to come over here?

Me: COMING.

I was there in, like, 20 min. Her kids, who have known mine since none of them could do multiplication, ran out of the house to greet me. Will pummeled me with a bear hug, Bryan enveloped the two of us, and it was everything I needed. God, I love them. Also, April’s kids–always sporty and healthy and vibrant—become a bit Greek God-like in the summertime: blond streaks, tan muscles, over-tall and strong and gorgeous. They’re also really interesting, kind, funny humans. Teenagers who are still willing to talk to adults are the absolute best, and possibly the antidote to any world-is-going-to-hell-in-a-handbasket feelings.

I’d love to write about her kids more… how one of them is navigating the choppy waters of dating in a heart-warming way that would make you want to pen five paragraphs. But those aren’t my stories to tell. What I can write is this: that evening with those great kids, and the multitude of texts and messages and emails from all of you to tell me you understand how I’m feeling right now… THANK YOU. It helped.

Although I’m missing my kiddos in a they-are-tied-to-my-soul way, I have truly enjoyed life with just Bernie. This preview to a future where our boys have their own lives isn’t so bleak… because Bernie is the best. (I’ll wait while you throw up in your mouth a little bit.) We might have already known this, but we really do still like each other—which is different from love and just as important. We have enjoyed oodles of evenings binge-watching excellent Netflix programming, eating great food, and just, you know, talking.

Two more days. And tonight: a reunion with my best friends from high school—the ones who know all of my stories and secrets. After catching up on the present (and sharing presents—a tradition we’ve never stopped), we’ll certainly bang away at the past. Thirty years of friendship, but we’ll still giggle about stuff that happened in 1988 like it was yesterday. And now my own kids are at the precipice of the whole titillating, scary, weird, awkward, embarrassing, basement-groping, how-far-will-this-go journey of the teenage boy. Eeek! I hope they have friends like these to navigate it.

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I love us. 

Do you also feel like you were 17 just a few years ago? The days are long but the years are short, as they say. Two more days without my kids is an eternity, but vividly rekindled memories from a teenage past prove it all goes really quickly. At this point in life, there is so much to look back on with sighs, smiles, tears, and the occasional face-palm. There’s also a near equivalent amount to look forward to (with the same reactions) for our kids. I think this might be the sweet spot, and I feel guilty for wishing away any of this time instead of savoring it. And I’ll get back to that. In two more days.

I CANNOT WAIT.

 

 

 

 

Lisa’s Birthday

Posted by Britt in Uncategorized and tagged with , , ,

December 16th is Lisa’s birthday. Lisa is my forever friend from age 14. We talked every single day from 1986 when I moved to her school until our graduation day in 1989… and many after that. An early winter birthday meant Lisa was a full half-year older, which was huge in the teenage timeline. When we met on my first day at the new school, I knew she had the skinny on all sorts of things from bangs to boys– possibly even banging boys. Lisa knew stuff.

“No no no, don’t sit next to those guys… come over here,” she waved with a smile and a laugh, and absolutely no concern for “those guys.”

And I knew we’d be close right from the get go. We had both erased “Yaz” into our canvas-covered binders and matched our Mia ballet flats to our sweaters. Her expertly applied Maybelline played up her clear blue eyes that complemented her perfectly permed and scrunched brown locks. Lisa was sexy. (Still is.) Every teenage girl should have a Lisa, unless she is a Lisa, in which case she might need a Britt. Lisa pulled me out of my middle child good girl persona to experiment with rules, limits, beer (blech), boys, and hair products.

One boring day in high school, Lisa convinced Scott (a senior!) to lend us his Jeep and me (with a study hall and easy-to-evade science teacher) to skip. The fact that Scott let two unlicensed girls drive his very cool Jeep off campus during a school day is testament to what boys will risk for the slimmest possibility of nookie. After spritzing ourselves with perfume at the mall and pretending to be college kids at the McDriveThru, I started wondering if we should head back to school. Lisa reminded me that I was a straight A student, would never get caught, that I’d never get into trouble anyway because I was so blonde and smart and good, and then drove directly to the curb at my house and started honking the horn.

See? Your mom isn’t even going to come out of the house. And even if she did, she’d never think it was you in the car. Because you are AT SCHOOL. Can’t be you. Relax.

And so I did. Pulling myself out from under the dashboard and pulling away from my driveway, we opened all of the windows and let out primal screams of joy and youth and freedom. And then we returned Scott’s Jeep, took our respective buses home, and immediately called each other on the phone to re-live the day and discuss how Scott was cute but, like, eww, not like that. Poor Scott.

As I watch my dearest friends’ daughters grow tall and gorgeous, I wonder if they’re a Britt or a Lisa or one of “those guys.” Can I even hope that they have the confidence of Lisa as a high school freshman? Never giving a shit about “those guys” and always completely certain she could sweet talk a boy out of his car, or anything else? This is how I want these girls to sashay through the halls of high school. But who knows this at such a young age? How do we infuse our daughters with an unshakable sense of their worth and power?

Maybe we should share our Lisa stories—the ones that reveal we didn’t always make the best choices, but that they were our own. The scariest and most fragile moments of youth can happen at the whim of thoughtless others when girls do not realize they have superpowers. Friends like Lisa would never let them doubt or forget their smarts and beauty and youth and abilities. Friends like Lisa make sure our co-conspirators for any bit of afternoon naughtiness are the ones who know us best and love us most.

Today is also the dreaded Cancer-versary, but this year I remembered it was Lisa’s Birthday first. It’s a Lisa-versary! Instead of succumbing to the seasonal blues associated with this calendar date, I’m taking a moment to remember how Lisa has always made me feel pretty, powerful, and fun. Years later she also showed me that breast cancer couldn’t take that away, either. Through her own treatment, recovery, and aftermath Lisa still approached life with a joyful passion like few others. With one in eight of us in the Shittiest Sorority, the odds weren’t entirely unlikely that we’d grow up to be cancer-ed in exactly the same way. Fitting somehow that my older, wiser buddy would get the skinny on it first. I was the physician, but Lisa knew stuff. She sent me a box of hats, socks, chocolates, and notes that were a perfect balm to the terror of the time.

Happy Birthday to my kind, crazy, sexy, wise, and hilarious friend. May all of your daughters be blessed with a Lisa—unless she is a Lisa—in which case… lucky you.

Lisa and Britt

Lisa and me… with all of our original parts… prom 1989