Todd’s Blog

Standing at the ticket counter on my way to San Francisco last week I overheard the following exchange between a man and the lady behind the counter:

” … what if I don’t drive?  You can’t require me to have a driver’s license, ” the man said.

The ticket agent said something softly about other forms of ID.

“This is not a fascist state.  I don’t have to show you my ID, ” he replied angrily.  Out of the corner of my eye I could see that she was uncomfortable, but keeping cool about it.

“Sir, we just need to see some form of ID.”

“This is fascism, ” he repeated.  “We’re living in a fascist state.  You have no right. ”

She remained calm, said nothing, and waited.

Seeing that she wasn’t going to budge, the man produced something for her and said, “I just want to inform you that you have no right to ask for my driver’s license.”

“And now you have, ” she replied.

The man went on his way and she turned to me.

“Do you have photo ID?” she said with a between-you-and-me smile.  I didn’t give her any trouble.

The guy was right, though.  They shouldn’t be able to treat every one like a terrorist or a criminal without cause.   But he was barking up the wrong tree.  He was venting his frustrations with the goverment at a person who was only doing her job.  His anger enacted no change, served no end.

The unfortunate possibility is that maybe she agreed with him wholeheartedly.  After all, he cannot have been the first enraged customer to voice that complaint, and considering the intelligence I saw in her eyes I imagine those complaints did not fall on deaf ears.  But she has a job to keep and bills to pay.  Maybe she gets up every day and dreads that she’ll have to bury her personal convictions and enforce laws and policies in which she does not believe.  And maybe she also dreads the wrath of those who would throw that in her face.

But probably not.

Logan has just recently started saying words that actually have meaning. Well, let me amend that : his words are starting to become coherent. He has been babbling in a conversational tone for a couple months now, apparently aware of what he is talking about while keeping everyone else in the dark. It never really seemed to bother him that our only responses to his insights were always “Is that so?” or “Really?”. This patronizing is sufficient encouragement for a little boy. Evan, I am sure, would be properly annoyed.

It is endearing to find that Evan and Logan are such good buddies. Evan adores his little brother and Logan worships Evan. Last week Evan spent a few of his vacation days with my parents while Jess kept Logan. Upon Evan’s return, Logan came running to greet him, squealing “Eckah, Eckah” (Evan) and then giving him a big hug. Then a few minutes later Logan waddled back over to Evan and rested his head on his shoulder.

And Evan treats Logan so well. Thursday morning Logan woke up a bit earlier than usual and immediately insisted on finding Evan. Well, Evan sleeps on a mattress on the floor of my bedroom right at Logan’s level. So Logan marched right in there and jumped on him. Instead of getting upset or irritable that he had been wakened so abruptly, Evan groaned a little and laughed. Then they wrestled and played in the sheets.

“I really want a sister,” Evan said to me the other day.

I chuckled.

“That’s not an easy thing to do there, Evan.  Making babies takes a lot of work.”

“But you could do it if you just came back and lived with Mom,” he replied softly, studying his feet and drastically changing the direction of the conversation.  He knew what he was saying.   It was one of those rare moments when you get your kid to really talk to you about  his feelings.

I didn’t know what to say, but I came up with, “It’s not really an option, bud.”

“It would be if you could just stop arguing with Mom.”

At this point I think Jess realized that we were talking about something pretty important, and she came over.

“What is this about?” she asked.

“I want you and Dad to live together again.”  It was an uncomfortable admission followed by an equally uncomfortable silence.

“Dad and I are happier this way, and it’s better for everyone.”

“But I was happy when you lived together.  If you guys could just stop arguing, you could live together again.”

There’s not much you can say to this.  You can’t educate a six-year old about the complexities of an adult relationship.  You can’t tell him that arguing is a symptom and not the cause.   In his eyes, the solution is obvious and simple: just stop arguing.  So he thinks we are being unreasonable and cruel, and we have to live with this impression of us.

“I just want a sister,” he repeated, and I think both Jess and I sighed in relief.  It was a question we could answer - the kind of innocent, naive question that you might expect from a six-year old.  Except now, at its heart, we knew what he was really saying.

“Babies are hard to make there, kiddo, ” I said with a bit of a chuckle.  “Let’s go eat.”

This is the kind of thing you record for posterity and for future embarrassment.

Evan came out of the bathroom the other day, naked as the day he was born and cupping his wee berries in his hand.

“Mom!” he said proudly, “I found my balls!”

Oh, to have no shame.

What a dangerous, mass-quelling device, the television.  It captivates us with its promise of mental sedation, and it quiets the voices in our heads.  We all have those voices - don’t deny it - but they’ve been given a sour reputation and labeled the mark of the insane.  They are the voices that tell us about ourselves and the people around us, and they are the voices that beg us to create, to produce, to think.  But television, no matter whether it is offering the latest reality show or the finest documentary, only asks us to consume.  We may learn a few things about people or history in the process, but how can we really apply that knowledge?

The fact is, we can’t.  Or rather, we don’t.  We’ll discuss the details of a show with friends the next day, and maybe it’s the avenue to deeper topics, but in general that experience is lost in a deluge of useless information.  We’ve consumed nothing but empty calories and therefore have nothing to show for it.

Lately, Evan has had an unhealthy fascination with the TV.  Maybe it’s just cabin fever or some other phase, but all he wants to do is sit and watch.  He has said, without shame, “The only thing that entertains me is TV.”  He has thrown fits when he is told he cannot have the television on while eating dinner, and he has rolled his eyes and complained that a show he is not interested in is boring and that we should be watching Spongebob or some other animated program.

Now, I have nothing against Spongebob.  The show is hilarious.  But you might be hard-pressed to find a timeslot in which it is not airing, and Evan can watch the same episode, back-to-back, several times in a row.  It’s mind-numbing.

Perhaps the most alarming symptom of this addiction is Evan’s complete disinterest in the things he usually likes to do.  He rarely touches his toys (a topic that I intend to touch on in another post), he easily loses interest in writing letters to Aris, and he has shown very little interest in coloring or doing anything creative.  To his credit he will sometimes amend his “TV only” stance to include books, but given the choice he will always choose a half hour in front of the TV over being read a “chapter book” or reading one himself.

So, for the most part, that choice has been taken away.  Jess and I are tired of Evan’s whining insistence that TV is his right, and we are particularly concerned about his inability to pull himself away from that hypnotic distraction.  As a possible solution, we have come up with a system whereby he can earn TV time (including video games and movies, but excluding time spent watching or playing with the family).  For certain behaviors that we want to encourage, such as getting up and going to bed on time, Evan can earn poker chips that are valued in minutes.  Different colors have different values, from 5 minutes (white) to 15 minutes (red) to 30 minutes (blue).  He gets 1 hour per day as a start, and can bank more through his deeds.  Chores he is responsible for performing receive no reward.  I have always been of the opinion that chores are something you do as a member of the household, and you do them because you are supposed to, not because you are paid to.

It is not as though I believe television to be the bane of humanity - I recognize that there are just times when you need to turn off your brain and absorb - but I think that habitually forgoing other, more productive activities in favor of TV fosters the kind of apathy plaguing our society.  When we gripe more about the writers’ strike than we do about the war, I think our priorities have been tragically skewed.

When you swallow gum, it’s like littering in your stomach, but when you swallow food you are supposed to, it is like putting seeds in your stomach, and they can grow into flowers.

–Evan (February 20th, 2008) 

On Saturday Evan and I set forth into the wilderness that is Camillus and attended the Split Rock Game Dinner at Aherin’s Pub.  The premise of this event is basically: if it’s legal to kill, it’s good to eat.

It was a packed venue, and quite a few heads turned with a smile to see Evan eager to try what most would probably turn their noses at.   And eager he was.  No matter what the meat, Evan was game, so to speak.  Venison, rabbit, walleye, wild turkey, rainbow trout, salmon, and even macaroni salad.  He tried a little of everything and seemed to enjoy it thoroughly.

Friday night I had asked him whether he wanted to go to Grandma’s house for a few hours while I went to the game dinner or if he would rather go with me.  He thought about it for a bit and said, “Well, I’ve never done that, so I guess I’ll go with you.”

What a great attitude.

Jess’s grandmother, Martha Weaver, died when she fell down the stairs in her home Sunday.

Martha was exactly what a grandmother should be.   She was sweet and irreverant at the same time, blushing at flattery or ribald humor while not being averse to swearing when it was warranted.  She loved her grandchildren and showed it shamelessly.  She was witty to the end.

Sometimes, when tragedy strikes, it takes the voice of innocence to remind us what we have left, and how we can cope.  When told that his great-grandmother had died, Evan replied, “But I still have them,” refering also to Harry, Martha’s late husband.

Not understanding, I said, “No, they are gone.”

“No, ” he said, pointing to his heart, “I still have them here.”

After several years of hosting wojtalewski.org from a computer that was old but full of gumption, I decided that I probably needed to just break down and pay for a service.  It’s not expensive when you look at the capabilities, and I don’t have to worry about making sure the thing is running.  I’m also able to register more domains this way, so when I get a crazy idea there are no real limitations except my own laziness, which is certainly a force of nature.

The old photogallery is up again (link not yet ready for the public), but I have to improve the look a bit before I’ll consider it ready for primetime.  I took down the forums because nobody really wants to look at that stuff, and because spammers are jerks.

There is still a lot of work to be done.  I’ve made my own page a subdomain of wojtalewski.org so that I don’t lay claim to being the only Wojtalewski on the web.

Feel free to comment.  If you can’t comment, let me know so I can fix it.

If you would die tomorrow, picture this:
Two faces you would have attend your side.
The first to ease your passing with a kiss,
The last to hear the wisdom you’d confide.

To choose the first, you look into your palm,
And find the heart in confidence you grasp,
The heart whose gentle thumping brings you calm,
Although it slips and shatters when you pass.

To find the last you’ll seek the hand that grips
Your heart, whose weakened pulses whisper songs
Of wisdom fading fast upon your lips,
To pass that wisdom where it now belongs.

Alas, cruel fate could have you die today,
So take your final kiss and have your say.

Sonnet of Tomorrow [2006-08-06] - Copyright © 2006 Todd Wojtalewski