Are We Too Safe?

I feel like I don't understand many things that seem to have happened over the 14 (yikes) years since I graduated from high school. I know I've talked about this before, but times have changed. Every generation has probably said that at some point, but I feel there's something particularly relevant about that concept these days. The overexposure to people we have gained from social networking sites in addition to the continued wave of hypersensitive parenting styles, have made what I consider to be a larger than average stride between myself and younger crowds.

People have every right in the world to raise their kids in whatever manner they see fit, so long as they are not putting that child directly in harm's way. The downside of that idea is when a parent makes a decision for their child with every good intention in the world, and it catches on so rapidly that society takes a seemingly harmless idea and forces the world to change around it in a harmful way.

The other day, a friend posted a picture on his facebook page. He, his wife, and their roughly two year old boy had taken some professional family photos. In one of the pictures, he was holding his son upside-down while he and his wife were kissing. Their boy had that kind of kid-smile that is infectious. It was a very sweet picture, but it wasn't long before comments started flying about holding his child upside-down. How it was very dangerous and to consider what might have happened if he was dropped! Then came the attacks on the two of them as parents, of course from total strangers.

Look, if you as a parent decide that it's unsafe to toss your child into the air and let them fall into your arms, or lock hands with them and spin around in a circle, or dip your child upside-down, that's completely your business. Quite frankly, if you hear laughter coming from inside my house during the day I'd caution you to stay out since there's a pretty high chance something like that is happening right at that moment. A higher level of caution when it comes to your kids does not make you a better parent than someone with a little more flexibility in that area. It also does not guarantee your kids unlimited protection from harm. More so, having an opinion on something doesn't mean that every needs to bend to your view, and offering your opinion of what is "safe" is not the same as some blind rage comment on how people who differ from your view are wrong.

So what then? Do we need to put bubble wrap over every object in the house? Ban the sale of tables with pointed instead of rounded corners? How long are we going to hear about Steve Irwin's son feeding crocodiles before we're able to be okay that he's someone who is growing up in a zoo with this lifestyle? Interesting to me, as I grew up in Florida just miles away from an entire park where young kids can come face to face with giant alligators for a price. Safety is really a frame of mind. I, for example, feel much more safe in a car than an airplane though statistics tell me planes are the way to go. So how safe are we? Too safe?

Something bugged me during a recent online search for a trampoline. One of William's favorite movies is the newest "Winnie the Pooh" and while he certainly loves that willy, nilly, silly old bear, Tigger has inspired him to fill moments of his day with bouncing. I'm happy to join in, but that can only last for so long. So I thought, "Hey! He'd bounce for hours on a little trampoline!" A short time into my search I saw this little bundle of joy: http://www.walmart.com/ip/IronKids-Inspiration-250-Fitness-Playground-Metal-Swing-Set/16451443

I love how hard they work to imply that this is not just some fun plaything. It's a fitness center! Complete with fitness slide! Better still is the level to which they have gone to convince people that it's safe. You're basically leaving your child to play with a cloud, while on a cloud. Everything is beautifully soft, rounded, contoured, and padded. There are nets to protect you from swinging too far off course. Best of all, the trampoline has a safety bar! Nothing says, "Have fun kiddo!" like a bar on a trampoline designed to restrict your movement and bounce height. Isn't that why trampolines like this were invented? No springs to pinch skin, seemingly impossible to hit any part of the frame, and better shock absorption than most off-road vehicles. Still fun? Of course, but look at the cost of all that peace-of-mind.

We spend so much time worrying about our kids. Parents try to teach these little life lessons, but learning to pick yourself up is something often overlooked. For a time, William realized that the threat that he might be hurt would get attention. This led to fake injuries with fake emotional responses, something we then had to learn to ignore. When a child is learning to walk, falling is part of that process. Eventually the training wheels need to come off the bike, and falling is part of that process, too. What is it Dory says in Finding Nemo? "Well, you can’t never let anything happen to him. Then nothing would ever happen to him. Not much fun for little Harpo."

Odd that after writing this, I wake up to several announcements regarding this: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-57493536-10391704/bumbo-baby-seats-recalled-again-over-risk-of-falling-skull-fractures/

So perhaps there's a sound logic to a company providing over-the-top safety precautions when there are parents out there who will simply ignore the most basic rules. Even if they are printed out for them, three times. Clearly there needs to be some middle ground established on this matter, and you just can't account for people who will be brazenly careless with their children. We used a Bumbo for a while, it went on the floor and was surrounded by carpet and blankets to fall on. We have knives in the kitchen, we keep them out of their reach.

...and when I buy some little trampoline for William, I won't be telling him to keep the bounces under two inches. Aerosmith taught me to live on the edge.

The Blame Knight Rises

Tragedy happens far too often.

------------------

I went to midnight showings for two movies. The first was the release of episode one of Star Wars. I did that completely legit. I waited in line for hours, I got my tickets, I saw the movie, I went home and cried for a few hours about how bad it was. The second time was for the first Lord of the Rings movie. A friend who was the manager of the theater got me in for the employee viewing.

I never got into the idea that seeing a movie sooner made it better. Maybe that's why I don't understand why people think it's cool to say "First" in comment sections of...everything. I don't like lines and I hate feeling like my personal space bubble has been popped forever. I think I understand why other people do it, and why some choose to dress up as characters from the movies, but it's not for me. If it were possible, I'd love to go and always be alone in the theater or just have a few friends with me. Perhaps that's why lately we tend to wait for the DVD release, or even the TV premier.

------------------

I have wanted to write a little on some current topics that have been floating around lately, and the shooting in Aurora is one of those topics. I'm still very new to blogging and sometimes I get the urge to run before walking, but something told me that people were going to be popping out write ups pretty fast. I guess I didn't realize how quick that would happen. The morning after the shootings, as more and more information was making itself public, many bloggers were clacking away at their keyboards, salivating over being the first one to click publish on their post. As a steady outflow of posts began to make it's way on to my twitter feed, I was reminded of a time when I was young. I was maybe ten or eleven and one of the neighborhood kids and I were having ourselves a heated little argument. Since I was so young at the time, I assume it was about which was better - bomb pops or orange push-ups. As the tension rose to the point of emanate fighting, I started to lose it a bit. I was so angry that everything I said was utterly stupid and made no sense at all. I would get my words out of order, and everyone watching would laugh, adding to my frustration of trying to explain how upset I was getting.

It doesn't matter what happened afterward, for the point of what I'm saying here is reacting to anything at your highest point of anger doesn't work. Reacting to things before you really know what's going on is dangerous, and desperately rushing to react at all will often leave you stumbling so bad that you lose the entire point of what you wanted to say.

I can't say if anyone regrets their knee-jerk posts or if they feel compelled to add or subtract from their statements. I will say that I was really disappointed with the theme of posts that were pumping out before the dust had even settled inside the theater.

Not surprising, it was all about who to point the finger at.

Blame Hollywood. Blame Warner Brothers. Blame Democrats. Blame Republicans. Blame the guy's parents. Blame local police. Blame the theater. Blame the people who were inside the theater.

I saw posts that encouraged blame to almost everything in the world with the exception of the whack job who found himself pointing a weapon at innocent people. It oddly reminded me of this post from Bekki at Chasing Supermom. I was hopeful that someone would just tell people to call off the dogs. I was concerned that amidst this outpour of grief from a small town, so many people sitting comfortable in their chairs sipping coffee, took to the internet to scream at each other, and I really wanted it to stop. Don't get me wrong, I saw compassion on that day. I saw messages of love and sorrow because in general, these horrible things tend to bring out the best in some people. Some people.

Sadly, many of these posts became a feeding ground of comments and finger pointing. Many people noted the baiting headlines and subject matter. As I stated, I'm new to the blogging world, and perhaps I'm just not sly enough to realize that if I really want people to read my work, I need to use titles like "Women are stupid," "Shut up women, there's a man about to talk," or "10 reasons why men are just better at everything ever." I find it a little sad that there's a need to resort to trick tactics in the blogging arena to become "popular" but perhaps that's why I don't get many views each day (be on the lookout for my post next week: "You, yes YOU, don't know how to do ANYTHING cause you are a DUMMYHEAD!").

-------------------------

I'm going to close this with a story from my recent camping trip. A friend of mine received some heart wrenching news while we were on the trip. A troubled co-worker had killed himself. I've been in his shoes before, and watching him go through the instant pain of hearing the news was hard and brought up some of my own memories of dealing with that type of loss. In the middle of so much pain, it seems to be the natural human response to reach out for something to blame. A way to put an image in your mind of where to direct all the anger. The question of "why" becomes a sort of quest, as if the answer will make everything better. We talk about how we would have done things so differently, so much better, and so much smarter. We talk about our own adversities and how we've managed to overcomes them and be so well adjusted. I think we do this to distance ourselves; to pretend that in our world, tragedies of such a horrible nature never happen. We're all very smart and in control of our lives. Reality is normally much more simplistic than the worlds we see in movies. It's supposed to be. Movies are meant to offer a place of joyful escape be it thrilling adventures in space or spontaneously finding true love in a diner, but our lives are no more Gotham City than they are Mayfield.

Blame won't bring anyone peace. I would offer instead the idea that when tragedies like this arise, it is a great time for thoughtful conversation, not angry ramblings. It's a great time to remind yourself of the people you love and the need to make your time with them special. It's a great time to try and push forward, not stand still and scream. This tragic shooting, and situations like it, are not rational, and they are not carried out by rational people. Trying to connect the dots of "why" is a long, unending road because you won't find reason where it doesn't exist.

I doubt anyone who I took note of as a person who felt they had the entire situation figured out during a time when many news organizations were still using the term "alleged shooting," actually reads my tiny blip of internet. However, many people read their blogs, and from time to time that includes me. I have to say, sometimes the successful people in any given field, suck.

Seriously, the fact that people were writing hateful, insensitive, blame-crazy things to those who had just lost loved ones, including kids...is disgusting. No one deserves that.

True Fear

"True Fear." That's how Melissa described our morning yesterday on her facebook page. Less than 24 hours after having a great compliment about how amazing we are as parents we found ourselves scared, standing with our mouths open, wide-eyed, and our hearts racing. Why? William had a little adventure time last night.

We have many of these door knob locks around the house. There's a certain level of comfort to them, but in all honesty, they are easy to bypass. With enough of a pull, the two halves will disconnect exposing the door knob and you're a twist away from freedom. William figured that out last night. We learned this as we were snuggled up on the couch watching some evening TV before Melissa turned in for her early bedtime. We were talking and trying, as usual, to clear some of our shows from the DVR, when up strolls William as calm and normal as he would at any point during the day. This, however, was not during the day! William was supposed to be in bed, and the knob safety device was supposed to be keeping him in his room.

We escorted him back upstairs to find the separated halves of the safety lock on the floor. I snapped everything back into place, double checking that it was connected correctly. We said our good night, after explaining that he needed to stay in his room and it was not safe to just run around on his own like that. After ten minutes, Melissa looks upstairs to see William going back and forth between his room and ours. We decide to up the level of protection. I once again attach the "safety lock" and additionally added a safety gate outside his door, hoping that if he decides to get the door open again, he'd be defeated by the gate in the way.

Long after Melissa had gone to bed, William had made no apparent attempt to escape and I decided to call it a night. I peaked into his room once more and found him sleeping soundly which always brings a smile to my face.

I have two alarms in the morning. One goes off as a reminder to make sure Melissa is up and getting ready to leave for work. Hey, sometimes even the best of us have a hard time waking up. The second is my time to start the wake up process and goes off right around the time Melissa is leaving the house. My second alarm began to ring as Melissa was leaning in to give me a kiss goodbye. We're as adorable as two puppies hugging three puppies. She opened the door and began to say something, but was interrupted by William running into the room with a very big smile on his face. Something else was on his face as well. Dirt?

The first thing to note here is that we were greeted by William who was happy and fine, so perhaps the second thing to note is that we were somehow greeted by William! I shot up out of bed with visions of poop-smeared walls or broken items in the house. The reality was much more terrifying. As I entered the hallway, the first thing I saw was the "safety gate" pushed out of the doorway. Let me be clear, I may not be the guy that the ladies want to see shirtless on the beach, but from hours of practicing drums I do have some arm strength. I do not mess around with locking the safety gates. Period. Freedom, it seems, was enough of a motivator for William to knock it out of place.

I turned to look down the stairs and saw several things had been moved around. I raced down, looking for glass on the floor or permanent marker drawings on the table, and that's when I saw it. The sliding glass door was open. I've never seen William make much of an attempt to figure out unlocking the sliding glass door. He does enjoy going outside, and clearly I need to remember my own advice that kids are perceptive beyond what we might give them credit for. Needless to say, my heart dropped and I got that uncomfortable pit in my stomach. As cautious as we try to be, William spent who knows how long, hanging out in the back yard. It might not seem so scary when I add that our yard is totally fenced in and I keep padlocks on the gates due to some issues with neighborhood kids feeling our back yard is a neat short cut to take after school. Just that idea though, of him being outside alone, the idea of having our comfort zone of control visibly ripped from under us was something I can't put into words.

As the day progressed and I waited for Melissa to get home so we could go find new safety measures for the house, William seemed to push on with his new found feeling of freedom. It was a difficult day to say the least, and I found myself a bit shaken in the task of trying to regain control of the household. It was perhaps similar to the idea of a person on say, an Olympic gymnastics team having a poor performance, setting off a chain of events in which other promising gymnasts also have terrible performances which cost them all hope of a medal. Too soon?

When I looked around online for a better door safety option, I was surprised (perhaps I shouldn't have been) to find that in general the standard purchase for door knob safety, the kind pictured above, is regarded as utterly pointless. One customer noted that her one and a half year old was able to separate them with relative ease. How scary is that? In the end we purchased this:

http://www.toysrus.com/product/index.jsp?productId=3812906

While time will tell if it will work, I will say this as a first impression. It seems durable, in the sense of I'm not worried that William will be able to simply pull hard enough on the door and just break it in half to get out. It was extremely easy to attach to the door, taking maybe two minutes. It's a very simple concept of, if he opens the door, it catches on the frame exposing a small crack of space. It also has a finger guard so if he opens the door, it won't close all the way. Eliminating the risk of pinched fingers. For the sliding glass door we purchased some track locks which attach with an allen wrench. Certainly something he won't be able to undo, but a little bit of a hassle as we will need to put them on and take them off every day. It seemed like William would figure out many of the other options. The track locks were cheap and there's just no way to take them off without the wrench. I don't care how many episodes William has seen of "Handy Manny", I don't think he'll figure them out any time soon.

I felt embarrassed that morning. Fortunate, but embarrassed. It's important as a parent to never let your guard down or get too comfortable with the way things are going. Life will smack you right across your mouth and face and chest and headface.


*Answers to questions you might have in your head already. William's door doesn't have a door lock, thus we were unable to turn it around and lock it from the outside. Yes, we will continue to look for other flaws in our safety/child-proofing system. Yes, I will drum for your wedding pending certain factors.

Back to Reality.

Someone recently told me that I don't "look like the camping type" and I'm not sure if that was a fat joke or if it was just a nod to my designer socks from Hanes. I actually love camping, but it was a different story when I was little because being in the woods in the pitch black is also fairly terrifying. I've progressed beyond that, mostly. I was also told a story when I was young about the son of my dad's co-worker who went camping and slept under a tree. That night a storm passed through and lightening struck the tree. The electrical current traveled through the roots and ended up passing right through the guy as he was sleeping, he later died. I recall at least one very specific camping trip afterwards where it began to rain and I demanded to sleep in our minivan. I also pleaded with my mom for her to sleep in there as well. I know she was quite fed up with me because it was the middle of the night and she was trying to sleep, but I was trying to keep her alive and I feel that's a good reason to wake someone up. Sorry mom!

Since moving to Idaho we, or more specifically I, have made time to camp a few times every year. We have some camping gear that is for the whole family. We have a larger tent and ways to cook and be comfortable outside. I also have some solo gear for those times when I'm alone. I have a dual sport motorcycle and wanted a way to camp off of the bike. Everything is small and light, but far less comfortable. With either set up I always have fun and besides, camping isn't really about comfort.

Then last weekend happened...

Every so often my friends and I will do a guys only camping trip. It's not one of those things where we are trying to rough it more than usual (which doesn't happen) or finally be in a place where it's acceptable to fart whenever you want (which does). As cheesy as it sounds, it's about connecting with the guys. It's about staying up late talking about everything without restrictions. Good old male bonding.

What made this most recent trip so different was for the first time ever, I slept in a camping trailer. It. Was. Amazing! It was a pop-up trailer with two queen sized beds, a stove, oven, sink, shower, and dining area. To eat at a table instead of trying to balance everything on my knees was amazing. To wake up in the morning without that familiar back pain from sleeping on the hard ground, because I spent my night on a soft mattress was unbelievable.

The ritual for most everyone on Sunday morning (leaving day) is to wake up early and begin the painful task of packing everything up for the drive home. There's normally a chill in the air and everyone is moving a little slow from lack of sleep or too much alcohol the night before. Everyone struggles to get things to fit in just the right way to be loaded up and more than one person is sure to have an item go missing. On the other side of camp, the pop-up trailer was clear, broken down and ready for travel before most people had finished their first cup of coffee. It was just that easy. I started to get this overwhelming feeling of sadness. Why? I knew the next time I would go camping, it would be back to my normal routine. Back to reality. On the next trip I'll spend my night tossing and turning, wondering what's outside my flimsy bit of cloth. I'll fight for space to put my bag or shoes or just myself, and from this day forward I'll remember that one beautiful night in the trailer where there was so much room on the bed it was almost lonely.

I'll admit, that kind of "camping" might upset some purists who feel that going into the wild with a small apartment defeats the purpose. They might be right, but damn, seeing how everyone looked and clearly felt the next morning, I feel okay about it.

On my way home I got to thinking about the camper (and how much I want one now) and realized that it's a good lesson to think about with the boys. I often post, and will continue to post, about the situations that cause me some headache, but really I love my boys and they are fantastic most of the time. In the moment though, it's hard to remember that they've been great all morning when they're both screaming as loud as they can for seemingly no reason after lunch. It's hard to remember the string of amazing days when you're in the middle of a really bad one. So from now on I'm gonna try to remember that night in the camper because no matter if the situation is really good or really bad, you're most likely gonna wake up that next morning and be thrown right back into a big steaming pile of normal, and that's really not such a bad thing.

She said "Don't Worry" and we just laughed.

Pregnancy is a stressful time.

"Hey! Thanks for the brand new info, Ev!"

It's just a blur of time filled with lots of confusion. It's a bit like sex I guess, which of course leads to pregnancy (see above statement), and the cycle continues. I remember lots of odd little moments from both births down to eating pancakes that were as thin and hard as crackers. I guess it's possible that they were crackers, I was pretty out of it. I also remember the nights when we'd finally get a chance to send the baby off the nursery and the nurses shut the door and would tell us to get some rest. Being so tired from the day, we fell right to sleep.

For five minutes.

That's when there was a knock on the door, as the same nurse, WHO JUST TOLD US TO GET SOME REST (!!!!!!!), comes marching in to check on Mom and make sure everyone has everything they need.

"Dad, there's coffee by the nurse's station."

"Hey thanks! That terrible slop juice is just what I need to help me get to sleep. Do you know where I can get some candy bars? I mean, like the fun sized ones cause...I'm trying to get to sleep. Maybe some energy bars? Red Bull?"

I was tired, and I "never said that." I am a nice man with happy feelings. All the time.

The doctors had one concern with William when he was born. He was born with a skin tag by his right ear. For those who have no idea what a skin tag is, please don't feel bad. It's a small grouping of excess skin. Almost half of all Americans have them, even if they are unaware (as they can just fall off before you even notice). They're most common among obese people....like I said, almost half of Americans have them. It is, however, not that common with newborns and because it was so close to his ear, the doctors were concerned that his ear had not developed properly which had caused the skin tag. Follow that with failing his initial hearing test (passed a second one with flying colors) and there were concerns. We were told to take him in for further screening...in a few months.

I have seen probably 5 or 100 commercials for Grey's Anatomy, so clearly I know a little about all medical professions. That seemed like a real dumb process. "Your kid may have a serious hearing issue, but don't worry. Just sit and think about it for a long time and we'll chat more once you've built up a couple nervous ticks."

Between the time we got out of the hospital and the time we were able to get William in to see the hearing specialist, I had become convinced that he was completely deaf, that it was my fault, and that Handy Manny was the only hope in fixing the Sheetrock Hills town clock. The hearing test itself was pretty interesting. They put headphones on the child (William really enjoyed having a strange object on his head that he wasn't allowed to touch) and play a sound on the left or right earpiece. The child is supposed to hear the noise on that side and look to the left or right at which point they'd flash some lights and toys would start to wave or move around as a sort of prize for looking in the right direction. I'm pretty sure I've had a nightmare with that very type of scene, but whatever works for the kids. William had a hard time sitting still, so I was sent in to sit with him and casually feed him cheerios while a nice lady figured out if he had a hearing problem. No big deal. I may have tried to give him subtle clues as to which side the noise was coming from, and by subtle I might mean frantic hand waving, and by clues I might mean blatant pointing in the direction the noise was coming from.

When all the testing was done the very nice lady sat down with us to explain that William's hearing was completely normal. The skin tags were just skin tags, nothing was wrong. When I explained that I may have been helping him, she assured me that she was very aware of what I was doing (clearly she was saving face, I'm stealthy like a ninja) and I had nothing to do with the results. When I explained that over the past couple months I had observed him not reacting to sound or his name being called, she assured me that children learn to ignore their parents from a very early age. What the heck, William? I should add, Handy Manny did get that clock fixed.

----------------------

There's been one other time that William has made me that level of worried and frightened for him.

As shy as William is around adults, he is much more open around kids. I get that. Adults are pretty upsetting and they have hair in strange places. We had some friends over one evening and it was time for bed. William was having such a great time running around with their little boy that I just went up with Melissa to take care of Carter and give William another couple minutes to have fun. Moments into Carter's diaper change I heard an awful scream. I rush downstairs and see William crying a type of cry that just made me panic. I notice something small on his forehead, and as I go to wipe it away I notice he had quite the deep cut. Really small, but as deep as the internet. As I continued to check on William, the other boy was interrogated on what happened to make sure it wasn't something he did. We were fortunate that of all the friends who could have been over, we were with some serious emergency room pros. Their little boy had a similar accident, and they explained that the problem with the cut was that it's just too small to stitch properly. We let him stay up a bit and calm down, cleaned his head and put on a bandaid (which William thinks are stickers). Yes! It was looked at by an actual doctor, and all is well. Yes! I know about mederma, and it is applied every night. My lack of concern for potential problems in my own body doesn't apply to my kids. He really is totally fine, and sometimes puts his hand where the scar is and says, "It's gone! It's gone!" though he'll probably have a bit of a visible mark forever.

----------------------

Believe it or not, I am actually going somewhere with all this. I understand that a scar on the forehead and a little bump of skin that most people miss unless it's pointed out, is getting off pretty lucky. I'm well aware that many parents deal with far worse issues when it comes to their kids. I even know a few. What I'm trying to get to is, no matter how tough or stressful parenting becomes, you're probably doing an amazing job. Being upstairs when your kid has a complete and total accident does NOT make it your fault. Just like you don't get to take credit for them not crawling into the dryer just because you were with them as they walked by it. My Dad once told me, honestly, that I was having pain from a kidney stone because I wasn't at his house with him. He really believed that. It's the same logic that made him invite over all his kids, their girlfriends/boyfriends, and everyone's pets, 7 people (Odd number? Fine! Okay? I wasn't involved with anyone at the time. No one wanted to hold me through the terrible hurricane winds.)  and like 10 pets jammed into his house because of the threat of a hurricane one year. P.S. Almost no wind and it barely even rained.


I suppose I'm doing my best to learn that there's no reason to always hover over my kids in some creepy way just because I consider it being "protective." I can only hope to teach them both some common sense, and perhaps not give them the matchbox cars with the crazy sharp edges. I'm looking at you Francesco Bernoulli!


Accidents can and will happen, so while with my man-sized logic that seems in perfect order, as a parent it's tricky sometimes to not try and blame...something. I'm working on it.


Not all of times William kicked me in the gentleman's fruit were accidental.


I know it.


I really am working on it.