Dad Today

Fun on a Grate

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 11:13:00 +0000

Fun on a grate over a vent, behind the Frog Pond in Boston Common.

I love the scene.

Love Drew delighting and trying to keep up (and keep his still fledgling sense of balance).

But maybe most of all love James' pause near the end when he asks his sister, "Now do you think it's fun?"

Her answer, too soft to hear well with all the rattling, but clear as I filmed it, says a lot about her and their way together.

Without pause, she said, "No." and then got right back to enjoying herself.

The Perils of Blogging While Parenting

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 12:00:00 +0000

First steps, then turns, now DANCE BABY DANCE. what next?

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 13:00:00 +0000

First steps, then turns, now DANCE BABY DANCE. what next?

Getting Messy, 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 25 Dec 2012 04:17:00 +0000

Summer 2012 saw the return of the Get Messy Party! This time to celebrate Maya and complete with pre-party interview:

A few of my favorite shots from the day:

Paint-covered tennis balls in the fitted white sheet

"shaving" the daddies

one seriously messy sundae

Here's what it (and they) looked like for the 2010 original: http://dadtoday.blogspot.com/2010/10/belated-but-worth-wait-get-messy-party.html

Wow can this baby turn!

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 03:47:00 +0000

First steps, then TURNS (and falls, and shaking it off, and going for it again, like a good tough kid) around the house and on the track, back at the end of July.

Hooky with George

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 21:31:00 +0000

Thanks to the folks at pbskids.org for including part of the Dad Today gang at the Boston premiere of Curious George's newest season last Friday. Great excuse to play hooky from work and school together and join George on his adventure down under.

Catch it tonight on PBS or anytime at pbskids.org:

A New Gripping Thriller from the DadCam

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 15:00:00 +0000

Worth watching for the surprise turn at 0:59 - and his reaction, as if to say...

I QUIT!

WHOSE IDEA WAS THIS ANYWAY?

I AM OUTTA HERE!

Determination in the Ferry Winds

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 11:58:00 +0000

Undeterred by ripping winds, he roamed with scrunched-face determination about the ferry's upper decks...

circa June 2012

First Steps

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 13 Nov 2012 13:57:00 +0000

at least the first caught on video...

Who says the camera is never running for third babies?

By the time we got this a week and a half after his birthday last summer, he'd been taking steps for a while, though never with the camera running. Here is a string of failed efforts to get video proof...

another case of camera nonperformance

His First Taste of Independence

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 10:00:00 +0000

One sunny evening last June, Drew got his first go solo with bowl and spoon, and it was awesome for all of us...

Li'l Camper

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 09:44:00 +0000

In May we took baby Drew camping for the first time. Not much sleep at night for him or for us, but lots of smiles in the morning...

Flying Baby Catching

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 12:00:00 +0000

Laughing hilariously until the camera starts rolling (and then again, at least a bit...)

Road Trip

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 18 Sep 2012 12:00:00 +0000

A road trip seemed like a good idea.

And at least for these 43 seconds baby Drew seemed to agree...

Close Call

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 04 Sep 2012 12:00:00 +0000

When we schlep the big kids around in the bike trailer, the trailer is hitched to our bikes by a metal tube that slips through a metal ring on the left side of our rear axle. This is held in place by a metal bar that slips through a set of holes when they're all lined up just so. A nylon strap also wraps around the bike frame and a little hook grabs hold of a little ring. And it looks like this...

... that is, when it's all done right, which it usually always is.

But the other day, it wasn't.

It was my morning to leave early, and Ashley's to drop the kids off.And to help speed the morning routine of breakfasts, and made and packed lunches, and picked out and put on clothes, and (when we're really smoking) violin practice, before I zipped down the hill and away on my bike, I also took Ashley's out of the shed to hook it up to the bike trailer, as I do almost every day. And off I went.

She called me an hour later.

"Something terrifying just happened," she said.

My heart jumped.

"What?" I asked.

"The bike trailer just slipped out," she said. "I reached down to help them out and it just fell out and rolled away."

"You're at the school?" I asked. "Wait. What happened?"

And as she recounted their zipping down the hill, and the weaving back and forth the kids love so much, shouting and laughing, "WOAH! WOAH! WOAH!" as they pitch side to side, I suddenly remembered taking out the crucial metal bar, and leaving it on top of the concrete wall, then getting the bike trailer and sliding its metal tube into the metal ring, and then, before replacing that metal bar, getting distracted by the need to retrieve car keys from the house and collect helmets that were left in the way back after an afternoon bike ride the day before, and then, after throwing the helmets into the trailer, not finishing the job.

"Oh my God," I said.

"Yeah." she said.

And the rest of the day, I was wrecked.

Unable to focus on work.

Just stuck there staring,

thinking about how fragile this all is,

how easily that tube could have slipped out anywhere else on that mile-long ride at rush hour besides safely at their first stop,

stunned by the dumb luck,

by the guardian angels,

by the grace

of such a close call.

*** This piece originally appeared as a guest post on Notes on Fatherhood ***

Namaste

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 12:00:00 +0000

In the bustle and mayhem of JP's 2012 Wake up the Earth Festival, when Ashley and I passed Drew back and forth, the not always explicit understanding of the hand off was that whomever was just relieved of the baby was now responsible for the two bigger kids, who were not at all easy to keep track of in the bustle and mayhem - darting and dancing through the crowds, or climbing up and sliding down the giant metal polar bears, or elbowing their way up (again) to the front of the line at the top of the hill to slide down the refrigerator boxes - as usual, the day's number 1 attraction.

"Where's James?" I asked Ashley, a little panicked when I lost track of him at one point.

But the panic was not long-lived. I scanned the crowd and spotted him in his yellow shirt, getting centered in the Yoga circle.

A true child of JP.

Falling in Love Again

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 12:00:00 +0000

Thanks to a climate change induced mild Boston winter, we didn't fall OUT as much as usual this year, but as usual, come springtime, I found myself falling in love again with our city. And as usual, it was JP's quirky, joyous Wake Up the Earth Festival that brought the love into focus.

Wind and Waves and Uh Oh ... HAT!

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 07 Aug 2012 11:29:00 +0000

Loving the waves of South Beach Martha's Vineyard

He's In!

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 15:00:00 +0000

My new favorite picture...

Boston's newest biker dude

Feeling Corny?

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 24 Jul 2012 11:05:00 +0000

Who says you need more than two teeth to enjoy good corn on the cob?

Ahhh, summer...

Moods

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 17 Jul 2012 11:00:00 +0000

It was an art-full year for James in Kindergarten. One of my favorites, was this triptych:

"I am happy because soon I am going to California"

"I'm sad when I'm leaving some family and heading to the plane."

"I am mad when my sister complains so much when I'm trying to get out of my bed and go downstairs."

And ACTION!

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Wed, 04 Jul 2012 01:35:00 +0000

The gripping sequel...

to the critically acclaimed original, circa 2006.

Baby Drew - Product Tester

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 19 Jun 2012 14:30:00 +0000

Baby Drew pressure testing the Ergo...

Check.

Going, Going, Gone...

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 05 Jun 2012 14:30:00 +0000

What does it take to break through from mediocrity to excellence in the creative life? The other day I saw and clicked and watched this short but great reflection from Ira Glass, host of NPR's This American Life:

It was just the nudge I needed to do what I've suspected I have needed to do for a while - which is to step off the blogging train, or at least to step off as so regular a passenger.

I know I have advertised this scale down before (like two years ago in this post on the idea of "Best By" dating for blogs). But then there was Drew, and a sense that, for the sake of equity, the guy needs at least some time in this spotlight. To be honest I have also found it difficult to give up this bird in hand - an audience for my writing, which has grown in these four and a half years to reliably deliver a few thousand page views a month, a few dollars of ad revenue, and the very occasional book sale.

On the one hand, I would like to believe that life is not a zero-sum game, that I can be a PROLIFIC writer generating content in all sorts of forms. But the reality is that, at least at this phase of life, it is a zero-sum game. Whatever time I give to this writing is time taken from another. And if, as Ira Glass points out, the only way to bridge the gap between my taste and my capabilities is VOLUME, then I need to get back in the groove of generating volume of the kind of writing I want to do most - playwriting - even if that means long stretches of writing solitude, with dozens and dozens and always-painful dozens of no-thank-you letters between me and an audience, which no doubt it does.

I am not shutting down Dad Today. Fear not!

But I am stepping down from the pace I've been keeping - something new every week. So that Drew doesn't one day feel utterly shafted by his relative absence from this chronicle of our family's early years, I know I owe him some solid treatments.

There will still be the odd, cute photo, like this one

The odd, cute photo

and the odd video, like this

But otherwise, for the most part, I will be...

In the Village

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 29 May 2012 14:30:00 +0000

By the time we arrived in Corail I was feeling pretty hopeless.. And after the remove, suspicion, and wariness of so much of the trip to that point, on our second afternoon, I was caught completely unaware walking down the hot, dusty street, by one then two then three pairs of little hands that appeared out of nowhere and took hold of mine. They stuck by my side, smiling, laughing, jockeying with each other for the best grip on my BLANC! hands, and when we followed the sound of music into the Hope on a String courtyard, and found an impromptu jam session underway, the children - the same ages as my children - danced, and insisted I dance with them. It was, hands down, my most surprising, gut wrenching, enduring impression from the week, and a clear answer to what I'll take from Corail...

A big part of our reason for visiting Corail was to see Hope on a String - a grassroots nonprofit focused on creating social and environmental transformation through music. After all we had seen up to that point, as we drove into this dusty town without electricity, without running water, without a paved road, I remember thinking, "Music? Really? Is this really the place to start?"

But something about dancing with those children changed my answer.After so much feeling of impossible distance between my life and theirs, the ability to be present and together and joyful in a shared moment was deeply moving and really caught me off guard. I felt it too our second and last night in Corail, watching a community concert. A bunch of kids pouring their hearts out on recorders and piano and in song and dance, before a packed audience of family, friends, and neighbors that felt no different at all from the assemblies at my kids' schools back in Boston. Here's a sampling of my favorite moments that lands on picture of dumbfounded me:

Yet even despite these moments of connection, much about our visit difficult for me - most of all the complete language barrier. My elderly host mother would say same thing over and over and over again. And I would just smile awkwardly, until she took matters into her own hands one way or another - for example, at one point disappearing into the room and emerging carrying a chair, which of course was the moment her son explained, "seat!" just as his mother collided with the door frame and careened out onto the front porch, where I ran up to meet her and take the chair from her as quickly as I could. Then I tried to insist she take the seat with vigorous but hopeless gestures and finally, when it was clear she wouldn't rest until I did, just said, "Mesi," and took a seat.

On my final day with them, I asked and took a few pictures of my host family, including these of my host mother, who all called, Mami, and who insisted on the second , both of us crouching beside the fake plant in the blinding sunlight.

But at that point I was feeling way woozy and had already begged off the breakfast she had clearly slaved over (over the charcoal stove) for me.

"Pa grangou," I said, "Malade" rubbing my stomach and feeling so guilty I would have done anything she asked.

And then she asked something I didn't understand and then said it again and again and again until finally her son said, "Give?" And I realized that, when, on my first morning, her daughter had snatched and unwrapped all of the gifts I'd arrived with - a solar powered radio, marbles for any children, drawings of our life in Boston from James and Maya, and a copy of my book - though they were gifts I had intended for the whole family (and which I had assembled not knowing what kind of family I would stay with), they had gone one to a person, with Mami assuming I had forgotten her, a rich foreigner happy to receive her impossibly gracious hospitality - one of the only rooms with a bed, abundant meals served for me inside at the table, as others sat outside on the dirt eating the meager-looking gruel we'd been warned was all we should expect. All that and not give anything in return? The realization hit me like a ton of bricks. I tore through my suitcase. My Nike running shoes and training shirt for her son. My yellow polo button down and green sleeveless workout shirt for my guide. My red Marmot rain jacket for Mami. Who needs it all?

Not me.

In many ways, being in Corail was the best experience of the trip - one the whole week had been building to.

But it was also very difficult.

I felt relieved to pile onto the van again.

A stop to see the model homes.

Back through Port au Prince.

Back up into Petionville and the Karibe Hotel.

Swimming and relaxing and luxuriating again at the Karibe Hotel.

That night, we put on the the best of what remained of our clothes, and drove to a sendoff soiree, where we wined and dined by the pool as the children of Haiti en Scene bowled us over with joy and power of song and dance.

The next morning to the airport.

That night, home in Boston, creeping into James and Maya's room as they slept, and losing it.

Just losing it.

The Charcoal Market

noreply@blogger.com (Stefan Lanfer) — Tue, 22 May 2012 14:30:00 +0000

Without close equal, the most disturbing place we visited during our week in Haiti was the charcoal market. It was like a scene out of Dante's Inferno.

On the way there in our white, air-conditioned van, Pierre described how some believe a country's ecological sustainability depends on its having at least twenty five percent forest cover.

"Haiti," he said, "has two percent."

Airplanes flying over the Dominican Republic into Haiti can see the border from tens of thousands of feet high. In fact, it's apparent even from satellite images. Even though the two countries are on the same island, divided only by a political boundary, that boundary is also now an ecological boundary. One side (the DR side) is lush, green - the kind of lush and green one would expect in the tropics, with rich, fertile earth, and ample sun and rain. The Haiti side is brown, brown, brown. Denuded. It looks like desert.

The number one culprit?

Charcoal. Trees cut down. Buried in pits. Smoked into a jet black, air fouling, lung compromising, dirty, dirty fuel that the vast majority of Haitians use to cook with. So the demand stays high and the industry robust, even though the industry kills the land, dries up watersheds, and literally robs families of the capacity to earn a living in the future.

Most of the country's charcoal now comes from La Gonave, a picturesque island (and part of Haiti) that lies across the water straight west from Port au Prince. When we arrived at the market, we all piled off the bus, and walked first to the water's edge, where, in the distance we could see La Gonave, and the impossibly beautiful scene of these classic wooden sailboats, anchored just offshore amidst glistening waters.

But there was nothing picturesque about the scene on shore. If there was sand or rocks at the water's edge, I couldn't tell. Because rising up from the water to where we stood was covered, every inch, with trash, which children and pigs picked their way through:

And then came the scene of the market. Young children, grandparents stooped with age, and everyone in between hauling and piling and transferring and loading these massive white bags of black, black coal, in the midst of coal-dust piles taller than men, the accumulation of years and years of this dirty business:

What few trees there were at the water's edge were coated black with the dust. And so were all the people. You can only imagine it coating their lungs just the same. And no hot shower waiting at day's end.

In the midst of it all, one of the most striking and lasting impressions I have was of Pierre speaking with one of the young boys working there with his family. Pierre did this with every bit as much grace and ease and respect as he showed speaking with the former Prime Minister earlier that morning. You can see it in this picture...

...which also catches me with a stupid grin on my face - my feeble effort to look at ease, a thin veneer masking the overwhelm, confusion, and dismay I felt being there.