Jen's Column / Jay's Boat

Hi Everyone! I'm playing catch-up tonight and flowing in my two most-recent columns. The most recent (8/29) column is the "Back to School" column about Bergen. It's below this posting. :), Jen

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Eleven years ago, my new husband and I filled a serving bowl with several small, folded slips of paper. On each was a single word: Piano. Vacation. Camera.

With much fanfare, we blindly drew a folded piece of paper (“Boat”) and taped it to a glass jar. The plan was to save our loose change in the jar until we could afford the dream purchase taped to it. Once we bought the boat, we’d draw another slip of paper.

The piano, vacation and camera? Got it, did it, own it. The glass jar saving our loose change? Sold in a garage sale in ’03.
Last month, Jay finally got his fishing boat.

It wasn’t because I was holding out on him — pre-empting his boat for my piano or my birthday trip to New York City. No, the delay was all his.

Approximately 250 boats (not that I’m counting) have come under his scrutiny in the last four years. He’s fastidiously inspected them, studied them, thumped them like cantaloupes.

Under Jay’s critical examination, not one of these specimens was quite right. They were too old, too new, too costly. They had a dent, a scratch, a spot of mildew. They were the wrong length. They had the wrong hull. Some had too many seats. Some had too few. Some had the wrong kind of seats altogether.

We really couldn’t be more different on this front, my husband and I. Where I’m impatient and impulsive, Jay’s willing to hold out. He knows what he wants — and he’ll wait as long as it takes to find it.

I realize this is a quality that should impress me. In this particular case, however, it just left me hollering, “Buy a boat already!”

But instead of buying a boat, Jay just talked about buying a boat. All day. Every day. And when he wasn’t talking about buying a boat, he was driving to boat dealerships. And when he wasn’t driving to dealerships, he was surfing boat Web sites. And when he wasn’t searching boat Web sites, he was scouring the classifieds.

He had certain non-negotiable criteria that even I learned to rattle off without taking a breath: 16-foot, deep-V hull, captains chairs, rod holders, minimum 25 horse motor, tiller, live well, bilge pump.

It became clear to me that if we didn’t have a boat in the garage this summer, it would be the end of our marriage. I called my dad.

“It is essential to your daughter’s happiness that you find my husband a boat,” I blurted as soon as he picked up the phone.

His puzzled silence didn’t deter me.

“This is Jen. Listen. I NEED Jay to own a boat.”

“I don’t know,” my dad finally answered. “None of the boats I’ve shown him have been right.”

Jay must’ve seen the crazed look in my eyes (or maybe my father called to warn him) because he found a boat — THE boat — on his own that very week.

But it’s not over. Now he’s in the garage every night, practically wiping the thing down with a diaper before bed. He’s drilling things and wiring things and adding mood lights. Last week I caught him staring into the live well, mumbling something about installing a light that would make it shine like an aquarium.

I’ve waved the white flag — or actually, a black one. Last week, in a show of support, I bought Jay a Jolly Roger to fly overhead.

Jen's Column / Back to School

I’ve hit another milestone. Next week, I’m sending my youngest child — my baby, my Bergen — to kindergarten.
Oh, how this conflicts me.

This is, of course, the year I’ve been waiting for.

I mean, really — how many times have I uttered the phrase, “When the boys are older…” in the last eight years? I will go back to school… when the boys are older. I will do more volunteer work… when the boys are older. I will clean my house… when the boys are older.

And, now, apparently, they’re older. With both of my backpack-wearing, snackbag-carrying sons heading off to school next week, it seems my time has come.

So why am I not feeling more joy?

There is, of course, that nagging feeling that I’m losing my baby — the boy who still cups his hands around my face and says things like, “My precious Mommy. My cute, precious Mommy.”

But, I admit, that’s not my real concern. Not yet. My growing sense of dread comes, instead, from the fear that I haven’t properly prepared Bergen for kindergarten.

Yes, I know, it’s kindergarten. They color, they sing, they listen to stories. What is there to prepare? But logic means nothing to me. I tend to go with my gut. And lately my increasingly hysterical gut has been screaming, “You haven’t done enough!”

I blame my sister. Her kids sit at their dining room table with their schoolwork for an hour each day all summer long. She’s always calling me to say things like, “I know Kaela’s only six, but she just loves working in those third grade workbooks!” and “My kids just get so cranky if they don’t do their math!”

Normally, I turn my nose up at her. Tell myself that kids should be playing — that they’ll be working soon enough. But last week, panic hit and I ran out and loaded up on workbooks and flashcards and turned our bedtime routine into a classroom. Instead of ‘night-‘night songs, Bergen and I are now singing ABCs and reviewing letter sounds. Instead of story time, we’re reciting the numbers from 1 to 30. “Fourteen! Don’t forget 14!” I cheer, as he skips from 13 to 15. “Do you want to get out of bed to look at the number line?”

My neurosis knows no bounds. I’m up at night wondering whether Bergen will remember to say please and thank you. Will he be kind? A good listener? A good friend? Will he sit quietly on the mat, raise his hand and share his crayons? Or will he run in circles yelling things like, “Buttocks!” and “Wedgie!”? I can picture either scenario.

I know it’s pointless to worry. The longer I do this parenting thing, the more I realize that I actually have little influence on the people my children will become. Simply, they are who they are. I can set the example I hope they’ll follow, but, ultimately, their drive, their compassion, their curiosity, their senses of humor — not to mention their propensity to use the word “butt” in almost any sentence — are already inside them. I’m just helping them survive the journey. Feeding them. Keeping them safe. Loving them. And, soon, sending them off to school.

So tell me why it is that in addition to the “I love yous” I’ll be professing when Bergen gets on that bus for the first time next week, I’ll also be yelling, “Be kind! Share! And remember 14!”

Sasquatches on YouTube!

OK, so last year Jay made a mockumentary called "Sasquatches." Many of you have seen it, but if you haven't -- or if you want to share it with a friend -- you can do so through YouTube now!

Jay says we can embed the video into this blog. But I don't know how to do that. So here's the link...

http://www.youtube.com/user/5021ratio

In other news: Bergen was very brave today getting his pre-K shots -- all three of them. (Yowch!) The boys are learning to golf, and love it. There's a little three-hole course near our house that's been perfect for after-dinner outings.

The boys just finished two weeks of swimming lessons and they both did an outstanding job. We are very proud of them.

OK. That's all. Until next week! :), Jen