Braving Boys

Yes, that's a black-ish eye, but not from football, just rough play.

Let me preface this post by telling you that my 9-year-old kid has not yet been fully uniformed and padded and protected and knocked around on the football field, and, yes, of course, I am scared to death that he will soon be jolted around to the point of tears and serious injury, but so far, he’s just been conditioning his big-boy body for a season of tackle football.

By conditioning, I mean he’s been running, jumping, racing, weaving, bear crawling, crab crawling, sitting up, pushing up, attacking dummies, and then doing it all over again. And again. Then one more time. For two hours. Sometimes more.

Almost every day, Joey is soaked in sweat and fatigued to the point that he can’t fall asleep. This is tough stuff — the hardest he’s ever had it in life. And here’s what I have to say about it all:

So far, I love tackle football.

It’s not the hours on end I’m sitting on a field overrun with ants that nibble constantly on my ankles. It’s the not the 4PM dinners we’re eating to prep for 6PM practice, or the rushed night-time routines when we return home at, oh, 8:30 or 9PM. It’s not my messy vehicle, the dirty clothing, the relentless reminders that Joey must lose 2 pounds if he wants to play in the first game.

Nope.

None of that makes me terribly happy.

It’s the way Joey works on that field that fills me with joy. He might complain at home about this sport that he chose (the first one he’s ever picked all by himself!), but as soon he as steps those cleats into the dirt and grass with 35 other boys, he becomes a man. No whining, no slacking, no eye contact with mom and dad. The kid just digs deep, and he works. And when he comes home, after he takes his long, hot shower, he has a certain bounce in his step. It’s not like he’s announcing that he’s enjoying himself, but I see it. And it’s something pretty special.

I keep telling Joey how proud I am of what he’s doing, and I’m guessing he’s going to get sick of hearing it. Like, soon. So I think I’ll shut up, watch from the sidelines, and simply marvel at what football can do for my child.

Monday starts conditioning with gear — that means pads and helmets, mouth guards, chin guards, everything. Maybe then my tune will change, and I won’t be so thrilled with what football can do for my guy (think: bumps, bruises, and brain boo-boos).

For now, though, one week into our new team sport adventure, I am encouraged, inspired, in awe of the baby who rarely participated at playgroups, the toddler who kicked and screamed at gymnastics class, the boy who refused team sports until last year, when we finally nudged him to try basketball.

Proud.

That’s all.

Just proud.

May 30, 2003

He didn’t arrive into the world until 11:05 PM on May 30, but we’ve been celebrating the kid all weekend long, and we’re still hours away from that glorious moment seven years ago when Danny arrived in all of his whopping-big glory.

It started with a platter of cookies delivered to the boy’s first-grade class on Friday, followed by a road trip right after school pick-up to an Orlando hotel. Danny loved the Marriott Courtyard outdoor pool, and the yummy Carrabba’s dinner out we enjoyed that night, too. Bright and early the next day, we were at the gates of Magic Kingdom, where Space Mountain, Thunder Mountain and Buzz Lightyear were favorite rides, and the day spent walking (and walking and walking) wore us all out. We refueled, though, with some trail mix and a stop at the hotel, before heading for another great dinner (plus free birthday dessert), and a nighttime adventure back at the park.

AI's Aaron Kelly

We rode all the faves again, and ended the night at midnight, just after big bro Joe spotted and was photographed with American Idol’s Aaron Kelly.

Sunday brought more adventure — lunch with one grandma and a big gift (an iPod Shuffle for the guy who loves music), plus dinner and more gifts with another grandma, aunt, uncle and cousins.

“How do you feel about your birthday weekend?” I asked Danny at the end of his official special day. His response: “Good, terrific, awesome, fantastic!” Those are his sparkle words, he told me. Indeed, they are — the words he’s learned in class to spice up his writing.

I’m not sure I could have said it any better. The weekend was, in fact, good, terrific, awesome and fantastic. How fun it is to be the mom of a 7-year-old!

The birthday boy!

Happy Birthday, Danny.

I love you.

Danny is such a good singer, and I really don’t think I’m saying that just because I’m his mom. He’s got that raspy, throaty sound, and when he belts out his favorite tunes, I just marvel at what he can deliver. He’s not convinced he’s all that good, and so he sneaks at singing, turns his vocals into baby babble when he knows we’re watching, and he flat out refuses to let us record him. “Hot Dog” was the last time we got a video camera near him.

Danny thinks football is in his future, because, well, he’s winding up his first season of flag, and that’s how he knows he probably has a shot at playing center as a pro. But me, well, I think he’s more likely to be a performer of some sort. And just as soon as I capture some more audio of my singing boy, I’ll be sure to share.

For now, though, just imagine a 6-year-old boy watching this video (his No. 1 pick at the moment), and cranking out the lyrics like a superstar.

I’m soft. I know this. And I’m OK with it. But it kind of goes against the grain of what John tries to teach the boys. Example: the other day, while at a lake for some fishing, Joey and Danny started whining about sunscreen. They hate it, especially the kind that sprays, because it gets in their eyes. So, we do our best to slather faces without blinding them, but as it always turns out, they are gun-shy and get all worked up about the event.

John is sick of it.

“You guys need to get hard,” he told them.

“Here’s how I do it,” he declared, then pretty much sprayed the stuff directly into his own baby blues to prove his point.

Explanation: John is a Marine, and he’s encountered some rough living. There was a period of time in boot camp when he was so hungry, he’d eat from sugar packets in the mess hall to fill the void in his gut. He hiked until his feet bled, marched until he couldn’t see straight, and for months on end, he was worn down and challenged to the core. He’s hard. He can spray sunscreen in his eyes.

Getting hard is good. It’s preparation for life’s tough times. It’s why Joey should eat fish, even though he doesn’t like it — because maybe, one day, fish will be the only thing available. It’s why learning to defend yourself is key, because when you’ve got to fight for your life, you’ll be ready.

I get it.

It’s just not me.

• I don’t like sunscreen in my eyes either. Bug spray is yucky, too.
• I do like fish, but I don’t like Chinese food, and heaven help me if, one day, it’s the only thing available.
• I don’t want to camp — I like running water and cozy beds too much — and I don’t want to climb a rock wall or a mountain or jump from a plane, a cliff, or anything, really.
• I am hesitant to play a “real” game of football with Joey, because he weighs 90 pounds and his power is pretty amazing.
• I shy away from “real” games of basketball, too, because I’ve had few balls smack me right in the face, and ouch!, that really hurts. (I am up for a mean game of catch or P-I-G, however).

Don’t get me wrong. I can be tough. I’ve white water rafted, parasailed, driven a jet ski, completed a few ropes courses, traveled Europe all by myself, run a 1/2 marathon, pushed two large babies from my body and fought breast cancer.

Still, soft is my fall-back.

This worries me, and sometimes I fear my boys will come to know me as the wimpy mom. It’s why I choose to engage in some battles. Will I ski down a snow-covered mountain when we finally take a ski vacation? No. But I am fully prepared to let the waves knock the crap out of me during our next beach trip. I’m also on board this year for a very long road trip (in one cramped mini-van), even though my better judgment says, “Don’t do it.” And this summer, I’ll take on one-too-many roller coasters with my little theme-park thrill seekers, even though these rides give me a throbbing head and wobbly knees.

It’s a good thing there’s a John and a Jacki in our family. It’s like we’re the anchors supporting our family tree. John is at the top (of course, he climbed up there), I’m at the bottom (because I don’t want to climb up there), and Joey and Danny are right in between, observing the qualities that define their parents and deciding which ones to embrace.

My wish is that Joey and Danny do get hard. I hope they also realize that, at times, it’s OK to be soft. Because really, I’m convinced there’s value in both.

Photo: Kristi Anastasi Collins

Six and nine. Must be just the right ages for assigning blame — at least in our house. And while the 6-year-old guy does his fair share of shifting fault, I must say that the 9-year-old has the skill down pat. He should, he’s been practicing it for years. It goes something like this:

Parents: “Joey, why did you trip your brother?”

Joey: “I didn’t.”

Parents: “Yes, you did.”

Joey: “No, I didn’t.”

Parents: “We saw you do it!”

Joey: “I. did. not. trip. him.”

And he’ll stand his ground until the bitter end (even though we saw it!), which often leaves us dumbfounded and praying this trait is soon extinguished and replaced with the honestly we preach every chance we get.

We tell our boys they’ll always be in less trouble for being honest (even if it reveals poor choices) than if we learn they are lying. Will they catch on, jump on board and evolve into the truth-telling boys we know they can be?

Probably.

It’s perfectly normal for school-age kids to cover up and duck out of taking responsibility, say some exerts for Parents.com. It usually happens when they know Mom and Dad would disapprove of something they did, and since they are not great at anticipating consequences, admitting wrong-doing can be overwhelming. The bottom line: for our kiddos, understanding rules and consequences is still a developmental work in progress.

Gosh, this makes me feel so much better. I was starting to wonder where this tendency was coming from.

Because.

Well.

I knew it couldn’t be my fault.

Bike Week 2010, Daytona Beach, Fla.

Among all of the duties we have as parents, exposing our boys to all sorts of stuff is a priority. That’s why we took them to Bike Week 2010 on Saturday. Danny’s had some “I love motorcycle” moments in his life (one Christmas, all he wanted was a toy dirt bike, and he always picks motorcycle racing when he games at my sister’s house), and Joey is usually up for anything car, boat or bike-related.

Now, don’t get me wrong — I really prefer that my guys don’t ride motorcycles at all, ever. Still, I thought the Daytona Beach event would be exciting. And for moments, it was (The Naked Cowboy and monster-sized snake were hits).

The Naked Cowboy and The Snake Guy

But Danny mostly moped, claiming his legs were too tired to walk up and down Main St., and Joey, well, he just wanted to get to the water to throw his cast net. And when I asked them both at the end of our maybe hour-long tour of this 69th annual extravaganza if they could see themselves as bikers when they grow up, the response was an overwhelming NO. And so we headed to a favorite fishing spot in Ormond Beach, where Joey and John dabbled at the shore and Danny sat with me in the car, playing his Nintendo DS. The game?

Yamaha Supercross.

Boy stuff keeps me so busy that I often don’t find the time to write about it. But I want to, and I need to, because one day, these beautiful monsters of mine will be all grown up, and there’s no way I’m going to remember all the cute little stories if I don’t jot them down. Here are a few:

Danny

Danny, 6 years old, finally lost a tooth on December 30. We were at Busch Gardens, eating lunch, when John tugged it out. It was hanging by a thread, we told Danny, and that’s why it needed to come out. He’d been very patient for weeks, letting that tooth linger in its assigned space. Big bro Joe would have yanked that thing from his own mouth the minute he noticed it jiggling even a tad bit. Not Danny, who is now monitoring another loose one. Yesterday, he came out of school and asked me, “Mom, is this hanging by a thread?” I checked and told him it was not. “Then how many threads does it have?” he said. We talked about threads, and figures of speech, and now we await the loss of pearly white No. 2. I predict it comes out, oh, sometime around mid-February. Joey happened to have a barely wiggly one after school yesterday, too. It was out by 5 PM.

Mom and Joey: Same-size feet

Joey is tall. Really tall. He just turned 9 on January 3, and he’s a half-inch away from measuring 5 feet. He’s almost as tall as his Nanny, his feet are nearly bigger than mine, and the mom of the short boy he guarded during his last basketball game was not at all happy about the pairing. About his height, Joey said recently: “I don’t always like being tall.” I asked him why, and he told me people at school think he has had to repeat a grade. “Has anyone ever told you that?” I asked. “No,” he replied. “But still.” Yea, I gotcha, Joe. And that’s exactly why the kid must pass his FCAT test in March, because if he doesn’t, he must do third grade all over again, and there’s just no way he can actually repeat a grade. That would just look downright silly.

We think Danny has a photographic memory — the kid can recite parts of a nutritional label in a nutty accurate way. Sugar and protein are his favorites. Name a food or drink (mustard, ketchup, ground turkey, milk), and he’ll spit back spot-on numbers. The other day, I told each boy they could pick out a frozen treat at the grocery store. Danny picked Scribblers popsicles (no protein, 6 grams of sugar), and Joey grabbed for a package of Klondikes, which didn’t escape Danny’s glance. “Those are loaded with sugar,” he shouted at his brother. Sure enough — 23 grams of the stuff in each square of chocolate-covered goodness. Joey didn’t care, he picked them anyway, and we’re OK with that. I mean, we don’t eat too much junk at our house, so we figure it’s OK to enjoy an occasional treat.

Somehow, we got to talking a few days ago about behavior (the boys like to report on who was good and bad in school each day), and I told them that everyone has good qualities. No one is entirely bad. That’s when Joey said, “I don’t always do the right thing. But I always try my best.” I don’t think I can really ask for anything more. And that’s what I told him — just before I picked boogers off his bedroom wall.

Stay tuned. More to come.

Joey, pre-sleepover

Surviving Joey’s first sleepover might have been harder for me than making it through his very day of school. Something about the overnight thing was really tough. I mean, I dropped him off last night at a friend’s “Guys Gathering” at 5:00 PM, and I didn’t see my 8-year-old boy again until 10:30 AM today, which means I was totally unable to monitor whatever it was he did for all those hours. I know he ate dinner, went to a movie, gobbled down cake, played on a tire swing — but how did he handle himself, was he happy the whole time, did he feel homesick at all? He reports that it was a blast, and he appears to have no complaints at all. He’d do it again, in fact, and he’d like to host his own party one day. The question is: Can I survive that, too?

www.fordvehicles.com

Joey wants a Ford truck. A big one. Specifically, he’s got his eyes on a F350, crew cab, diesel, 4X4, dually, black, with a big silver thing on the front and well-equipped for pulling a pretty large boat. Why? I think it has something to do with the truck (and boat) his uncle got. But Joey doesn’t just want the F150 Uncle Jim has sitting in his driveway. Nope, he’s ramped things way up, ensuring that his prize will cost him an arm and a leg, plus a few other body parts. But that’s OK. He’s 8, and dreaming should be a part of every kid’s world.

www.fordvehicles.com

Six-year-old Danny is a dreamer, too. He sees in his future a brand new Mustang GT500. I know where this wish comes from — Dad is a huge Mustang fan. A 1970 was his very first car (bought with his very own money), and together, we had a 1998 GT, which we traded for a mini-van two months before Joey was born (that was a sad day: not the day Joey arrived, the day we said farewell to the car). Thanks to Uncle Jim, we have a Mustang again — the one he sold us to make room for the truck and the boat. It’s also a 1998, and while Danny does love it, he yearns for the Shelby.

We sure hope Joey and Danny can score the wheels they want when they grow up. In the meantime, we keep telling them what it will take to acquire the keys to their dream machines: good grades, good college educations, good jobs, a good amount of savings. Even then, it might be a stretch. But we won’t burst their bubbles just yet. Because who knows, if they have just the right amount of drive for just the right amount of time, they might get exactly what they want. And nothing would make us happier than sitting shotgun with our grown-up guys in their grown-up rides. Well, maybe we’d be pretty happy if they got us a dream car, too. We’ll take anything — except a mini-van.

Crazy boys, with crazy cousins

Two experts on the TODAY Show recently shared that most parents, when surveyed, say what they want most out of life is to raise healthy kids. And when 6,400 moms and dads were interviewed in one study, the following six practices emerged as key for raising better kids. Embrace each one, and your own offspring will be better behaved and less likely to engage in risky behaviors.

1. Have dinner with your kids at least five times per week. This is what matters most, not your work, not the stuff you’re buying, but actually sitting down and paying attention to your children. It’s not the food that matters, it’s the connection and strength of the family that comes from dining as a group. If you just can’t make it happen because you’re working two jobs to make ends meet, gather at an off time and have a snack together.
2. Take your kids to church or synagogue weekly. This will teach them that there’s something bigger out there, and they’ll learn a solid sense of respect.
3. Check your kids’ homework nightly. Intellectual development is just as import as physical development. The more you monitor, the better.
4. Demand the truth, and get it. Earn trust by becoming a hands-on and involved parent.
5. Take kids on vacation for at least a week at at time once per year. Leave your Blackberry at home.
6. Get your kids involved in team sports, but be careful. Research shows that some sports may increase incidences of drinking, smoking and violent behavior.