February 26, 2012 · 12:17 am

Kids Online–Staying Safe

At least once a month I seem to run across a conversation or an online posting asking when it is time to allow kids to have access to email.  We can be as overprotective as the best of them,  but on this front we’ve taken the approach that early online access is as much an opportunity as a risk.

Education:  The most important idea I want my kids to learn about any electronic communication is that once you text, tweet, or hit send, whatever you posted is out there forever.  You can’t delete from a server.  Someone might have hit print.  The message may be stored on someone’s phone.  Electrons are forever.  That means there is no room for regrets if you forget the golden rule.

Insurance:  There is one condition for having email access–and, later, Facebook, Twitter, etc.  I always have the current password, and the first time I try to log onto an account and the password has been changed, account closed.  In the 7 years that at least one of our kids has had an email account, they have always followed that rule.

So far, so good.

 

 

 

 

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February 1, 2012 · 1:27 am

Found: The Ideal Sport for Kids

We’ve done most of the usual sports over the years, some for just 1 or 2 seasons and some that have clearly become life-long activities:  t-ball, soccer, basketball, lacrosse, volleyball, gymnastics, football, karate…even a few tennis and golf lessons last summer.

But in our experience, swimming is the sport that consistently seems to treat kids the best.  Here are 7 reasons:

1.  PLAYING TIME–In swimming, everyone participates.  No one is stuck on the sidelines.

1A.  A DIFFERENT DEFINITION OF WINNING–We are all about the ‘personal best.’  Our summer coaches even award a ribbon every time a swimmer breaks his own best time in an event.  So we never worry about whether our son or daughter comes in first or last in an event.  Instead, success = taking time off.  With this approach, a last-place finish that sets a personal best is a much bigger accomplishment than a first place finish that is slower than the seed time.  The opponents that matter most are the clock and your own best time.

3.  FITNESS–3 examples:

  • My 8 year old’s abs put a G.I. Joe doll….er….action figure…to shame.  His secret?  2 hours of practice per week during the school year, 5 hours of practice per week during the summer season–plus swim meets.
  • After 8 years of summer swimming, his 16 year old sister has at least 10 more pounds of muscle than she would have.  Always very thin, instead of resembling one of those skeletons that hang in a science classroom she is now strong enough to play high school varsity and travel club volleyball.
  • Their 13 year old sister swims 100 and 200 meter events.  Then she grabs a drink and a quick snack before competing in her next event as soon as 30 minutes later.

4.  THE POOL–AGGRESSION FREE ZONE–In most sports, kids learn–and sometimes are coached–to use aggression to offset someone else’s superior skill.  In swimming, the lane lines give each swimmer her own space, and the only thing that matters is speed.  Swimming doesn’t necessarily favor the big…and there is no opportunity to be rough:  Swimming rewards the fast.

5.  BALANCING TEAM AND THE INDIVIDUAL–Swim meets are team competitions, and kids and their parents cheer their fellow Dolphins, Dragons, Sharks, or Seahorses.  At the same time each swimmer can earn a personal best or a place ribbon, usually in 3-4 different events. in one day  But there is no conflict between team and individual goals:  Swimming is the rare team sport in which an individual pushing solely for his own success cannot hurt the team’s performance.

6.  SAFETY–Because there is no physical contact between players or with any hard surfaces or equipment, injuries–beyond the occasional strained muscle–are rare.  In swimming I enjoy watching my kids train and compete without any worry about sprains, broken bones, or concussions.

7.  A SPORT FOR ALL SEASONS–The summer (June-July) outdoor season and the winter (September-May) indoor season combine to give kids the opportunity to train and compete for up to 11 months out of the year.

If we could just get them to start the swim meets a little later in the day…

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January 19, 2012 · 12:25 am

I Get By With A Little Help From……Complete Strangers

Last Friday night I headed out with 2 of our trio on a trip to Richmond, normally a few hours’ drive from our home.  Our high school-aged daughter had a 3 day sports competition as part of a travel team, and I planned to split the weekend between cheering her on and spending some one-on-one time with her elementary-aged brother.  Seemed like a great plan.

But about 2/3 of the way there, my trusty–but not new–SUV lost power.  What does THAT mean?  Radio–stopped playing…which was extra painful because we were listening to an ’80s show that we expected to air our phone-in request in a few minutes.  Headlights–dimmed in a hurry.  Dash instruments–dropped to zero, despite the fact that we were still going.  I moved to the right shoulder, and before the next exit the engine gave out, too.

Dark (without any lights).  Cold.  Heavy, long-weekend traffic on I-95.  2 kids, plus luggage, on board.  And for the first time in almost 30 years of driving, I was stuck alongside the road with a problem that couldn’t be solved with a spare tire and a jack.  With the emergency lights barely flashing, I got out and stood behind the truck, counting on the reflective parts of my ski jacket to replace the flares I was not sure I could get to without unpacking all of the bags.  [I know:  Maybe not the smartest move, but at the time my first thought was to keep us from getting hit by someone who couldn’t even see us.]

But then everything took a turn for the better because one person after another went out of their way to help:

I tried to flag down a passing police officer, but he did not see me in time across 4 lanes of heavy traffic.  So I called 911 and the operator notified the county police that we were stranded without lights.  Less than 5 minutes later the same officer was back, parked behind us with his lights flashing to keep us safe from highway traffic and offering to put the kids in his car to keep them warm.

The officer called a state highway truck.  The state highway driver checked out my SUV, reaching the same conclusion the officer and I had:  The alternator was dead.

The officer called for a tow truck, and he knew the driver who showed up to get us off the interstate.  They talked through our best options, fielding all of my questions.

The tow truck driver recommended a garage.  He assured me that it was a family-run business that would be open first thing Saturday morning and that he had even known the owners to stay open late on the weekend to help stranded travelers get back on the highway.  He also recommended an inexpensive, but national-chain, hotel directly across the street from the garage.  He took us to the hotel and then took our truck to the garage.

Meanwhile, my daughter was working her smartphone to find a ride to the tournament.  She found out that another family with a daughter on another team in the same club had left later than we had.  My daughter called to ask for help, and they happily detoured from the highway to pick her up and take her on to the team hotel in Richmond so she would be with her team for the full weekend–The players room together, so once she got to the hotel she was going to be safe with friends and chaperones.

I called the Richmond hotel to let them know that I would not be checking in as expected.  It was 11:00pm, 5 hours after the deadline to cancel a reservation, so all I wanted was to confirm the room for the rest of the weekend.  I explained that we were stranded until we could get the truck fixed and the lady on the phone put me on hold.  When she came back, I was stunned to hear that she was changing our reservation from 3 nights to 2 and was waiving the cost for Friday night.

The next morning, my son and I were at the garage when it opened.  They already knew our story because the tow truck driver had called one of them AT HOME.  In less than 30 minutes they had confirmed the alternator diagnosis and quoted me a repair price.  When I asked how long it would be before we could get back on our way to my daughter’s tournament:  “45 minutes.”  Incredible.  By the time I took my son back across the street to the hotel for the mini-buffet breakfast and we got packed, the truck was ready.  We drove on and were able to catch most of his sister’s last match of the day.

In a time when many people coast through their jobs and treat customers as an inconvenience, every one of these people went above and beyond to turn a crisis into a problem solved.  Much appreciation.

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