The Islander – Part 3: The Island

I grew up on an island.
When people think about islands in the Northwest, they often think of small communities that can only be reached by ferries. Filled with bed and breakfasts and quaint shops these islands in the northern part Puget Sound are in fact really nice to visit and get brunch.

I didn’t grow up on one of those islands. I grew up on an island that had I-90 going through it.

Mercer Island is located in Lake Washington which is a lake just east of Seattle. On the other side of this lake is Bellevue, the largest suburb of Seattle. This city is a middle/upper class community with more Starbucks per capita then is logical and a feeling of serenity despite the fact that there is a freeway that intersects the north part of the island.

Diversity in this island was unique when I grew up. With very few African-Americans and a large Jewish and Asian-America population, my sense of racial normality didn’t reflect much of America. I had no concept that Jewish people were a minority. I didn’t have any friends who were Black or African-American until college because, there were so few in my community.

Systems of oppression were clearly present in retrospect, but growing up on this island I had no concept of the racism and classism that informed the make-up of this city. There was a sense of preservation and control in this city. If there was an option to turn the bridges that connected us to Bellevue and Seattle into draw bridges, many people on this island would probably be in favor of this medieval idea to keep the others out.

The desire to create a feeling of a safe community was a desire to do the best for the children in the city as much as it was an expression of unacknowledged bias and insecurities. The outsides of houses and cars that were parked outside often were not reflected in what was actually inside of the house and the lifestyle of its occupants.

Like in high school, conformity was a measure of success.  Differences were only embraced if they didn’t threaten mainstream narrative of whiteness.

That doesn’t mean that this island wasn’t a wonderful place to grow up. The issues related to this community were not unique, and despite these problems recognize there was a much good that occurred in this city.

The island was filled with friendly people, wonderful parks, and great cultural opportunities. You could find on this island, as my family did, amazing private music teachers, a wide variety of ethnically diverse and restaurants, and a wonderful youth theater.  Since the island was used by Starbucks to try out a lot of different designs and innovations, we had a lot of Starbucks. This may not be seen as a good thing by some, but growing up, these places provided a feeling of comfort.

The island felt like a college campus. One could drive around the entire island in half an hour and feel a sense of safety in every corner of this city. Walking down the quiet streets on warm summer nights as a teenager, this city felt like a place apart from the chaos of the world, somehow better, and somehow right, innocent, and idealized.

Senior year my family moved off the island to Bellevue.  I visited the island a couple times the following year when I visited from college but since then I haven't been back.  Part of this has to do the with my relationships with my high school peers after high school.  The other piece is a little harder to articulation.  I have great memories of Mercer Island but I don't miss this place. 

We miss things that somehow feel incomplete.  This feeling can change over time.  I missed my maternal grandmother for a year or two after she passed away, but I don't miss her anymore.  I have fond thoughts about her, and I'm proud that I knew her.  I came to a point where I understood that the time we spent together was enough, and I was blessed to have the time to hold her in my heart. 

My time on my island was enough for me.  When I did miss Mercer Island, I missed the idea more than the reality.  The older I got the more I realized the idea wasn't real, and was a fantasy that would pull me away from who I wanted to and needed to become. 

Parenthood: Week 324 - Birthday Party Tips

I have probably been to about forty children’s birthday parties since the birth of my first son, Ollie. I probably haven’t seen it all, but I’ve seen a lot. I’ve been to some amazing parties, and I’ve been to some that have been excruciating. So here’s a list of recommendation on how to make your child’s birthday party awesome.

1. Embrace the transition
Your child’s first birthday party is usually an adult party with some babies around. This is a celebration your child will not remember.  It is more of acknowledgement of the hard work of the parents put in during the first year of that child’s life and a thank you to all the people who helped make that first year possible. So it’s perfectly appropriate to have activities, food, and drink that is more focused on the adults.

This slowly changes until around age 5 where birthday parties are not kid parties with some adults around. The priority is for your child to interact with their friends. Adults will get a chance to socialize but these conversations will be broken up by needing to attend to children. Food becomes pizza and juice, and that’s fine.

This transition will happen, but it can be a challenge to fully understand. It’s not that one type of party is better, you just need to learn to appreciate how they are different and find value in these different experiences.

2. Cupcakes
You have some activity, everyone eats, the child gets that happy birthday song sung to them and now everyone wants cake.

The process of cutting up a cake quickly and neatly, placing them on plates with utensils, and passing out these plates is almost impossible to do without a lot of help, and is not fun when you have children waiting for cake, which for many is the climax of the party. The answer: cupcakes. There’s no need for utensils, and you can even get away without plates. The wrappers mean that many adults can help pass them out without worrying about sanitation.

If you still a cake, I recommend buying a small cake for the candle blowing thing andbuy cupcakes to serve the majority of the people quickly.

3. Location, Location, Location
Do birthday parties at places that regularly do birthday parties. I know it doesn’t seem very creative or original to do birthday parties in the same places other families do them. However there’s a reason people use the same kids-themed play spaces: the staff knows what they are doing.

If you hold your child’s party at a place that regularly holds children’s birthday parties there staff will be ready for you. They will have a bin for presents, their staff will most likely help you set-up and clean-up. Sometimes they even pass out food, and help you load stuff in and out of your car.

If you want to do your child’s party at a place that doesn’t usually host children’s birthday parties, ask a friend to show up early and help you out, because chances are, the staff will do nothing.

4. Pizza
It’s really the perfect birthday party food. You can pre-plate the pizza and put them out on tables,so kids don’t have to grab their own food (children are HORRIBLE at buffet lines). Most children are happy with cheese pizza (and gluten-free pizza is not hard to come by). Set up the tables with some bowls of fruit, crackers, and some juice boxes and your are set. Some more adult-orientated food can be at a side table. I’m already sick of eating pizza and it’s only the beginning of the summer birthday season. However it works, so it’s best not to fight it.

5. Presents
Avoid having present opening be part of parties. It is socially awkward, children often loose interest in this process, and they aren’t very good at being polite when they don’t like a present.

If you want people to bring presents, tell them not to. It’s your party. If instead of doing presents you want them to donate to a charity, do a book exchange, or something completely different than say so on the invitation. Creating an experience that children can focus on the value of friendship through a shared experience over material gift is important.

6. Enjoy The Party
It’s really hard to plan children’s birthday parties. Just remember it’s not going to be perfect, and to take the time to enjoy the party yourself.

Stop hosting for a minute, find the smile in your child’s face and look around the room at all these people who are there for your child. Your child brought these people together to share love. That’s a magical, life-affirming, and powerful thing to witness and feel, so take a moment to experience this.

The Islander – Part 2: The Fantasy

Part 2:

I see in Ollie, my 6 years old, the fantasies of my childhood. Like Ollie, when I was a child, my fantasies were those of Disney movies, superheroes and Lego sets. I would create complex stories an scenarios to process the world around me and escape with a sense of creation and control that often feels out of reach to children. In Star Wars films, comics books, I was able to replay and deconstruct human interactions and through fantasy figure out what reality was, could, and meant to my experience as a human being.

As I got older, a different kind of fantasy entered my life.

When I watched my favorite cartoon, Batman: The Animated Series. I would follow up watching this show with playing with my toys and pretending in playgrounds that I was Batman. However, I never had any illusions that I could ever actually be Batman. I  was keenly aware even as a child that as much fun it was to pretend to be Batman, this was a fantasy that could never play out.

As I got older into my teenage year and my thoughts about my future came to the fore, I found myself watching less cartoons and got into two other shows that became my favorites, The Wonder Years and Boy Meets World. Unlike my fantasies around superheroes, I didn’t see these shows as unrealistic depictions of what my life could be like, instead I saw these fantasies as realities to pursue.



In the 1990s an explosion in teen-centric culture occurred in popular music, television shows, and films. While there were many shows like Buffy, The Vampire Slayer that addressed issues related to the high school experience with thought, and insights (albeit in a genre which included vampires, with actors who were not teenager).



Other art, like the numerous teen-sploitation films (She’s All That was great, but many were horrible) added to a distorted caricature of high school that is more dramatic, less diverse, over-sexualized, and wholly unrealistic. But my classmates and I didn’t realize that as we moved through middle school and created goals, and priorities for our high school reality, the fantasies we were consuming.

The drama, the independence, and to my male cis-gendered, heterosexual teenage mind, the sexual dynamics and expressions of masculinity that I now understand as destructive, seemed attractive, and in some ways was seductive.

This confusion set up my generation to pursue unrealistic fantasies that come into conflict with a better, more meaningful and realistic reality. Instead of caring and focusing on friends who were real, we pursued friends we thought we should have. Instead of expressing joy in what we loved to do, we pretended to like what we felt would help us fit in, and instead of embracing and celebrating diversity, we fought for a status quo to bring us predictability and comfort at the cost of our self-esteem.

This tension didn’t always end up negatively, but it had to be overcome to accomplish positivity for ourselves and our community.

Unfortunately this pursuit of unrealistic fantasies wasn't limited to my high school...

Parenthood: Week 323 - 6 Years A Parent

“Well my time went so quickly
I went lickety-splickly out to my old '55
As I drove away slowly, feeling so holy
God knows, I was feeling alive.”
- Tom Waits

Ollie turned 6 years old a couple weeks ago. That means I’ve officially been a parent for six years. Other parents warned me that “it” all goes by so quickly, and it really does.

I’ve understood for most of my life even though time is a constant, even pulse that never changes, our perceptions of time is constantly changing. This came from my experience with music. A boring song could make five minutes last forever, and a great performance that I participated in could feel like it’s over in seconds. I’m aware of time during most of my day and I’m constantly reflection on how certain passages of time feel. Time is just one of those things that is on my mind.

The passage of time with children is marked by incredible outwards physical changes that reflects even more astounding mental and emotional development. Looking back at pictures of Ollie as a baby, and looking at him now, intellectually I know it’s the same kids, but the changes are really hard for me to fully comprehend.

Objectively, looking at the science of biology, Ollie changed far more than I did in the last six years, but I also changed during this period of time. The change inside of myself over the past six years was only made meaningful and more significant because Ollie was in my life.

When I think about how I’ve changed and what Ollie’s presence in my life has meant to me, I can’t help but think how much my life would not have changed if I never became a parent. Would things be the same? Would I be living in the same condo, with the same lifestyle? I don’t know. I think something would have happened in my life be, or maybe I would have become complacent or frustrated with life. It’s hard to know.

Life isn’t about one thing. Different events intersect with each other to create situations for us to change as humans. However, it’s undeniable that parenthood for the past 6 years has intersected with every single part of my life.

I know that parenthood has made me more empathetic to other parents and children. I know that parenthood has made me put my career in perspective, and it’s important, it’s just a job. I know that parenthood has forced me to reflect on all of the facets of my own identity which has led to growth, and I know that my life feels more full than at any other point in my life. I like that I’ve changed in these past 6 years and grown along with Ollie, and I’m excited that the challenges and joys of parenthood will continue to help me better understand the world and myself.

In the past 6 years, Ollie has already given me more than I could ever give him. I hope that he is grateful to me for all that I’ve done for me, but more than that I hope he knows how grateful I am for the better person he has continues to help me become.

The Islander – Part 1: Introduction

In the past eleven years, this blog has left few subjects in my life in the shadows. I started this blog writing about my love of music, I wanted to let my thoughts and wonders about the art of music out into the open. Slowly the blog evolved to reflect the changes in my life. While music will always be my hobby and part of my professional life, my thought and experiences in my life pulled focus away from music, and the blog reflected this change.

First it was posts about this little puppy name Buffy, then running, politics, college, parenthood, and then teaching. These subjects are more the norm in this blog because more than music these subjects are what is at the certain of my life, my energy and where I find the most meaning in my life.

This blog also has been a way that I could process and better understand challenges in my life. There was an early post about my having shingles, and then I went deeper. I wrote about having Crohn’s disease, challenging times with Buffy. Other difficult moments, including struggles with parenthood.  I wrote about openly, facets of my identity, and deaths in my family. There are a couple things that I haven’t written about in my life on this blog. One these topics I haven’t discussed (except for this one post) was my time in high school.

My time in college was meaningful but it has a simpler narrative. It’s was the final chapter of a trilogy. As I wrote about in these post, I had my mentors, my tribulation, and my tribe. I left college knowing myself and with an amazing partner, Diana, ready for the next adventure in life.

High was school was that darker second film in the trilogy for me. It was a time of feeling lost, not knowing my place, with an ending that felt incomplete. The road ahead after high school not well understood as high school.  My teenage years didn’t give me the space and permission to fully be myself. When I graduated from high school I was both relieved to be done with high school but I also wanted to stay.  This was despite the knowledge that even though I knew that even though my time at this place benefited me, it was a place that didn’t truly see me.

I feel less confident writing about my time at high school than my experiences with racism. I don’t know why, but I think that’s why I need to write about this time in my life. It has been more than twenty years since I started high school and in a year, it will be twenty years since graduating. Memories from high school, like ghosts, visit me, and instead of facing them, I have chosen to ignore them, and in that process push aside experience I need to better understand to better know myself.

So let’s do this. [inhale, 1…2…3…4…5 exhale]

I’ll tell you about the island that I grew up on and fantasies left unfulfilled. I’ll describe those tore me down and how in my responses to them, I only aided them in their pursuits. There are teachers I will write about who inspired me, and peers who made me feel less than. There are those individuals I will honor, the most unlikely of friends who showed me love and showed me a path to learn to fully be myself be and love myself.

Welcome to Mercer Island High School, home of the Islanders.

Parenthood: Week 322 – I Wonder As He Wanders

Ethan sometimes walked on the path. Other times he didn’t. He stopped often to pick up something from the ground. Sometimes it was a rock, a blade of grass, or a leaf. After a while it was as if Ethan forgot what was in his hand as he would be surprised at what was dropping from his grasp as he leaned over to pick something else up off the ground.

It was one of those evenings when the weather invited you to stay outside. The heat comforted without taxing you and the cool breeze refreshed without pulling away your energy. This is June in the Chicagoland area.

Ethan and I found ourselves wandering the grounds of the Chicago Botanical Gardens. We had come as a whole family for a family event, but were sad to realize that portions of this evening, Ethan could not participate (this is a whole different story…ugh), so I took Ethan to explore the grounds while Ollie staying with Diana to experience the family night programing.

So often in our little ones don’t get to move through life at their own desired pace. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Children shouldn’t stay up as long as they want playing, and they shouldn’t be allowed to sleep in all of the time. Little ones need to stop activities for snack time before they get hangry and babies often fight taking naps (something I will never understand). We need to teach our children to create structure in their own lives by creating structure for them.

It is wonderful and important that children have time to go at their own pace, as Ethan did yesterday almost five minutes sitting on the ground looking at a leaf. Watching Ethan exploring nature was cute for a minute and then got boring. And I had to fight the urge to move him along to something else, because that was for me, not for Ethan. Sometimes children need to be in charge of their own schedule, so I let him sit there. As I watched him and let go of my desire to do what I wanted to do, I stopped feeling bored and I felt a sense of peace.

There is something magical about watching young children in nature  They don’t need technology, or other stimulus they can just walk through a forest, sit on a beach, or wander a path through a gardens as Ethan did yesterday and be satisfied. This is part of the innate scientific minds in children. They want to discover and explore the world around them. Toys, books, and music are great ways to facilitate this exploration but bringing children to nature allows our children to grow and explore in a way that is unique, powerful and inspiring to witness.

As we explored the ground Ethan started trying to climb a hill. He kept slipping, but he kept trying. There were some signs of frustration, but he didn’t give up. I placed my hand under one of his feet to provide a foothold and this allowed him to push himself up the hill. If Ethan noticed that I helped him, he didn’t acknowledge this as he sat on the top of the hill looking out into the clouds, as the sky  changed colors as a prelude to the sun's descent.

There is so much that we have to do for our children, and there is so much we have to teach our children. Sometimes the best thing we can do for our children is to not do, and let them be. It’s okay for us to be spectators, to learn from our little ones, do as they do, and share in the wonder of earth.

Year 9: Week 37 - It Was A Year...

I find myself at the end of year 9, feeling less like an ending, but more like a pause. The to do list isn’t done, work to do this summer is already requiring my attention, and I’m not feeling any sense of closure. Part of it is that even though students are done with school, I’m not done with them as I still have grades to  complete that are due next week. Maybe, another part of it is that as much as I want to do be done, part of me doesn’t want to let go.

It was a great year overall, but like any experience, or any meaningful endeavor, this year was complicated. I was able to do right and do so well for some of my student, and many of the teachers in my department. I also know that there were those students who I didn’t do enough for and some teachers that I worked with that I didn’t support as much as I wanted. However, I’m not filled with regret because I know I did the best with the time that I was given. I think we can wish we could have done more, while acknowledging that in reality, we really couldn’t have.

It was a year when I thought about power. I talked explicitly and openly with my students my power as a teacher being less significant and weaker than the power they held as students to support, inspire and work for and with each others. It was a message that at first felt uncomfortable to say but resonated with my 3rd graders as much as my 8th graders.

It was a year with a challenging 8th grade class that I never gave up on, and learned to accept them and embrace their flaws. We never got to creating that classroom atmosphere which I usually reach with my 8th graders but it ended up being okay. Rallying around the music, with only one song out of eight written by a cis-gender straight white men, we looked at the lack of diversity in the concert-band world and did something about it, in a small but meaningful way.

It was a year in which I adding physical work in every single of my classes to help them settle their brains and their bodies and teach my students to self-regulate. Stretching, tense-release exercises, and breathing gave my students the tools to actively help myself settle and be present in class as it did for my students. Together we took the time to come to a place, ready to work and be with and for each other, which I often found I needed as much as my students did.

It was the year that I came back to the 5th grade Lorado Taft retreat after missing this trip last year because of the birth of my second child. The time away from the trip made my cherish the time even more with my students. I valued the moments, the challenges, and the opportunity to make new teachers feel included in this wonderful tradition.

And it was a year where my greatest success as a leader was helping others succeed. I stepped back more than I stepped forward creating opportunities for others who more often succeeded than failed because of the faith I had in them and the freedom I allowed them to enjoy. If leadership is more about what we can do for others than for ourselves, than my time I spent at school brought me to a new level of leadership that allowed me step back with pride and watch those I serve as a leader succeed.

It was a school year when the work challenged me, but also enriched me as a human being. There’s more work to be done, but that’s one reason I love it so much. It’s the end of a chapter, not the end of the book, and I’m excited to face the upcoming blank page with optimism and faith.

Parenthood: Week 321 – Shoes

Ethan happily picked up his shoe and sat down to try to put it on himself. Even with a 50% chance of picking the right shoe, Ethan always managed to pick the wrong shoe to try to put on. This isn’t that big of a deal with toddlers. There feet are more of a rectangle than the shape of a foot and they really don’t seem to mind if they have wrong shoe on. The only reason they probably end up with the right shoe on is so that parents don’t feel embarrassed that their child isn’t dressed properly.

I sat down on the floor, and pulled Ethan into my lap to help him put on his shoe. Ethan loves to try to put on his shoes and his boots, but he’s not quite there yet and I wanted to get out of the house. As I got the shoe on I asked my other son, “Ollie, can you find your shoes?”

Ollie didn’t respond. I looked over and saw him walking in a small circle. “Ollie, where are you shoes?” Again, Ollie didn’t respond. I went to the back door to see if he had left them there, but they weren’t there. “Ollie, help me look for your shoes.” At this point Ollie started helping me, first looking in cabinet for his shoes as I looked in the closet.

I couldn’t find them. I figured since it had rained recently, he could where his rain boots. “Okay, Ollie let’s just do your rain boots.” The only problem is, we couldn’t find his rain boots. All I could find was snow boots. Spring had indeed come, and it seemed ridiculous that Ollie would wear his snow boots but it was better than nothing I figured.

“I left them outside,” Ollie whispered. “What?” I had a sudden flash of a memory of Ollie helping Diana with the garden without any shoes on. “Ollie did you leave your shoes outside?” I asked him, “yes, by the bush.”

Okay, we can do this. I told Ollie to get his boots on so we could find his shoes, and as I look over to Ethan, I realized that the one shoe that I had put on him had disappeared. I spent the next five minutes trying to find Ethan’s shoe, and eventually found it crammed into his little snack cup which had the remains of some Cheerios that were his morning snack.

I carried Ethan on my hip, with him wearing one shoe, followed by Ollie wearing his snow boots into our backyard. I asked Ollie to give me some sense of where he left his shoe and eventually he directed me to look behind a bush. After ten minutes of looking I gave up. Snow boots would have to do for this trip to Target, but he needed shoes for school the next day.

As I headed toward the car, I realized that Ethan still only had one shoe on. So, we went back inside and I eventually found the other shoe in the pantry.

Fifteen minutes later I was in the shoe aisle of Target. Ethan was happily pulling boxes off of racks and I tried to convince Ollie to buy the cheapest shoes they had: light-up Marvel Superhero shoes.

I don’t even know how long it took to get out of the house, but I do know it was an ordeal..for want of shoes.

That was two weeks ago. Yesterday as I was organizing the shoes in the closet, I found the shoes Ollie said he left outside.

They were inside the closet all this time.