Looking for Love?

Dear Friend,

As a parent, I sometimes think about what kind of advice I will give my kids when they begin dating, and looking for a special someone in their lives.

Of course, my children are still young. Nevertheless, you're talking to the guy who was checking out private school options in my community years before I got married. I wasn't in a hurry to have kids, mind you. I just like to be prepared.

One of the thoughts that I had recently along these lines was that people really have no business getting into a serious relationship with somebody until they already have secured a successful relationship with themselves.

I know that in my marriage things have not always gone smoothly. And my wife and I have responded proactively with marriage counseling on and off for over eight years.

The biggest thing that I learned from this counseling was that, although I generally went into it with the idea that something was wrong with her and that she needed to change, I always came out of these sessions realizing that the real problems lay inside of me. Unresolved issues. Fears that I had never faced. Or just the fact that I really did not understand myself as well as I thought that I did. Couples counseling always morphed into individual counseling. And we both grew up a lot as a result.

Ultimately I have come to believe that the greatest and most important relationship that you must cultivate during your lifetime is the relationship with yourself. Only when you are comfortable with the whole of who you are can you have a truly powerful and lasting relationship with another.

So when my kids get ready to get serious about someone, I'm going to advise them that any baggage that they carry today will just come back to haunt them later in their new relationship.

Wanna meet a great guy or gal? Sure, clean yourself up. Get buff. Dress sharply. But if you really want to get in shape for the dating scene, learn to love you. Accept yourself fully. Deal with your baggage so that your new loved one won't have to. It's the greatest gift that you will ever give to them. And to you.

Talk to you soon,

Hugh

Pre-Trip Jitters

Dear Friend,

I got a nice note today from Stuart Wickes of the Family Adventure Project (http://familyadventureproject.blogspot.com).

Stuart was commenting on my last post about pre-trip anxiety. I guess that's why I have a headache tonight after being out all day tying up loose ends before we shove off!

I was reading Stuart's blog and I loved a list that he had made of the mindset necessary for a happy family journey. I agree with him completely on this, and (with your kind indulgence, Stuart) have repeated his list verbatim below:

1 Positive attitude(!)
2 Patience and flexibility.
3 Determination (but only if you really want to get there)
4 Imagination (to overcome whatever obstacles you encounter)
5 Good route choices (safe, quiet= enjoyable, past interesting things to stop at)
6 Clear goals everyday (that everyone’s on board with)
7 Keep everyone looking ahead (things to look forward to: today, in a few days, this week, next)
8 Well managed expectations (about hills, hard days, easy days, when to stop, where to stay)
9 Staying open to unexpected (even if it slows you down or takes you off route)
10 Accommodating everyone's needs (the hardest but probably most important)

Would you add anything else? What do you think?

Please give me (and Stuart) your thoughts!

All the best,

Hugh

Nothing

Dear Friend,

I find myself too tired to blog this evening.

I have spent hours researching washers and dryers for our new RV, and I have discovered that I really do not want to be a market expert on compact washers and dryers when I grow up. I just want a great washer and a dryer that will work with the limited power environment of an RV (electric or gas).

I have also spent hours trying to find a replacement power cord for my oldest daughters new netbook PC. As a result of this research I have discovered that her little netbook has a weird and rare power plug, and that her model number must have been such a short production run that no one seems to know that any were made!

Aahhhhh! Too much work for a guy like me! Especially when I don't really have satisfactory answers to my questions.

So I have decided to just chill out and skip my usual blogging.

Then again, I think that I just wrote my blog. Oh my.

I just can't help myself I guess.

And to you aspiring writers out there, take note. Writing, like life, is what happens while you are planning other things.

Don't think about your writing, just write! If I thought about my writing before I started typing, nothing would ever be written. And I know this from many years of getting nothing written.

So there!

Have a great day and all the best,

Hugh

"Educating" Teens

Dear Friend,

My wife and I were talking today about our oldest child, who is almost eleven years old.

He is a very bright, compassionate, and mature young man, and he has been a great help to us with chores and in dealing with the younger kids. But he is getting quite bored, maybe even burned out, at school.

And we've been wondering what to do about his education after the sixth grade. You see, his Montessori school only goes up to the sixth grade.

In the philosophy of Dr. Maria Montessori, who founded the Montessori educational program, a young person should have learned all of the basic knowledge they need to begin their life in the world by the end of sixth grade. I know that this sounds strange to public school-trained ears such as mine, but she felt, and I have become convinced that she is correct, that a great deal of what is taught in traditional schools after that time is just filler, designed to keep kids busy until they are mature enough to attend college or to get a full-time job.

Her idea of a proper middle school was more of a social experience, where kids might work together to build a business, for example. They would build social skills at a time when social interaction was becoming a big deal in their lives. They would learn how to work with their peers on tangible projects toward meaningful ends, instead of cramming theoretical information into their brains in order to pass the next test.

They would also learn the practical skills that they would need to live on their own. How to make money, for example. Or how to balance finances. Or how to wash and fold their clothes. You know, real stuff.

They were expected to have already learned how to learn. Any additional information that they required in their lives was available when they needed it. They would just need to look it up.

The problem that my wife and I face as parents is that we live in a world where education is built around the test. Schools cram information into kids, and encourage them to learn good test taking skills. Essentially, schools seem designed to produce good students, not successful individuals who will live and work in a predominantly non-academic world.

There are practically no formal schools at the middle school level and above that follow Dr.
Montessori's ideas, though many academics praise those ideas.

Our son can be homeschooled, of course. But that's not the problem. What he needs are more complex social experiences. Yes, even at his age.

We would never push our son into doing anything that he is not comfortable with. And he certainly knows how to speak up for himself. But at some point, I think that he needs to journey out with other young people and discover the world. All kids do. And, hopefully, they'll discover the better part of themselves in the process.

I know that some young people have the opportunity to do this sort of journeying through their church or other religious institutions, in the form of "mission trips."

"Mission trips" are often group trips to poor, third world environments where the kids, with adult supervision, can live together and work for a period of time to make a difference in the lives of less fortunate people who really need it. This sort of experience exposes young people to a world they would probably never otherwise see, and it teaches them that their personal efforts really can make a difference. It is also a bonding and maturing experience for all involved.

I would be glad to be a part of such an effort. But I want my kids to also have such experiences when neither mom or dad are around. That is when real maturation occurs, in my opinion.

So, that's what we talked about today. Once again, I am curious what you think.

If you have or had children of this age or older, what are/were your views on the best experiences that they can be exposed to? What really is education for a teen? Is sitting in a classroom listening to lectures the best way for teens to spend their day? Or is it just the easiest way to control them while we run around trying to make a buck or two every weekday?

I am really interested in what you think. I look forward to your comments. And thank you for your interest and contributions!

All the best,

Hugh

Computers and Kids

Dear Friend,

Help!

I have a bit of a conumdrum and I'm not finding much helpful material about it on the web or from folks I talk to, so I thought that I would bounce it off of you and see what you thought.

You see, my kids love computers. I mean, they really love computers. If we'd let them they'd do nothing else but sit on 'puters all day.

Just when I think that these computers are just a substitute for last generation's TV addiction, I listen in on what they are up to. And I am impressed.

My oldest is recruiting and organizing others into groups to achieve a task. My other kids are creating virtual worlds and taking care of virtual pets. The creative activities they engage in are really terrific. Mostly.

My kids are very physically active and would rather run around that be involved in sedentary activities, so I'm not worried about them becoming overweight "couch potatoes." So what, exactly, am I worried about?

I think that the problem is that my wife and I do not know how much is too much. And when we look for guidance there seems to be two camps - or one, really.

The camp of the academic purists, as I call them, basically think that computers are just aggrandized televisions, and that we'd all be better off without them. I notice, however, a distinct generational slant in these folks, with most being too old to have experienced computers in any but an adult professional environment.

The other camp is no camp at all. It is made up of those parents who simply put some random restriction on computer time and content usage, or simply put no restriction at all.

The first camp has reams of data to support their position. All of it written by old dudes from the pre-computer generation.

The second camp has no documentary support at all.

My instinct is to observe each of my children, see how they react to their interaction with technology, and then to meter their exposure based on that reaction. I also always want to see my kids involved in a variety of activities that involve physical activity, different types of challenges and stimuli, and basically incorporate variety in their daily life.

But then there are four of them and it can be tough to work all day and do all the other things that we adults need to do every day and at the same time be closely monitor how many minutes/hours each child has spent each day in each activity. And the computer monitoring software that I have tried just doesn't hold up well - it's too rigid or just hasn't worked well.

In fact, just thinking about manually keeping track of all that they do everyday makes me dizzy. Sometimes watching them run around in circles makes me dizzy too!

I'm sure I will hear from you the same kinds of things that I have read. But I am asking you for your thoughts in the hope that some of your responses will help me and my wife to do what is best by my children.

And maybe you'll be helping other readers out there with the same issue.

Thanks so much for your thoughts! I look forward to reading them!

All the best,

Hugh

How Strong is Your Rope?

Dear Friend,

If you are a regular reader of this blog then you know that my family is in the process of transforming our lifestyle from a more conventional and ordinary form to a creative lifestyle that conforms more closely to our dreams.

Although this process of transformation has been fun, it can also be stressful at times. And conflicts do arise.

In my opinion, the process of creative family lifestyle design doesn't really create conflict as much as it can uncover previously unacknowledged conflicts and force you to deal with them.

Many of us have issues with loved ones that go unresolved simply because it is easier to ignore them than to deal with them while we are following a busy lifestyle. Now I'm not suggesting that you should intentionally dig up all of these conflicts. However, if there are issues in your family that are likely to raise their ugly heads while you are also undergoing a lot of other stress in your life, the combined stress may be too much to bear. In such a case addressing these issues in advance may save a lot of unnecessary pain later.

In thinking about the stresses that my own relationships have undergone, it became obvious to me that such stress can be beneficial to relationships in the long run.

You know the old adage, "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." Well, I've come to believe that without tough times, relationships never mature. If you've never really experienced true stress together with your partner, then I believe you can't know for sure how strong your relationship is.

How strong is a rope? There may be a rating from a manufacturer, but only by using that rope, and stressing it, can we know for sure what it can handle. And it's better to know such answers early on in relatively safe situations where you have some control over the circumstances than later when some truly serious issue arises.

What is true for an ordinary rope is also true in relationships. Unfortunately, relationships don't come pre-labeled as to their strength and fortitude. I propose that in any important relationship, the participants need to find themselves, at least once, seriously questioning whether they should end that relationship. This sounds harsh, but it is only at this point that you can know for sure what is going on deep inside of your heart.

If a relationship is never tested under fire, I believe that relationship could be more likely to ultimately fail. Strong steel is forged in a hot fire. Strong relationships are forged, and weak relationships fail, as a result of meaningful conflict.

No one goes looking for conflict or negative stress. Certainly not me. And I have found that beginning the process of pursuing my dreams has been relatively stress free, despite all of the changes that we have brought to our lives.

Today my family are living our lives, not just enduring them. We are no longer paying dues. Instead, we are enjoying the ride.

No, we are not being irresponsible. Instead, we are simply aware that life is a finite existence, and now is the best time to live it, not later.

When conflict does arise amongst us, it gives me a greater sense of peace while amidst this negative energy knowing that our strong relationships will come out of that conflict even stronger than before. I don't fear that all will fall apart. And the absence of that fear makes conflict resolution much easier.

So the next time you find yourself in a heated confrontation with a loved one, remember - you are in the process of forging your relationship into a bond greater than steel.

Respect your partner, and require equal respect for yourself. Resolve issues as best you can and then reassure him or her that your shared love is all that really matters anyway.

I wish you the best of luck in all that you do.

Best regards,

Hugh

Captain of the Bayou

Dear Friend,

The Road Warrior crew is resting comfortably at home while we re-provision for our next excursion.

In the mean time, I thought that I would share with you a story of an experience we had in the bayous of southern Louisiana last weekend.

While visiting New Orleans, we thought that it would be interesting to take a bayou tour of the swamps and wetlands of lower Louisiana. We joined a group of folks aboard a small boat captained by a lifelong bayou native, with a unique Louisiana accent that sounded to my ears like a marriage between the deep South and northern New Jersey.

The bayou boat tour was great. It rained while we were out, and I had not seen such intense downpours since my days in the Costa Rican jungle. The weather was hot and humid but the rain felt like I was taking a warm shower.

My kids handled a gator the captain scooped out of the bayou, and a small snake made a new home in one of my kid's long hair (we finally got it out, to the disappointment of all of the yung 'uns).

If you didn't know (and I didn't), a bayou is a natural waterway or inlet that generally contains brackish water and is surrounded by wetlands of various types. Bayous are the remnants of ancient river bends that have been cut off from the main river channel by the constant shifts in the river's course. The word "bayou" derives from an American Indian word that had its pronunciation distorted somewhat by the Acadians (now called Cajuns) when they arrived in Louisiana from Atlantic Canada long ago.

Despite these unique experiences, what struck me the most about this excursion was not the beautiful natural surroundings, but rather the boat captain himself.

This man fit the bill of what I like to call call a "marsh dweller," Where my family is from is full of low salt marsh areas, and the people who live back in these harsh environments always came off to me as tough, harsh at times, extremely independent, often loud, occasionally braggarts, tellers of "tall tails," yet in matters that count honest to a fault and the salt of the Earth in character.

These marsh folks often seem to be people who put you off at first, even perhaps bowl you over a bit with their loud manners and their rough appearance. But, once you spend a bit of time among them, and show them some basic human respect, they inevitably treat you like close family. And their honesty about themselves and the world around them is so refreshing that I find myself not wanting to leave their presence - except that I would have to endure more loud, tall tails.

This Louisiana boat captain was one of these familiar marshy folks. So in a way I felt at home.

While on our bayou tour captain told us a story about the alarming loss of wetlands all over southern Louisiana.

Apparently, one of the many benefits of coastal wetlands is the role that they play in lessening the impact of hurricanes before these storms reach major coastal population centers. The most common cause of coastal hurricane damage is the "storm surge," or wall of water that these storms push ahead of them as they approach a coastline. An extensive coastal wetland buffer can knock down the height and force of these surges substantially. When the coastal buffer is lost, coastal cities lie open to destruction from the sea.

Our captain told us a story about a group of Dutch scientists and engineers that were invited to the US a few years back as consultants to the US Army Corps of Engineers. Their job was to advise the Corps on how it might stem the loss of these wetlands. These folks were in the States for two weeks, and had the occasion to take a bayou tour with our captain during their visit.

Apparently in the two weeks they were in Louisiana these Dutch folks constructed a simple demonstration system that pumped river water from the Mississippi river into the bayous, effectively proving that wetlands could be reconstructed in a relatively simple and inexpensive manner, reversing the wetland losses that had so devastated the coastline to date.

The captain explained to us that the Mississippi River used to naturally overflow its banks into the bayous all the time, dumping silt laden waters into these slow moving waterways, where it served to build up the wetlands and counter the effects of tide and erosion.

However, since the Corps earlier efforts to control regional flooding by building an extensive system of dikes, called "levees," the waters and their precious silt content were being channeled directly into the sea, dumping this silt into the ship channels at the mouth of the Mississippi. The Corps apparently then dredges the silt from the ship channels and dumps it farther out to sea.

At the time our captain was excited to hear about the efforts of these Dutch engineers. Holland is a very low country surrounded by a system of dikes, so Dutch know-how in this area is renowned worldwide. However, our captain was far from impressed by the news that, once these engineers had demonstrated their cheap and simple solution to a problem that the Corps had been unsuccessfully struggling with for decades, these Dutchmen and women were promptly sent home, and their experiment was canceled.

Our captain was convinced that somebody at the Corps was afraid of looking bad, or of being shown up by "foreigners," or whatever. He said that he was so upset by how things were being handled in the bayous and wetlands these days that he and his wife had already picked out the town in Montana that they will move to as soon as he gets ticked off enough to just chuck it all.

From my life experience, this man's story rings true. But of course we will likely never know about many simple solutions to expensive, complex problems for the same reasons.

Anyway, I enjoyed this man's story, and I particularly enjoyed the passion and obvious expertise that this otherwise simple sounding man clearly displayed.

I am a well educated man. I suspect that this boat captain may not have even finished high school. But in the matters that he was discussing, I would weigh his opinion over many a doctorate holder.

I learned long ago not to judge a person's intelligence from his or her appearance or speech patterns. I have met many stupid people who were wearing nice suits and a surprising number of apparent geniuses in dirty T-shirts driving in rusty pickups.

Anyway, that's my story from the bayous. I thought it worth repeating. I hope that you have a chance to visit this beautiful and fascinating part of the world sometime too.

All the best,

Hugh