another carless day

another carless day. i love this kind of existence, reminds me of those post-college days in newark delaware which in some ways were the best times of my life. just let it flow. we roll out the door with rocket and a vague plan to hike bernal hill and find some more secret slides but only make it one block before we stop for the kids to get their hair cut at stephany's. everyone speaks spanish and miles gestures to make his hair plan clear. we walk a little farther to casa sanchez where we are lucky enough to eavesdrop on a big group of traveling cool skateboard ladies from portland oregon discuss skate parks and the skate business while we eat rice and beans. we make it another block to the water park where miles entertains some kids running through the fountains. a little farther south to garfield playground, home of the purple dinosaur and the wierd moving balance beam. we watch a very professional looking soccer game and start to laugh hysterically as we avoid stepping in doo doo and hockers. we give up on the healthy hike up the big hill and head back for ice cream, stopping at the bookstore on the way where i read maya a book called king and king about a gay prince and buy virginia burton's book "life story". waiting for our cones i spot this cool woman and her twin girls we met at rancho cicada last year. we take our cones to the water park and soon the kids are soaked and sugared, chasing each other around topless and happy in the sun.

i topped off this day at our wonderful neighbor nancy's house, drinking a bottle of nice red wine and eating a delicious sandwich made with her home-preserved strawberry jam while miles and her son got awfully goofy. i put miles to bed with a nice wine buzz.

a day without the car is often a better day, i need to remember this. for so many reasons.

locals

another full day. potrero hill rec center for a pick-up soccer game, lots of little boys running in the green. rocket sprinted around the field like a maniac and maya and her friend lucy made bead rings and shared a bottle of orangina on the playground. i took miles for his first violin lesson with one of the teachers from his school. on her block were several extremely friendly cats who greeted us with purring and rubbing. miles really liked the big grey guy, who a neighbor informed us was named chewie.

later we visited with an old friend and my brother and kids in parque ninos. miles and edison looked pretty huge on that big seesaw. i remember the first time he walked the 7 blocks to this park without being carried or strolled and what a big deal that was. the free farm stand was there, giving out free organic produce and acme bread, surplus from the ferry building farmer's market. the acme bread is a little too good with our fake butter right on the crust. on the way home we stopped to buy ice cream cones and have some cheap thrills on the water park swing. we ended our full day by having dinner with our friends and their three boys, the boys wild, temperamental, sweet, maya taking the three-year-old as her special little friend.

feeling sad that my fear of flying is keeping me from spending time with my friends and family on the east coast this summer. it has been a long time since we were in delaware, and this august my best friend will be there too. i tell myself we can't afford a big trip but of course we have a credit card. it's just still too scary. julia suggests hypnosis, but what if it worked? then i would be in a plane, which is just not at all safe. back to my old mantra, why can't we all be together, why are we so far apart? documenting the pleasures of our very local existence makes this pain a little less.

more summer reading

there is finally a bookstore nearby! modern times bookstore has relocated from valencia street to the old china books building on 24th near harrison. i love the children's section full of books about different kinds of families, child memoirs about being a refugee from the congo, stories about martin luther king, the underground railroad, native american indians. there is a mysterious little gallery in the back which i hear might have art classes soon.

we bought a copy of freak the mighty, which i have in bed with me right now but will have to hide from miles until he gets older. somehow i remember books like this as mostly happy, but this one has a kid whose dad is a murderer and whose best friend dies, oops. luckily he is happy with little house on the prairie.

sunday streets again

mother's day. we were lucky to catch sunday streets and were out for almost the entire day, walking from our house to 18th and valencia with rocket dog. i saw a student i had when he was four who is now a junior in high school. his mom recognized me and i felt old. he told me about some mech droids they were building in japan and was very into rock the bike (music powered by pedaling bicyclists). later another student sped by on her scooter. when she left our pre-k program at 4 she was barely speaking, today she politely introduced my to her brother and looked like a beautiful about to be 2nd grader. of course we saw many friends from the neighborhood. there were a bunch of kids from miles and maya's preschool checking out these amazing dancers (imagine video of amazing dancers here, i can't seem to post the video right now) but my favorite was a little boy who was just learning how to walk when he was in preschool, and usually used crutches to get around--breakdancing!! he was inspiring.

painting part of a mural outside the brava theater.
we saw this before sunday streets really got going. it is conceptual art? did someone just throw their recycling bin through a glass door in a rage? did someone break a glass door and someone else push the bin through to make a statement of some sort? hmm...trippy...confusing. watch out for the broken glass.
also at the beginning of sunday streets miles and maya enjoyed lying on the asphalt in the sun, until a cranky cop suggested they get up because it might scare other people to think they had been hurt. c'mon.

doom and gloom cycles and wanting it all

these things come in cycles, right? we have pretty much accepted that maya will follow in her brother's footsteps and attend the starr king mandarin immersion program. we will support her as much as we can and see how it goes. maybe it will be hunky dory. if not, a learning experience.

but now middle school changes are now on the horizon again. never a dull moment around here! in a draft proposal of changes we read about in the fall miles' entire school was slated to feed into a mission middle school but there was a lot of mandarin immersion parent uproar. many vocal people did not like the low test scores and spooky scary crowd of mission kids. i was not thrilled at first but the more i looked into and thought about it this school grew on me. the kids miles is getting to know, slowly but surely, would be together for another few years. it was a nice sized school, not a gargantuan one with 1500+ kids. small class sizes. and walkable, walkable, walkable. but then a few weeks ago another district plan emerged, a plan in which the mandarin immersion program was to be placed at a higher scoring school, but a huge one, with bigger class sizes, and across town.

maybe i am nuts to lean toward my kid attending a low-scoring school in a part of town with more violence and less open green space, but to me community is huge. i can clearly recall that horrible self-conscious feeling of being in a new school, surrounded by strangers. it took a long time to be myself when i switched schools in 6th grade. and then another long time when i switched in tenth. i never got to know kids outside of my classes and everyone was in a little group alienated from everyone else. i also remember that long long bus ride i took for years, and how my parents never set foot in my schools. and i don't think a tiny school is the best but yes, size matters. i know i am projecting onto my kid but i really believe that it makes more sense to not have to make all new friends every few years in a huge sea of people just because, well, because we live in a big city. i am hanging on to my commitment of having a stable community for my kids despite the erratic urban planning around here. i like walking my kids to school and being green and all of us getting to know the people and places on the way. our city here is the mission, bernal, and potrero hill.

so maybe it will be a waste of time, but i guess i am going to jump into this middle school assignment redesign process by attending the meetings and thinking and talking. who knows what the district will come up with? i would love to see starr king stay together. or at least have my kids attend middle school in our neighborhood. learning new languages is supposed to bridge cultures, not separate people, right? after posting this i will organize the soccer registration forms i have been trying to collect from miles' second grade team, kids in ALL the classes who our tireless coach has been working hard to recruit and register.

anyway, it will all work out somehow, but i do think this school district, like a lot of government, is good at coming up with plans and goals, but not so successful at implementation. suppose the implementation would be easier if there were not so many voices clamoring for what they want and think is right. it would be nice if we could all just be good citizens and not be so entitled and think about the bigger picture in a thoughtful way. the good, the bad, and the ugly are all out in the open when you talk about educating everyone's kids. and of course we are all in for another shock when the new state budget is revealed.

a house or a place to live and food

the sun makes it all so much better. aahh. after a rainy stretch life is beautiful and full and warm again. in the starr king open space all is green and flowers are starting to bloom.

feeling spoiled rotten i bussed it to noe valley with maya where i got some fancy clothes with christmas gift certificates. for her birthday maya picked out "the most beautiful paper plates and napkins, ever" (i think they were left over from hanuhkah). we also cashed in a noe valley bakery gift certificate for a shi-shi cake. we lounged at home, had a picnic of bunny pasta in the sun on the deck, and then borrowed a huge pile of library books. i know it is a parenting no-no, but days like this i feel like my kids are my best friends. especially my little girl, lately.

we went to pick miles up from school and he was practicing for the chinese new year parade with his buddies. in between carrying the dragon they played a wicked game of handball while maya climbed around on the playground and me. my starr king girl gang and i hung out and talked about, well, school stuff, but also our upcoming party for a friend at a new mexican restaurant in the mission, gracias madre.

i am going out tonight to see rich's band play. supposedly j mascis will be jamming with them for a song. this brings me way back to that heady elation and angst of being 21 and blasting dinosaur jr. in my cheap little boom box. probably mishearing and mis-singing the lyrics, "don't let me fuck up will you, 'cause when i need a friend it's still you."

miles told me that he was the kid selected from his class to speak at the martin luther king peace celebration today. don't ask me how he was selected, i doubt it was for good behavior. we have been reading an amazing book, martin's big words, which makes me tear up every time i read it. miles said his dream in chinese first. then he said "i have a dream everyone will have a house or a place to live and food." which could be something he heard someone else say and didn't put much thought into, but i prefer to think he is learning something good from living in this crazy neighborhood in the big bad city.

24th street window shopping

i am lucky my brother lives in town. and that his daughter is my daughter's best friend. this morning we walked with the cousins from our house up 24th street to the dance mission theater family dance class open house. it turned into a good hour long walk, with the kids checking out all the sights, smells, and sounds. a new record store with crazy comic books for grown ups! a head shop called purple haze with some (according to miles) extremely ancient egyptian statues in the window. a storefront filled with grim reapers. many pastries with little colored balls on top. skull art. casa de canario with the african gray parrot who looks so wisely into your eyes. posters of creepy adult movies (inception), adorable owl movies (legends of the guardians). a crazy smashed in muni bus shelter. a dog with an army jacket on. smells of donuts and grilled chicken. cacti for sale. hipsters. people speaking spanish. hipsters and their dogs waiting for pop's to open.

we went to the dance studio and miles astounded me by joining in the demo creative movement class for 3-5 year-olds. i said he could be an assistant. skipping, twisting, jumping and shaking his booty he looked so happy and so...huge. especially in his size 10 puffy down jacket.

and a little escape to the backyard this afternoon. i pushed over the compost bin and was amazed to find black, rich, soil. a lot. and a bunch of sweet little potatoes growing at the bottom. i dug, scattered, weeded, pruned, and harvested mint, borage, potatoes, and some green onions while maya played evil gardener with her calico critters and the bright afternoon faded into dusk.

a few things we saw on the way to jed's house this morning

wind turbine on the roof of the sunset magazine house near garfield parkpainting on someone's garage
new mural with rocks with eyes (hard to see). miles and maya are sitting on the rocks, get it?

i was talking to my friend about how it is hard to write blogs that are about your daily existence without worrying about boring readers. i am taking a little break from journaling my oh so profound thoughts and am instead sharing some sensory details from our lives. yes, taking a break from thinking.

this walk today from our house down 24th st, and up the north side of bernal hill. in perfect sunny weather with a little wind. the smell of pot smoke here and there, donuts cooking, roasting chicken. we heard some kids yelling at each other and screaming with laughter as they chased each other around a block. the blimp overhead, a family of three children coming around the corner in their pajamas, preceded by a remote control race car. many dogs to pet. in the water park on the way home we saw a bird of prey with pale wings, very high, bigger than a hawk. a little boy named rueben who spoke mostly spanish played a long long game of hide and seek with maya. after a while there were about 10 kids playing, miles and his buddy and maya running fast and shirtless and yelling under the blue sky.

the feast for the senses around here, even if it is on top of noisy cars and garbage, is most definitely part of what keeps us from leaving. maybe it would be as full in the middle of nature some where, but i would not trade all this for the regularity of suburbia in which i spent much of my childhood. all this stuff to see and hear and smell, it makes me feel more joyful, in the moment, alive.

beautiful day in the neighborhood

i love days like these, all in the neighborhood. a fuss-less walk up potrero hill, through the newly green open space. miles said goodbye with a hug and barely a backwards glance. a slow walk down with lots of dogs to pet. we sang michael jackson as we walked over the highway and didn't care who listened. at home maya and i got very domestic for a few hours. we picked flowers and vegetables, and then made sun prints. for lunch, pasta with the garden veggies (arugula, tomatoes, parsley). we drew some trees and made collages. then a stroll down 24th to get a coconut donut from the friendly donut shop, where spaceman 3 was blasting. we met a nice mom and three year old rock and roll boy and hung out with them. then back up the hill. soccer, all kinds of crazy kids running in the grass, balls flying, miles in his element. the red-tailed hawk sat in his tree above us gossiping parents while maya and some big girls made mud soup in the ground. the kids and i walked down through the open space singing a song i wrote about not swallowing your gum and a woman getting out of her car told us "the family that sings together stays together."

sometimes i feel like i am a wierdo, that all this mundane stuff can make me feel such ineffable happiness. and little flashes of sadness thinking about the kids growing up and this all going away. i try and try to live in the moment, because when i do it can be so good.
stuff we made
book miles started writing before anyone woke up today. terrible spelling, heavy captain underpants influence.
leftover from someone's alice in wonderland costume, i think

pre halloween

halloween is days away yet some things around here are taking on that element of..."what are we?"this is a house we walk by on the way to school. for a long time it has been the house that needs some love. suddenly it is the witch's house. look closely...creepy, eh?

and this, is it harmless entertainment for kids or an expensive subliminal message filled commercial for those too young to know better?
1974 looney tunes folder propped up on nasty garbage container by sf general. conceptual art? why does the tasmanian devil look so evil? i never before noticed what a carnivore he is. and what is bugs looking at?

wha,ah,ah

singing, dancing, eating, riding ponies, stuck buses, big fears

the potrero hill festival is my favorite of the year.

maya (and her brother and cousin) found herself on stage again with the mobile arts platform, singing and dancing with the amazing Asheba. less than two weeks ago she was dancing with MAP at the galeria de la raza. i'm liking the MAP.

the kids made their own cotton candy at the potrero hill neighborhood house booth. there were pony rides supplied by an exceptionally crotchety pony lady. politicians and michelin men handing out bags of candy. a joyous dance performance with much audience participation by students from the international studies academy. here is a video of the cupid shuffle, something i was unaware of until saturday. i still can't do the electric slide. we also got to see a muni bus stuck on the crest of the hill at 2oth street and carolina. later on we went to a giants game on tv party and today was a mellow one with miles' sweet friend over for a playdate.

despite all the fun, my little partier son could not go to bed tonight because of his persistent new fear, the terrifying possibility that i will be late to pick him up at school and he will have to go in the dreaded cafeteria after 5;30 and wait for me. it is heartbreaking to see my son crying about this day after day, so i am going to try and take more action to make things better for him. it is not the kids, or the teachers, it is miles' feeling that he would be "in a big empty room, all alone." to be somewhere surrounded by people, but no one he really loves, not a close friend or his family is miles' current fear, and it is a big one. i do understand. it is hard to be patient about this, but i do understand. i do.

i guess the cure will be to somehow show him not that i will always get him from school before the remaining kids in the after school program are herded into the cafeteria, but that if i don't he will be able to go in there, and be ok waiting in that big empty room, and maybe even find that it is not as empty as he thinks.

this is a challenge. let me know if you have any ideas.