Posted at 02:35 PM in Our Town | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
As a first time mom of three month-old boy/girl twins in Manhattan, I belong to a couple of email groups for moms (mainly) of twins to share information, etc. I found the following posted to both of them a few days ago:
For the first time, I was struck to my core with a kind of fear I'm not sure I could have imagined existed. Shortly thereafter, I realized it would never go away. I'm not sure I counted on this -- I don't think anyone could have prepared me for it. I sort of feel trapped by the inescapability of it. It's not just a New York City thing, I would guess . . . it could happen anywhere. My husband says, "Of course those people are out there, but I'm not going to live in fear," which I take to mean he won't be paralyzed by the crushing weight of possible horribles. I don't think that's going to happen to me, but at the same time, I'm not sure I'll ever truly be free of it, either.
There are actions to be taken to lessen the risk, of course; there are skills you can teach your kids. But you can never be 100% sure they'll be safe from these men (mainly). Which is why it is so difficult to imagine hiring a male nanny. My husband and I talked about how unfortunate it is that men are circumscribed from these kinds of roles in our society. Wasn't feminism supposed to benefit both men and women? Weren't jobs that were traditionally defined by gender roles supposed to be blown open to both sexes? Can't a particular man be more nurturing than a particular woman?
And then those questions hit the cold hard curb of the statistics: that the overwheming majority of sexual predators of children are male. That the recidivism rate among pedophiles is among the highest of any single type of criminal, and they tend to be resistant to known therapies.
Which is why, even as the gentle, feminist, man-loving Quaker that I am, I looked with alarm and suspicion today at the man sitting alone in Central Park as he studied a group of toddlers in a soccer lesson. It was a moment before I thought that he probably had a kid in the class and another before thinking, "he'd better have a kid in that class."
Our kids are casualties of pedophiles, but so are our good men and how we think about them.
[Willa's note: This post was followed a few days later by the post below:]
Sometimes, I'm more on the mark than I realize . . . the following came along on the same parenting listserv where the first notice originated (posted below).
This incident was reported all over the Brooklyn Parenting Groups and
had everyone terrified. I wanted to forward this message from the
Bococa board that clarifies what really happened. Please do not post
unsubstantiated rumors of child abduction.... This particular rumor
set off a witch hunt for an apparently innocent single dad.
---see below
From: Judy R
To: bococa parents
Sent: Friday, June 22, 2007 12:35:05 PM
Subject: [CarrollGardensPFG] incident in Carroll Park
The community affairs officer from the 76th Precinct came by the park
today to speak with Kathleen and myself about the incident in the
park. He said the police determined there was no attempted abduction.
Apparently, the mom had been talking to the man with the dog and when
he left, the little girl followed the dog.
Posted at 03:34 PM in Current Affairs, Lookback to the Old Blog (R.I.P.), Nobody Told Me, Our Town, Religion | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
It's pretty clear that Bennett is going to be into music in some way. The other day, the phone was off the hook on speakerphone and he started dancing to that stutter beeping that happens. Being a toddler, he also really likes to control things, especially electronic things. So last night when I got home (before heading off to the excellent Julian Velard show), Jason told me he had the best video. Okay, maybe he let our girl bite a dead bird's head, but he also got this:
More music love from Julian Velard after the jump.
Posted at 02:47 PM in Bennett, Music, Our Town | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)
Last night, I sat on the floor looking for one of the 42 books the kids usually pull out and ask us to read the first three words of before bed. This is what they do: go to the shelf, where there are 80 or so age-appropriate selections on topics such as hippos, bedtime, "their" letters, numbers and colors, picnics, the word "please," and you get the idea. They pull one out and set it on the knee of Jason or me, who have been sitting patiently, cross-legged, waiting for their selection. Once they've placed the book on our knee, they stand back up and turn around, studying their feet the whole time with the deliberateness of an amateur disco-dancer trying to remember exactly how many steps in this part of the Hustle. Once they've reached tush side to Mama or Daddy, they plop in our lap and sit, contentedly, for approximately the first 2 and a half lines of whatever book they've chosen before they're off to the bookshelf again to find the tome THEY REALLY WANTED IN THE FIRST PLACE. Repeat some nights until parental weariness of the exercise ends it. Last night, though, it was me looking. "Jason, where's Elmo Loves You?"
Bennett loves Elmo Loves You, though I think it's cos I read the whole book in the Elmo voice, which thanks to a girly vocal range, I can kind of mimic.
Jason: "I threw it away."
Willa: "DAMMIT, Jason! Bennett LOVES Elmo Loves You!! I can't believe you threw it away!!!! GOD!"
Can you tell I was really fed up here?
Jason: "I didn't, I was just kidding."
Now you may notice here that nowhere above did I express any particular amount of disbelief or inquiry into WHY he might have thrown it away. And that is because Jason throws EVERYTHING away. He has thrown away every set of instructions and warranty information accompanying our purchases, from the home office printer/fax/scanner, the sofa, the iPod, our camera, the food processor. He threw away our CURTAINS one day because they came out of the dryer wrinkled. I kid you not. He regularly throws away the liner to the shower curtain, and in fact, keeps a stock of new ones in the bathroom closet. He just likes them fresh, even if they're clean. If I didn't make us take the time to go donate clothes the kids have outgrown, I'm pretty sure he'd put them in the trash. Such is the intensity of his compulsion to get. rid. of. stuff. On the one hand, it makes him a perfect Manhattanite. But I think he's going to have to come around. Apparently hanging on to stuff is the new thing; it's the blowback to consumerism run amok borne of a housing/credit/stock market crisis that is supposedly going to trickle down to the shower curtain industry. I, for one, am looking forward to it.
We went to our first concert in a couple years. I'm scared that I just wrote that, but it's true. We are both former music business types who gravitated to that line of work because of our love of music. Tonight we got a sitter (not just any sitter, but the wonderful N) and trekked up to see Sigur Ros, the amazing post modern darlings of Iceland, at the United Palace on 177th Street, where I filed this report from my Blackberry:
"Sopooppoppoppo many white people, bobbing their heads, almost imperceptibly. At one puint, the music stopped and the whole theater all 3300 people just sayt there in complete silence for oh 15 seconds before a couple people finally yelled ow! And then it was silent again for a while till the music started. The woman next to Jason cried. People who had to get past us in the row on the way to their seats said excused me as they passed. People SAT in their seats! What happened to people barfing on your shoes? I mean, I,m wearing opened toed flats tonight."
This was originally posted on our family blog, on September 17, 2008.
Posted at 08:38 PM in Music, Our Town | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Posted at 02:38 PM in Current Affairs, Our Town | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)