The joy of the music recital (no, seriously!)

Yesterday, I had the occasion to attend a "Coffeehouse Concert" at the music conservatory where one of my sons is learning to play the drums. This is a highly elegant name for what is, in effect, a mini-recital in the middle of the season.

Signing up for this coffeehouse has been very good for my son... his desire for playing the drums, and subsequent practice habits, had flagged somewhat of late, and the goal of getting prepared for the gig has spurred him back into it with a gusto.

But it's still a recital. And those things carry some bad juju in the parenting world... the jokes abound about the suffering and misery of the recital (except, of course, for when your own little darling is up...)

And yes, I concede that some of the performances have all the surface appeal of listening to Wolverine walking through a chalkboard store.   And it is patently obvious that a certain percentage of the young folks seem to be participating solely because someone is forcing them to...

But then.   But then, there are those.  Those young people whose faces radiate their feelings as they play their favorite instruments.  Effused with a true love of music, they brave their performance anxiety in order to learn the crucial element of being able to ply this craft in front of an audience.  It is easy to pick out the ones who are still taking these lessons because they love music and they love to make music.

And I realized yesterday that there are few things as powerful as watching a young boy or girl, a young man or woman, play a musical instrument with joy and happiness, realizing that you are seeing the next link in a chain of musical legacy that stretches back over the centuries of human existence.  Whether it's drums played to the Clash, acoustical guitar covers of The Police, or piano versions of Greensleeves and Ode to Joy, music is a gift from God, and it is truly a blessing to see young people who are infected with a love of it, and a love of the very difficult craft of playing it and carrying on that tremendous tradition.

So, the next time you have to "suffer" through a recital, listen for those nuggets.... revel in those young men and women who are so obviously reveling in their music.   And count yourself lucky to be part of the great symphony/oratorio/opera/gig that is Life.

A truly Super Sunday...

One of my most beloved friends lives in Arlington with his wife (also a long-time friend) and their three lovely daughters.  This man, along with his brother, have one of the best relationships with their parents that I have ever seen, especially with their father.  Although I am sure there were some teenage growing pains, since that family is comprised of human beings, these men have a tight-knit bond with their Dad and their lovely Mom.  I have told the patriarch of this family (who I leave unnamed out of respect for their privacy... this isn't their blog) that one of my life goals is to have a relationship with my sons like he has with these two fine, God-fearing men.   As far as I'm concerned, Mr. X is a benchmark for a father.

So.... how in the world does that apply to a Super Sunday?

Yesterday morning, I had the immense privilege of baptizing my youngest two sons.  Our church allows someone undergoing this solemn ordinance to choose who shall dunk them, and I served in that role for Logan and Ryan.   It was a very special start to this Sunday, and from what I have gathered from my friends in the audience, I wasn't the only one deeply moved by it.

And yet, the event itself is not the connection to Mr. X.  That occurred several days prior, when Allison needed to tell the minister who would be performing the baptisms.  She asked my boys, and they declared, without hesitation, that they wished to be baptized by their Dad.  That simple action warmed my heart almost more than the actual event, and is what made me think of Mr. X and his sons.

There is a lot of time to be played yet... I'm still in the first quarter of this Fatherhood Football Game, and there is still much work to do in order to emulate the baseline of Mr. X.  That said, this little vignette from our family life this week made me feel that I'm on the right track.  I am blessed to have close, wonderful relationships with all four of my sons, and I would not trade that for any currency, of any form, in all the world.   I love my sons.

Mr. X:  thank you for the great example.

P versus NP on the way to FBC

Our place of worship, Frisco Bible Church, is about an 11-minute drive from our home; on this morning all three of my boys were riding with me in my vehicle, and I had one of the most eclectic 10 minute conversations I could have possibly imagined.

It started innocuously enough:  Matthew piped up and mentioned how much he is into puzzles right now, and he mentioned that he has figured out most of mathematics is like a puzzle to solve.  Which it is. (My degree was in mathematics, which has served us well as we homeschool our boys).   I then told them about one of my favorite stories from math, about how Gauss developed the formula for summing a sequence of consecutive positive integers.

If you don't know the story, Gauss was, like most geniuses, not doing very well in primary school, and was assigned by the master to add up all the numbers from 1 to 100 as a form of punishment.  (It is the mathematical equivalent of writing lines, and it should take a good while to complete when done manually).  The young Gauss, however, solved it as a puzzle and returned with the correct answer in a matter of minutes.  And his formula is still used today... 

After that little foray into math history, the conversation then turned to the great unsolved conjecture from computational theory, P versus NP.  Yes, it really did.  Just a few days before, I had been watching an episode of "Numb3rs" with my boys, and the mathematician in the series, Charlie, had retreated to his garage during a time of emotional duress and worked on the PvNP problem as a way of holding his emotions at bay.

And so now, Matthew wanted to know what it was all about.  Talk about opening a can of worms:  I only have a B.S. in Math, and I'm not Charlie Epps... or Gauss.

So, with only my basic understanding of what the PvNP problem even entails, I endeavored to explain it to my sons. (In a nutshell, the idea is to prove that if a computer can be used to verify a solution to problem, then the computer ought to be able to be programmed to find a solution as well;  if this thing is ever proven {you can win $1,000,000 if you do}, it will have a huge impact on the computer sciences).

Obviously, this wasn't making sense to them (did it make sense to you?), so I struggled to find an analogy that would help them understand the difficulty often faced when creating algorithms that can be used in computer programming to solve problems.  Even the simplest things that humans can do without much effort or thought (such as sorting items) require an algorithm and multiple lines of code... all to teach the computer how to do these things, so the computer can do them very, very fast.

Then I remembered an old motivational demonstration I had heard about, designed to teach people about improving their communication techniques:  making a PB&J sandwich.  I told them I had a loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter and a jar of jelly, and a knife.  I asked them to tell me how to make a PB&J sandwich.  (Most people will immediately start with 'put the peanut butter on the bread', so you put the jar of PB on top of the loaf of bread.... you get the idea).  The creation of the 'algorithm' is the outlining of the very specific steps to get the 'computer' to properly assemble the sandwich.

Since, in this instance, my audience is made up of pre-teen and teenage boys, moments of hilarity ensued and filled out the remainder of our drive.  "I'm spreading the jelly all over the plastic bag of the bread loaf!"

It was a very packed and interesting 10 minutes.

So......

 

What's the point of this otherwise-incredibly-nerdy-post-that-will-bewilder-most-folks?

Far too often, when my sons try to engage me in conversation, I do not give it the effort I really should.  You know what I mean, the 'uh huh' syndrome... or the 'I haven't got time to get into that right now', or 'Dad would like a few minutes of no questions'.   Guilty on all counts, plenty of times.  Especially since I tend toward the curmudgeonly, a card-carrying G.O.B.

This morning, for some reason, I didn't.  And it was a wonderful time... and will be a lasting, precious memory for me.

Every now and then, really listen to your kid's questions, no matter what your mood or the situation.  Whether it's unsolvable math problems, sports, the dating habits of their favorite musician, or the intricacies of Spongebob.   They asked, so it's something that interests them.  Discuss it with them and they will feel special.

And you might find out that you do too.....

Watch it, young man!

The other day, in church, I looked over at my wife on my left, and saw a young hand draped on her right shoulder. It startled me for a second, even though I knew perfectly well that it was the hand of my ten-year old son, Matthew. I leaned forward to sneak another glance at them, and saw my son, sitting up straight as an arrow, his arm tucked lovingly over the shoulders of his mom.

My son will turn 11 in just a few weeks, and it seems like only a short while ago that he preferred to curl up in his chair and burrow into our sides during the sermon. (For the record, his incredible little mind pays full attention, and could probably summarize the pastor's lesson better than some adults in the room...). In fact, he still likes to cuddle and burrow, showing that he yet hovers on the cusp betwixt little boy and young man.

But this was the first time I had seen this. He looked so grown up. I was filled for pride for this young man, who went off to Maine for seven weeks this summer, and came back a blinkin' teenager. I was proud of all he had accomplished, and how he comported himself with dignity and grace so far from home, and how respectful he always is..... and that he still loves his mother and wants to put his arm around her.

He's a good kid. He really is.

And he needs to move his arm. Those shoulders belong to me, young man!

A long-expected day

Yesterday, I watched with pride as my son Matthew finally got to experience a day he has anticipated for the better part of three years.  In the second half of his first soccer game of the season, my son pulled on a keeper's jersey, put on his gloves, and played his first game as a goalkeeper.

As I said earlier, he has wanted this for years.  He fell in love with the defensive aspects of soccer as soon as he was old enough to appreciate the game.  However, the recreational soccer organization in our city does not use GK's until the boys reach the U9 stage.  For awhile now, my son has played sweeper, and has been the last line of defense for his team despite the fact that he could not use his hands.    In the last couple of years, the team has played on a much larger field, with a 6'x12' goal... and no keeper.  We have seen **a lot*** of goals scored from the midline or worse.

And so, I've watched him as he tried to defend this huge goal without being able to use his hands.

That changed yesterday, and it was a joy to see one of my sons get to fulfill a dream.  Granted, he's young, and it's not quite the equivalent of starting in goal for ManU, but it's still his dream.. and he had waited almost half his lifetime to see it realized.

In order to make his debut the best we could for him, we sent him to a top-notch goalkeeping camp this summer, and have arranged for him to get keeper training from specialized coaches throughout the season.  He threw himself into the training with gusto, and it showed as he stepped into his goal.   He walked like a keeper, stalked like a keeper, and played like a keeper.  He had just a touch of that attitude-- "this is MY goal, and you stay out".

And he played very well in his debut.  He allowed three goals, but saved many more, proving to be quite fearless the whole time.  After only one game, his teammates dubbed him "Brick Wall".  Even the opposing coach, whose team is one of the best in the whole association, took time in the congratulatory handshake line to compliment him on his play.

Needless to say, I was brimming with pride.  But even more than pride... I was filled with satisfaction.  Pride comes hand-in-hand with the dangerous train of thought that I am watching, in my son, the future keeper for the US national team, or maybe Chelsea or Real Madrid, etc, etc.

But the satisfaction was for him, and the joy I could tell that he was feeling.  My son realized a dream yesterday, and it was everything he had ever hoped it would be, and he had fun doing it... and it showed.

It doesn't get much better than that for a Dad!

Lessons from Six Flags

This past Saturday, my family and I went to Six Flags over Texas in Arlington.   Yes, for those of you familiar with an August day in Texas... we are insane.   Actually, the reality is that we try to live within our means, and we had some free tickets.   Normally, Six Flags is a significant expenditure for us, as a family of five.   Two of our boys are already over the 48" line, even though they are only 8 and 7, so they are full price.  If we just drove up to the park, and walked up to pay.... it would cost us about $250 US just to get in!   

However, on this day we had 3 free tickets thanks to their summer reading program, and we had to use them by August 9th.  So here we are on 9 August (naturally), getting our trip to Six Flags in before the tickets expired.   In 100 degree heat.  In August.  And the place is packed.   So what are the lessons from Six Flags?

First, all of this hard work I've been doing to lose weight and get in shape is paying off dividends when I least expect it.  Had I done this exact same outing last summer, I would have bonked by mid-afternoon, and would have been suffering.  I probably would not have left, so that my kids could continue to enjoy it, but I would have been miserable.

And I was not.  I did not hit my wall until after 9:00 PM, as we were wrapping up and heading home.   That was such a blessing to have the energy and stamina to enjoy this day with my family, no matter what the temperature.  On a further note... we were going out to our car to have our picnic lunch, and my wife and kids were sagging a little from hunger, so I offered to double-time it back to the car and have all the sandwiches and drinks ready when they got there.   My wife eagerly agreed  (of course!), and so I power-walked to the far end of the parking lot in the hottest part of the day, threw all the stuff from the Jeep into the shady tree area, and started making sandwiches.  As I sat there... I realized I wasn't even winded... and that felt really good :-)

On a totally different note.. I really want to know where my 8-yr old got his daredevil gene.  He just loves any activity that is dangerous... rock-climbing, roller coasters, you name it.. he wants to try it.

So what's the problem?   Well, Daddy is not really a roller coaster guy.  :-|  Never have been.  It's just not my thing.   As it turns out, one of the few top-notch roller coasters that Matthew can ride at Six Flags is.... the Texas Giant.   Yes, he's too short for the Titan and the Batman and the Mr. Freeze, etc.  But he's tall enough for the Texas Giant.

And of course... he wants to ride it.  You can tell it's the highlight of his day at Six Flags.   Mommy has ridden it before and refuses to do so again.  He's too young to stand in line and ride it by himself.  And he's looking at me with those big brown eyes, and paternal pride is on the line.

All I can say is... thank goodness for martial-arts-style mental focusing techniques.  Whoever designed that roller coaster needs to be institutionalized.  Or tarred and feathered, then deported.  Excommunicated.   Something.   Because he is one sick, sadistic, warped person  :-D

But I did it.  I guess that makes me a hero in Matthew's eyes, at least for one day.  I could see it, and he was so happy that he got to ride it.  The things we fathers do for our children!

Random thoughts for the day:
1.  Watching Olympics until after midnight combined with getting up at 0445 to go to the gym combined with being 40 years old?  That's some bad juju, very bad juju.
2.  I have my permanent call sign from the FCC now!  My amateur radio operating license is KA5RWW.  Now I just need to scrape up enough money for a radio :(
3.  Went to put my sunglasses up in the holder in the van this morning, and they came apart in my hands.  Somehow the frame broke right above the bridge.  Bummer.   I only wear cheap sunglasses (I am too rough on them), but I had really liked this pair, and they had lasted 6 months or so.  Oh well.

Kids sure do grow up fast

Lately I have been struck by how much older Matthew (our 8-yr old son) looks.  Despite a real difference of only 15 months, he seems much older than his brother Logan.  I watch Matthew when he goes to the rock climbing gym, or as he plays soccer, or as he plays videogames... and I am struck by how he carries himself.

 
There is less and less of the awkwardness that often accompanies the post-toddler years.  He moves like a cat, and looks like a miniature teenager. (Now there's a frightening thought-- Dear God, he's only 8!)  I watch him with a mixture of pride, and wistfulness.  Wistfulness for youth in its own right, and for the speed with which time is passing, carrying my precious son towards manhood....