Dear Kid,

Several many years ago, the world (and traffic) stood still as Dad and I careened in a taxi from our apartment on 53rd Street downtown to the hospital. Not too long thereafter, you consented to join our family. This was (and continues to be) a Most Excellent Decision. Happy Birthday, baby.

Also, today is International Women’s Day (Happy International Women’s Day).

A birthday is just the first day of another 365-day journey around the sun.  Enjoy the trip.  ~Author Unknown

It’s also the anniversary of the first day the IRS began to levy and collect income taxes (1913).

You are only young once, but you can stay immature indefinitely.  ~Ogden Nash

And it’s the anniversary of the first dog-licensing law (NY State 1894). Booker says this means he should be allowed to drive. When I pointed out his legs won’t reach the pedals, he went off to chew on his owl.

The year you were born marks only your entry into the world. Other years where you prove your worth, they are the ones worth celebrating. 
 ~Jarod Kintz

But mostly it’s your birthday.

Birthdays are nature’s way of telling us to eat more cake. ~Unknown

Hope you have a Wonderful Day.

Aging seems to be the only available way to live a long life. ~George Harrison

We love you, kiddo.

Love, Mom

Dear Kid,

NOTE: there are lots of notions, theories, assertions, and disagreements about the origins of Valentine’s Day. As I may have mentioned, I am not a historian. With any luck, much of what I publish is accurate, but if you’re looking for real history fuhgedaboutit.

After years of observation, I can sincerely report that Valentine’s Day is a holiday designed to make people miserable.

In the olden days, this was done by killing them (St. V was in prison [miserably] before he was killed on Feb 14th).

Saint Valentine is the patron saint of lovers, engaged couples, epilepsy, plague, greetings, travelers, young people, and bee keepers. The guy is a mixed bag saintly-speaking.

The oldest surviving valentine is a poem written in 1415 by Charles, Duke of Orleans, to his wife. The duke wrote the valentine while he was being held in the Tower of London (where he was miserable). He remained (miserably) in the Tower for 24 years.

King Henry VIII declared February 14th a holiday in 1537. Which is ironic considering he killed most of his wives because they didn’t “give him a son”. Like they misplaced the order with the baby factory or something.

Nowadays, we make people miserable by Setting Expectations. Since no one on the planet can live up to these Great Expectations, pretty much everyone is miserable. And poorer since they spent a lot of dough trying to Meet Expectations.

Alexander Graham Bell applied for his patent on the telephone on Valentine’s Day 1876. This is only important because I wrote a blog about phones.

Valentine’s Day is the #2 “send out cards day” of the year (Christmas is number 1). I think my birthday should be at least podium worthy, but it’s not.

Most men do not send out cards; they buy gifts. If they know what is good for them.

The roots of Valentine’s Day can be traced back (maybe) to the Roman fertility festival of Lupercalia when a young man would draw the name of a young woman in a lottery and would then keep the woman as a sexual companion for the year. They might not all have been miserable, but I’m betting it wasn’t all rainbows and unicorns for everyone.

Or possibly:

In the Middle Ages, young men and women drew names from a bowl to see who their valentines would be. They would wear these names on their sleeves for one week. Today, to wear your heart on your sleeve means being transparent with your affections.

Or possibly not. See “historian” above.

You can make special Valentine’s reservations at White Castle which is guaranteed to make both you and your date miserable, thereby fitting the theme perfectly. Other fast food chains have joined in, which does nothing to make me happy.

More home pregnancy tests are sold in March than in any other month which is weird because condom sales are highest around Valentine’s Day — 20 to 30% more than usual. There is (probably) something profound to say about this. I don’t know what it might be.

The Italian city of Verona, where Shakespeare’s lovers Romeo and Juliet lived, receives about 1,000 letters addressed to Juliet every Valentine’s Day. This isn’t miserable (except for the Verona post office people) it’s just dumb. Juliet is dead and there is a play to prove it. (Note: Sending letters to Santa makes much more sense–he brings gifts and Shakespeare never demonstrated his willingness to commit suicide for love.)

There’s a lot of candy on Valentine’s Day. Which of course makes sense given the number of people that start diets on January 1st.

Lots (and by lots I mean about 9 million) of people give their pets gifts on Valentine’s Day. This weirded me out until I read that the average amount spent on a pet gift is $5.04 which seems about right. Booker is not going to get a present. He might get any extra treat. Maybe. Please don’t get his hopes up.

Love, Mom

Give yourself a Valentine’s gift and sign up to have DearKidLoveMom delivered every day to your email box.

“Individuals play the game, but teams beat the odds.” – SEAL Team Saying

Dear Kid,

Summer is off to a fine start. When we’re not in the midst of a monsoon, the sun is shining and the spinach is growing. There are s’mores to be made, lawns to be mowed, pools to be splashed in—in short: summer.

With all those fine, frolicsome activities comes the start of The Summer Job. Summer jobs are wonderful for all sorts of reasons. You meet new people, you earn some money, you learn about the “real world” work environment, and – perhaps most importantly – you’re out of the house  and off the couch for part of the week.

Working with new teams can be an interesting experience. The team you find yourself working on can make all the difference in how you view your job.

There are teams where you fit in immediately (camp comes to mind). These are the teams made up of people you feel like you known forever even though you met them thirty seconds ago. They are people you’d like to hang out with when you’re not at work.

There are teams you fit into pretty quickly but on a more professional level. You’ll never be ‘besties’ or get together outside of the office (or warehouse or restaurant or whatever), but they are nice people and make for a pleasant and cooperative work environment. Once the job is over, you probably won’t stay in touch, but that’s ok.

Then there are the teams where one or more member poisons the environment either by attitude or by skill level (guess which is more likely). Being on a team like that can be crazy hard as the team figures out what to do about the problem child (Teach him? Help him? Cover for him? Rat him out? Force him to eat homegrown spinach?).

I hope your job turns out to be all good things and that you enjoy the people you work with.

Please fill the bird feeders.

Love, Mom

Nothing you learn is ever wasted. –A Sage

Dear Kid,

Once upon a time, there was a Dad. This was way back before he turned into a grandpa and learned how to lie on the floor and let you feed him Cheerios.

He was a pretty good Dad, and despite the fact that I was a teenager and he was my father I listened to him more than I let on.

One of the things he once said was “Nothing you learn is ever wasted.” The learning may not always be tons of fun. (Oh, that’s how gravity works.) It may not always be immediately obvious how or when you will use a piece of information. (Who is ever going to ask me about strudel?)  You may even roll your eyes when you hear a fact-let. (Whatever, Mother.)

I’m sure there are scientific-types who would point out that every time you learn something synapses in your brain develop and your brain becomes more powerful. I’m not one of those people, so I won’t point that out.

I’m sure there are bakers and strudel aficionados who would point out that learning about strudel is always a good thing. I certainly agree that going along for a taste test would be fun, but that has nothing to do with what I’m talking about.

I bring this up because we are approaching Choosing Your Classes for Next Year deadlines. I get that as a freshman, there are limited options. You’ll need to take all sorts of intro classes and pre-reqs and freshman requirements. For all I know, you won’t have any options at all first semester.

But college learning doesn’t only take place in the classroom. As you hear a professor go off on a tangent, don’t get impatient to get back to the subject matter. When a friend tells you about a class they are taking in a totally unrelated field, listen. When you have the opportunity to attend a random event, go.

When you have the choice to pick classes not directly related to your major, consider the breadth of options. Find something that sounds fun. Choose to be a well-educated human.

It may not be immediately obvious how or when you’ll use American Sign Language or Secrets to Baking Strudel or Philosophies of the French Impressionists. That’s ok. Learning is good, and it’s never wasted. Besides, you might get to taste great strudel.

Happy Father’s Day,

Love, Mom

Mortar Boards the way the world sees them

Dear Kid,

Once upon a time, you were born. Since then, it’s been a series of graduations. You graduated from pre-school, you graduated from Kindergarten, you graduated from training wheels (although there were fewer attendees for that one). We sat through (fairly short) speeches. We clapped politely for other graduates. We cheered for you. And we celebrated. Often with fabulous, age-appropriate desserts.

A graduation ceremony is an event where the commencement speaker tells thousands of students dressed in identical caps and gowns that ‘individuality’ is the key to success. ~Robert Orben

It is time to plan the next graduation celebration. I’ve been thinking about it. I suspect the speeches will be longer, the cheering more exuberant. I’m pretty sure we will need fabulous, age-appropriate desserts.

Mortar Boards the way Pinterest sees them

Fortunately, there is help for me (yeah, yeah, not enough. I get it.) Pinterest is brimming with graduation-themed pins. Party ideas, cap decorating ideas, party decorating ideas, and food ideas. I love Pinterest and plan to steal borrow pay homage to at least a few of these ideas. That is, if I can pry myself away from Pinterest long enough to actually do anything.

The candy idea got me thinking about mortar boards. Who came up with this particular look as being a great fashion option? I still don’t know because everything that I looked at about mortar boards was serious and boring. Not my fave combination. I can’t find anything even mildly amusing about mortar boards. I looked. I thought there would be a treasure trove of hilarity out there. Nope. Nada.

Graduation: a ritual event where they award you a diploma, in the hope that you will have learned enough to be able to read it.

The only mildly funny thing (which really isn’t all that funny, imho) is that the color for business school tassels is “drab.” That is the name of the color, not some wisecracking description of the color.

Now before anyone gets all bent out of shape let me point out that both of my tassels are (shudder) drab. I discovered this when we were getting ready to graduate from Boston University (Go Terriers). There it was, a tassel labeled “Drab.” Who came up with this color?! Seriously?? We have marketing people, we have creative people, we have people who sit around and think up fabulous names for nail polish and paint, and the best someone could come up with for the tassel for business school is “drab.” Even saying the word sounds unhappy.

Drab. I kid you not.

Sigh. Not that the color of a tassel is any reason to pick a field of study. It’s not. Not at all. Still, if things work out so that the tassel is pretty…

Have a very un-drab day, Kid.

Love, Mom