Some frightening and unforgettable moments today

I started this blog really to chronicle the early years of parenting. It seemed a good way to work out on paper the giddiness and angst of navigating someone else's education and maturation. In that vein, I plan to post interesting stories, theories and trends related to children, education and parenting. Here are a couple:

A New York City painter has movingly chronicled the early years of both his sons' lives via short films. The first was done three years ago. The second appeared in the New York Times today. These are really, really sweet.

On a frightening and what-the-heck-is-wrong-with-these-parents note, this Washington Post story of a grade schooler driving the family car to school because he was so anxious to get the free breakfast. Turns out the dad had been under a court order not to leave the kids alone with mom, but Dad had to work and Mom had to get her sleep. Again I ask, what the heck is wrong with these parents?

And we have a winner - or at least someone who knows their music

My girl Sandi Larsen informs me that the hauntingly beautiful song in the movie Revolutionary Road is "Wild is the Wind" by Nina Simone. You can listen or buy it on Itunes.

Holidays are made for heavy movies

With my holiday time dwindling to mere hours, I raced to catch up on my movie watching. Went to see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button yesterday and Revolutionary Road today. I came out of both carrying an extra 10 pounds of emotion. Benjamin Button is based on the F. Scott Fitzgerald short story which somehow escaped me in 11th grade American lit class. Good. 

It might have spoiled the movie for me, a three-hour cinematic tour de force that doesn't resemble the book at all. English actresses keep showing up actresses from this side of the pond and Cate Blanchett in the lede is a prime example. The movie centers on a really disturbing theme: how would our lives go if we lived them in reverse? If instead of aging, we were born physically old and emotionally young, then we grew physically young and emotionally old. If when we died we just grew smaller until we disappeared like blowing dust. See where the poundage came from? Film critic Roger Ebert argues that this premise is just plain wrong, read: distressing. I wondered how even when Pitt's character was old as Methuselah and in a shrunken, midget body, it was still Brad Pitt's dazzling face. The Boston Globe has the answer.

The trailer for Revolutionary Road is almost better than the movie and includes a few scenes that didn't make the final cut. If you've seen Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? or read the stories of the late John Cheever, you know this movie's angst or read here to get a sense. The movie's singular question is this all there is to our lives is as timeless a query as it is a painful one. Because of course, if this isn't all there is to life, what are our chances of being able to switch course? The movie asks this question and shows its beautiful, horrific answer. For those of us in real life, asking this question in the middle of a recession, record unemployment and two ongoing wars makes it a bittersweet experience, a challenge even to live out loud despite the things that confine us.

On an up note, the soundtrack is fabulous! There's a haunting song that opens the trailer and the sultry, smoky voice sounds like the late Nina Simone. I tried to do a quick search but came up empty. Anyone know or who can find out the name of the singer, please come back here and tell the rest of us.  As for me, its onward to dinner, a little housework and preparation for a busy work week ahead; all the things our lives are made of. Et tu?

Change for Generations X and Y

The annual release of crime statistics from the FBI always sets my teeth on edge. Crime is down but for young people it remains devastatingly high. For young black men, it unacceptable as I said in my Seattle Times column. 

A new president, an energized, united Congress and can-do has become our mantra. At least some of that ought to trickle down to the youngest generations, the ones most devastated by high murder rates, unemployment, evaporating student loans and substandard public schools. If I could request something of every American parent it would be to do something each day that smoothes the road a little for our kids. Not just feeding them and sending them off to school, but planning ahead - thinking of how expensive college will be, of how downsizing and outsourcing has  narrowed opportunities and changed the rules of the game. We're living them a mountain of debt and globe with wars flaring up in too many spots to count. In all good conscience, we have to help them navigate the minefields.