Clergy Family Confidential

I blog today with a heavy heart. The husband of my associate priest, the Rev. Kathy Corley, died suddenly yesterday after a massive stroke. We’re all in shock and mourning with Kathy and her two children, Andrew and Dan. Dave was 50 years, a financial guy with a passion for scuba diving, bird watching, and the gospel.

Please keep the family in your prayers.

Tim+

You can always tell when PBS is having a fundraising drive because they’ve got great programming interrupted by yapping. This is of course why God invented the clicker. After the kids went to sleep last night I found some footage they were airing of Jimi Hendrix playing the 1970 Monterey Pop Festival. For a $120 donation I could have had the CD/DVD combo but I preferred to watch it in installments via the clicker.

The snippets I saw were classic Hendrix — he was coaxing inimitable sounds out of his left-handed guitar. There’s not much more you can say about it — it’s simply guitar virtuosity. Yes, it’s Eric Clapton whose nickname is God — the height of heresy. But Hendrix at least sits at Clapton’s right hand.

The highlight for me was his version of Bob Dylan’s “Like a rolling stone.” Stunning.

But it also makes me wonder how to impart the appreciation of good music to Ben and Zack. My father probably thought the same thing — he was a symphony orchestra conductor — while I was listening to Kiss and AC/DC. But the songs they like, “Cotton-eyed Joe” and ”Bad Day,” aren’t exactly enduring classics. 

I guess all you can do is play decent music around the house and hope some of it rubs off. We forced them to watch enough Baby Mozart videos — some of this better take!

Cruel and unusual. That’s how I’d characterize Daylight Savings Time from a parent’s perspective. Throw in a Saturday night outing to Madision Square Garden to see the Knicks and it’s downright abusive. How was I supposed to know we’d be turning the clocks ahead when I bought the tickets?

The boys and I didn’t get home until 1:00 a.m. Okay, technically it was midnight but losing that hour made it an hour later. It didn’t help that the last-place Knicks decided to play just well enough in the fourth quarter to send the game to overtime. And at that point you can’t leave. I refuse to raise children who think it’s acceptable to leave sporting events before the bitter end. What kind of parent would I be if I taught them to leave baseball games in the seventh inning just because they were falling asleep or the home team was losing by 12 runs? You’ve got to have some standards. So we stayed until the Knicks imploded during the overtime period.

We’ll spend the rest of the week fighting about both bedtime and waking up for school. I think I need a nap.

Big night for Zack tonight — his first sleepover. He’s all fired up about it and he and his friend William have been planning out the evening’s schedule for weeks. I don’t think sleep is on their agenda but then it’s not at our house so who cares?

Zack’s been clamoring for a sleepover for two years now; ever since Ben had his first sleepover when he turned seven. And his packing list reflects the long wait. He’s certainly not traveling light: he’s bringing his comforter and pillow, some stuffed animals, clothes, pajamas, toothbrush (only because we’re forcing him), and his plastic Godzilla. At least that’s all I’m aware of. 

We’ll see if we get THE CALL tonight. You know, the one that comes from William’s mom at midnight when Zack is too afraid to fall asleep. I’m not expecting it since Zack is a great sleeper but you never know. Ben was fine for his first sleepover  — though Bryna and I were a bit traumatized. “Our baby doesn’t need us anymore!”

It’s all part of that parental realization that we don’t “own” our kids, we’re merely their temporary stewards. And that’s bittersweet.

NPR is airing an interview today with the Rutgers women’s basketball coach, C. Vivian Stringer. I really don’t care about women’s college basketball (or men’s for that matter), but whenever I see a name like this it naturally makes me wonder about the initial. What does C. stand for? Do people call her “C.” or “Vivian” or “C. Vivian?” What’s she hiding? Is she related to G. Gordon Liddy?

I’m not sure if a first initial is distinguished or pompous. Then I realize we’ve done the same thing to our son Ben. His full name is Andrew Benedict Schenck. Perhaps one day he’ll fancy himself A. Benedict Schenck. Which might look good on legal letterhead but may also be confusing during academic roll call for years to come.

He’s named Andrew for my late father, a symphony orchestra conductor and a wonderful dad. We didn’t call him “Andrew” because it was just too soon to have another “Andrew Schenck” running around. Plus I can’t stand the name Andy which is what it would probably have devolved into at school. He’s named Benedict for the saint — NOT the pope. We named him first in case you were wondering. 

But we usually just call him Ben. Unless he’s in trouble in which case his full name works beautifully when you yell it out on the playground. Interestingly, a bunch of his friends call him Benedict. He didn’t want to be confused with the myriad Benjamins in his grade and so in kindergarten he asked people to call him Benedict.   

If Ben decides to go with that first initial he’ll be in decent company. There’s F. Scott Fitzgerald, M. Scott Peck, and J. Paul Getty. We’ll just ignore J. Edgar Hoover and J. Danforth Quayle.

Do you hear that huge sigh of relief? The kids are back to school after a week of Winter Vacation. Actually this was a good one. When the boys were younger Bryna and I would be all set to check ourselves into the local insane asylum by now. Or at least order some padding for our bedroom walls. There are only so many consecutive games of Candy Land you can play before you want to fling yourself off Gum Drop Mountain.

But now we’ve achieved a pretty good balance between interaction with the boys and independent play. By “independent play” I mean the Cartoon Network.

Since they’re only 20 months apart they have two modes: playing great together or killing each other. There’s no in-between. Yesterday they spent an hour sledding and playing some sort of snow game. When I peeked out the window it appeared to involve eating snow. After they came back in and had a snack they were back to teasing each other mercilessly. Paging Sponge Bob!

Big snow day yesterday — 9 inches. Ben and Zack felt ripped off since it’s vacation week. “This would have been a snow day!” they lamented. Too bad, now get outside and go sledding. We have a great hill on the rectory property which helps. And now that they’re a bit older they can actually go sledding without my help. In years past I served as the pack mule, hauling sleds back up the hill after each run. It was a good workout but quickly got old.

I did get outside for a snowball fight, however. As usual I was pelted from all sides, which felt like the reenactment of the stoning of Stephen, the church’s first martyr. Unlike the story of Stephen, the boys’ victory dance consisted of making snow angels.

To continue the theme of martyrdom, I built a fire when we came inside. We then burnt several marshmallows at the stake. One confessed its heresy but still emerged as a gooey ball of flaming chemicals.

Here’s a fun game to try with the kids: name the marshmallows before you thrust them into the flames. Joan of Arc, Thomas Cranmer, Hugh Latimer, Nicholas Ridley. For more names, check Foxe’s Book of Martyrs http://www.ccel.org/f/foxe/martyrs/home.html the 16th century classic. And remember, kids, don’t play with matches!

We celebrated Zack’s 7th birthday yesterday with a Godzilla/Pirate party. This was per Zack’s orders. This was a tough theme to pull off since you can’t buy Godzilla/Pirate plates at Party City. And I wasn’t about to dress up like Godzilla. Though I did think about rigging up a fire-breathing mechanism with a can of sterno. That’s one way to get a reputation among the neighborhood parents.

We held the party in the church Parish Hall since who wants a bunch of 7-year-olds running amok in your house during the dead of winter? And while Bryna and I were exhausted afterwards, I loved being able to host the party ourselves. Where we live, this is the exception — most parties are held at some themed-party place (gym, bowling alley, rock climbing  wall). And while we’ve done this, it feels like outsourcing your child’s birthday.

We had a bunch of mini events: bobble head dog painting, pin the tail on the donkey (everyone cheated!), Twister, bingo, and, of course, pizza and cake. Then the kids raced around on scooters, laughed, and just enjoyed one another. A good time was had by all and no one was maimed. 

The theme? Well, Bryna put a fire-breathing monster and a pirate action figure on top of the Carvel ice cream cake. Perfect.

Spent the weekend in Fishkill, New York (about 2 hours north of NYC) for Ben’s black belt weekend. He’s been studying  Taekwondo for three years and this was the culmination. He loves it and has made some amazing progress over the years. Third grade may be a bit young to be a black belt but even at that age it takes a lot of dedication and perseverance to get to this level. I’m proud of him. And it’s nice to know your 8 1/2 year-old son can break a concrete brick — this was the final test of yesterday morning’s promotion.

Though it feels like an awfully long time ago, I used to train in martial arts. When I was in high school I studied GoJu, a Japanese form of karate http://www.usagoju.com/. I earned my black belt and studied under an amazing sensei (Japanese for instructor, if you never saw “Karate Kid”). So watching Ben’s black belt test brought back lots of memories.

The only problem with the weekend was that there was very little for parents to do. The retreat was held at a place called Camp Mariah. And, yes, it’s named for Mariah Carey who evidently gave a bunch of money to have it built. It’s part of a large complex of summer camps that serve, among other things, as the destination for the Fresh Air Fund which allows urban kids to have an outdoor summer experience. [If I knew any of her songs, I'd insert a Mariah Carey lyric here.]

The food was lousy, the accommodations spartan at best, and Bryna owes me big time. Which I will be milking indefinitely. Fortunately one of Ben’s best friends was also up there and his father and I hung out a lot. We even avoided the chow hall completely on Saturday night and went out for BBQ. Hey, what else would men eat when abandoned by their wives? Plus Bryna was at his wife’s house that night dining on pasta carbonara. It beat the previous night’s freezer burned pasta shells in the cafeteria.

In the end it was all worth it. Ben did a great job and I come across like a martyr. Perfect.

We’re on the Birthday Watch these days. Zack’s in countdown mode for February 15th when he turns seven. He’s so focused on the date, I feel like I should create his own personal Advent calendar. Because we do seem to mark the season of “Zackvent” that precedes the big day.

Yesterday he designed his cake. He handed Bryna an ornate drawing with seven layers (to mark the years of course) — all with different colored frosting. Then he announced, “Have Carvel make this.” Oh, and since it’s a Godzilla party there’s a fire-breathing monster on top. I’m imagining the blank look from the teenager behind the counter. “Can I interest you in a Fudgie the Whale?” Uh, no. Unless you can make flames come flying out of his mouth with a can of Sterno.

Zack’s a bit touchy about the fact that his birthday is one day after Valentine’s Day. I think this is where the Godzilla theme comes in; it’s the anti-love fest. I joke with him about getting a pink cake with a big red-frosted heart on top. He’s not amused.

So, “Zackvent” continues. At least we’re not subjected to annoying “Zackmas” carols in the mall.