Homework - Help!

I was always a good student, in all subjects. For math, I took all of the college prep classes and passed the necessary math in college. Granted, there was not much of a math requirement for a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, but I took what I had to. So I feel like I have a pretty good handle on it. I can balance a checkbook, figure square footage of a room, measure for curtains or for sewing dress hems.

(Reader: imagine a sufficiently ominous/scary music bit for effect here).
Then my daughter came to me with her 7th grade homework. (AAaaagh! Not that!)

I don’t remember there being so many different kinds of numbers: composite, prime, whole, rational, real, reciprocal, and integers. When did they come up with all of those? What do you need so many kinds of numbers for? A number is a number! Dividing fractions, common denominators, cube roots – remember how to do those? I don’t! Negative times a negative is a positive, positive times a positive is a positive, negative times a positive is a negative – it’s enough to make your head spin!

Okay, so I sit down and try to drag some recollection from my classes (so long ago!) and begin to try to help her understand the assignment. I think I get it and start to explain it to her.

This is when it really gets good (insert more ominous music here) – she tells me they don’t do it like that anymore!

What? Can they really change HOW you do math? Aren’t there formulas and equations and an order of operations? How do they expect us to help our kids to succeed with their schoolwork if they go and change it all on us? It’s hard enough to remember how we were taught, but to have to learn new ways of computing word problems? No thanks! And I don’t know about you, but how much of that stuff do you actually still use in your day to day life? None! I can honestly say I haven’t had to graph a parabola, or figure out how many apples and oranges Susie and Billy are sharing, or anything about trains leaving stations traveling in opposite directions. Of course this line of reasoning doesn’t go over real big with your kid’s teacher.

I said earlier that I was a good student, I’m a fairly intelligent person. So I do what anyone would do in my situation – I yell to my oldest daughter to come help. She’s in 10th grade, they can’t have changed things in the 3 years since she learned it. Oh, but they can!

I don’t get it (and honestly, I don’t want to), but I have confidence my daughter will - it will just take time. In the meantime, she can call Uncle John who teaches math in high school.

And I’ll tell my daughters that I’m a whiz at English – unless they decide to change it on me.

I’m With Stupid

Today is Ask a Stupid Question Day. Really, you can look it up! Ask away – this is your chance. Anything, no matter how dumb - today’s the day! Whatever has been nagging at you, find someone to ask.

Here are some things I’d like to know:

*Is Tweety bird a boy or a girl? (Well? Do you know? I’m taking a poll, look to the right. Make sure you give your answer!)
*How many licks DOES it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop?
*If “bra” is singular, why is “panties” plural?
*Why is there Braille on drive-up ATM’s?
*Can I ask you a question? (I think this is my favorite!)

So go ahead. You can ask anything – start it like this: “This might sound stupid, but…” Leave a comment on this post and ask your stupid question you'd like to know an answer for. (Maybe someone can come up with an answer!)

Now if someone can just tell me why hot dogs come in packs of 10 and buns come in packages of 8…

As Forrest Gump says, “Stupid is as stupid does.”

Family Stories

When I was very young, my parents took an interest in tracing our family tree. My mother started doing historical research, interviewed family members, wrote to distant relatives and was able to come up with fairly detailed genealogies for both sides of our family. As part of the research of the paternal side we visited small cemeteries deep in the hills of Muskingum and Guernsey counties. Believe it or not, I have fond memories of running and playing tag with my sisters in the graveyards amongst the tombstones on many beautiful, quiet, hot summer days, while our parents took careful notes of dates and names, and sometimes took rubbings from the headstones of our ancestors.
An interest in genealogy is a family trait that I inherited. I enjoy research in general - with ~20 years spent at the library I’ve done more than my share of looking for answers, and have often been told I’m good at it. Even my current job requires quite a bit of research. The historical anecdotes of family trees are fascinating to me. So I took on the responsibility of maintaining and updating the family tree. Thankfully, in this computer age there are boundless resources available. My first task was to computerize the research that my parents had done into a genealogy electronic database program so I could easily identify any gaps. Then I turned to online resources. I discovered links to family lines that my parents’ research would never have uncovered. I located long-lost family members, and I met strangers who we are actually related to. Currently, our family history is rather detailed and complex. The software program I use allows you to print your family “story” which I printed out and presented to my dad a couple of years ago. To see the work that had been started years ago by my mom combined with my new exploration – well, it was a gift he still treasures.

While on vacation this summer as we walked through a wooded path to the lake, I spotted an old forgotten family cemetery through the trees. Making our way off the path through the forest, we climbed over a portion of rusted wire fencing. It was a beautiful, quiet, hot summer day. We wandered over the graves and explored the tombstones, many broken and leaning on others, some so old and worn they could not be read. We called out to one other the names and dates of soldiers, infants, families – each lost in our own thoughts. Looking back on the experience, the genealogist in me hopes that some descendent has documented their stories. But my thoughts that day were taking me back to another cemetery, another family, another story…

High School Musings

High school seems like a whole other lifetime to me. I graduated over 25 years ago (now that's a statement that will make you feel old!). I have some good memories from those times, and bad memories too of course (high school girls can be so mean). It's such a short span of years that you spent there when you look back at it.

I signed up for Facebook recently, just to look at a friends' photos on her profile. I started looking around the FB site a little and discovered a few old friends from high school that I hadn't talked to in years. I've added them as friends now on FB and re-connected with them, and discovered that two of them have actually gotten together after all these years and are now engaged.

Then at a friends' house this weekend, she introduced me to their new neighbor. Amazingly, we had gone to high school together - I recognized her right away, after sooo many years. Though we hadn't been close back in those days, we did have some mutual friends. We spent some time reminiscing and talking about who ended up with who, the class couple that actually got married and are still together, all our old friends and what they're doing now.

Hopefully as my daughters go through their high school years I can offer some insight. Those years have an impact, but the dramas and relationships are easily forgotten over the years. Though it may be hard to believe now, any tragedies experienced - no matter how big or small - will recede from memory as they grow older. The friendships can continue through the various stages of life, but it will take effort. The boys that break their hearts are just stepping stones along the way to finding "the one." Things that happen now, friends and enemies they make in high school - they all help make you who you are, but they don't define you. Enjoy every minute of it - the good and the bad.

Going green, er... pink

Recycling again, but this time as inspired by "Pretty in Pink."

Remember that 80's teen movie? With Jon Cryer as the fabulous "Duckie," Molly Ringwald played "Andie," and Andrew McCarthy's wealthy character "Blane" ("His name is Blane? Oh! That's a major appliance, that's not a name!") was to take Andie to prom. Then when Andie's father buys her an awful second-hand dress and she gets another hand-me-down dress from her friend, she takes the dresses and reworks them into her own creation.

Great movie, awesome soundtrack, and perfect inspiration for K's homecoming dress. Instead of hitting the mall and trying on armloads of gowns looking for "the dress," a co-worker gave me some of her college-aged daughter's old dance dresses. K was instantly infatuated with one of them in particular. With some adjustments - cutting out excess fabric, sewing in some extra seams, getting rid of the puffy sleeves, and shortening it to tea-length - it is homecoming ready.

Now we just have to hope her date doesn't turn out to be a jerk like "Blane" in the movie, or her Daddy might make him the next recycling project!