Tuesday, January 21, 2014

How To Raise Kids in Community





One thing that makes our community unique is the intimacy of our living situation along with the presence of 4 very young children. Our house has lots of nice bedrooms, but not a lot of shared space. In spite of this, most of us spend a considerable amount of time in our cozy communal areas.  

Here are some tips that have contributed to our functionality as a family within these tight quarters.  

Figure Out What Works:

Our kids, en masse, can be a formidable force. But we’ve developed some tactics for dealing with that. When it gets so bad that you can’t even discern one kid from another… when the world just feels like a psychedelic chunky mist of couch cushions, screeches, and thumping djembes… all encapsulated in the omnipresent top note of the My Little Pony theme song… it’s time for SEPARATION.

Sometimes we do this by gender: Boys upstairs, girls downstairs. Sometimes we do it by family: Gillespies go up, BruFeathers stay down. If it’s really bad, we put each kid in a different room. Generally a separation of about 15 minutes will do the trick.

Housemates Must Set Their Own Boundaries:

One of my biggest challenges as a parent in community has been to trust my housemates to set their own boundaries. For the first year that my kids were autonomous enough to scamper about, following housemates and begging for attention… I scrambled along after them asking, “Is this too much? Do you want me to take him? PLEASE tell me if he’s getting on your nerves!”

That was not sustainable for me. Letting housemates play with my kids had become even harder than keeping them too myself because I was so paranoid that someone might be “annoyed”.

Now I tell housemates, during the interview process, that I expect them to set their own, clear boundaries. If they play with my kids, I will assume it’s by choice. If they need my help or intervention, I'm more than happy to take over... but they have to ask. 

Now when folks play with my kids, I can accept it as a break. I can go make my bed, or unload the dishwasher, or even take a shower.  

Discover Your Playtime Specialty:

Most people who live in this house have a playtime “specialty.” The kids learn what each adult, as an individual, is interested in.

If I was expected to wrestle, I would probably never play. The kids come to me when they want to hear a story or bake cookies. They go to Andrew when they want to play Legos or Chess. If they want to make a smoothie, they ask Lali, while Benjah is good for a puppet show or a dance party. Jonnie likes to play ball, Noah and Jordan will paint or draw with them, Jeremy wrestles, Kate does workbooks, and Aaron likes to detonate rockets and volcanos with baking soda and vinegar. We all have our thing.

The kids have learned that when they approach someone with, “will you play with me?” They'll probably be met with, "I can't. I’m really busy right now.” But if they ask me, specifically, to read them a story… or if they ask Aaron to shoot off a rocket, they are more likely to hear, “OK, I’ll do that for a little while.”

It feels good when the kids know what we like. It reminds us that we aren’t just drones of their entertainment. Instead we are nurturing a valuable bond. This makes playtime far more gratifying.

Close Relationships Help with Discipline:

The primary methods of discipline in this household are “time-outs” and “natural consequences.”
Some of our housemates are comfortable giving time-outs or discussing consequences with the kids, while other housemates leave that to the parents. But whether or not housemates participate in formal discipline procedures, the ones who play, converse, and interact with the kids on a regular basis, generally command more respect when managing their behavior.

***

Along side those points, I think we’re also just very blessed to live in a household where folks feel grateful to teach and inspire the next generation. I know that living at the Heart and Spoon, especially for people in their 20’s, probably involves far more responsibility and commitment than many other communal-living options in this town… that’s why I’m eternally grateful for all the “aunts” and “uncles” who have chosen to do this family thing with us. I’m sure the karma fairies are smiling upon you.    
  


 

Friday, January 10, 2014

Communal Dinners


 (Photo by Tara Whitsitt)
 
We like to refer to our household, The Heart and Spoon, as an “Intentional Community.”
Some people call our house a “commune,” but that’s kind of a joke. We laugh because we all know that people who live in communes walk around naked, smoke tons of pot, drink freaky tea, rarely shower, and enjoy orgies.   
And none of that stuff EVER goes down at our house.
I’ve always wondered if “intentional community” means that the community is supposed to have a common intention… like supporting itself financially with a product like woven sandals and nut butter, or by providing a human service: like a homeless shelter or a summer camp.
Or does “intentional community” just mean that everyone lives together on purpose? I guess an apartment complex, or a dormitory, might be an example of an “unintentional community” according to that definition.
Our household has spent a lot of time devising community oriented projects - so that we can live up to our declaration of “intentionality.” Once we thought we might develop a cottage industry making insulation ovens. We also talked about crocheting water bottle cozies out of recycled plastic bags to sell during the holiday season. We’ve considered creating a dinner theater and, on a grander scale, our ambition is to purchase property for growing our own food, and to use as a venue for our artistic, educational, environmental, and humanitarian escapades.
So far, none of these ideas have come to fruition.
I used to see this as a sign of communal dysfunction. But I’m starting to look at things less critically. I’m fairly certain that someday we’ll accomplish these goals… or something else, equally constructive.
In the meantime, I think it’s clear that the “intention” of the Heart and Spoon is to subsist as a well-functioning home. We provide a living example of artists, students, social workers, activists, parents, and kids all working hard to support one another. Our house is a well-designed Home Base, with dinner on the table every night at 7:00.
Our house also has a dinnertime ritual. No matter how many people are eating… whether it’s 4 or 27, we wait until everyone has arrived, we put our arms around each other, and sing: “1… 2… 3… TOGETHER HUG!

This ritual can occur at any point during the meal… whenever it seems like everyone has arrived to the table. When 13 people are eating (which is common), the first person might be soppin’ up the last of her sauce with bread by the time the final person sits down with his plate. Between getting everyone to the table, and the constant procuring of last minute condiments, beverages, and ongoing kid-needs, our dinners are boisterous and action packed.

The Together Hug is the Great Solidifier of dinnertime. Just like dinnertime is the Great Solidifier of our entire household.

So, it’s true; we never made more than one prototype of the insulation oven… but there have been a lot of productive, inspirational conversations generated between mouthfuls of Kate’s Asian cabbage salad. And I’m pretty sure the world is a better place after Noah makes his peanut sauce.

It could take us years to pull together a more palpable “intention” as a whole community, but as a daily practice in cooperation, we’ll just keep on eatin’ dinner.

 

 

Tuesday, January 7, 2014

Survival Mode


 
I have a palpable memory of childhood boredom. It smells like lemon pledge. I can recall lying on the couch in front of the window, watching dust float in the sunlight above me. I remember that I moaned, “I’m sooooooo booooooooored” to my mother who was dusting furniture and plants.

She responded, “I don’t know why you should be bored. There’s plenty of cleaning to do.”
And I said, “Cleaning is boooooooring!”

Now I tell people that I don’t get bored anymore.  And, for the most part that’s true. I certainly don’t experience the full-bodied, almost suffocating sensation of boredom, the way I felt it as a kid.
Except for yesterday.  
Yesterday I thought that 2 of the 4 kids were going back to school. I packed their lunches, bundled them up, and resourcefully scraped ice off the car windows with some sturdy plastic packaging I discovered on the floor of the back seat. I deescalated a fight regarding car-seat preference, found music that they both agreed on, and made my way to school.
Then I experienced a twilight-zone sensation. The school was dark and the parking lot was completely empty.

It was sort of like the time that my mom and I brought my science fair project to the mall a month early (on accident). There we were, walking around the mall with a giant tri-folding poster board and a whole bunch of crystals and magnifying glasses and stuff, expecting to be mingling with a bunch of other families carrying around tri-fold poster boards… but we were the only ones.
I’ll bet it was really annoying to my mom when I kept saying, “what’s going on? Where are we supposed to bring all this stuff? Huh? Huh?”

But she kept her cool, looked at the mall-map, found the information desk, discovered that we had arrived a month early, and drove us back home.
So, yesterday, when the boys just WOULDN’T STOP saying, “what’s going on Jes? Why isn’t anybody here? Isn't this kind weird? Do you know what's going on?” I very calmly said, “Yes. This is weird. I have no idea what’s going on. Please don’t talk to me anymore so I can think.”

And we sat there, idiotically, in an empty parking lot while TLC sang "Don't go chasing waterfalls..." on low volume - until I spotted a sign that read, “Have a great break! See you on Tuesday, January 7th!”

And then we drove home.

And that’s when I got bored. Probably because I just had to go into “survival mode.”
Honestly I should just thank my lucky stars that my kind of “survival mode” doesn’t require me to stand on a street corner with a cardboard sign, or steal a loaf of bread from anybody. I don’t have to sit in a bomb shelter… or hide my babies in the trunk of a hollow tree… or anything like that.

My kind of “survival mode,” thank goodness, is totally, utterly boring. It just means that I have to turn off the part of myself that wants life to be exciting... I have to stop thinking and go into domestic autopilot.
I have to become a mindless drone of dishes, conflict resolution, food prep, and laundry.

And even though I am a full-time house parent, that really isn’t normal for me. And a really big part of my soul wanted to rebel and get super angry.
But, since I’m older now, and more mature, I decided that I’d rather feel bored than perpetuate a dramatic episode of outrage.
I mean, obviously, there’s a time and a place for everything (including outrage), but on a random Monday, when kids are playing ninja all over the place, and there’s a huge pile of laundry, and puzzle pieces and Jenga blocks, and an overturned tea-set on the floor… maybe it’s just time to turn off the passion and plod through the day.

I had to let the folks around me be dissatisfied, messy, and oppositional, and I couldn't think of  anything wise or witty to say in response. All my snacks lacked pizazz.
But life is made up of a whole lot of days, and sometimes you run out of popcorn.

Days like yesterday are basically “filler days.” They are merely a vehicle to carry you to the next, more interesting day. They’re like a Greyhound ride… and if you’re lucky, maybe you can pull off a good conversation somewhere along the line.