Sep 24

Helpful, Not Useful

I recently had a brief exchange with Joel (7) that provided an opportunity to talk about dignity (and hint at the personalistic norm).

Joel had done some favor for me, and I had thanked him. The rest of the exchange went as follows.

Joel: “I like being useful!”

Me: “Helpful, not useful.”

Joel: “Huh?”

Me: “You mean to say that you like being helpful.”

Joel: “I don’t understand.”

Me: “People are helpful. Things are useful. We should never talking about people being useful, because people should be treated as individuals with dignity, not as tools we use. Understand now?”

Joel: “I think so…I like being helpful.”

Me: “I’m glad. :)”

Take your utilitarianism and shove it, Sir Topham Hatt!

Don't laugh. It's surprisingly hard to draw using a stylus on a tablet screen.

Don’t laugh. It’s surprisingly hard to draw using a stylus on a tablet screen.

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Jun 16

Crazy Cat

He was still supposed to be in the temporary cardboard carrier at this point. He clawed his way out.

He was still supposed to be in the temporary cardboard carrier at this point. He clawed his way out.

You may recall that I recently had to make the very difficult decision to say goodbye to my furry best friend, the first cat that I owned as an adult. A couple weeks later, I felt ready to find a cat welcome to the family. After a few hours of bouncing between shelters, I found the right fella, Gabriel. We found out quickly how different from Dusty he would be. In the car on the way home, he clawed enough of an opening in his temporary cardboard carrier to stick his head out. Since he was choking himself at that point, I had to rip a larger hole and pull him out. Amanda wasn’t thrilled to have a “loose” cat in the car for the remainder of the trip home. 😉

The ...

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Jun 03

Mighty Morphing Toaster Pastries

By Evan-Amos (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Strawberry PopTarts (photo by Evan-Amos, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

My wife recently had an interesting interaction with our 5yo about how to spell something.

Lily: [holding an Aldi generic PopTart] How you spell PopTart is P-O-P-T-O-T.
Mommy: That’s “PopTot”.
Lily: How about P-O-P-T-O-O-T?
Mommy: That’s “PopToot”.
Lily: P-O-P-T-O-R-T?
Mommy: That’s “PopTort”.
Lily: P-O-P-T-A?-R-T…?
Mommy: That’s it!
Lily [giggles and smiles]

She starts kindergarten next year. I think her teacher’s going to have her hands full keeping her from getting bored. 😉

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May 07

Passing Pets and Precocious Personalities

I think Dusty was a little jealous of this addition to the family 7 years ago (Alex).

I think Dusty was a little jealous of this addition to the family 7 years ago (Alex).

Today we said goodbye to a furry member of the family. A little over a month ago, our cat Dusty started losing his appetite and, consequently, weight. Long story short, skipping over expensive vet visits and whatnot, he never regained his appetite, lost almost half his body weight, and became very weak. On Wednesday night, while we still sat around the dinner table, we told the kids that we’d made the difficult decision to have him euthanized on Saturday. Their responses fascinated me and distracted me a little from my grief.

I didn’t really get through telling the kids the whole plan before I started crying. That immediately triggered crying from them. Once the initial wave of sadness passed, which was pretty uniformly intense for all involved, further mourning and processing proceeded according the differing ...

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Mar 19

So Much

Photo "Depression" by Flickr user Ryan Melaugh

Photo “Depression” by Flickr user Ryan Melaugh

So much I want to say
So much going on in my head
So much I can’t express
So much I’m sorry for

So much anger
So much frustration
So much fear
So much anxiety

So much failure
So much disappointment
So much sadness
So much emptiness

So hard to explain
So little confidence
So afraid to frighen
So lacking tears

So they don’t know

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