What is the role of art in the world?

Hi Dawn! I think we save the world one thing we love at a time. The hard part is knowing what we love.

I'm like you in that way, Dawn, about loving many many things and I'm not at all good about narrowing down. I don't think I worry about narrowing down. Some people are the dig-deeply people who take one thing as far as it can go, and I admire them. Some people have a gift for taking the work of the dig-deeps and translating into terms the rest of us can understand. (Those are some of the writers I love most, especially the science essays that bring tears to my eyes with how perfect and amazing things are.)  And some of us are the synthesizers, the ones who pick up seeds here and there and deposit them to grow somewhere new and mix them with other things and love everything and love how everything fits together and do lots and lots of things and some of them pretty well. All those ways of looking and being seem good to me.

I hope Jordan starts loving at least one thing deeply or maybe many things a little more – that will be a happier life to have. But being in between being a kid and being an adult is frustrating and awkward for lots of people. It's weird to feel adult and know that you're as intelligent as the people who are running your life and making decisions about you and to feel so disempowered so often.

(And that's why I left home at 16….)

Hi Dawn. Wow I know this sucks big time and why is it that the moms get about 99% of this crap?  I  think that angry and teenager are synonyms and google residental treatment centers sometime to get a feel for the extent of this social problem. We went through a similar thing with my daughter only she didn't externalize her anger, she turned it against herself and acted like everything was FINE(this really means Fucked Up, Insecure, Neurotic and Emotional). We almost lost her. Two years later my wife and I have ceased being the monsters we used to be.
It does get better if you can get through it without going postal.

I better at being me than almost anyone else.  It's a full time job.

Two daughters - yeah, I went from walking on water to being the stupidest creature alive to being cool dad - all in about five years.  My head is still spinning, but at least there's a smile on my face.  A freakin' cheshire cat grin actually.

Love your voice Dawn … A

I tell my kids - “If your gonna be a turd, go lay in the yard” and that's the end of it.

oh ya; Turning a hobby into a business - priceless!
          Find your bliss

As I'm thinking how it is that the resistance i felt when Nico was 16-17,has somehow morphed into a dance of complicity. When exactly did it happen. When did the friction stop and things started to glide,smiles again,and hugs,and laughter,and sharing ideas and silly jokes that don't have any uncomfortable moments. When…I do not know the exact moment,perhaps around the time i started to let go,to push away his soul not bc I stopped loving him but bc I never ever wanted it to stop…the loving,and ached so much for any sign of a truce..somewhere. The space of time did perform a miracle of sorts,him away surrounded by family who loved him every bit as much as I did,but was not acutely aware of an ache in their heart like I was. Me so wrapped up in him/us that I lost me.lost my strength,a vision,and him  pushing me away through words and sometimes no words…a lot of no words.
I wonder if this time around it will be different, I'll almost be sixty by the time they they are adults,I wonder will I be riding a bike in heels ;-) will I have let go of an inner voice that saps my strength,and vision?
Will I still giggle ? 

I'm thinking yes :-)

Dawn, I came here to comment on your wonderful blog (done in the reason, excuse, elegant solution manner) … and you've started a “raising a teen” support group.  You just threw that in for fun - right?

I like a lot of stuff too and finally figured out that it's ok to be that way. Funny, when I acccepted that is who I am - I gave myself permission to actually “be” whatever it was I wanted to be …

I wish I could give advise on this - being that I work with angry teens. Sigh. I have one of my own who is alternately trying to figure out ways to get me to give her “stuff” … and angry, sullen and noncommunicative. Yeah, she is 16. We should introduce our kids to each other and see what happens.  

Now, back to you and your art.  I for one happen to very much enjoy your photography.
I also love how you express yourself and how you reach people through the combination of the two.  I love that you are giddy and a teller of tales - giddy-up gal!!!

Dawn? It isn't just parents who disempower adolescent humans. We have all this evolution behind us pushing us to be ardently sexual productive and reproductive beings around that age, and we have so much information and intelligence and capability, and sometimes more competence in many areas than people older (my son has always been a computer wizard and I've had to play catch up, or is that ketchup?), and yet 16 year old kids are viewed as kids by the world around them. In their own experience, they've come into their own, but they can't vote, in many states can't drive a car without a lot of restrictions, can't get a “real” job that will pay significant money, have to have parental signatures on legal documents, and, oh yeah, mom still buys the laundry soap. I think there's a lot of built-in frustration and no easy solution to it except just getting through to the other side with time and some kind of detachment from it all.

Jeannie I did Nico's laundry the other day. As an act of love…really. It was his birthday ,we had this whole day palnned out…then my friend broke her toe,and he ended staying with his brother and sister as well as my friends two children,while we went to the hospital.
He only got a cake a couple of days later,but I did his laundry,that night, so he could go out with friends. He no longer expects me to do his laundry,nor do I ,and that is why when I did it it made both of us smile.
Maybe it becomes an issue when they expect it,when you are no longer a human with emotions and feelings but a wall that does housework,like I felt I was for a few years.
And then one day you are no longer their wall but a door they come and go freely through,this usually coincides with them doing their own laundry,and a hug for no reason at all.
Now as I watch my young children dance and sing i cannot even imagine a wall…but only time will tell ,and maybe just maybe this time I will be able to detach myself from the wall and swing on the door instead. 

I like this reason, excuse & elegant solution concept of yours.. just wrote on yr last entry that I'll give it a thinkabout. Maybe a dive into the thinktank is more appropiate. I feel a trend coming on. And so true a tale that each of us are artist in our very own right & unique ways;

The greatest job satifaction is excactly that, when one's hobby / artistic talents is being put to play. Must say though, I've given up on figuring out how to channel all my passions into one thing. It used to cause me distress when trying to. It is finally becoming easier for me to let go of whatever it is I'm into when something new & fascinating catches my eye: tara 5 yrs old, pulling out her toybox to grap one piece to play with & before she knows, the floor is filled with the entire content of the box cuz oh! that's fun to play with & oh! so is this.

That would also be my bit re the children comments as I don't have any apart from the little me; Perhaps a bit paradoxical saying this cuz you gais talk about the challenging parts of parenthood, but reading it, did made me miss the experience of knowing a person from day one. It is very obvious how deep & strong a love you all have for your children..

lastly.. yes, I'm almost done now. I like your photo, the contrast of events, eyes looking forward & backward. The boy looking ahead & minding his step very carefully.. to me he is fully absorbed in this own task.. & the adults turning to look at the big event, the bride..& the part we can't see, which all together makes the magic in this image. A very cool moment you caught in the lens… Ok. done.  love & joy  tara

I've used my labour breathing techniques more since my son was born … 

He's just entering adolescence, and is getting “prickly.”  I have three kids, the girls were definitely easier, but I've heard girls can be a handful too. 

I like what you said, “I want to be careful to set my boundaries for how he may treat me.  If a person on the street spoke to me that way Jordan does, I would walk away from them, maybe even quickly,” 

Yup, at first when my son started speaking to me in a snarky way, I was taken aback.  The girls didn't do that much, and when they did, I knew it wasn't “them” and took it as a sign that they had something going on.  Eventually,  I'd get what was bugging them out in the open.  With him, sometimes there's a direct reason.  Sometimes he's just carrying home how the other boys talk to each other - they can be really cruel!  Now, when he speaks to me in a way which I find inappropriate, I calmly tell him that I will talk to him when he can address me properly. You're right, we wouldn't take this kind of behaviour from someone in the workplace or on the street - we'd either call them on it, or we'd walk away.  I have been walking away when he speaks to me in an inappropriate way, and the other day he followed me, burst out in tears and buried himself in my arms.  God, I wouldn't want to live through being that age again.  It can be such a turbulent time.

Two quotes, one about adolescents, and one about art  …

With any child entering adolescence, one hunts for signs of health, is desperate for the smallest indication that the child's problems will never be important enough for a television movie.
Nora Ephron

And this one about following your heart's desire … I guess it can apply to being a parent too.

I have learned, as a rule of thumb, never to ask whether you can do something. Say, instead, that you are doing it. Then fasten your seat belt. The most remarkable things follow.
Julia Cameron

Great reflections as usual. 

Working with oppositional boys - my job, ya know - I get to experience it all.  I agree that there's a huge amount of frustration in these boy's lives, but I'm also sure that much of it is designed in, and I don't mean this in any theistic way, only that it is a natural component of becoming a self-actualized adult.  Problem's arise not from what they are feeling, but in how they act on those feelings, and those actions are hugely informed by the culture.  How more conflicting a message could they have been sent?

I've had success in this work, definitely far more than I expected, and maybe more than I deserve, but whatever, it's there.  I listen to them, treat them with respect, validate their emotions, convince them that I do not want to change who they are, only to give them tools so that they can consciously regulate their own behavior, and ignore overtly oppositional behavior.  Obviously there are times when aggressive intervention is needed, but these are truly rare, and obviously in a restrictive place like a wilderness school, this is more easily and safely done.

Jeannie's point above is very important.  The time between when we primates are biologically ready to form social and sexual relationships - to get on with the making of copies of ourselves and endowing those copies with a safe society - and the time when our culture - a culture increasingly requiring longer and longer periods of education and acculturation - is supportive of those activities, is becoming dramatically long.

Okay, I'll stop now, but I've been thinking on the whole adolescent experience for a while now.  It's a wonderful and complex contemplation.  I'll write on it more sometime.

crazy is a good word to describe this house full of babies and adults…somedays.
it feels different this time around,more adult like ;-) I think letting go of any real expectations has been a gift I have given myself and the children. i am more patient…but still not patient all the time,i am more reflective…yet not reflective all the time…pattern here.
I have a wonderful husband,who is this amazing dad. This house is crazy in the most delicious of ways :-)