In the tragic cacophony of the last week, it was hard to know how to be a parent. What do you say, or not say, for that matter? We turned off NPR in the mornings and in the evenings, trying to follow “the guidance,” but also because our limited tolerance for what felt like a complete and utter breakdown of humanity. There were the events of Uvalde themselves. The agonizing story of the reunification process. The bungled police response. The photos of the kids and teachers coming out in the news. The husband of one of the teachers’ passing. The despair. So much despair.
Most parents, I imagine, were in some kind of haze of still working, still parenting, still going on as functionally as possible, while grasping at anger and gratitude in equal measures. It’s in these moments that the dissonance of parenthood and childhood feels most stark to me: if you have a child that’s small enough to protect, you hold them in a cocoon of perceived safety. You keep them from the noise, the information, the imagery, the violence, the malignancy, for as long as possible, while also wrestling the inevitability that they’ll encounter it sooner than you’re ready for, and also a fairly rational understanding of how powerless you actually are.
I’ve thought a lot about what we try and cultivate in kids in order to help them be prepared for what we call the “real world.” The real world is harsh. It comes in waves. It’s not fair. It’s got bullies in it. It’s unpredictable. It is stressful. And we haven’t (as a society), treated it kindly. So we talk about empathy, compassion, uniqueness, community. These are the words that our kids’ schools have taught them and sing in songs at the start and end of the day. We hope they understand what these words mean.
But the line between childhood and the supposed real world is not a specific moment in time, and so it feels both urgent to instill something, and like their readiness is somehow contingent on the parent to teach. But no adult I’ve met—and certainly not in the last few years—feels ready either. And, so the protecting process is one of reckoning with the idea that none of us—not the adults or the kids—is actually ready for what’s happening. That maybe protecting is answering their questions, enduring, and accepting more than acts of shielding or blinding.
As I walked around my neighborhood last week doing very mundane things—getting my kids from school, to the grocery store, to the coffee shop—the thing that felt most dissonant with the news were the roses. Roses were blooming everywhere, climbing up trees, with neon brightness, hanging heavy with scent over fences and along property lines. They seemed almost fake in their excessive vibrancy; the coexistence of something that beautiful with events so horrendous was hard to reason.
It was also the only thing that felt like an antidote in all of this: looking for the roses. And by roses, I mean noticing beauty. By beauty I mean the literal flowers, but also the sky, art, writing, kind gestures, reassurances, and the everyday absurdities of my small-but-rapidly-growing kids. It’s what feels slightly miraculous in spite of it all, the most persistent, the most unique.
Recommendations:
Ezra Klein’s interview with Ada Limón: A beautiful conversation in six poems.
Trey Ganem, an artist customizing the caskets of the kids killed in Uvalde last week.
That’s a Stress Response by Anne Helen Petersen, a commiserating and illuminating (if sad) document on the ways our bodies have manifested both our individual and collective stress.
Love + Radio: The Living Room: one of the greatest podcast episodes of all time about the observations and speculation from one neighbor’s home to another:
The recipes of Carolina Glen like these sweet and sour braised leeks and these peanut butter dessert cups. Glen also has very fun IG reels.
Out of town: June is strawberry picking season in the Hudson Valley. Greig Farm in Red Hook is great.
My pro tip for delicious salad: mix thinly sliced fennel and radicchio in with your greens of choice. A bitter lettuce is life-giving. If you’re being extra on top of things, soak the chopped radicchio in ice water for like 30 minutes so it’s not too bitter. Season generously with lemon juice, EVOO, lil honey, S+P.
Ask: I’m looking for chapter book/series recommendations that work well for readaloud for both a 4.5 and 6.5 year old. Ada and I just finished the Fudge series and for whatever reason she’s hesitant on Harry Potter. Some past favorites include: Mrs. Piggle Wiggle, some Ramona, Dory Fantasmagory, the Clementine Books, Heartwood Hotel, and a bunch of Roald Dahl.
‘Till next week.
Ivy & Bean is great. With illustrations by Sophie Blackall.
We love(d) reading Grace Lin’s books, especially Where the Mountain Meets the Moon.