There’s handful of kids I’ve watched grow up from blogs to Flickr to Instagram and it’s a certain kind of disorienting to see them self-actualize into adults. I remember them so clearly, as babies, toddlers, in their homemade halloween costumes, them wobbling on a sidewalk trying not to fall into a puddle just to their left as the parent walked backwards capturing it on their phone.
I’ve watched them move to Europe, the parents get divorced, buy a new house, renovate that new house, sell that house and then move again, back to the city. I’ve watched them start new schools and new sports and go on vacations and go through their Minecraft phase. I’ve watched them get a dog—a puppy—who’s now full-grown. At first the kid and the puppy were both small, then the dog grew faster than the kid, then the kid grew much faster than the dog.
It’s disorienting because the only kids who appear to grow up faster than your own are the ones you know on social media. It’s disorienting because they disappeared from the platform from ages 10-16 and then they suddenly emerge, post-puberty, okay with their parents posting about them again, and they’re heading off to art school or putting out their own albums or working at a restaurant, functionally independent. They’re taller than their parents and wear their clothes and can drive. They go on backpacking trips with their friends.
My kids are on the cusp of five and seven and in a remarkably peaceful phase of co-existence. They play together, they bicker at a minimum, and the rate at which they’ve become capable of things even since the spring often requires a double-take.
Ada can use a knife to cut up an apple with only moderate cause for alarm. She can tie her shoelaces. She can ride a two-wheeled bike. She can do the monkey bars forwards, backwards, sideways, and with her eyes closed. She can get invited to a birthday party, learn she won’t be able to go, express massive disappointment, and get over it, fairly quickly. She can be trusted to save some of her money. She can apply her own sunscreen. She can read books for hours on her own, and make her own playlists.
Julian zips his own jackets and buttons his flannel shirts. He gets himself a snack from the drawer. He’s fully moved on from Duplos to Legos. He refers to tools with highly specific names—pliers, wrench, winch, levers—and knows the difference between many types of batteries and helps himself to AAs. He’s mastered the vast Star Wars universe. He often tells us he is happy. He says when he feels shy. He can spend an hour working on a Lego construction, drop it on the way to showing it to you, watch it smash into 200 pieces, experience a lip quiver, then pick up the pieces and build it again. He uses words like complexity, catastrophe, suspension, and spectacular.
Lately I’ve become aware that my kids are leaving the phase of being a certain kind of well-documentable because their inner lives are becoming bigger than their outward expressions. We’re moving from: here they are on their first day of school, here they are at soccer practice, here they are with their apple picking haul, to the one where they quickly become so much further and more complex from what is possible to document. Of course they already are that, but I can see them becoming more enigmatic and dimensional and inquisitive in ways that are further and further from representable in images.
Occasionally someone leaves a comment on a photo of one of my kids remarking at how big they are since the last time. And they are—they are very big. But even more than how much taller they’ve gotten or how much their face has lost its baby fat, is how much they’ve changed at doing the very banal everyday things that incrementally move them to independence, that are hardly ever memorialized, but represent the biggest shifts of all.
Recommendations:
To watch: Cinnamon in the Wind, Kate Berlant’s comedy special on Hulu (not the quality of the live show, KATE, but a fun introduction to her standup.)
To wear: This long-sleeved merino blend Patagonia top for fall running. I’ve learned that a key part of being a parent is caring about base layers. It’s expensive but it’s perfect.
To wear: These Carhartt WIP double-knee pants which are kinda like Rudy Jude jeans but less heavy and less expensive. Fave pants right now.
To wear: I actively hate the name of the product, but the Le Bon Shoppe boyfriend socks are my fave thicker cotton socks.
To do: Running around Greenwood Cemetery in the evening, like 5:30-7 p.m., is perfect.
To make: Textile Arts Center, where Ada has taken many envy-inducing afterschool classes, is opening up their studio October 15 + 16 for Gowanus Open Studios and you can sign up for (free) marbling and weaving workshops.
To read: My friend Jess Grose’s new book, Screaming on the Inside: The Unsustainability of American Motherhood, is now available for pre-order (and comes out in December).
To listen to: “Unboxing, bad baby and evil Santa: how YouTube got swamped with creepy content for kids.” A great piece on The Long Read podcast.
To see: An exhibition of Maira Kalman’s work, “Women Holding Things,” opens at Mary Ryan Gallery (515 W. 26th Street, NY, NY) next Thurs, October 6th.
Also to see: My friend, Kelli Anderson has an exhibition opening at the Center for Book Arts next Friday, Oct 7th, titled, “Abracadabra: Letterform, Technology.” Expect nothing less than total wonderment.
Recs, please: I’ve just gotten back into semi-regular running after a multi-year back injury, but aside from my single merino wool shirt above, don’t have appropriate cold weather running attire. Recs for cold weather running would be much appreciated!
"It’s disorienting because they disappeared from the platform from ages 10-16 and then they suddenly emerge, post-puberty, okay with their parents posting about them again..." YES
I love cold weather running! Smart Wool running socks, a fleece headband to keep your ears warm and sometimes I toss on a Uniqlo puffy vest.
Love the Tracksmith merino everything — pricy but durable & feather-light. https://www.tracksmith.com/collections/merino?g_acctid=878-716-5324&g_adgroupid=140029734629&g_adid=618277004123&g_adtype=search&g_campaign=Tracksmith_Search_NBS_NA_US_DSA&g_campaignid=18145232317&g_keyword&g_keywordid=dsa-1731549592064&g_network=g&gclid=CjwKCAjwp9qZBhBkEiwAsYFsbzNHzLPI33EptjhXgeeHnm3r4p-MER419KxSDNfLhgqrSYTQYtGvGBoCt3gQAvD_BwE