Blessed With a Patient Little Fella'

We are so thankful for Benjamin; he is such a good little guy. When we had to postpone the trip, he didn't complain at all. He just said, "OK," and went about his business. He's never once said he wished we would leave now, or asked how soon we will be leaving. He is very  patient.

The flip-side of that virtue is that, in dealing with him, like in dealing with his time-impaired papa, one has to be very patient or very persistent. Like when you want Benjamin to finish eating a meal in under 45 minutes.

Nonetheless, even his  patience has limits. The most recent  time we played Candy Land, he got sent way back on the track after an already long game. After that delay, he  decided to read the "magic rule" allowing us to finish the game sooner. (After he won, though, he wanted me keep going until I too got to Candy Castle.)

We are pretty sure we're spoiled with him on patience. While he does have some other traits that can be difficult, in the scope of kid challenges, we'll take 'em any day. Once number two joins the family, like with any new addition, we'll probably see just how spoiled we are.

As to any quality with a child you don't yet know, it's impossible to predict. I'm human, so I can't help but speculate. Will being adopted influence her patience or other long-standing character traits? Surely it will. But how? If she has spent her infancy in an orphanage, sadly, she may be well used to waiting. By contrast, some orphans from foster homes are rightly showered with attention and care. Further, we've heard stories of orphanage-raised babies who, once they get a feel for their lifelong mom and dad, don't want to let go of them.

We will judge none of it but just give her what she needs. I've met and heard so many stories of biological siblings who are almost polar opposites, I think the most shocking thing would be if she were just like Benjamin. We're not counting on anything except a child that we will love no matter what.

Meet Bob

This morning my son was printing his name. Instead of a 'B' he wrote a 'D'. When I suggested he make the line longer and add another "hump" to turn it into a 'B', he thought of an easier route.

"No, I'm just going to change my name," he told me.

He did not, however, choose a 'D' name. "I'm just going to call myself 'Bob' now." He chuckled, "I named myself after my Uncle Bob."

This story reminds me how over a year ago he named lots of his toy characters, bears, figures, his hobby horse, etc., all "Max." One day we were out somewhere; someone new we'd met asked him his name. Without warning he grinned mischievously and told her it was "Max."

Later that day he was back to "Benjamin," which he's been since . . . until today.

Stuck on a Gooey Gum Drop

My son and I were playing Candy Land this morning. Now who doesn't like a good competition or game of chance for a diversion once in a while?

I didn't check the clock when we started, but I knew  it had been well over an hour. And we were almost no closer to someone winning than we had been 45 minutes earlier.

Somewhere, on the "Other Side," some guy named Milton or Bradley or Hasbro was laughing his head off every time I got sent all the way back to that gol' darn "Peppermint Stick Forest."

I couldn't take it any more. We had to do something else, so I used a variation of a trick I heard Grandma perform the other day. She "found" some "magic passes" in the refrigerator that gave her and Benjamin free passage to the "Candy Castle."

I  "found" a "magic rule" in there. It was a proclamation by "King Kandy": " … anyone who shall draw a purple card shall skip all the purple squares and proceed to the very last and shall have the privilege of entering Candy Castle!!!"

Well, you know  what happened. Draw. No purple. Draw. No purple. Draw. No purple. Draw. No purple. Draw. No purple. Draw. No purple . . . .

I had to rig it. When he was looking away — Benjamin, not King Kandy; even the King was getting bored — I slid in a purple card ripe for one of his upcoming turns.

Hurrayyyyyyy! Benjamin is victorious!! And we all win a chance to do something else.

Myself, I'm really looking forward to doing the dishes.

Two Riveting Hours of Television

My wife said to me the other night that she had seen a promotion saying David Blaine was going to attempt to hold his breath under water for 9 minutes. "Then it said," she went on, "'tune in Monday for the 2-hour special event.' That should be more like a 9-minute special event, shouldn't it?"

Right!

Personally, I would give them 5 minutes for intro', 9 minutes for the stunt, 5 minutes for the EMT's to determine a winner, and 5 minutes for post-game analysis. A few commercials. 30 minutes: bam! Done!

I didn't watch it. Actually, my only motivation to watch it would have been to see how they managed to pad the thing out that long.

How did  they fill 2 hours? (Oh, and I suppose I should ask, need I send a sympathy card to the Blaine family?)

"Card-Carrying Breastfeeders"

I read on BloggingBaby about a new Kansas breastfeeding educational initiative. Nursing proponents are making cards available to breastfeeding moms. Women can then hand out the cards if harassed for breastfeeding in public. The card states that it is a woman's right and has numbers to call about the law or nursing.

See Kansas now has card-carrying breastfeeders.

As I commented on that post:

Good for Kansas!!!!!

In a park once, a teenage or young-adult daycare teacher with her group of kids once warned a breastfeeding friend of mine, "Um, I don't think you'll be able to do that here, we're bringing a bunch of kids over here." Indeed! My friend, of course, told her she had to,  had every right  to, and would continue feeding her baby right where she was. (Good for her!) I thought, "What a good thing for those kids to see — how a mom does and should feed a baby, and that it is nothing to be ashamed of!"

The young daycare teacher was surely just ignorant, but probably didn't believe my friend. What a great educational opportunity a card like the Kansas one would have been!

We Should Be at Disney World: A Close Call

We are supposed to be at Disney World right now. We postponed our first substantial vacation in many years, and thank God we did.

It all started last Saturday afternoon when Benjamin told us in a tired voice, "I have a terrible  headache." Now, this could have meant a lot of things (as my discussion of kid symptoms explores). It turned out to mean 'I'm going to be miserable for three days and puke a lot.' The poor little guy!! Fortunately, we were at home when learned. Less fortunately, we were scheduled to leave for DisneyWorld in three days.

To Convalesce At 38,000 Feet Or Not To ...
We quickly looked into what costly consequences we might be up against if we rebooked for a later date. Meanwhile, Benjamin got pretty  much better, and we considered going. We took into our minds, however, enough of his Dr. Jeckyll-Mr. Hyde convalescing behavior. We thought about it and imagined having Ben's first plane ride begin with us carrying him on board, terrified, balling and saying, "I won't go! I won't go! I do  want to go! I do  want to go! I won't go! I won't go!" Nausea or not, we would have had to use the complimentary sanitary bags located on the back of the seat in front of us before the jet even began to move.

That experience would have forged lovely memories and associations to prepare Benjamin for his third flight — probably later this year — when he will be cooped up on the plane with us for a relaxing 18-hour jaunt to China.

Further, our clean-up-puke time had severely restricted our get-enough-rest-so-you-enjoy-the-trip time and our neatly-packing-suitcases time. Had we gone, we would have had to run out the door with a house in shambles to return to.

Though it doesn't sound like a good thing, my wife luckily began to feel queasy just when we had  to make a decision. That clinched it.

Thankfully, the cost of delaying the trip was quite reasonable, all things considered. We'll be going a little later in May.

Providential Decision Affirmed: The Crud Hits Me Mid-Week
Incidentally, the virus hit me mid-week, fast but hard. Benjamin was not  kidding when he said "terrible headache." Man alive !!! (I've never had  a dagger stuck through my head, but I feel like I now know what it feels like.) I'm so glad I wasn't paying $100's/day in 88-degree Florida to lie in a hotel bed, moaning, aching, with a 103-degree fever, praying I wouldn't vomit, not having the energy to convince my wife that she must take Benjamin to the park herself and try to get him to go on rides he's afraid of because he's tired and moody, only to hear later how he refused; to force my wife to alternately listen to my feverish babbling and Ben's crying about how he really did  want to go on the Dumbo ride now. I was quite able to moan and enjoy my delirium in my own bedroom much more affordably, thank you very much.

I obviously have no idea what our vacation will hold. Nonetheless, I just know  it will be better than the one that almost was.

New Old Posts

So I was writing the other day about Benjamin and me tagging along on my wife's business trip to a conference.

I have now posted the entry about the benefits of not acting like "the help" (or those around us in different jobs in general) is invisible: "All From a 'xiang jiao' [banana]" (I backdated it.)

Even though we often end up plopped down amidst interstate exits and mini-mall sprawl, I always enjoy these trips. I tried to explain why in this entry—

"Business Trips: In which Benjamin Meets an Orange Moose and is Awarded His Very Own Shoehorn"

—that I wrote for DadBloggers.

"I'm Sick": Choosing Wrong

As the other day's sudden onset of Pool-Time Deficiency Syndrome demonstrated, my son's "symptoms" can indicate unmet needs wants. Once in a while they can mean he's bored or doesn't like what we were doing.

Sometimes, several of a child's physical complaints in row are on the safe side of the reality-fantasy divide (which divide toddlers and preschoolers find virtually undetectable). Then, just when you think it's safe to assume the next symptom is more mind than body, the following — an old incident that recent events recalled — happens.

I was with Benjamin at a café, and he started saying his stomach hurt. Given his then-recent history, his mood, and other factors, I was fairly certain he just wanted to go home. With that certainty, I chose to finish my conversation with a friend before leaving. I chose wrong.

There is a high price to be paid for making a wrong judgment on this front. That day I learned that this price can be as high as a father and son, stained (shirt and pants) with vomit (out in public where people are eating) and with no clothes to change into.

The upside of this tale is that most of the consequences fell (literally) on me that day, not on the heart (or the person) of Mrs. OccupationDad. Therefore, there were was no marital peace lost.

And the moral of the story: "The boy who cried 'wolf!' he may be, but if he has a full stomach, take heed!

All From a "xiang jiao" [banana]

Finally my annoying habit of practicing Mandarin Chinese phrases, even as I walk around in public, has paid off. We were at the breakfast buffet at the hotel this morning and I was doing just that with Benjamin. I was asking him if he wanted a "xiang jiao"  [banana]. A minute later the person running the breakfast buffet, a polite, cheerful, middle-aged woman who looked to be of another ethnicity, approached my wife, Benjamin and I and asked incredulously if I had said "xiang jiao" . I admitted I had, now embarrassed. We explained that we were trying to learn Mandarin (because we are adopting from China
) and asked if she spoke Mandarin.

We got into a nice conversation with her — in English, though: ("Wo putonghua shuo de bu hao."  [I don't speak Mandarin well.] Yet.) We learned that she in fact speaks four languages   (And,  she had been trying to learn a fifth, Spanish, from some of her Latino colleagues when she had worked in the hotel's housekeeping department.) She is originally from Taiwan, but has family connections to the Philippines and Hawaii.

We really enjoyed asking her questions about languages, hearing about her travels and family, and seeing a photo of her cute grandchild. She appeared to like having an interchange beyond "Good Morning, Ma'am, . . . we'll be bringing out a fresh bowl of that in just a minute," etc. Further, she seemed to be delighted by engaging Benjamin to use the words and phrases he knows in Mandarin. (One of his favorites is "Wo xiang niu nai."  [I would like milk.] He's a big fan of the "niu nai." )

True, our chat was serendipitous; it did not result from my initial greeting. (Two minutes before our exchange I had offered a homogenous "Hi, how are you this morning" to our acquaintance-to-be and had received a similarly everyday, friendly reply.) Nevertheless,  the result  highlighted the enjoyment and connection to be gained by not pretending those around us with different backgrounds or types of jobs are just wallpaper.

I guess I also found out, perhaps to the chagrin of my potentially embarrassed wife and friends, that the same gains can be sparked by wandering around mumbling in broken Chinese.

A Serving from the Melting Pot?

At her conference, my wife was in the buffet line for lunch yesterday. Behind the buffet line were servers who all appeared to be Latino. One of the conference attendees next to her — a Caucasian guy — was telling another that he had seen a bumper sticker that said "Secure Our Borders." He continued that he thought he would have a bestselling bumper sticker if the same slogan were written in both English and Spanish.

We don't know if the man was oblivious, indifferent, or being deliberately provocative. (My wife thought he was clueless; the staff was, perhaps, "invisible" too him.) Now it's possible   the workers were all citizens and/or legal immigrants and  completely agreed with the sentiment of the bumper sticker in question. (Statistically, though, I suppose that the opinion part of that hypothetical is very unlikely). Nevertheless, the comment — the guy's opinion notwithstanding — seemed insensitive, to say the least.

Without getting into my (complex) opinions about immigration or multicultural issues, the situation makes me wonder. Would this man have been as outspoken about, for example, the war if surrounded by a bunch of soldiers or peace activists, or about abortion if surrounded by a group of conservative Christians or pro-choice feminists?

At breakfast, we again learned the value of not  acting as if the "staff" is invisible just because their culture or income-level or language or education level might  be different than yours.

I hope to tell that story in the next post.

Pool-Time Deficiency Syndrome

We are in Janesville (WI) staying in a hotel. (Mrs. Occupation Dad has to attend a conference here and we came together, like we always do.)

There is free wireless Internet access for me, TLC's "A Baby Story" for my wife and a pool for Benjamin. "Hotels always have pools in 'em," he observed today. Good pattern finding! Maybe we better start staying at Motel 6's to give him a little dose of the real world.

(I wonder if we'll  encounter any exceptions to this pool rule in China. [We're told that the urban hotels in which adoptive families are set up are always pretty upscale. The more rural hotels — typically where children actually join their new families — are less fancy but still nice.] Time  for swimming, though? That's another story.)

Benjamin surely was very eager to use the pool this  morning. We went to the included breakfast thing in a room with a view of the pool. Benjamin is not the kind of kid who would (or did) keep asking excitedly over and over about swimming, running over the pool window and saying, "Let's go, let's go!" You can tell, though, that inside his head he's constantly percolating about it. He did ask a couple of times, "When are we going to go to the pool?" spacing these casual remarks out a bit. This didn't speed things up enough for his taste.

So, near the end of breakfast, he put on a bothered face and made a couple of humming, moaning noises, then said, "Well, . . . I'm feeling really sick today."

"You are?" we replied, wondering what this was about.

"Yeahhh," he continued pathetically, "but . . . I think going in the pool would make me feel a lot better."

We explained to him that you didn't need to be sick to qualify for pool time, that, in fact, it's the other way around — and that he and I would be heading to the pool shortly after breakfast.

A miraculous healing ensued and we've had no more reports or signs of really sick sickness so far today.

Life Near the Fastlane

For those of you who read this blog periodically — all 5 of you — you might  be wondering where I've gone.

Well, I have lots of "material" for the blog in my mind, in notes, and in half-finished stories.

I haven't been able to really complete any because, for a guy who's been living in the "slowlane" it's seemed  like a crazy couple of weeks.

There's the substitute teaching, of course. We've also had an adoption seminar, a number of family (of origin) things — including Easter and multiple celebrations and visits for Benjamin's birthday, family-business tasks, taxes (we have someone do ours, but I help my brother-in-law do his . . . figure that one out), a couple of viruses (relatively mild but annoying nonetheless). On top of all that, a car, an electric line and a dryer have all died (in unrelated incidents) here in the past couple of weeks. Plus, we're trying  to get ready for my wife's business trip (this week) and our vacation (next week).

Gosh, when I put it all in one paragraph like that, it's more understandable. Now I'm starting to see where all the time has gone.

Frankly, though, I'm not above screwing around, and at the end of few of these past days, I've been known to just drop in front of the TV without the energy to write.

I want to fill in some of the "stories" of which I've been making note. (I'll backdate them to the appropriate for organization [anal retentive] purposes.) I'll link them in a current post.

Here are some—
My first day as a music teacher: Clap the rhythm ... on your own knees!

A funny "incident": The Teacher Kicked Him in the Eye

Ben's new friends: "That which we call a [Beanie Baby] by any other name would smell as sweet."

"That which we call a [Beanie Baby] by any other name would smell as sweet."

This is "Sweet Bunny." Now you maybe notice that Sweet Bunny is, in fact, a dog — not that there's anything wrong  with that. His official Beanie Baby tag does not bear this name, but this is what Benjamin named him.

Benjamin is not really into stuffed animals that much, but he likes to snuggle this one, which he received recently from his Aunt. The poem on the tag, which he's memorized, states that this dog likes to snuggle. Benjamin's a stickler for instructions (most  of the time).


This is "Sweet Rabbit," (compliments of the Easter Bunny). The name makes sense. Interestingly, though, he was  named "Sweet Cupboard." Sweet Cupboard, however, had to "have a talk with" Benjamin — this is what he tells us — and as a result he changed the puppet's name to "Sweet Rabbit."

The Teacher Kicked Him in the Eye

"The teacher kicked him in the eye," was what the student told them in the office, but I didn't find that out until later.

I had taken an assignment to sub in kindergarten.

The students were a little chatty and silly, but it was a well-behaved group.

At one point, the kids were all seated on the floor as I was in front of them leading a reading lesson. One of them raised her hand and told me her finger was hurt. I walked between the kids to get to her. I thought maybe she'd cut her finger; when I got close, though, I could see it was just a just a sore hangnail or something like that.)

Meanwhile, behind me I heard a scramble of voices and then sobbing.

I turned around and saw one of the boys in the class had his hand to his eye. He was the one crying, but the poor little guy was trying to restrain it.

I could see that, as I had been walking by (balancing to make sure I didn't fall on the kids in front of me), the heel of my big shoe must have caught him right by his eye.

I rushed back to him, "Oh my Gosh! Oh my Gosh! Tyler, I'm sorry; I'm sorry! Tyler, are you OK?" (Names changed to protect . . . you know the drill.)

Well, I took the poor fella' aside and told him he could sit down and rest. I had another student go to the office for an ice pack. Tyler was OK, and was feeling fine a few minutes later.

An educational assistant returned with an ice pack (and the student I'd sent). "They" (in the office) wanted the E.A. to bring Tyler back to the office, just so they could check if he was OK. That surprised me, . . . but fine.

Not too long after that he returned. With the other ensuing classroom adventures of the day, I didn't think much about the incident again.

At the end of the day I went to the office to get a form. One of the secretaries greeted me with, "How did your day go? Sounded like you had a little incident down there today."

I wrinkled my forehead: for a few seconds I didn't know what she was talking about; I had put it out of my mind. "Ohhh, Tyler ! Yeah,  I feel so bad about that. I'm so clutzy. I was walking in between the kids and I caught the poor guy with the back of my shoe."

She laughed, "Oh, well, one of the kids came down and asked for an ice pack, and I asked him, 'For what?" and he just said, 'The teacher kicked Tyler in the eye.' And we were like, 'Who's  your teacher?' and he said, 'Mrs. Stadelmann.' We looked at the board [with the sub's listed on it] and I was thinking, 'What's going on  ?'" Note that not only was I a sub' they had never had there before but also probably the only man in the building besides the gym teacher and one of the custodians.

We discussed the "incident" in more detail, and I asked when to expect a subpoena. We laughed and they assured me not to worry about it now that they understood what had happened. However, they said they had already had to contact Tyler's mom just to let her know, since she's a teacher and all. Great , I thought. (There are two types of teacher-parents, those who are extra understanding of their kids' teachers and those who are hyper-critical of the same.)

As for me, next time I send a kindergartener with a message about an injured child, I'd better send a note, especially if I'm the cause of the injury.

Clap the rhythm ... on your own knees!

Welcome! We're so glad you were available to sub' here today.
My first day subbing went pretty well overall. It didn't start with quite the "welcome back" to the district one might wish for.

As I mentioned, I was in for an elementary music teacher. She works at two different schools. I whisked into the office of the first school just at the time I was supposed to get there. It was a little busy so I had to wait a minute.

"May I help you?" They see an unfamiliar man in a tie with a black briefcase. They probably think I'm an educational software salesman.

"I'm the substitute for Mrs. Querin." (Names changes to protect …)

"For who?"

My heart rate doubles; I've started at the wrong school. No. That can't be, I read the information over five times.

"Mrs. Querin . . . ," I pronounce the name a couple of different ways. " . . . music teacher, she starts here and then goes to Franklin," I add, almost confidently.

The secretary believes me, but seems to be trying to hide her bewilderment. She walks back to the other secretary and repeat my alleged assignment.

The other secretary explains who I'm supposed to be subbing for and points to a schedule on the wall. (I would think that they would know a sub' is coming, or least know all the teachers in their building, part-time or not; it is April, after all. Maybe, the first secretary was a sub', too.)

Whew! They direct me and even tell me there is another music teacher down there who will let me know what I'll be doing.
__________

Only 10
The plans were thorough. And her Thursday schedule was thoroughly hectic. Her prep' time for the day: a ten-minute break, a thirty-five-minute break during which she has to travel to the other school, and a half-hour break called "lunch." There were 10  half-hour music classes to teach, ranging from Kindergarten to 4th grade.


Multitask Or Else
Both of the schools have a significant population of lower-income students. Almost all of the groups needed stern classroom management.

It was  my first day, and I had  had a bit of practice "teaching" again at church school.

Nevertheless, I found it difficult to deliver this firm class guidance while trying to choose and find the right songs on the CD player and in the music book, attempting to lead the singing in a way that did not incur infectious ridicule, and (sometimes), trying to prevent musical games from turning into recess-like free-for-alls.

Ultimately, each class went fine.

I do not envy the elementary vocal music teacher, especially "Mrs. Querin," and especially on Thursdays.

"Dada's going to work today" OR Operation 'Occupation: Sub', Day One'

Today I had to say something I've never said to my son before, "Dada's going to work today." I will miss him. Especially after the nightmare I had last night in which he, my wife and I were all clinging to each other for dear life as giant rocks were falling out of the sky. (A little repressed anxiety about subbing, perhaps . . . ?)

Today is my first day substitute teaching. I'll be subbing in an elementary music class. I've taught elementary before (that's my field), but never music.

I hope the teacher has left a very complete lesson plan. Perhaps I should bring a Wiggles video just in case. Or, better yet, The School of Rock. ("Hat tip ..." [as they say on the web] ... "hat tip" to my wife for the School of Rock joke.)

What are you doing in there?

Today I was reminded of a story about something that happened a few months ago.

Benjamin was going through a phase where he would use the bathroom and then stay in there just playing with stuff he found. One day while my brother and sister-in-law were visiting he was doing just that. Just before they left, my sister-in-law needed to use the bathroom, so we gave him fair warning that he'd have to come out in a minute.

When she couldn't wait any longer, we told him, ready or not, we were comin' in.

He was at the sink with a big roll of toilet paper under the running water. Half dissolved tissue was oozing off in the standing water (since the drain was pretty well clogged with the same substance).

In the flurry of vacating the bathroom, making the sink operable again, saying goodbye to my family members, telling Benjamin not to put toilet paper in the sink, etc., we didn't really discuss what on Earth he was trying to do.

Once it was calm, we asked. He earnestly answered, "Well, the toilet paper fell in the toilet. I was just trying to wash it off."

It broke our hearts. Conscientious to a fault. A big soggy, messy, gloppy fault.

April Fool's Day

Oh yeah … April's Fools Day: We explained the concept to Benjamin and he got  it.

His main jokes were:

"Oh, no! Eddie [one of our naughtier cats] peed on the floor …"

"Mama, I peed on the floor …"

"Dada, there's a badger in our house! …"

" . . . . . . April Fool's!"

April 3rd and the jokes — same ones — are just starting to peter out this morning.

John Travol-tot

I was with Benjamin at church school this week. One day all the kids attending (ages 2 – 9) were together singing and doing hand and body motions to a song they had learned. The accompanying music was upbeat pop-rock.

Most of the older kids were doing the learned dance and motions. The preschoolers were either trying to do the same, just standing there, or kind of wiggling to the beat. Except my kid.

Benjamin was doing this wild free-form dance. I wanted to blame The Wiggles , but this   was no Wiggles  dance. It was an intense, all-out disco dance: turning, arms up, elbows out, up, down, shake, hip-shimmy, etc., etc. Despite being in a crowd, he was taking up a 3' X 8' space on the floor.

Actually, … Benjamin and I are not shy about gettin' down in the kitchen, whether it’s the Wiggles, Mother Goose Rocks, They Might Be Giants, New Order, C+C Music Factory (one of his favorites), Cake, Count Basie, J-Lo, Glenn Miller, Moby, … whatever.

When he was showin' his moves there in the church hall, I didn't know whether to be self-conscious or proud.

Well, anyway, now half the church probably thinks I take my kid out clubbing every weekend. (It's only really  like once a month.)

Teaching Flashbacks

The public schools in our town are on spring break right now, and our church is having a morning church school program for preschool and school-age kids for the week. My wife and I signed Benjamin up for it and I signed up to volunteer to work at the program for a few of the days.

Benjamin hasn't had a whole lot of experience with long, organized group activities or learning. Nevertheless, he's been doing great. He's had no signs of "homesickness," and is adjusting to the routines quickly.

I, on the other hand, was reeling a bit after my first day of volunteering, and it was not even half of a day. I was leading the "recreation" sessions. Each (age-level) group of kids would come to "my area," and I would lead them in specific games or activities. Having taught elementary school, I was on familiar ground.

I often carelessly remark, about being an at-home dad, that I'm still teaching, but with the ideal student-teacher ratio — 1:1. It wasn't quite as funny when the "ideal" part was taken away and I was forced to humbly remind myself that even a small group of kids about whom I know little is much different terrain.

These are some pedagogical and life lessons I relearned in a few hours:

• Kids aren't born knowing how to raise their hands or get in a line.
  
  
• Just because kids are staring at you intensely doesn't mean they have any idea what you're saying or even that they're listeni— "What? Uhhhh, no, we're not talking about my shirt right now …"
  
  
• You should have already come up with excuses valuable life lessons about why everyone won't be able to have a turn at being the special … whatever … today.
  
  
• When a 10 minute activity takes 20 minutes, and you have to repeat it for the next "class," they will finish it in 5 minutes. You will want to be ready for the question-and-answer session that will follow it: "Now  what are we gonna do?" "Uhhh … "
  
  
• Curricula are rarely written by "normal" teachers, but instead by curriculum writers and/or teachers who seem to have forgotten what it's like in a classroom. So most teachers' guides are to teaching as your car's manual is to learning to drive.
  
  
• Any schedule that doesn't list bathroom breaks is wrong.
  
  
• There are  naughty kids There are  kids with naughty behavior (even at church school.) Not your kids. They were great! Hope springs eternal that the naughty can be truly separated from the kid. Prepare. This transformation will not  occur under your watch.
  
  
• Starting at around 5 or 6 years old, kids will perceive almost any activity as a competition, no matter what  it says in the teaching methods book, lesson plan, or the Bible.
  
  
• If any sort of projector is involved, allow 5 minutes for improvisational shadow plays, 5 minutes for ceasing said shadow plays, and 5 assistants to micromanage spontaneous arm and head shadows. Alternatively, have ample security personnel to lock down a corridor between projector and screen.
  
  
• If you're seeing leg   shadows on the screen, the owner of the leg might not  be your first choice for the student to summarize today's lesson.

I was being cautious on day one. By the second day, however, I was flagging down running kids in the hall, and jumping in front of the assembled group of kids channeling presumed-long-lost gimmicks to get their attention even when it wasn't my turn to teach. The teacher knee-jerk reflexes die hard and resurface quickly. (It took years for me to lose the impulse to intercept others people's kids running or yelling in the supermarket.)


Now a shocking confession: soon I may just be "Occupation: Part-time Dad" for a while. I have signed up to substitute teach (in the local school system). (The pay will help defray some of the adoption costs.) Not to worry, when our beautiful daughter arrives I'll be back on full-time overtime.

I don't know how much the kids learned at church this week, but I do know that God sent me some good practice for subbing.

Sub' teaching, as I recall, makes for some good stories. So the outstanding question is, do I post them here … or create Occupation: Sub?