The Calm is nearly here

Just a few more days till the schools are out & Dubai shuts down.

Never thought much about it but, until fairly recently, the Life Punctuation Point known as:

"End of School / Summer Holidays" that dominated my world for so long, was dead to me.

But now, behold, the Resurrection!

I am a Phoenix, thrust back into the world which is dominated by the School Year.

*************************************

Since that heady Summer when:

the jeans were still 501s,









and tights were still 50 denier.




When our boots were Biker & the trainers, Adidas Gazelles or Sambas.

 AND ....... when that University coughed up that Degree so ferally clawed into existence laboriously achieved

....................................... the doors to 8-10 week holidays slammed SHUT!

For the next 15ish years, holidays were limited to 2-3 weeks A YEAR!!!

Pretty tough going when you live in a different country to your family, it has to be said.  My Dad put it into perspective though by reminding me that when he first went overseas, he didn't return home for 3 years!!!

Let us pause a moment and think about that.

Yeesh.

......................................................................................................................................
...................................................................................................................................................
............................................................................................................................................................
But, now I have a kid.  Things are different.

My life is back to being punctuated by School-Events (bloody Christmas concerts, sodding Dress-up Days, Leaving Presents for Teachers, school photos, holidays blah blah blah).

Especially the Summer Holidays.

Especially in Dubai.

It starts around April/May, people start announcing they will be leaving. Hate that.  See Goodbyes Suck

Also, every conversation seems to take a "So, what are your plans for the Summer?" turn.
It is just a given that you will be going away.

'Where' and 'How Long For' are the only variables.
Some people literally, are on their way to the airport as the school gates close & stay away for, like a bazillion weeks.

And this is what I have noticed, for those of us who largely spend the bulk of the Summer here in Dubai, when we find someone else doing the same, there is a Comrade In Arms air of mutual respect that blossoms. A nod of respect.
Nice one.
We are in this together.

During the non-parent years, I delighted in the quiet roads of the Summer & the general calm that settles over Dubai.
I still do.
50+ deg heat notwithstanding, I like Dubai in the Summer.

I see Rude People.

Not much gets my goat more than people being rude to other (also, btw) PEOPLE, who work in shops, restaurants or other forms of the service industry.

You people makes me cringe.  You make my soul cringe.

And, just FYI, it is a deal-breaker as far as any kind of friendship might go.

If you are the sort of person who:

*  snaps superiorly, completely unnecessarily & disproportionately, at someone trying to help you or respond to your request,

*  speaks condescendingly or mockingly,
*  do either or both of the above, in a loud voice just because you have or, would like to ensure, an audience

then ... we are done.

( frankly, I am disappointed you broke through my usually very reliable screening process.  I will be reviewing my Insufferable Idiot FireWall)

********************

Dear Rude Person,
I would ask that you consider whether you would speak to that same person in the same way, in your home country, if they were the same nationality / race as you.

..........................................

No, I thought not.

You embarrass me.
I am embarrassed for you.
Because you are a Class A arse-hole.

There is no excuse for that kind of behaviour.  None.

Sometimes, VERY occasionally, frustration can take you places you, later, feel disappointed you had to go. However, you can always remain respectful and dignified.

Nothing wrong with complaining, if you are not satisfied but, sweetheart, you don't have to go nuclear, you don't have to be rude and you don't need an audience.

At the other end of the scale, I have seen people 'complain' with such class and dignity & ultimately, far more successfully than any of you squawking Jumped-up FishWives or brash puffed-up chests 'Big' Men,

And, you know what makes this already shameful scenario even more unforgivable?

Carrying out your ridiculous carry on in front of your children.

Way to parent.

Hang your head in shame.

And show a bit of class, would you?

The next day:

Spotted and sent to me by a (NICE) friend.

Word.

They Aren't Ours to Keep

Right, you are either going to be one of Them That Get It or, Them That Don't.

I think of all my posts, this will be the one that will either speak to your heart OR,
have you scratching your head thinking "what is WRONG with these people?".

That's ok.  You Head-Scratchers can toddle off for a sec - but, do come back later, normal service will resume soon enough.

**************************************************************************

OK, so now we are alone ..... let's talk.

Let's talk about saying goodbye to our non-human friends or family members.

Unsurprisingly (given my childhood ie Wherever I Am ...&, not really coincidentally, subsequent life-style choice ie Write About Your Passion ), I have had much experience (sadly) in loss of this nature - starting from childhood, right the way up to last year.

My Folks get it
And they gave it to me.

2012.  The hideous year in which we lost 4 family members (3 dogs - old age, congenital health issues and ghastly accident & 1 cat - suspected shot, by someone I hex, daily).

I have said in the past that I believe very strongly in giving children the opportunity to grow and live with pets (doesn't matter what species).

This is Ollie.
He gets read to.
He pretends he is interested.
He seldom is.
He is a polite dog.

There are a myriad of joys, blessings and lessons that children can get from having a pet.

Yes yes yes, the kids get all the benefits & the old folks get all the poo-clearing & the bills.

Deal with it.  You the grown-ups. 

Gloria.
Our Gloria.
Only knew life in a cage.
Spent last 5 months of her life with us.
Left us, finally knowing
the deep joy of sofas & cuddles

Thiiiiiiiink of the liiiiiiiiittle chil'ren.



One of the least obvious, but VERY valuable, is the opportunity to address death & loss, in a safe way.
Hopefully, before they have to encounter it within the Human Family or Friend sphere.

 Things live.  We love them.  They love us. Inevitably, though, sad times come.  Doesn't diminish the good times.  In some ways it makes them more special.

These were tough things to explain to the Household 6 year Boy.  But, we did.

He was (& still is, at times) sad but he knows what happened.

***

Through my degree (Education & Biology) and then, subsequent research on helping adults (& children) with Pet Bereavement, I learnt a number of important things.

The most important, I think, is to use the words.  YOU gotta be brave.  No one digs using the 'D' word but, this is an opportunity to help your kid, so time to man up.

Say 'died'.  Not 'went to sleep' - potentially, trying to avoid 'the word' can give kids the fear of falling asleep, bed, having an injection themselves etc etc.

Enough.

Talking to Children about death of a pet - here, there's all sorts of stuff out there for you to have a look if you want to.

***

I don't want this whole thing to be about The Kids because when you are a Grown-Up, losing a pet (Species Irrelevant) hurts like HELL too.

There is no skirting around the issue.  No getting away from it.

It isn't simply the loss of the physical  presence of a much-loved furry/feathery/scaly buddy- sometimes we mourn too for the severing of the connection with a former life.

• Perhaps your cat predated your spouse.
• Perhaps your budgie was a pet that you shared with a room-mate that has now moved away.

Now that creature is no longer physically present, you feel your connection with a previous life is also finally ended.

*OUCH*

Sometimes, the loss of a pet reminds us as to what an emotional rock their presence in our lives has been.

• Maybe that dog joined your household as a pup in a different country, moved around the world with you been a constant in a life full of upheavals.
• Maybe your horse, acquired, finally, as an adult, returned you on a daily basis to that Pony-Mad Little Girl from *ahem* decades ago.
  (a phase that everyone, btw, reassured your parents you would grow out of!)

OR .....

It does not have to be anything like any of those things.

Perhaps you just really REALLY miss your friend.

Because a Friend is what these things are, to us, The Ones That Get It.

And, as much as it hurts when they leave us, I, for one, am so glad that I Got It.

And finally,

The Rainbow Bridge*

A long time ago I read something which I found very helpful.

A concept to meditate on (in between all the gulping sobs, snot-catching and eye-dabbing) which I, personally have found very calming.

(Note: I paraphase and have added my own take on it all)

Simply, these entities are not ours to keep.

They have their own journeys to follow, their own paths to follow.
As do we.

We are blessed to have been able to travel along together, for a while, but ultimately, our respective roads will branch.
This is true for all of us, regardless of hairiness, scaliness or number of legs.

They are not ours to keep.  That bit, in particular, feels right.

So, when the time comes, we must let them go & wish them well. 

*Bloody poem wrecks me.  You have been warned 

The 'right' way to beat your child

Recently this 'parenting' book & its teaching has been brought to my attention.

http://www.amazon.com/books/dp/0966378601

Now the Scientist in me knows that I need to read this book for myself. 
Scientist Roo also knows that she need to spend more time researching & reading around the view points.

BUT, based on just the comments within the review section of the Amazon link, the Gut Instinct Roo is mortified at what this man is teaching people & what people think is ok.

From my initial research this man has no background in child psychology, child development, science or anything that I believe would qualify him to be telling people how to raise their children.

He has a BA in History & a Masters in Divinity & what I think is a Doctorate in Ministry (not sure.)

Here are some quotes from the book that I found on another blog:


p.134 “Acquaint your children with authority and submission when they are infants. This training starts the day you bring them home from the hospital.”

 p.142 “You must provide examples of submission for your children. Dads can do this through biblical authority over their wives, and Moms through biblical submission to their husbands.”


p.106 “Watch a baby struggle against wearing a hat in the winter. Even this baby who cannot articulate or even conceptualize what he is doing shows a determination not to be ruled from without. This foolishness is bound up within his heart. Allowed to take root and grow for 14 or 15 years, it will produce a rebellious teenager who will not allow anyone to rule him. The spanking process drives foolishness from the heart of a child. Confrontation with the immediate and undeniably tactile sensation of a spanking renders an implacable child sweet.”

p.151 Tripp describes the whipping procedure: take the child to a private place (so nobody can stop the abuse), make the child confess, tell the child "how many swats he will receive", put the child over your lap (as Tripp says, to "put the spanking in the context of your physical relationship" (!!)), pull the child's diapers or "drawers" down and whip them. Then pull the child up and show affection.


p.154 “When your child is old enough to resist your directives, he is old enough to be disciplined.



Rebellion can be something as simple as an infant struggling against a diaper change or stiffening out his body when you want him to sit on your lap. When our oldest child was approximately 8 months old, we were confronted with parenting our first mobile child. We had a bookshelf constructed of boards and bricks. Fearing the shelf would fall on him, Margy told him not to pull himself up by the shelf. After moving him away from the shelf, she left the room. As she peeked in on him, she observed him surveying the room. Not seeing her, he headed back toward the forbidden bookshelf. Here was a young child, not yet able to walk or to talk, looking to see if the coast was clear so he could disobey. Obviously, he was old enough to be disciplined.”




NGGGGGGGGGGGGGGAAAAARRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!

 
I, personally, feel desperately uneasy with all of this - I want to explore WHY I feel so uneasy about this.

The position I am coming from with this:

* I am not anti-religion - far from it.  However, I believe whatever you believe is personal & I have
   no patience for tub-thumping.
   Extremist-Atheists are every bit as tedious & intolerant as extremist-Whatevers.  Believe in nothing
   or believe in the Great Pumpkin, I don't care. Just don't tell me that you have all the answers &
   everyone else is deluded/evil/blahblahblah
   I am very interested in learning about all sorts of faiths, beliefs, non-beliefs, conspiracy theories. 
   Love it. Want to learn all about all of it .......... WHICH IS HOW I FOUND THIS BOOK


*  I cannot say that I would never smack The Boy. 
    To date, we have never had to.
    But we'd never rule it out but, again, to date, we have yet to come across a scenario when we
    would feel it was
a) appropriate
b) would have taught anything or
c) that THAT course of action would have made whatever the scenario we were in, better.

* I have some, and I did not expect this to happen when I became a Mum, Tiger Mum tendencies.
   I have exceedingly high expectations in terms of behavior &, I have a strong commitment to
   emotional & social intelligence (personally, a work in progress for myself & my job is to help the
   Boy grow in that way as well)


And so, given all that, I'm going out on a limb here (back to that Tree-Hugger Roo perhaps) -

I do not understand, given alllllllllllllllllll we now know about Child Development, the Acquisition & Experimentation of & with Language, the importance of Exploratory Behavior in young children, Emotional & Verbal Expression & the importance those things have on growing Self-Confidence, honing Decision-Making & the making of good choice skills - how anyone can believe that unquestioning  submission to a biologically superior being (and this superiority may be reinforced by physical means if necessary) is ok.

We don't even believe it in dog training anymore*

I don't wish to cause any offence.  Not at all.  I just do not understand.




* a WHOLLLLLLLLLLLE other rant

"Wherever I am there's always Pooh. There's always Pooh and Me ..." A.A.Milne

 Focus on the dog, people.

The dog on the sofa. Not the weirdo kid.*

That is Pooh.  (oh DO try not to snigger) You know, Pooh? As in Winnie The ....?

Well, that dog, (name inspired by the books about a toy bear, written in the late 1920's, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnie-the-Pooh ) was a very special dog.

He was there, from Day 1 of Me.  Yep, from Day 1 of Me he never left my side (& vice versa ).

He, along with ALLLLLLLL the other dogs that entered my life as a child, (at one point we lived with, I think it was, 13 dogs - all rescues from HongKong SPCA, incidentally) started & then, signed, sealed & delivered the Love of The Dog (especially the Rescue Dog) into the very soul of Me.

I truly believe Childhood pets can be really pivotal.

He was mine.  It all started with him.



“So wherever I am, there's always Pooh,
There's always Pooh and Me.
"What would I do?" I said to Pooh,
"If it wasn't for you," and Pooh said to me: "True,
It isn't much fun for One, but Two
Can stick together," says Pooh, says he.
"That's how it is," says Pooh.”

― A.A. Milne, Now We Are Six

 

* Think that I should count myself lucky, having escaped any kind of lasting mental scarring from that outfit. It MAY have been the 70s but, come on!?

 

 

Write about your passion, they say.

(Well, in that case, this should be an easy post to write.)

OUR STARTING POSITION

It is possible that We are not entirely unbiased on this subject but, Rescue dogs (but, y'know, the species is really irrelevant) have been in my life since, well, Day 1.

Literally, since Day 1 of Me.

The Trousers has dedicated his life to animals too.  Fixing them.  Learning about them & helping them.  Whatever animal, seriously, WHATEVER animal he will want to try to help.  If it needs fixing, he will try to fix it.

Well, that's what vets do, right? So, no surprise there.

Together, we use our respective skills to try to help.

We have done our respective 'things' in a variety of countries, HongKong, UK & now, Dubai.

Even The Kid 'gets' it already, I'm proud to say.
When one of our (rescue, obviously) dogs passed away recently, He said,
"We need to find another dog that doesn't have a home & he can come be in our family"
*SNIFF* (that's ma boy.  He was 5.)

Animal Cruelty is everywhere

Let me be clear, cruelty to animals happens EVERYWHERE.  It is important we remember this.

HOWEVER, it is undeniable that there is still a disparity in legislation or priority given to repercussions when cases are brought to the attention of the relevant authorities, depending on the country.

This could be due to:
EITHER
a) the value or considered role of animals in a given society or culture
OR
b) the country's national economic situation & the strain its people are under.  Feeding One's children  or saving Oneself from the risk of rabies, for example, are not unreasonable priorities.

*enters, stage left, with Soapbox*

That said, on a level playing field, I'm going to go out of a limb (a fairly wide limb, that I can fit my soapbox on to) here and say:

1) It is NOT ok to hurt things for amusement
2) We (as a species) need to TEACH OUR CHILDREN that hurting things for amusement is NOT friggin' OK
3) Other sentient beings (doesn't matter how many legs, doesn't matter if furred, feathered, scaled, whatever) deserve RESPECT. You don't have to love them.  Just respect them.
4) Pets will teach your children valuable LESSONS in responsibility, compassion, care, &, when the time comes, death.  But if you are irresponsible about it, you will teach your kids some fairly worrying things too

'If you See Something, DO Something'

Recently, there have been a number of very upsetting reports of animal cruelty here in Dubai. 
There IS a Law.
It is a really good, comprehensive, thorough law but, the seeming lack of interest in enforcing the Law frustrates many.

Things will  improve & many here will, hopefully, see the campaign "If you See Something, DO Something' over the next few weeks.

By the way, this seems a fairly reasonable mantra to have, wherever you are.  Whatever the species.

No?