kevdonahue

IMG_0781, originally uploaded by kevdonahue.

That’s what it looks like. Really just Kelly at the birthday party of Kelly’s friend Alex, at Skirmish in Lehighton, Pa.

The team won its second straight conference championship. He played second doubles.

Finally we can breath. We can step back. We’ve been looking for Spring-Ford and Phoenixville.
We lost a couple guys, but Justin Baman, who’s a freshman, came in and really stepped up. Cruz Marin, a jayvee player for three years … he stepped up. They (6-4, 6-3 winners at third doubles) have been really successful. They have one loss all year, to Spring-Ford. Matt Connor, a senior walk-on, and Pete Donahue (at second doubles) have given us depth. They’ve only lost two matches.
Keenan McAuliffe (first singles) has been in some tough spots. But he placed fifth in PAC-10 singles and Nish was fourth. That’s just fourth and fifth, but still very impressive. First and second singles and third and fourth doubles have stepped it up. They have really given us an edge all season. 

– Perry Del Rossi, Methacton boys tennis coach 

She peels an orange in one big piece, proving it can be done. Impressive!

IMG_0684, originally uploaded by kevdonahue.

Virginia and Kevin were in Harrisburg for the annual UU district conference April 8-10. While there, we attended Sunday service at the Unitarian Church of Harrisburg (that’s lead minister Rev. Howard Dana and associate minister Rev. Suzanne Marsh with Virginia before service).

The Harrisburg church is noteworthy because it has flourished over the past decade, and three years ago expanded its footprint beyond its suburban base by purchasing a second church in the city itself–and getting all the joys and issues that come with being a part of neighborhood as part of the deal. Which is what they wanted.

Anyway, Rev. Dana was inspirational and Virginia and I were energized by a Saturday discussion of how to make liberal religion relevant in the 21st century. Fascinating, challenging stuff.

Color’s called serape (it’s a warm orange). We’ll be hanging some photos from our 2009 trip to the Southwest on the walls soon enough.

We visited with Virginia’s mom and brother Chris’ family over the weekend, had the chance to celebrate Ryan’s birthday (13th) and help with some painting and yard cleanup at Rosalie’s house. It was a fun, fruitful weekend, and we still got home in time for Virginia and I to teach our Sunday school class. Photos below, including one of our lunch at a tasty Mexican restaurant near Roz’s home.

In a recent post, I said that as a parent, I was more offended by handheld games than the console variety:

The thing that actually does bother me are the handheld devices, in the hands of 5- to 12-year-olds, who sit distractedly in social situations and never interact with the other kids nor the adults. It’s especially vexing at family events, where the kids don’t see each other very often, and instead of talking and playing with each other, they hunker down in their seats and barely look up except to eat the occasional French Fry. On Christmas Eve, I saw a young guy around 8 or 9 playing his DS in church, as other kids put on a Christmas pageant. I wanted to chuck the thing against the wall.

This is helpful to me. I’ve been ignored by a kid playing a game in front of the TV, and even when I coach teens playing basketball or teaching a Sunday school class, I’m used to the feigned disinterest. I’ve come to realize that kids—especially bigger ones—are often listening even when they appear to not be.

But I am often stung when we’re sitting at a table for a lunch or dinner and the kid can’t be bothered to look up and be part of the conversation, especially if me or another person (adult or child) is asking him or her questions.

Jedd Hafer, of the Love and Logic Institute, e-mailed me this, which made me feel a little more justified:

Dr. Bruce Perry calls it “biologically disrespectful,” meaning that we are made to relate face to face. From the time we are infants, we respond to facial cues, etc. All this “exclusive personal stimulus” (earbuds in, texting, handhelds) goes against our biology. We are deprived of a real human need—face-to-face relating. (Says the guy in the email, responding to a blog. Man, I’m a hypocrite!)

Which explains why my wife has darn-near grabbed my iPhone and thrown it through the nearest window when I yeah-sure’d her recounting something important from her life. Forget kids: I think “presence” is the biggest challenge we all face in our relationships these days. How do you score on this modern-day challenge?

This was originally published by Men’s Health: http://blogs.menshealth.com/fatherhood/when-gaming-is-biologically-disrespectful/2011/03/04/#ixzz2bX9f3sl9

In my previous post, I was pretty dismissive of the idea that video games are risky for children. So let’s be clear: there are risks, and approaching video games and children with a “whatever you want/as much as you want” attitude is not where I’d want this discussion to go.

I contacted Jedd Hafer, of the Love & Logic Institute, to help me (and hopefully you) with understanding the impact of video games and appropriate ways to manage children’s relationship to them.

He started by saying that kids can indeed tell the difference between make-believe and reality, but there’s more to the issue. Here’s what he had to say:

The bad news is that violent video games have been shown to have a cumulative effect on things like mood and empathy. Think heavy metal poisoning—a little bit won’t kill you, but too much and you have problems. When you see a person die violently in a movie, you might have an empathetic reaction. I even wince when the bad guy gets impaled at the end of . . . well, every Bruce Willis action movie from the 1990s.

But when you play a violent video game, you are the one doing the shooting and your internal reaction when the bad guy gets shot is “Yes, I win!” There is a reason that the police and military use simulators. They do prepare us for and de-sensitize us to the real thing.

More bad news for the developing brain is that many new neurons are showing up for work and learning that their job is . . . to be electronically stimulated instead of, perhaps, some more important functions.

Love and Logic believes that kids should make lots of affordable mistakes. The question becomes “what is affordable?” Can an average, healthy kid play some military games in moderation without much effect? Probably so. Have kids with violent tendencies rehearsed horrific acts that they later carried out in real life? I live less than 45 minutes from Columbine High School and I can tell you the tragic answer. The Columbine shooters literally practiced for their attack.

Since we believe in being practical, let me offer some specific signs it may be time to intervene:

• Kids lacking relationships in the real world (their only friends are online gaming or Internet friends)
• Kids becoming extremely irritable and short-tempered
• Not getting sleep or schoolwork done
• Lacking empathy, enjoying when other people hurt

If you are seeing these or other harmful effects, set some good limits (ex: ”We provide/allow video games when they aren’t causing problems.”) and don’t be afraid to remove the offending object for a time.

Now for the Internet (applies to online gaming as well): I like to think of the Internet as the biggest, most dangerous city in the world. At what age would I let my kid go anywhere, unchecked and unsupervised, around that city? I’m thinking about 35?

Seriously, we are big advocates of computers being in open areas of the house. Obviously filters, history checks and passwords (if you don’t know how to do this stuff, get help—just not from your kid), as long as we don’t become dependent on them to where we stop talking to our kids and engaging them about this stuff. I’m a pretty nosey dad when it comes to this stuff. Does it irritate my 13-year-old sometimes? Yep. If it saves his life, it’ll be worth it. A predator (there are sooo many) getting access to my kids is NOT an affordable mistake.

To sum up: Some gaming in moderation won’t harm the average kid. Too much, especially the 1st-person violent stuff, and it can have toxic effects. And if I am going to err on the net, I’d rather err on the side of safety.

Stay involved, dads. You are the best safety device of all!

So what do you think? I’d love to hear about how modern-day dads are meeting these modern-day challenges.

Also, a recent study is making the rounds that suggests video games are not to blame for callous kids (though I’m not sure I buy the methodology). And a quick Google search of recent headlines turned up ones that say games can help combat depression and (wait for it) obesity. Read if you have the time:

– Study: Violent video games may not desensitize kids (USA Today)

– Study: Casual gaming reduced depression symptoms (Seattle Post-Intelligencer)

– Using video games to combat obesity (Patch.com)

This post was originally published by Men’s Health: http://blogs.menshealth.com/fatherhood/are-video-games-dangerous/2011/03/03/#ixzz2bX7joYwY

So previously, I shared a story from the Way-Back Machine, when my heretofore Little Angels did something bad—jaw-droppingly bad, in fact. They vandalized somebody else’s property, then kept it quiet till one of their friends confessed in a fit of conscience.

(My wife and I are both journalists by training, so one thing we’ve always tried to instill in our kids is an idea that no story ever stays untold for long. I can’t tell you how many times my wife has brought up something the boys would prefer we didn’t know, then launched into the well-worn reminder: “How many times do we need to tell you? We always find out.“)

So the big question I’ve had over the ensuing years has to do with punishment. Should we as parents have been more punitive?

I spoke to Jedd Hafer, of the Love and Logic Institute, an organization which helps parents. Rather than try to explain Love and Logic, I’ll share Jedd’s response to the episode:

I love the tractor story. What a great example of how kids learn from modeling and that values are often ‘caught’ rather than taught. I’ve been busted myself with my kids picking up things I hoped they weren’t noticing.

In this situation, Love and Logic might ask if the kids could’ve done extra chores and odd jobs (for the next 100 years) to raise the money for the damage. When kids cause a problem, we expect them to solve it: [with sadness and empathy] “Wow, that’s a lot of money to pay for that tractor, guys. How are you planning on paying for it?” Now, they have to think about, worry about and sweat about solving the problem.

Obviously, with their young ages, we might help them out a bit, but the key is that they get the message “when you cause a problem, you are expected to solve it—not because we are mad at you, but because we love you and want you to succeed out in the world. We want you to be an expert problem-solver.”

You are certainly correct that we’d take it more seriously if the kids hurt a person or animal. We would still want to foster empathy for the victims (neighbors) so we might ask the kids (during calm times) how they feel when their stuff gets broken.

I love that they had to face the police. That’s what happens out there in the real world when you break the law. I bet that sticks with them. And you are so right—experiencing the consequences of our not-so-bright [boy] ideas is the best teacher of all.

Looking back, I think I missed an opportunity to teach a lesson about consequences, because I decided the costs involved were simply too big, and they were too young to be burdened with sweating about dollars.

Today, with my children now teens, my perspective is different. My 16-year-old recently passed the driver’s test and received his license. He isn’t paying all of his insurance, but a substantial amount. When he recently punched a hole in a basement wall (that’s another story), he had to figure out how to patch it, not me. And my 14-year-old who loves his summer camp? He asked if he could stay a second week there, and we said fine—if he paid for it. He’s working on it, mostly by requesting that presents throughout the year—birthdays and such—be turned into dedicated cash gifts, and doing a little child-sitting (he took a class to be better-prepared).

In each instance, they are taking responsibility for their needs and desires. It’s a step toward that day when they’ll move out from under our roof and make their way in the world. And that’s at least one of the goals here, isn’t it? To prepare them to set their own course.

Aunt Betty, originally uploaded by kevdonahue.

My mom’s sister Betty Stansfield passed away on Monday, Feb. 21, 2010, after a years-long battle with cancer. She was a lady of great warmth, great faith, and great strength.

Betty’s life included more than her fair share of pain, too—she lost a child 10 years ago, fell into a coma during treatment for a brain tumor 5 years ago, and yet she was not one to complain or make excuses.

The night before she passed away, I was looking for photos to send to my cousin Marybeth, who was beginning preparations for what we all knew was inevitable (Betty went into hospice three days earlier). And I found this photo. It was the last thing I did before going to bed that night, and her smile was in my mind all night—until I heard the next morning that she had passed away. I’ve been trying to keep that smile in mind all week.