Happened upon this topic at a potluck on Sunday and got kinda mired in it.

I've been saying for a long time, "abolish the current system completely, and use all the funds for anti-poverty measures - this will help more children."

Partly I was saying that as a way to express my belief in the total failure of the current system to keep kids safer than they otherwise would be. And partly, it would clearly have lots more positive effects on society and less awful power-dynamic racist classist crap which the current system is rife with.

I have a survey up at surveymonkey.com with over 60 responses from people involved in foster systems (primarily current and former foster parents) across the country, evaluating the strengths and weaknesses, failures and successes, of the systems they've interacted with. Responses are all over the board. It's hard to summarize statistically cuz I'm not a researcher, but there's a pretty strong scatter pattern in terms of how much people think the system helps or hurts children and families. Meaning not more than 50% think it helps, even a little, but not more than 50% think it hurts even a little either. That's an oversimplification but I'd have to pay a monthly fee to tabulate and download the results.

I also have two good friends who were abused as children and were not helped by the system, and who feel scarred by it as adults. One has been dealing with it for a long time in therapy, the other only recently. I emailed with the first, "K", about this topic recently, and here is a little of what she had to say...

Systematic reform:
I, of course, agree with systematic reform.  If ALL families had a living wage, quality health care and mental health care, state of the art intervention for substance abuse, a school and community center system that created networks of support then abuse would decrease.  If people saw an abuse/neglect intervention system that worked (I have no idea what that would be) they would be more likely to report when abuse did occur.  I think Hilary Clinton was not off base with her "it takes a village".  If entire communities saw the children of the community as "their's" instead of the child as just the property of the parents then abuse would decrease.  I also think abuse/neglect intervention system and the foster care system are very, very broken.  [name] worked for the system in [state] as a social worker and found it to be a system that was doing its best but inherently lost children "in the cracks", she also found that social workers were damned if you do and damned if you don't.  A lot of the system is guess work and that can never work well.  I don't know what the answers are but I know what we have now doesn't work.

K is also a teacher and has been in the position of having to report students' families to social services. She also tries to build relationships with the families and provide support to them.


Another friend I've been emailing with about it says that of course statistically more children would be helped by reducing poverty, but those who aren't can't be ignored. I agree, yet I genuinely don't think there's a way to help. I realize that's not "ok," I just think it's true. This same friend mentioned that people choose larger cities to live in rather than small towns often because they don't want everyone up in their business. Also, that some communities accept parental actions that other communities reject.

So if you have an impersonal, institutional child welfare system then you have one set of huge insurmountable problems, and if you rely on community members to take care of each other then you have another.

Today I was catching up on Strollerderby posts by the two authors I read there, and came across this:

Economy Tanks; Child Abuse Rises

So I will stand by my original position. I will amend it to point out that mental health treatment access is a huge important factor as well.
I acknowledge that I do not have the answer that will help every child, and no I am not "ok" with some children getting hurt, but I do think it's worthwhile to reduce the numbers and I do think I have a real answer to that.

Unfortunately, I realize these are entirely academic arguments and the child welfare system as it currently exists is not about to disappear. Too many people who know virtually nothing about how it really functions are on power-trips or do-gooder-trips of denial.

Argh.

It has been at least a month since Greg lent me a magazine with a recipe in it for butternut squash soup. He'd made a variation on it for potluck. I have been trying to assemble appropriate ingredients, and find time to cook a new food (longer cuz I won't be as efficient as stuff I'm used to, and I have no idea how long it'll take). I finally thought I had it all together yesterday morning. And then... There just is no off-the-shelf chicken broth available that doesn't have *something* we can't eat. I had purchased some at Hannafords when I was apparently too dazed and rushed, and missed the "chicken flavor" and "flavor" on the label ("flavor" can be anything, and Zach has allergens that don't fall under the FDA labelling law, so we have to avoid this). Also missed the "fat free" and the fact that there's 1 g of protein per cup as opposed to the I-forget-how-much-but-much-more that I was expecting after having looked it up on Nutritionadata.com a few weeks ago. BLEARGH!

This, after having looked at all the other broths in can or box, organic and non, at both Hannafords and the Coop. There were THREE trips made over the past couple weeks with chicken broth as at least one of the primary goals, and none were successful.

Meanwhile, I did once make chicken broth from scratch. For the cats. Back when we lived in Brooklyn. With a recipe out of The New Natural Cat.
I remember it being annoying and taking forever, but I also remember that she had you really concentrate it. That's about all I remember.

I have been saving the bones from the legs & thighs we've been eating. Some of them, at least. But I know nothing about what to do with them, or even if it's ok to use them once they're cooked. I'm kinda intimidated by researching broth recipes, but I guess I better. I don't want to have to go buy backs and necks and do some complicated thing that would require the kitchen to be usably clean (I'm used to using it when it's not). This is why I was really willing to go for the boxed stuff at least this time.

URGH.

(Oh...um... this stuff we have... I opened the seal before taking a 2nd look at the box... It's about the size of a box of soy milk... anyone want it?)

P.S.: Humidifiers really ought to be labelled as single-season disposable products, or made differently. We have a rather large collection, none of which work. This is also a source of annoyance today.

Not perfectly written, and a little long, but gets at some of the important issues I have with the Prop 8 thing:
http://www.pubrecord.org/commentary/515-beyond-black-vs-gay-a-wake-up-call-to-gay-marriage-activists-in-california.html

Thank you, US Rep Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), for not getting caught up in all the hype blowing the marriage issue out of proportion, and instead keeping a good perspective on legislation and issues that matter as much or more.

Rare that the Advocate publishes something I find useful, but here it is.

http://babble.com/CS/blogs/strollerderby/archive/2008/11/07/arkansas-adoption-ban-passes-fails-to-eliminate-queers-and-their-spawn-from-the-earth.aspx

You can click on her tag "Shannon LC Cate" at the bottom of theh post and see everything she's written at Strollerderby, I think.

Today I nudged my 3 favorite Writers With A Clue to say something about the crap floating around the internet in the form of reactions to CA passing Prop 8.

Shannon at Peter's Cross Station got there first.

GO READ IT, PLEASE!

Still would love to hear from miriamjoyce and Arlene.

I'd made a little sign for Zach's stroller that said "Vote Today!" with the Os colored in blue, so I could feel useful while walking him around the neighborhood peeking at construction vehicles in the morning. Someone said hi to us while we stood at our closest large intersection. But my favorite moment of the whole day was from around this time of day, when our family walked together up to our polling place. A black woman saw our sign and stuck her arm/fist out her car window as she drove by, yelling "Yeah VOTE!" with awesome intensity.

(Zach started insisting shortly before we left that he was voting for Popop for president. He still says so every time, but he also gives a little sly grin. It did cause me to call my dad on the way to the polls, and it was nice to have a quick convo about the election with him.)

The South Asian-appearing poll worker who was there to give instructions after we'd signed in was barely containing his bubbling enthusiasm as he showed us the ballot and made sure we knew how to read it and use the machines.

Around 5:00, after we'd voted but before Zach went to bed, I started feeling weird. There was nothing to DO. I'd spent all day on Monday and the first half of Tuesday feeling like I wanted to DO something (ok, I've spent the past few months feeling like I wanted to DO something, and the most I did was two batches of phone calls for move-on and the Obama campaign on Saturday and Monday). All of a sudden, that sense of anticipation was changing to just wait-and-see.

Last night a bunch of friends came over after dinner (yay!) and once results started actually coming in we worked hard to limit ourselves to every-15-minutes checking of the results on Karin's laptop.

Early on, PA came in strong for Obama, and none of us could quite believe that that was it. It would've been really hard for McCain to win at that point, and then it just kept coming. Painfully slowly at first, but there were no bad surprises.

We found out the West Coast votes were in and the election was over when my mom called. The phone rang, and everyone dove for the computer. Mom was obviously at a party and we couldn't hear each other much, but it was a fun way to get the news. That moment of the phone ringing and everyone realizing at once what it must mean was my other favorite one of the day.

I called oppendonnell and she said the streets outside her house were like New Year's Eve. I was jealous - I and a few others here were missing that sense of being in a crowd rejoicing. My sister called this morning while I was wallowing in the odd anti-climactic-ness of it all, and the isolation of being in a quiet city and home with a kid. It was good to hear from her.

Obama's acceptance speech was not one of his inspirational and surprisingly progressive ones. I suppose it makes sense, but it was disappointing. I loved that there was call-and-response! And I know he (his speech writers) did a great job with an appropriate speech for the moment. It just wasn't what I wanted emotionally. I did get teary a tiny bit when he mentioned the new First Lady.

As I said to my sister today: There are going to be cornrows in the White House.

This morning I couldn't bring myself to make oatmeal (boring) or even pancakes (2ice already this week, and the kitchen's a mess), I just wanted to go out to breakfast. That the restaurant I wanted to go to closed over a year ago was irrelevant, since it's not like I can eat a big plate of eggs and a buttered bagel. We did go out for sushi, though. Our first restaurant trip with the boy. He ate some plain rice, a tiny bit of wasabi (Mr. medium-salsa-by-the-spoonful thought it was a little too spicy), and some cucumber bits fed by chop-sticks. An elderly Japanese man came over and said, "Hi little Obama!" in a friendly and excited way.

It sort of seems like nothing's changing. Self-correcting, self-perpetuating system where individuals can gain or lose power or wealth but equality and justice do not win out overall. Obama's just another one of Them, on many levels. Or at least he probably is. It does remain to be seen, but I'm not holding my breath.
On the other hand, something has changed. The U.S. elected a black man to be president. The left/democrats/progressives won a presidential election despite whatever attempts the right/repubs made to steal it.

There's a giddiness buzzing under the surface out there. I now want to Do Something again. I want to harness this energy.

I hope he hits the ground running. I hope he proves me wrong that his actions won't lead to any real change (universal health care would do it!).

And... Why the heck is W still president at this very moment? I think I might now finally have to get one of those 1.20.09 bumperstickers. Can't wait!!!

Too bad January tends to be cold in Albany. We need a big ol' block party, dancing in the streets.

Z is a backhoe (slightly sagging in the back) and Karin is a steamroller (bottom of front rolly part not fully painted).

Zach LOVED trick-r-treating. Totally unexpected and totally fun.

I'm too lazy & tired to do anything besides copy n paste this pic that K already uploaded to facebook. sorry.

http://mobimotherhood.org/MM/portal-Aboutus.aspx

It's support & information for moms who are having extreme problems with breastfeeding.

Spread the word - more people need this resource!

La Leche League may tend toward the dogmatic more than I like, but they're good to have around. Here's this from my email:

> Get the word out˜quickly! Squidoo, which I had not heard of but is
> apparently a charity-promoting organization (I‚ll learn more about it
> later) is giving $80,000 to charity. They are inviting people to visit
> their web site and vote for an organization to receive $2. They‚ll
> continue accepting votes until the $80,000 is gone. That‚s it. Simple,
> quick.
>
> On the list is La Leche League.
>
>
>
> If LLL can get the word out quickly, they could get a large donation
> indeed. Ditto for the other organizations.
>
>
>
> Spread the word∑.
>
>
>
> http://www.squidoo.com/squidoo-charity-giveaway

Warning: It is hard to walk away from this. And when you do, your eyes will jump around for a while.

http://www.nekogames.jp/mt/2008/01/cursor10.html

Must go back and see if I can win again with a higher score....

Two, in fact:
Today when I arrived at my community garden plot, it actually looked like a garden. Not a weedy mess with maybe some stuff growing in it if you know where to look.
We had hit the typical mid-summer mess of fast-growing weeds and no time to do anything about it. Plus all the rain had made a huge swamp and it was hard to get a moment to work when it wasn't actively pouring. I put in a bunch of time this past week, and it's paying off.

Along with free-standing non-weed-choked plants, I have now re-planted three of the beds with salad greens, spinach, and chard. And while the viability of the seeds was questionable, I accidentally unearthed some from the bed I planted 2 days ago and they had already started to sprout!

This marks the first time I have reclaimed the garden from a weed problem and turned it back into a productive garden. Other years I've never managed to get the late summer planting done.

I would've liked to get salad greens in 3 weeks ago, to harvest baby greens for salads along the way, but I'm still pretty pleased.

I've also got a few ideas for improving the garden next year. For one thing, the radishes fall down all over the place and make a mess when they go to seed, and they really could be removed once flea-beetle season has passed, which I didn't think to do this year. They're attracting cool butterflies, but I might be able to do that with some less floppy flowers.

Woo.

Karin says I should stop being so surprised. She says Americans don't want to do anti-racism work because we like our racism just the way it is thankyouverymuch.

But... I wanted to find info on anti-racism workshops with an adventure education/experiential education twist. I googled. I didn't find much that combined the two and didn't know what keywords would work, so I just started with "anti-racism workshop" and played around from there. I found 10ish links. ALL OF THEM were in Canada, Europe, or Australia.

We went to World Fellowship, in NH (Albany, NH, actually), for a week.

First, I must share my packing coup:

At no point during the entire trip did either of us think or say, "hmm, I wish we had X, let's add that to our list for next time."

And that's with bringing all our own food and food-prep stuff. I did forget the rice, so we went to the supermarket in town and got some. We were going to town anyway, so no big deal.

Also, we are almost completely unpacked. All that remains is a small pile of Karin's clean clothes and sundries.

Woo!

We all three had a great time. It was awesome spending so much time with my sister, who Zach fell in love with immediately (he may remember her a little from the last time he saw her, in January, but now he was old enough to really get to know her). And we got some good time in with my mom, too, and with my Dad and Susan who are more frequently seen but just as much enjoyed.

It was beautiful up there. Great weather, too, which we are very thankful for.

A week was way too short.

Now Z doesn't have Gram and Clara and Popop and Sue everywhere constantly, and he's frequently talking about "bye popop," etc, but he is SOOOOO excited to have his Nadia (& family) back. Yay for good people at home as well as away.

Also, WILD BLUEBERRIES!!!!!!!! YUM!

(and, Z is suddenly food boy. he's eating! fingers crossed that he keeps it up.)

*playing with a toy car*
Z: Mama!
K: Is Mama in the car?
Z: Mama!
K: oh, Mommy is in the car.
Z: *nod*
K: Mommy is in the car, bye bye mommy! vrrm vrrm vrrm (all over Z & K's bodies)
Z: Bye bye!
(repeat a few times)
Z: Mama!
K: Now Mama is in the car?
Z: bye bye!
etc.
E: Is Zacky in the car?
Z: Yeah!
K: All 3 P---ks are in the car.
E: Should we go visit somebody?
Z: Yeah!
E: Who should we go visit?
Z: Popop!
K: vrrm vrrm vrrm (around the playroom)...

When we "got to popop's house" we visited the fire trucks (as we did on Sunday when we visited him at his gf's house) and played in the water. Those were K's additions.

Zack has found the word for one of his favorite things in the world. There is Nadia, there are moms, there is nursing ("side!", as in "other side"), and now there is STROLLER!!! He used to spend days saying "outside outside outside" and much of the time what he meant was stroller walking. Now he can be specific. And he threw three crying-real-tears fits over the weekend about having to get in the car for a short drive first before getting in the stroller.

( We have also been stroller-obsessed )

ZMP are now his official legal initials, and he is ours.

Not that he is really any more ours today than yesterday, but the legal system has put its irreversable stamp on our role as his parents.

It's not a big event to us, because since 4/6/07 there has been no question that he was staying with us permanently, and there was no more turning back for us as of the day we met him than there is today, as far as we're concerned.

We finalized in family court. I think our lawyer filed there (both surrogate and family courts have the power to do adoptions) because the weird surrogate court judge requires the home study to be done by a particular social worker and we would've had to have her come out and do another one (briefly) before finalizing. We didn't know we were going to family court until we were notified of where to show up today, and we were very thankful that we ended up in front of the one judge who we never saw with Shaya. As Karin said, we don't need to mix memories. It was odd enough sitting in the family court waiting room. Nice to have a more pleasant association with the building, though.

It is weird that we can be legally both his parents, but we can't have a legal relationship to each other. But, while we don't really define family in the same way the legal system does, it is still convenient to match up with their requirements sometimes and it's nice to be in NY where we can both adopt him together.

I really do love a good concert of political folk music.

Back when we had Chris (early 2005), Karin and I saw Charlie King and Karen Brandow performing with Pat Humphries and Sandy Opatow. That was an awesome awesome concert. Friday night was similarly awesome.

We had been ambivalent about going because as much as we love Pat & Sandy, Holly had been getting on our nerves lately. We last saw her at Clearwater last year (?) and it was the same shtick as it had been the previous time (at least a year before, maybe more). And it was old and boring and not inspiring or fun or anything. Her theatricality has never been my favorite piece, but it stood out as particularly annoying without the good stuff to balance it. We still bought her newest CD, and I think I played it twice before giving up on it in frustration and annoyance. :P

Well, she redeemed herself on Friday. She did a great mix of old and new, lots that I really liked and hadn't listened to in ages and even two that are on that newest album and now make me want to listen to it again. And the banter was actually engaging!

Some of it was about how art, including songs, can help us to digest the more complex, foreign, and disturbingg things in our world. That rang very true to me. I learned a lot more about history, politics, etc, from my parents' folk music collection (and later my own) than from school. And I wanted to be a history teacher, originally, because I wanted to use folk music to teach my students. I'd forgotten about that. It is good to have a reminder as we think about homeschooling. I mean, of course we'd expose him to it anyway, but it is different because now I'm thinking of creating curriculum specifically around folk music. I wonder if much of that has already been done and is publicly available for the borrowing/adapting.

Holly instructed the audience to each think of one tiny, managable item we could do in the next 24 hours to make peace, and do it. I didn't manage to think of one of those, but there are bigger, harder, slower changes I've been inspired to work on, so hopefully I can keep those in sight and make some progress there.

Thanks to brigadoondays for using one of her snow-day refunded tickets for one of us so it wasn't even an expensive outing. It was fun riding with you, too.

I've been frustrated lately in the world of blogging. Zachary does so many cute things, and changes so much all the time, that I can't keep track to tell you all about them. So, well, rest assured that the boy is being extremely cute on an hourly basis, even if the stories aren't making it here.

My current favorite is that he's shaking his head and saying "ohh." Well, more like "eau" as in "de toilet." He doesn't always mean it - still figuring that part out.

He's also got probably 40 words by now. Many of them are very similar to the ones I posted yesterday - bebba, bobbu, etc. Something in that approximate range means balloon, apple, umbrella, car, Becca, bottle, bubble, and probably more that I can't think of. Things similar to "outside" are slide and other side (for nursing). The guessing gets kinda confusing and a little frustrating all around, but he's pretty patient with us.