Frugal Family Fun

Our family is rather frugal. 

We’ve certainly been very blessed.  My husband and I are well-educated.  We’ve had good jobs in fairly lucrative professions.  We’ve had some good breaks.  We’ve worked very hard. 

But both my husband and I come from humble families.  As kids we weren’t poor, but money was certainly not abundant.  Our grandparents lived through the Great Depression in agricultural communities.  They were not fans of debt.  We inherited that aversion. 

I’ve always been grateful neither my husband nor I are big spenders.  We like to go out to eat and travel, but neither of us is into buying fancy cars, clothes or electronics.  Both of us have non-glamorous, dependable cars with over a hundred thousand miles on them.  We hope to double that mileage before relinquishing those vehicles.  We live in Arizona, but keep our thermostat at 80 degrees or higher at all times.  (Fans work well in the desert and we do consume a lot of iced beverages.)  Neither of us has a smart phone.  After having the same cell phone for about a decade, I just recently traded it in for a free phone with texting and picture taking capabilities.  Whoo-hoo!  It feels like decadence to me.

My husband and I simply do not like debt.  When one is indebted, one must work more to service the debt and one is more vulnerable to downturns in the economy.  That takes one away from one’s family and creates tremendous stress.  Financial problems are cited as the number one cause of divorce. 

Because my husband and I have been careful to take on as little debt as possible, and to pay as much of it off as soon as possible, we have had a lot more freedom than we might have otherwise had.  For example, we had the wonderful luxury of having my husband stay home full-time when our kids were little until the present time. 

My husband and I set a goal a while back of being completely debt-free by the end of 2013.  Throughout 2012, we have been even more frugal than ever to meet that goal.  We’re so excited about the prospect of being completely debt-free that we don’t mind the short-term sacrifices.

Though eating out is our favorite indulgence, we have not spent any of our income going out to eat in all of 2012.  We still enjoy trying new cuisines and different dishes, but this year we have been trying to get inventive in our kitchen at home.  It has gone better than I would have imagined.

We also love traveling, but we have not gone on any vacations all year.  We are middle class and run in middle class circles.  Last summer and over the Christmas holidays, our friends have been going to the Disney parks, the beach, and cabins in the mountains.  Meanwhile, we’ve been staying put at home.  Even during the scorching Arizona summer, we stayed put.  We have not been resentful and do not feel deprived.  Plenty of families don’t have a roof over their heads, so we’re very grateful to have a home where we can stay put!  As it turned out, last summer was actually our best summer in a long time.  We were not rushing anywhere.  There was no packing, no travel logistics.  We just stayed home and enjoyed each other’s company.

Lots of families have been facing tough times this year.  By choice or not, they do not have money for luxuries.  I wanted to share a brainstorm of the things our family has been doing to have fun this year without spending lots of money.  Maybe it will give others some ideas or otherwise be helpful. 

It is not meant to be an exhaustive list and I’d certainly welcome other ideas.  These are just things our family has enjoyed.

I began this list last summer, so some of these are geared more towards that season.  Perhaps they might be helpful in a few months if they cannot be adapted for the winter.  But plenty of these things are adaptable year round.

1.      Library Summer Reading Program.  Public libraries—LOVE THEM!!  And I’m not just saying that because my mom used to be a librarian.  Libraries are terrific resources all year, and they particularly do a great job of ministering to kids during the summer.  Several of my ideas on this list involve the library.  The first involves the summer reading program.  Our library, like many, had a program to encourage kids to read over the summer.  Our family reads a lot of books, so this is something our kids do every year.  They would read anyhow, but it is fun for them to keep track of all they read and then get little prizes for the books they’ve finished.  This past summer, my older child even won a random drawing of all the kids who had signed up for the summer reading program.  She got free passes to a local zoo and a bowling alley. 

2.      Library Activities.  The libraries are always doing neat activities for kids, but we rarely go to them during the academic year.  There are too many neat things going on and we just don’t have time.  Sadly, when we do go, we’re often the only ones who show up!  One summer activity we always enjoy is the kids’ morning movie series at our library.  They used to provide the kids with popcorn, but I guess with budget cutbacks they cannot afford that anymore.  But they are nice to let us bring our own snacks.  I put some grapes or snack crackers in a Tupperware for each of my kids and that makes the movie experience more fun.  We could have watched The Muppet Movie at home, but somehow watching it on a big screen at the library with big office chairs is more fun.

3.      Reading Aloud.  This may sound a little dorky initially, but be open-minded.  In past eras, families didn’t have as many entertainment opportunities, and books were hard to come by, so they read together.  It is still a great way to spend time with family and to get kids excited about books.  In past summers, I’ve read to our kids from the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle series, the Little House books and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  Last summer, I read several of the Harry Potter books to our kids, who were quite impressed by my rendition of Hagrid’s cockney accent.  My husband cracked us up with his reading from the Bunnicula series.  This fall, I read to our kids Little Women and several books from the Chronicles of Narnia series.  Good stuff.  And the kids get involved too.  Our youngest child reads every day aloud to practice her reading skills.  That can be rather entertaining too as she practices proper enunciation of sentences with an exclamation point.  Our older child then likes to get into the action by reading to us story books with pictures.

4.      Borrowing Movies from the Library.  Our local library has a pretty good selection of movies that you can check out.  We’ve not had time to do that in the past, but we’ve done it several times last summer and during the winter break.  We introduced our kids to the wonders of family classics like E.T., Lassie and The Trouble with Angels.  And after reading the first few Harry Potter novels, we checked out the movie versions.

5.      Dinner Parties.  During the academic year, our family is super busy and so are our friends with kids.  Summer and winter breaks are a great time to catch up and entertain.  Last summer, we had friends over for dinner several times, and were invited to friends’ houses for dinner.  This winter, we hosted a Hanukah dreidel and latke dinner party among others.  And we’ve been invited to several dinner parties to celebrate my husband’s recent graduation from nursing school.  Whether or not there is a special occasion, it is a lot of fun to try new recipes and linger over a delicious meal with great company.

6.      Swimming at the City Pool.  When we decided to expedite the paying off of all debt, one of our economizing moves was to drop our beloved YMCA membership.  Bummer!  We really enjoyed it, but thought we could live without it, at least for the next couple of years.  One of the main reasons we joined the Y was to have a place to go swimming in the summer.  A frugal friend of mine tipped me off to getting a family summer pass to our local municipal pool.  Indeed, that was pretty darned economical.  A summer pass for our whole family to use the city pool was less expensive than just one month of our former membership at the YMCA.  The city pool had more circumscribed hours, so we had to plan more when we went to swim.  And the city pool is more crowded at certain times.  (Though it is almost empty at others.)  But the cost savings is so huge, we didn’t mind these things.  Our kids love the city pool.  And my husband and I swam laps in the lap lane when we went.

7.      Free Day at the Pool.  Several local municipalities have free days at their pools.  Last summer, we took advantage of several of those dates.  We had a blast!  Several such pools had fabulous water slides and several had diving boards, which our kids loved. At one municipal pool’s free day, the life guards even had relay races.  Our older daughter had a great time participating in a few—including a greased watermelon relay which was not quite as messy as I had envisioned.

8.      Movies in the Park.  Our city’s parks and recreation department always has a summer movie series.  They show family-friendly movies in a local park.  There is usually one per month.  Our kids love it.  We take some snacks and lay out on our picnic blanket.  The films are outdoors, but in the evenings when the sun has gone down.  The absence of sun at that hour--combined with sitting on damp grass--makes for a very comfortable temperature even in the most brutal of Arizona summers.  Sometimes our kids even get cold and need a jacket!

9.      Slumber Party.  Last summer we hosted our first slumber party for our kids’ friends.  I wasn’t sure what to expect and had some simple crafts lined up despite my ineptitude for all things crafty.  But it turned out the kids were pretty good at entertaining themselves with Barbies and Legos.  Later in the evening, we baked and decorated cookies with left-over sprinkles from Christmas.  The kids were very excited to get a decadent snack of chips and popsicles.  My husband had removed furniture from the living room to accommodate sleeping bags.  So later on, we set out bowls of microwave popcorn and popped in some DVDs from the library.  Eventually the kids conked out around midnight.  In the morning, I made them pancakes while they played a bit longer.  I even let them have the option of regular pancake syrup or chocolate syrup.  It was a wild and crazy time!  We hosted another slumber party just before Christmas.

10.  Vicarious Travel via Television.  Our family loves traveling.  We also love learning about different cultures.  Since we’re being particularly frugal and not traveling this year, a trip to Buenos Aires, Johannesburg or Hanoi is just not in the cards for us in the short-term.  Heck, we haven’t even gone camping locally.  But there are a ton of great travel videos out there.  PBS has some great shows: Rick Steves, Rudy Maxa, and Globe Trekker.  We don’t have cable, but some of the Travel Channel’s programming is available on DVD or streaming video from various sources.  Dhani Tackles the Globe is a neat concept that my kids enjoyed.  Pro football player, Dhani Jones goes to different countries to learn local sports in an effort to learn more about their culture.  Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations is similar but instead of using sports to explore various cultures, Mr. Bourdain uses the medium of cuisine.  Rudy Maxa and Rick Steves are older and less hip, but just as fun to our family.  We enjoy watching travel shoes like these.  It is a vicarious travel experience to places we aren’t visiting this summer, but might one day get to experience in person.

11.  Vicarious Travel Via Grocery Shopping.  Another fun substitute for travel is exploring non-mainstream grocery stores.  Last summer we began regularly shopping at a local grocery store which markets to Latino customers.  Not only do they have great sales on produce, but we feel like we’re taking a 30 minute trip to Mexico whenever we go to that store.  The kinds of packaged foods sold are different from those in our regular grocery stores, the announcements are often in Spanish, and the bakery has pan dulce.  Last summer, we also came across a grocery store that caters to Asian Americans.  It is not as close to our house, so we don’t go often.  But the store is huge and has a wide variety of goods from all over the globe.  When we go to that store, our family methodically goes up and down every single aisle looking at all the exotic foodstuffs.  We come home with a variety of items to try.  Shopping at this particular store has prompted me to cook different East Asian and South Asian dishes at home.  It has been a lot of fun.

12.  Celebrating the Olympics.  Our kids looked forward to the Olympics for months and we particularly made a big deal out of the opening ceremony.  Inspired by our watching of travel shows, we decided it would be fun to cook some meals indigenous to the Olympics host country.  Because I’m of English heritage, I think I am entitled to be blunt: my people have not developed a palatable cuisine.  My husband and I went on vacation to London years ago, and we experienced the awfulness of English food first hand.  The only decent food we had the whole time was when we went for tea and when we stopped in at a mom-and-pop Indian food restaurant.  We saw a BBC travel show last summer where British chef Gordon Ramsey traveled to India and described how Indian cuisine is the “national cuisine” of his home country.  As a result, our family decided to attempt butter chicken and saag paneer (two of our favorite Indian dishes) the afternoon of the Olympics opening ceremonies last summer.  It was delicious!  Beyond the opening ceremony, we also watched a fair amount of swimming and most of the women’s gymnastics. (Go, Gabby!)

13.  Household Projects.  Ok, this may not sound like fun, but hear me out.  During the academic year, my husband sorely neglects his honey-do list.  And I’ve had several design-type projects on my own to-do list, but never had time to do them.  Our older child is a Papa’s girl.  She truly enjoys helping him paint and pull up linoleum.  Our younger child is a Mama’s girl.  She loves flowers and aspires to learn to embroider.  So, actually tackling our household projects list is family fun.  In the tackling, we’ve even identified other projects we’d like to try in the future.

14.  VBS.  Our kids have been going to Vacation Bible School for as long as they were old enough.  Every year it is one of the highlights of our summer.  My kids love the games, crafts, skits and songs.  I help out and have been asked to play Biblical characters in the lessons.  One year I was an over-the-top Doubting Thomas sort of character who thought Mary was off her rocker as she told the kids about how special Jesus was.  Another year I dressed as a Babylonian-era woman who led the kids in a sort of Bible study with anachronistic (but attention-grabbing) props. 

15.  Advent Activities at Church.  This year we participated in several fun family church activities leading up to Christmas.  We participated in Las Posadas.  Our kids were shocked at how rude the volunteers were to the Holy Family seeking shelter, but they knew it was just pretend.  The participants then concluded with a feast of tamales and hot chocolate.  On another occasion, our church’s choir participated at an interfaith Christmas concert at a local LDS church.  The music was beautiful and it was neat to celebrate the season with folks from other faith traditions.  Our kids also participated in our church’s annual Christmas pageant.  The director had us say an extra prayer at the last rehearsal because the prior rehearsals had gone so poorly.  But on the day of the pageant, all went well.  The kids were adorable.

16.  Spending Time With Family And Being Grateful.  This is the best part of the summer or winter holidays.  During the academic year, we are all so busy and life is so hectic.  Just having time to hang out, not rush through a meal, take walks, play board games, or watch a DVD together is a lot of fun.  It is important to stop and smell the roses instead of always speeding by them.  Once you pass them, you can’t ever go back.

 

 

Mark 4:8
Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, some multiplying thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times.

American Teacher (2011) (Attitudes Towards Teachers and Other Government Workers)

This documentary noted some of the bad media coverage of the teaching profession.  Despite the widespread concern explored in the film that teachers are asked to do too much for too little, there was a clip from Fox News Channel about teachers being greedy and just looking for financial gain.  Interesting.

In my observation, that sort of media vilification is not uncommon.  In our current culture, we’re always looking for people to blame.  It is the government.  It is the undocumented workers.  It is the lazy poor people who are leeches on society.  It is the Muslims, the Mormons, the liberals, the secularists and any other group the speaker/writer isn’t crazy about.  There is always someone to blame. 

To me, a very worrying trend is that these days Americans seem to really like scapegoats--though we don’t use that term a lot.  I guess it feels better to make someone the villain instead of looking more deeply at a complex problem.  But I find that approach to be emotionally immature and quite indulgent.  It is unproductive to sit around whining and venting angrily that someone is the reason we have certain problems.  It would be much more productive to instead find creative solutions to complex problems with many root causes.  Finding such solutions starts with trying to understand the complexity and various root causes.  But once a cause or two is identified, it does no one any good to just sit around griping.  Great nations are not composed of people who simply sit around pointing fingers and stewing in their own anger.  Great nations are composed of people who think deeply and creatively to understand complexities and find solutions. 

In the case of concerns about our educational system, I think teachers are an easy target for such scapegoating.  They are the most visible people in the failing system.  It is easy to pick on them instead of looking more deeply to figure out why kids are not learning and graduating.  Violence, hunger, family problems, drugs, financial instability, lack of classroom resources, crumbling school buildings.  These are very pressing issues that undermine our ability to educate our kids.  But they don’t have one easy source to blame.  They also don’t have a quick fix. 

Quite frankly, I think teachers are also an easy target due to gender.  As we saw last year when Governor Walker tried to eliminate most collective bargaining rights for employees of the state of Wisconsin, in the brutal economy most of us endure, there is not a lot of sympathy for public employees in the base case.  Teachers as a group seem to be particularly disliked.  But it seems interesting that we don’t seem to lump police and fire fighters in for such ill-will even though they are government workers too.  As a society, we tend to admire them.  They risk their lives for others.  (In truth, many teachers do the same these days.)  However, I don’t think it is any coincidence that we beat up on a profession comprised mostly of women, and we salute (sometimes literally) professions where men dominate. 

This disparate treatment has been most clear to me in times of crisis.  When there have been horrific school shootings, the media doesn’t focus that much on the heroism of the teachers who try to save their students’ lives.  Some of them have used their own bodies as shields to protect their students, but that doesn’t get a lot of attention.  Yet, there seems to be a lot more coverage when a police officer or firefighter does something heroic.  I’m not saying we shouldn’t praise the police and firefighters, but we need to have a less stifled, more expansive view of heroism.  We should be praising the teachers too.

During 9/11, I remember hearing about teachers at schools near Ground Zero in Manhattan where there was concern buildings might tumble and crush their campuses.  Those teachers apparently walked kids calmly to safety.  What bravery!  Many of us would have wanted to run for our lives, not keep a frantic group of kids together to get them to safety.  But in the days, weeks and even years afterwards, I never heard those stories again.  There was a lot of media coverage of the fire fighters and police however.  I certainly respect those fine individuals, but why didn’t we hear more about the brave teachers? 

My own belief is that it is rooted in our cultural beliefs about heroism and honor.  We admire it in men.  It is not as noteworthy in women.  The assumption is that women are supposed to sacrifice themselves for children.  They don’t get a lot of respect in the base case, it is easy to find fault in them, but not praise their heroism.

The following article is a recent example of the extreme disrespect one women in the school system had to endure.  I don’t think this was an aberrational incident.  But it went viral because someone on the bus thought to record what happened one day.

http://news.yahoo.com/bullying-teachers-more-damaging-online-era-131037020.html

Luke 20:13

“‘What will I do?’ the owner asked himself. ‘I know! I’ll send my cherished son. Surely they will respect him.’”

1 Thessalonians 5:13

Show them great respect and wholehearted love because of their work. And live peacefully with each other.

American Teacher (2011) (Demands on Teachers)

A couple things occurred to me when watching American Teacher.

First, the demands on one’s time that teaching requires are not unlike the demands in other professions.  I’m a lawyer.  People in my profession work around the clock too.  My husband was an accountant for over a decade.  Unpaid “overtime” was a given.  That is what is expected of American professionals.  Everyone is expected to be a workaholic who is always on the clock and doesn’t have a life.

Such professional demands are not healthy for human beings for many reasons.  When adults are expected to work like that, it shouldn’t be a surprise that we are a nation where obesity, substance abuse and stress-related health problems are serious issues.  When we have no time for personal lives, it shouldn’t be a surprise that divorce rates are high and our children have so many problems.  It was the confluence of two such demanding professions that led my husband and I to become a one-career family.  There were not enough hours left after all our professional demands to raise a family—or just cover the basics like feed us healthy meals or pick up the dry cleaning. 

There is something wrong with that economic model.  It is not sustainable and it is wasteful.  There will always be a brain drain if people are forced to choose between unsustainable, unconscionable professional demands and raising a family.  It really does take time to raise kids and maintain a household.  Human beings have to have time to do all that and still have a few hours to catch some shut-eye.  I have a very strong work ethic, but working round-the-clock is not sustainable.  And that cannot be the only model of professional excellence. 

Because of all this, I really resented the young, single teacher who expressed not having respect for the teachers who didn’t work around-the-clock.  One can be caring and committed without sacrificing one’s family to work round-the-clock.  But at this point in her life, she does not seem to have the life experience to realize it.  I’d like to hear her interviewed after she has her own family.  Indeed, had you spoken to me about this issue in my 20s, I probably had a similar attitude.  That changed when I became a parent and realized first-hand how demanding that role is.

Reform of our work culture is necessary to make our economic model sustainable and less wasteful.  We cannot look down on people who leave at 5 p.m. and spend the evening (and weekends) with their children.  We cannot expect everyone to forego having a family or to have a family but never spend time caring for them. 

Having a family and having a life outside of work are not sins or signs of slackerdom.  Having a family is hard work.  And raising productive, well-adjusted children benefits society immeasurably.  Perhaps not this year.  But when you get older, who do you think will take care of you?  When you are retired, who do you think will be in the work force paying taxes to keep the roads paved, the military armed and the firefighters on duty?

Proverbs 19:18

 Correct your children while there is still hope;
do not let them destroy themselves.

American Teacher (2011) (Overview of Film)

I came across the documentary American Teacher as I learning about education policy to teach a new course on Homeschooling and the Law.  Although the course focuses primarily on the legal aspects of homeschooling, issues with the public school system in many ways prompted the modern homeschooling movement. As a result, we will discuss various educational reform efforts at the beginning of the course. 

American Teacher is a film about the challenges that public educators face.  A lack of resources (e.g., materials, time, support) to do one’s job is one huge challenge addressed.  But another major challenge addressed in the film is how teachers are underpaid.  To my surprise, the issue of teacher salary was actually a major component of the film.

American Teacher notes that when public schools originated the teachers were mostly men.  But the film describes that early in the 20^th century there was a conscious effort to recruit women to the profession.  The reason for this was that at that point in time, women could be paid less than men for the same job.  It would cost less to educate kids if women did the work.   

The film also noted that men have become an increasingly small minority in the teaching profession over the last several decades.  The film theorized that decline is because of the poor pay.  The film describes how men used to be able to support a family on a teacher’s salary but no longer are.  

Parenthetically, I’ll flag that even before the women’s movement, moms, grandmas, aunts and sisters have sometimes had to support a family from their earnings when the father (or other men) of the household died or abandoned them.  It is interesting to me that that reality is never addressed.  The debate is always on the man-supporting-a-family model.

Interviewees in the film noted that our current educational system is built on the premise that women who teach do not have to support a family.  They are presumed to have husbands who are the primary breadwinner.  The wives’ teaching salaries is thus thought to just be an added financial perk, but not really necessary to a family’s well-being.  With that framework, it doesn’t matter that the salary is not competitive with other professions.

The film focused on a handful of good teachers across the country. 

The two male teachers featured both had families.  Though it was not clear, it appeared their wives did not work outside the home.  They describe the birth of their children as putting great financial stress on their families.  Both of the featured male teachers illustrated the issue that a man could not support his family on a teacher’s salary.

One gentleman had saved a lot from real estate investments, which he thought would help bridge the gap from his teaching salary.  Ultimately, it did not.  He left teaching primarily for financial reasons after he became a dad.  He joined the family business to support his family.  He noted that even in an off year, in the family business he was earning twice what he earned as a teacher.  Moreover, he had a lot more control over his schedule and workload.  He had less stress and more time with his family.  Unfortunately, he seemed sad about his professional choice.  Clearly, he had loved making a difference in students’ lives.

The other male teacher featured in the film had not left teaching, but had worked a second-job for many years.  After teaching a full-day, he then spent another five plus hours loading heavy merchandise onto forklifts and into customers’ vehicles.  Working round the clock to make ends meet took a huge toll on his family.  He rarely got to spend time with his children.  Due to exhaustion, he fell asleep at family functions.  The family’s home was foreclosed.  Eventually, he and his wife divorced.  She said that he was never home; she felt like she hadn’t had a husband when they were married.

Three female teachers were featured in the film.  Two were apparently single women without dependents.  They both described the long hours they put in, and how much they relied upon their own money to provide basic supplies for their classrooms. 

These two single women also described the grueling hours the devoted to their jobs.  Insightfully, one of these women stated quite strongly that every teacher, whom she respected professionally, worked 6-7 days per week and during evenings.  The suggestion was that if you weren’t working such hours, you were not dedicated and not a good teacher.

The third female teacher featured was pregnant at the start of the film.  She was scheduled to give birth to her first child mid-way through the academic year, but was only allotted 6 weeks of paid maternity leave no matter what.  It was not entirely clear, but it appeared that she was the sole breadwinner of her family.  Her husband stayed home to care for their baby full-time.  Among other things, the film followed the struggle this female teacher went through to find time and a place during the school day to express milk for her baby.  She was also exhausted after being up with her baby in the night and then teaching all day. 

In one interview, this new mom described how exhausted she was and how she wasn’t even taking care of herself.  She mentioned everyone kept asking how she could come back so quickly after giving birth, but rather exasperated she asked rhetorically what choice she had.  Her husband and she did not have rich parents and had to support themselves.  They needed her paycheck.  It seemed like those around her did not anticipate that her teaching salary would be financially necessary to sustain a whole family.

Towards the end of the film, this same teacher seemed to express ambivalence about continuing on as a dedicated teacher now that she was a mom.  She indicated her priorities were shifting.  She said that for the first time in her adult life, something other than her students needed to come first.  She could no longer sacrifice everything for them.

At the end of the film, it was noted that one of the two single female teachers had gotten married and had given birth to her first child.  It was added that she took a year off from teaching and was not yet sure if she would be returning.

Ruth 2:2

One day Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, “Let me go out into the harvest fields to pick up the stalks of grain left behind by anyone who is kind enough to let me do it.” Naomi replied, “All right, my daughter, go ahead.”

Being Elmo: A Puppeteer’s Journey (2011)

My kids and I watched this delightful documentary recently about Kevin Clash, the puppeteer who is best known for having developed the Sesame Street character, Elmo.  Because our family does not watch much TV, our kids have not even seen the television show very many times.  But even if you are not a regular viewer, who doesn’t love Elmo?

One sweet aspect of the documentary was the explanation of the essence of the Elmo character.  He is supposed to be a little kid who is the embodiment of love.  He is vulnerable and loves others.  And that vulnerability and love is very endearing to people.  He is wildly popular with children (and adults alike). 

One beautiful, but heart-breaking aspect of the film was where Mr. Clash explained that he had never really understood the impact the Elmo character had until Sesame Street began to get requests for visits by terminally ill children.  It had a profound impact on Mr. Clash when he was told that spending time with Elmo was the dying wish of many such children.  It was moving to see in the film the adoration of kids like that and the hugs they gave the puppet.  And the bittersweet looks of appreciation on the faces of their parents.  My hearts just broke for them that they were guiding their children through their last days on this earth.  But meeting Elmo seemed to bring peace to the families.

I thought the documentary’s exploration of the influence of Mr. Clash’s own family on the development of the Elmo character was also really interesting.  Some interviewees talked about how Elmo’s pure, loving heart was a reflection of Kevin Clash himself.  But one interviewee, who had known him since his early days as a teen puppeteer in Baltimore, disagreed and said that the reality was that Elmo was a reflection of Kevin’s parents.  They were so loving, supportive and enthusiastic; those qualities were expressed in the Elmo character.

Indeed, it was really sweet to hear Mr. Clash’s parents being interviewed.  They were just bubbling with pride in their son.  The Clash family lived in a poor neighborhood when Kevin was growing up.  Money was really tight.  Kids at school made fun of his interest in puppets.  At one point, his growing obsession with puppets inspired Kevin to cut up the lining of his dad’s winter coat to make a new puppet.  After he realized what he had done, he was fearful of what his dad would do.  But the elder Mr. Clash was so impressed by the puppet his son had created, he simply told Kevin to ask first next time before cutting up clothing.  (Baltimore winters are cold, what a reaction!)  Despite all this, Mr. and Mrs. Clash supported Kevin’s unusual passion. 

In the days before the internet and when long-distance was expensive, Mrs. Clash even tracked down the man who crafted Jim Henson’s Muppets.  That gentleman ended up becoming Kevin’s critical mentor who taught him a lot about puppeteering and even opened doors for him with Jim Henson.  Thank goodness for a supportive mom!

The last part of the film I wanted to mention was Kevin Clash’s own family.  Apparently, his marriage and his daughter’s birth coincided with the rise of Elmo as a cultural phenomenon.  Kevin Clash was traveling a lot and his marriage did not last.  He also missed a lot of his daughter’s childhood.  But he loves her so much.  At one very touching part of the film he compares the wonder of creating a puppet and the wonder of creating a human being.  He describes the joy it brings him to make puppets and create puppet characters.  But he describes with a sense of awe that his daughter is more amazing than any puppet.  With tears in his eyes, he describes his pride in and love for her.

Psalm 103:13

As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him.

Triumph at Carville: Leprosy in America (2005)

This was an interesting little documentary.  So many people dump on the South, but apparently the South played a critical role in helping to cure Hanson’s disease (which is more commonly known as leprosy). 

The name “Carville” was given to a former plantation in rural Louisiana that in the late 1800s was converted into a hospital and an institutional home for people with Hanson’s disease.  It still exists today, but because modern medicine has advanced so much, people with the disease now have little disruption to their lives.  Newly diagnosed people live in their own homes and are not institutionalized. The patients who still live at Carville are older and have lived most of their lives there.  Most of the facility has now been turned over to other uses.

Because of fears that the disease could be passed on to others, people who used to get sent to Carville were essentially treated like inmates.  They were patients in the sense that they were given medical care.  But they were confined to the facility and not typically allowed to leave. 

Most heartbreakingly, this led to the separation of families.  For that reason, I think the documentary fits well in the theme of recent posts to this blog.

Spouses were not allowed to join their Hanson’s diagnosed partners at Carville.  Diagnosed children were sent to Carville without their parents.  I cannot imagine the terror of the children being ripped from their families and sent to a place of strangers, many of whom were frighteningly disfigured from their disease. 

Patients at Carville were discouraged from dating or marrying.  But still love blossomed and families formed.  Several of the women describe the anguish of having children while at Carville.  As healthy children were not permitted at Carville, infants born to patients were sent to orphanages or to families to be raised outside of the institution. 

In the documentary, two grown children of Carville patients described occasional visits to see their birth parents.  It broke my heart to imagine what that must be like to lose custody and any rights to raise one’s own children.  It broke my heart to imagine what it must have been like to be raised without parents like that.

Despite these anguishing aspects of Carville, there were some bright sides.  There was apparently a real sense of community.  Everyone worked—there was a dairy, school, gardens, etc.  And people did things to celebrate life.  Christmas pageants, Mardi Gras celebrations, a newspaper, a baseball team, fishing.

One man spoke about a couple at Carville who were like surrogate parents to him when he was sent to Carville. His Carville “mother” adored him and couldn’t believe he ever did wrong.  He was closed to her even in their advanced age.  Others who were sent to Carville as children spoke about the nuns who cared for them, embraced them and made them feel special.

Indeed, the nuns at Carville were a really fascinating aspect of the film.  The Sisters of Charity were the primary caregivers when Carville first opened.  It was noted how brave this was of them.  Leprosy was so feared and had such a stigma in those days.  It was thought the nuns were risking their lives, physical suffering and disfigurement to go to Carville to minister to the patients.  But that was their vocation.  Someone had to do it and they wanted to be the hands and feet of Jesus to the most shunned people in society.  What a powerful witness to God’s love!

It was noted in the film that in those days, bright ambitious young girls and women became nuns.  That was the one vocation for women where they could try different professions, go places and have responsibility beyond their own families.  It was noted that the Sisters of Charity at Carville filled a number of key roles.  They taught.  They nursed.  They worked in the lab to find a cure for Hanson’s disease.  They ministered to the spiritual needs of the patients.  They mothered the children.

Mark 14:3

While he was in Bethany, reclining at the table in the home of Simon the Leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on his head.

Discovery Atlas: China Revealed (Separation of Families)

There was another family highlighted in the film that I wanted to mention.  A male window washer in Shanghai was chronicled.  He is a migrant from the provinces who had come to seek better wages in the big city.  He risked his life on a daily basis doing a very dangerous job.  He washed high rise office buildings at night to avoid disrupting elite professional workers during business hours. 

Sadly, he lived in Shanghai alone.  He moved to Shanghai for economic opportunities, but due to the limited freedoms people have to relocate within the PRC, his wife and child had to stay in their home village.  That is such a sad situation, but not uncommon in the PRC in the twenty-first century. 

Tragically, this pattern in the PRC is not new in the world.  It is not uncommon for couples and parents/children to be split apart for long periods because of dire economic conditions that prompt adults (usually but not always males) to go elsewhere to earn money to support the family. For example, the current situation in the PRC is not unlike the plight of Mexican and Central American migrants in the United States who are separated from their families for months or years at a time.  And it is reminiscent of the separation of families in South Africa during the apartheid era when men would go work in mines or other locations far away from the “homelands” where their wives and children were legally confined.

Discovery Atlas: China Revealed focused on the window washer as he traveled home to see his wife and child at Lunar New Year.  This is a very common practice.  Many adults in the PRC have had to leave their families in the provinces to seek jobs in large urban settings.  They typically are poor and don’t have the resources to travel home very often.  The Lunar New Year is a huge holiday in Chinese culture, perhaps analogous to Christmas in the United States.  It is the time when many such families reunite. 

I felt so sad in watching the documentary that when the window washer arrived in his village, his little daughter did not recognize him or show any excitement over his presence.  She seems stunned and weary of him.  Understandably, he is heartbroken to be a stranger to his only child.  What parent wouldn’t be?  He has had to make huge sacrifices to provide financially for his family, and his daughter does not even know him.

Psalm 2:7

I will proclaim the LORD’s decree: He said to me, “You are my son; today I have become your father.”