It must be a strange thing to come to that moment in your childhood when you realize that your life is actually, technically, your own. It’s certainly not the case that your parents feel that way, having spent the prior half decade ensuring you do not fall into holes or starve to death; your life is their problem, as far as they are concerned. It’s not even the case that you know what agency in your life truly means—and it is probably a good thing that you don’t.

It’s just that you really wanted a third consecutive pasta meal, and you have come to understand that it is reasonably arbitrary that another human being gets to choose otherwise on your behalf.

I get it. It sucks. They also write newspapers about you every day, which I imagine will also someday be an issue. Until then, it is your life; we just cannot eat another bowl of pasta.

This may well be one if my favorite headlines ever. Living with a kid this age is incredible. She’s sound asleep in the other room, and in the center of the universe. What a gift.

dad

I cannot tell you how proud I am of Kina and her commitment to gowns-for-all in the face of insidious societal transphobia. She’s a fantastic daughter and a great friend to Nicky, whom she’s known for her entire life and who looks totally fetching in his prince’s dress.

This is language she’s constructed for herself, by the way, which is amazing to me. She’s building a moral case for dresses out of plain cloth. It’s sad that she’s having to do this out of a sense of opposition to ignorance, but she’ll need that later on.

We hope that this daily front page has been clear in its commitment to trans lives, and we can promise you that it always will be.

It can’t possibly get much bigger than a hundred and one, can it?

dad

Kina doesn’t see a lot of value in proper tea etiquette.

dad

You heard it here first, folks.

dad

To be fair, caftans are pretty comfortable even when you’re six. She wrote the fake glasses today, too, once the other fake elders finally arrived.

dad

It was truly such an epic weekend that even the sight of Kina on a dance floor at the local bowling alley dancing to a Beyoncé cover band and tearing into a chicken leg was just another passing example of the reckless abandon she brings to her favorite days of the week. Happy birthday, Georgia.

dad

For a very long time now, Kina has asked us to take her to a place of her own invention, where you can dress up in costumes and do makeup things and hang out with your friends and without parents and have your pick of tiaras. Ha! Ha! says her father—surely that is either nonexistent or will cost a million dollars.

Reader, it exists, and you can drop your child off for two hours to the tune of just forty-five U.S. dollars. And! And! They will feed your child high tea and ply her with pink lemonade and take a cute polaroid picture of her dressed up as some princess or another and actually do a reasonably good job with the eye shadow.

Afterwards, when your child is wearing her normal princess dress that she brought from home, they will usher you out into the shadows of 19th Street between 7th and 8th, where your child and her friend will take each other by the arm and start walking down the sidewalk gossiping and laughing, completely ignoring that you are there and being extremely charming to passers-by.

It’s hard to imagine being able to write this newsletter without the invention of movable type by Johannes Dooginsberg. We can all thank Mister Dooginsberg for the advent of affordable bibles and other literature, efforts that underlie outstanding and ironically hand-drawn newsletters like the Daily Kina, to which you can still pledge your eternal allegiance.

Urk.

dad

She really must insist.

dad

Kina tells me that this elaborate spying ritual is all in service of preparing for a huge prank to be pulled on the boys crew sometime in the near future. When I ask her what the prank will look like, she describes the same roles: Distracter, Spy, Lookout. I explain to her that she’s missing the actual Pranker, but she seems unperturbed. The prank is just that the boys exist, and the prank is that the girls are spying on them, and the prank is forever.

dad

Honestly, ensuring that everybody gets valentines is the right move from a sociological perspective. What feels like chaotic neutral behavior is being maybe the one kid in class who receives all the valentines and hands none out because she does not have the patience to write twenty-three names out by hand, even as she writes me detailed notes about how I have failed her as a father by pooping for too long? Let’s see how this plays out.

dad

Another clutch parenting tip down the drain as Kina grooms her stuffies until well past 8 in the morning.

dad

Andrew won a Grammy®1 last night—her second, astonishingly—as the cellist of the Attacca Quartet, playing the music of Caroline Shaw. The newsroom here is very proud of her, having known her since before she was a Grammy®-award-winning artist, even before the publisher of this newspaper was born, even (if we may) when Andrew was Kina’s age and did not yet know how to play the cello.

That it is possible to grow from being a person I did not know to play the cello to being a person who now wins Grammys® for it seems like a minor miracle, but I can assure you it is the combination of a tremendous gift and many years of hard work that, frankly, I cannot imagine having put in the way Andrew has.

The last time Andrew won a Grammy® (words that I never imagined I’d say about a child whose musical gifts were once limited to playing the Jaws theme over and over), it was February of 2020, just a few weeks before the lockdown. To win an award like this comes with real privileges, and the Attacca Quartet got very few of them that year—a massive victory, but a real letdown of a parade. 2020 was a bad year for musicians, and I watched Andrew adapt and the quartet grow (sprouting not just a new second violinist, but also two additional children). It occurred to me that most musicians do not see an award like this even once in a lifetime, and it was good for Andrew to make the most of the one they got, even though times were tough.

The last time I wrote in this paper about the American Museum of Natural History was back in 2021, when we patted ourselves on the back about how wonderful it was to walk through the best museum in the entire world with a curious four-year-old. I still stand by that, but I can straight up tell you right now that it is even better with a six-year-old. Kina can read now, which means she can figure out what all the animals are, express her formidable opinions about gems (including the almost-certainly purloined Star of India, with its glittering star and complete absence of the color pink). She liked the dinosaurs enough, and she spent a very significant little moment under the belly of our friend the whale. All in all, an outstanding way to spend the coldest day of the year—and we didn’t even succumb to the call of the gift shop!

Kookoo bananas, for sure.

I’m not sure exactly what it feels like to be six and wake up feeling as though you’re not actually in your own body, but there is something about waking up from a dream and feeling in-between bodies, clawing for the edges of the dream while still making sense of your own eyeballs that does resonate with me. Bodies are strange things, and souls even stranger—nobody should have to reckon with them at 6:30 AM, in my opinion, but Kina seems to enjoy it enough, so I’ll leave the casual morning dissociation to her.

dad

Getting real “bingo” vibes off this drawing of Kina doing her finger guns thing—a development that has been extra amusing for her lucky parents.

I contemplated making “I’m Going Freestyle” the top headline today, but I was afraid I would not be able to do the shredded burrito justice in the big illustration.

So it goes.

When she wasn’t threatening to pluck out my chest hairs or watching videos about deadly slow lorises, Kina spent all morning defending her mother from my suggestions and mansplanations. Parry as I might with my own assertiob that I was being unfairly maligned, Kina came at me again and again, sticking her head out from her bedroom or yelling from the bathroom that “mommy was right”.

I seldom get the benefit of the doubt from my esteemed roommates here, but it is amusing at least to see somebody so small defend my wife’s honor in the matter of whether or not to parboil pierogies.

dad

Welcome, new subscribers, and thanks to those who have pledged their support of this august institution. I am clearly off to the races with an evening edition that arrives twelve hours late, but this is what the funding is for! Just kidding, I forgot and then I was asleep.

In any case, here we have Kina delaying her bedtime by insisting on what appeared at first to be three revolutionary products (à la Steve Jobs) but turned out to just be cutting out hearts together. It was lovable, fun, and crafty all at once.

I recognize, in the moment, that what Kina is doing here is complex; she does not want to go to sleep, she loves spending time with her parent friends, and she is a big fan of hearts. My first reaction to the “fun crafty loving” project—much of the time—is mostly to suggest that it might actually be time for bed, but I’m learning to relish the moment differently. I do enjoy spending time with my child friend, of course, and I’m getting used to the hearts.

Okay, setting aside Kina’s unwillingness to commit to a long-term relationship with the PBS gross nature videos channel, I think we are all a little reasonably skeptical of liking and subscribing to things. I do not like being pandered to, and I like pandering even less.

And yet, here we go.

I’ve been drawing this paper every day now for almost three years. I’ve got it down, nestled tightly in the space between Kina brushing her teeth and Kina being rushed out the door (much to her dismay) to school. I have worked through at least fifteen Canson mixed-media pads, three stacks of the best white construction paper in the entire world, and an irresponsible number of Crayola washable markers. I do this, as I have said, for my own mental well-being, for some future Kina who wants to know what this time was like, and for you, the person who is reading this.

Sometimes I scream while closing my mouth, too, but it doesn’t sound like whistling.

dad

Sorry to deliver this Sunday paper so late; Kina pranked away my energy to write newsletters yesterday. It is presumably to be found wherever she put Laurea’s purse.

“Don’t make this into a Parade!”

As of 6:30 PM, she liked the babysitter well enough, but the jury’s out.

dad

Kina gets her collector’s habit, I think, from me. Lately, as you can see, the collection is stones.

Also: I am proud of my zebra, and somewhat shocked that Kina knows what the African savannah is?

dad

It’s okay, folks, we figured it out.

dad

The school gates close at 8:30. She got dressed at 8:15 today. I will accept any and all strategies for solving this.

dad

She later admitted that the wound matched the shape of her thumbnail.

dad

Kina’s friend invited us out to a famous ice-dancing extravaganza that is actually much better than I thought it would be, but mostly because I got to watch Kina stare with astonishment at a bunch of skating princesses for two hours. There was snow, though, and a giant crab. And fire. They set fire to the skating rink. You had to be there.

dad

Happy Lunar New Year to all who celebrate. Kina would like you to know that there are no rabbits in our family.

It might be difficult to discern, but I made this Parade myself at a Riso workshop run by Futura’s dad (which is why the girls were having a play date). It looks like a mess, but it is a slightly art-y mess, and it makes this whole project like 1% more zine-y.

It is absolutely one the best things to hear your kid singing herself to sleep with a song that includes the lyric “breathe in a bag”.

dad

I think you can probably tell from today’s edition that Kina is getting more curious about things that feel threatening. Tonight she asked if we could watch tsunami videos or maybe just videos of “people being hit by huge waves”, which is fortunately a search term with relatively underwhelming results on Youtube. In any case, this recent obsession with natural disaster hasn’t resulted in any commensurate increase in nightmares, and so I’m playing along by making bowls of oobleck for Kina in the minutes before bedtime and watching her figure out how to extract herself from quicksand—should she ever need to.

Short answer: it takes a long time to sink, but don’t get too comfortable.

dad

Happy continued New Year from the world’s most committed celebrant.

dad

In just two months, this newspaper will be the same age Kina was when I first starting drawing it. She still remembers that time, and the kids and teachers at her little preschool—where she looked down from the rooftop playground and smiled as she thought about me.

Hi to all the teachers from Small World!

dad

Still working on the new Kina figure. Posture is tricky when you add detail!

dad

The kid has started to show an interest in that part of our lives that predated her arrival, focusing largely on the bits after we met (Kina having traditionally believed that we were somehow always together.) We collectively spent a few hours yesterday filling her in on the things she wasn’t there to see about our relationship, all of which she listened to voraciously.

In her mind, everything about our lives as a couple—from the day Laurea first shook my hand—was aimed squarely at marriage (and really, squarely at a wedding day). This could not be further from the truth. What we didn’t talk to Kina about was how uncertain both of us were about pursuing a long-distance relationship back in 2002, how reticent Laurea was to get married, and how long it took for us to get our heads around having a baby.

With that long arc in mind, there were many stories with which to regale our darling daughter about our brilliant and carefree lives before she arrived. Laurea and I have often talked about those years, but always in the quiet hours after Kina goes to sleep—fearful, I suppose, that she’d feel both insulted by our nostalgia and left out by our stories. It felt good to be able to talk to Kina about the parties, the travel, the jobs, the friends, the wedding—and she was soaking it all up.

Thanks to Uncle Ken for the makings of a fort. Thanks to Mommy for tolerating a garish nylon mansion in the middle of Kina’s room.

dad

I have spent a not-insignificant part of my career explaining how Google Docs works, and so it is both a little impressive and a little scary that Kina just went for it this way, because she is six and has never used Google Docs.

dad

This is the “stop hitting yourself” of manipulative kid questions.

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As we reckon with this moment in which the child no longer wants her father to stand nearby at drop-off, sending him into a spiral of separation anxiety, I will direct you to the last two times I got stuck to the fence.

dad

I appreciate Kina’s concern for my well being, but I think it’s a bit early for the child to become the parent—even as I see myself in her this way.

dad

p.s. “Is there any, like, nineties day?”

Mommy comes back with trinkets, is exhausted, loved by daughter beyond measure.

dad

The problem with justice is that gymnastics always gets in the way. Aside: Still tinkering with figure stuff here, and introducing Wammawink from Centaurworld, which I will have to write about here someday.

To be fair, the mandarins were really small, but she ate another dozen later this evening. We agree that mandarins are really good and probably better than candy.

For fun, tried out a more detailed Kina figure today, but not sure I have the patience to work it out.

The orange is great, tho. Weekend energy.

I only have the one kid, so I can’t tell if Kina is more obsessed with danger and darkness than the average child, but this week’s emergent theme of harm and threat seems very much in line with Kina’s fascinations in general over the last year. She binge-watches videos about insect stings, fast-forwards her cartoons to the bits where a tornado sucks up all the main characters, and will calmly enjoy the bits from Princess Mononoke in which people’s limbs are sliced off as she eats kernels of popcorn.

I’m not particularly inclined to say she’s been desensitized to violence, so much as that she’s not yet sure what the violence signifies or leads to. Still, after a recent spate of nightmares, it seems that she’s starting to evaluate the risk of being near things that are dangerous, and that includes New York.

As she and I quietly drove back from her cousin’s birthday on Wednesday night, she randomly asked me whether or not there were things in the city that were dangerous, and drew as examples upon the things she’s most likely to think are dangerous: tornadoes and earthquakes principally, with a slightly less pointed curiosity about limb-slashing.

Happy birthday to Kina’s only cousin and spiritual brother, who could not bring himself to smash a cake specifically produced for that purpose. Otis, your sister-cousin enjoyed the unsmashed slice of cake she was able to eat as a result. Bless you, flower king.

dad

The funny thing about Truth or Dare for six year olds is that all the truth stuff is super factual, like “do birds fly?” and “do you love Mommy?”

Both, of course, truly yes answers.

I’m scared to go “dare”, but I will keep you informed as things unfold.

Strangely enough, I remember this feeling from when I was small—smaller, even, than I felt I ought to have been at the time. We never quite feel like the person we see in the mirror, which leads me to wonder who we think we are, and where that person comes from.

Lately, I look in the mirror and feel somewhat older than I ought to be—which has been an ongoing process, obviously, in ways that are different than simply being shorter than you might expect. I suspect my assumption about how old I am is shifting about as quickly as the person looking back at me (and out at all of you), but that’s likely a process of continual begrudging acceptance. I’m not thirty anymore, and I’m very quickly realizing that I’m not forty anymore, and that line of reasoning becomes increasingly untenable as a human being, and so I just don’t spend much time with mirrors.

So, who is this person who isn’t reflected in the mirror?

It’s kind of hard to explain how fun it was yesterday to take Kina to Central Park (which we are obligated by our Standards desk to call “Zentals Park”) and just let her tell us what to do. Having started at one of the Central Park East playgrounds, we found ourselves crowded out by billionaires and fled to the common fields, where Kina had a significantly better time climbing rando boulders for the next two hours in her frilly princess dress (complete with formal gloves). We traded tips on how to climb some of the more complex rocks, did some sketching in the ethereal golden light, and took in the unusually warm January air together—though I was probably underdressed for the occasion in ways that Kina and her mother were not, for which Kina fully roasted me.

At one point, after climbing a particularly tall boulder, Kina sat with me and mused quietly, “This is so fun.” I think I have never been happier as a parent than I was in that moment, sitting with a literal princess in Zentals Park and knowing that she recognized how special it was to be there.

I love this kid.

And with that, the end of the third calendar year of this cursed pandemic and the blessed publication of The Daily Kina. Kina is now six, and the year is now 2023, and the time she spends with her friends is more independent and sassy and full of nonsense drama that sometimes makes all the friends cry at the very same time.

Faithful readers will recall that we spent last New Year’s Eve with Futura, too. In that short newsletter, I offered the wish that “…this year (the third calendar year of this august publication) [might] be better, for all of us, than the last.” The good thing about Kina’s childhood, in the main, is that each year is a bit better than the last—in the sense that Kina has become something greater this year than she was a year ago (though she was no less cute in 2021 than today, I’d offer). Kids, in other words (if you are lucky), trend towards improvement.