kid forced to wear school uniform for photographic proof of her scholarship; Kina is allowed to hold the sign
A slightly lighter topic today, though no less fraught for our publisher, who knows full well the importance of a school photo and the power of a well-selected outfit—a selection she was denied in the face of green/beige homogeneity. We must all suffer indignities from time to time.
Parents later explain the importance of apologies, promise to do better, and everybody gets a hug
It’s surprising how little I’ve heard from other parents about whether or not they fight in front of their kids. I suppose it is the sort of topic that we’re afraid might invite judgement (a fear I shared even as I wrote the headline on today’s paper), but conflict is such a significant part of sharing a life together that I’m curious why the topic doesn’t come up more often.
Laurea and I had an argument yesterday in Kina’s presence—something we prefer to avoid—and it ended with me shouting as we walked out the front door of our building, which I am not proud of. Kina, judging by her demeanor and plugged-up ears, wasn’t proud either. Recognizing that things had gotten too noisy, we cut our losses, and I took Kina to school in silence as Laurea made her way back upstairs.
Kina didn’t know this at the time, but I ran home right after dropping her off so that I could catch Laurea before she went to work. We had a calm and clear conversation about what we wished had gone differently, apologized for our parts in the argument, and pivoted to talking about how we would address this with Kina.
Kina’s memory of spilled ice cream draws a blank in the over-40 set
I would not have started writing this newspaper if I didn't care about remembering the various little things that happen to Kina every day. Despite that effort, Kina has started to be able to recall more minor dramas from her youth than we find ourselves able to remember. Whether, as in the case of the fallen fish-shaped ice cream cone, these are events that actually happened or are mere constructions of her mind, it feels at times as though things are slipping away from us—not least of those things being Kina’s childhood. I think this process of writing and drawing gives me some sense of control over that distance of memory, but it’s insufficient. I never thought, in 2020, that the real repository of stories from Kina’s childhood would be Kina herself, but as her brain develops and the stories add up, I’m surprised (though I should not be) that she has her own take on her life: which moments startled her, which of them dug deep, which felt pivotal or silly or sad.
The stories I remember from Kina’s day now include her own, sometimes from years ago, and I feel lucky to be able to write down the moments that I truly did once forget, having been reintroduced to them by the person who was there in the first place.
city inspector banned from room after filing violation
As the inspection report shows, the only thing keeping this swing from collapsing is two small, tight knots wedged between the bedframe and the shelf hanging from its side. Any reasonable assessor would smack a stop-work order all over this.
“I’ll just be dry again after,” she claims raspily
Why even chug water out of these gigantic Stanley cups like we’re water billionaires when the winter air is just gonna suck it all out of us and leave us as wrinkly dusty hunks of skin after ten minutes? The ruse is exhausting.
Kid wants to know why dogs are called “dogs”, cats “cats”
Our little etymologist is fascinated by the origins of words—both the where and why of them. Who called it a dog? Why? Why do we still call them dogs? Why do we not call them “cats”? What other random syllables might we assemble to name the thing currently named “dog”? Language is an agreement, Laurea tells her in the bath one night, that things should be called things and not something(s) else. Kina’s own language is an agreement that she formed with us in the first few years of her life (and, notably, in one extremely solitary and formative year of her life in 2020—we see that take shape in the absurdist headlines of this newspaper.) It feels strange at times to watch as her language evolves as an agreement with others, too—as she becomes a New Yorker in her choice of words and accents. She’s part of the big agreement now, as are her parents and their parents and her friends and their parents.
scrappy little kid reassures daddy, who just bit his own cheek
This kid has had some tough run-ins with the pavement in the past, but also, yesterday, with a little kid in her class who just wouldn’t stop yelling at her, which made her cry, which made Mr. Ortiz call Laurea, which made both of us really mad until we remembered that these people are literally seven years old and living complicated lives with very little impulse control, and when Kina came home, it was like nothing at all had happened that day—a total walk in the park. Laurea and I had agreed not to make a big deal about anything Kina wasn’t prepared to make a big deal about, and the worst that came of last evening was that I bit the living daylights out of my cheek, and Kina found herself comforting me on a day that I thought would have been really hard for her. Think of that next time you get a pretty bad cut.
dad
p.s. Thanks to EV, JSM, MB, and C+GF for upgrading your subscriptions. Every bit of support is welcome. The newsroom appreciates your ongoing readership.
facial hair appears to be sole requirement to manage
I don’t know why she felt the need to reinforce her preexisting status as boss of this household by holding two balloons onto her upper lip. Everybody likes balloons, I suppose.
child is fascinated by the connection of family to olfactory memory
I can remember with great clarity the smell of my grandmother’s house when I was Kina’s age. There is a specific sort of dustiness in the walls that underlies something green and cool. And there is the smell of sugar and milk from the kitchen, where the water had a specific flavor, sort of floral, rocky, with just a little aldehyde. The cement floor of the breezeway smelled as cement does, and the drywall boards after years of damp did, too. I smell the dirt and the roots of the trees from the basement even through the wall, and the sweeter ground of that basement giving way to the smell of old carpet and French toast as I walked upstairs for breakfast. I smell my grandmother’s cigarettes for a while at bedtime, and then I don’t after a few more years. I recall the smell of those cigarettes and the French toast at five in the morning, when she’d arrive at the house, and her smell lingering there over breakfast and in the car. I can smell the flowers she grew in the breezeway—with the cement and the wallboard—with real subtlety. In the afternoon, with the sliding door open to the deck out back, you could just take in a bit of the river from the cove beyond the tracks. The lazy, fernlike aroma of the grass, damp at the bottom of the hill, where the air was gravelly and green.
A bird and a tree
Kina built this Parade off of a sticker, fulfilling the long-held promise of a tree.
so she can always be wherever Mommy is; also, a bed that is also a car so they can go places and snuggle
Kina has not done a lot of research on transportation machines, but her devotion to her mother is substantial, which bodes well for the whole enterprise.
critics applaud coziness of nook, which is situated under kid’s bed where the kitchen used to be; a fine nook
The nook is a criminally underrated structure, in my opinion, and Kina’s nook is one of the finest there is. It is also why we got her a loft bed. To not build a nook under one’s bed feels like a dereliction of duty to coziness.
our investigation chases down the original hugger to ask them why hugs look that way, with some arms on top and some on bottom
Wikipedia’s entry for “hug” is suspiciously mum on the inventor of the hug and their rationale for why some arms are on top and others below, which leaves our newsroom wondering what exactly they are trying to hide.
Thanks to those of you who have chipped a buck or two in so far. It all makes the next several years of writing these a bit less expensive. Let’s hope Kina’s snuggles last as long as I do.
Some interpretations of ruling even suggest that he cannot set foot in living room or cough
We do not have a very large home, and so the prospect of not talking in it—and being banned from its largest room—is pretty unpleasant. But this is the price I pay for having a seven-year-old, clearly.
The upside here is that I get to hear scary stories about the bathroom and occasionally get dressed up in blankets.
It has been 701 days since our last meaningful snow on February 13, 2022, when Kina visited the Museum of Mathematics and chucked a snowball at my head (as memorialized—at least the museum bit—in the February 14th edition of this publication).
There is no record of the snow on February 13th, 2022, because we assumed there would be some snow in the subsequent year. We regret the error and will henceforth note that it has snowed, just in case it never snows again.
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Kina did not know how to ice skate yesterday at 3:00 PM, but after several falls, one maligned plastic skate-assisting bear, and a burst of dedication to the cause, she was tootling along with confidence (if not any particular elegance) by 4. So smitten was she by her newfound mastery that she spent the remainder of the day swaying back and forth as she walked, as if she were gliding along on freshly Zamboni’d ice. Will she make the 2036 U.S. Olympic figure skating team? Talk to me after two more visits to the rink.
A sudden windstorm sweeps through Williamsburg, and our correspondent is there to tell the tale. At eleven: Another shocking downpour; Kina demands cake.
Parade is back again, with a cavalcade of media and textures to capture this little bundle of balloons. I asked why she didn’t fill in all the letters of “Parade”, and she answered “contrast”. Okay, Picasso.
