Culture Shock

Prior to spending a year abroad in a foreign country, I was taken to a hotel in that country's capitol city for two weeks for intensive language training. Along with grammar and vocabulary lessons, we were prepped on how to handle culture shock.

Culture shock, according to the U.S. State Department, has several phases. Not everyone will go through all of the stages, or go through them at the same pace, but it is very likely that someone living abroad will be fascinated by the new culture at first. He or she will be eager to try new tastes and new experiences.

Later, usually after three months or so, a person can get caught in a stage of comparing his home culture with the new culture. The visitor notices that certain situations are "better" or "more comfortable" in one culture or the other. Home sickness usually sets in at this point and some people sink into a temporary depression.

A person immersed in a new culture eventually moves into an "acceptance" phase. In this phase the new culture isn't better or worse than the home culture, but rather "different." The visitor/immigrant finds a way to reconcile the old and the new.

I am assuredly caught in the "comparison" stage of culture shock with regards to Christmas in the U.S. Understandably, not every family/town/state celebrates in the same way, so my experience here is most definitely a "local phenomena" instead of a national occurrence.

I've always been open to change, but this year I'm especially uncomfortable...

1. The holiday menu is pizza and wings. At another home, our meal is served on paper plates.

I can appreciate the spirit of "making it easy on everyone" but I LOVE the special menu items at Christmas! I appreciate the unique dishes that family members bring. I love to see the special plates and glasses that come out once a year, and to hear the stories behind the traditions. What are we teaching our children we we serve them fast food for a holiday?

2. Boys' girlfriends were invited without parental consent. Call me "Old Fashioned" but I think it's proper to ask parents before inviting the girlfriends of minors.

3. I keep hearing "It's all about getting together." Christmas, in my mind, is a religious holiday. The intent is to recognize and celebrate, publicly, Jesus' arrival. It IS NOT about treating each other horribly during the year and then tolerating one another for an afternoon.

My dear husband keeps reminding me..."nothing will feel normal." His advice: "you can't change things."

If the State Department is correct, I'll eventually move on to the acceptance phase.

Origin Unknown

For some strange reason, I monologue as I drive to work in the morning. I tell (myself) about my home town, my family of origin, my elementary school days, my college years, and more, as if I were dictating my autobiography.

This morning I found myself talking (to myself) about the family safe deposit box. Folded inside, I'm told, are my biological father's adoption papers, the secret to his birthplace and family of origin.

My uncle, second husband to my aunt who is now deceased, may be the only person who knows if the mythological box even exists. I was told about it as I grew up and my grandparents promised that one day I would receive the key. They are now gone, and my uncle communicates with me, on average, once every three years (after I write him a kind reminder asking if he'd mind if I fetched the family heirlooms I was promised from his house. "Oh, I'll bring them to you some day," is his routine reply).

I sometimes wonder about my father's parents, who would have been my grandparents. I've been told that they came from Germany in the early 1940s to the state of Tennessee, but there was never any certainty about their ethnic origin.

I certainly feel German, having an affinity for German food and drink beyond any other cuisine.

I imagine that I look German too. I have German skin, that, as I age, develops the typical tags and dark spots I see on older German women.

My oldest son, without any pushing or prodding, has grown into a German Engineer...a German composer-astrophysicist type.

Perhaps it's this child's status as a senior in high school that has me "summarizing" in this way. These are also his (distant) origins.

Chain Store Children

A topic that has been on my mind lately has to do with State and Federal Education Mandates. My children, especially the younger two, go to school in an era that promotes uniformity. Schools favor the "measurable results" provided by standardized exam.

As a teacher, I realize that a student with "out of the box" thinking and behavior can test my already fragile nerves. I tend to teach to the middle and create evaluations that are manageable to grade. Still, I can imagine a world where students create cool projects, following their own interests and strengths, to show mastery of a subject rather than filling in rows of bubbles with a #2 pencil.

Yesterday was parent-teacher conference night. I knew, going in, that I was going to hear that W hadn't been walking the straight classroom line. He has trouble, even at home, walking a straight line from the shower back to his underwear drawer.

He gets distracted. He daydreams. He isn't a big fan of 100 math problems in one helping or writing out spelling words for practice.

But he loves theater, writing, costumes, drama, and music. He is the proverbial "square peg, round hole."

Do we really want a world full of cookie-cutter children who become cookie-cutter adults? As adults, they might be more employable, easier to predict, or better suited to enjoy living in high rises.

My fear is that we squash out the "Robbert Rodriguezes" of the next generation, the creative, sometimes bizarre individuals of the world. I hope that, as an educator, I can thrive somewhere between Common Core Standards and a sincere appreciation for uniqueness and nonconformity.

Early Exclusive Decision

I got a letter in the mail. The opening paragraph read, "Congratulations! You are the parent of a District Five Section 12.A Area-all-State Orchestra Participant." (Try saying that five times fast). I'm also the parent of an All-State Choir Participant of the same district and section, a Wendy's Heisman Athlete Award Nominee, and a DAR Young Citizen Award Nominee.

This is all new territory, this land of Senior Teas and Senior Award Ceremonies.

Our oldest son just submitted his "exclusive early decision" application to his #1 choice college. Being savvy, he applied to two other schools before he hit the submit button on the exclusive early decision. Some colleges have offered to waive his application fee so he has applied and applied..."Why not?!"

He submitted his NCAA application and football recruitment questionnaire at the very last minute. He wants to play football in college...and then he doesn't.

I was annoyed when this almost-eighteen-year old spent the day at our pastor's house when he should have been working on his #1 college choice application essay. It took all of my strength to step back from personally editing his essays when I thought they could be more well organized.

He spent the entire past weekend performing in the pit orchestra for a show. Then he topped it off with a late-night cast party. I thought he should have been resting and doing homework.

We're on the prowl for scholarships. And he just added started piano lessons to his schedule (great, another recital).

I keep telling myself that every parent of a teenager-athlete-musician heading to college is going through something similar...the tension that exists during the child's "getting ready to blast off" stage of life.

I'm hungry for some good advice from a wise parent who has lived through this stage. At the minimum, I could really use some stress relief.