SHOPPING WITH ELVES.

I have vague memories from long long ago of going holiday shopping without personal assistants. Those must have been dark times, because I can barely recall them. Thank goodness for the help I have now. Good help is hard to find, particularly when it’s crawling away to the Graphic Novels section of a bookstore. Happy happy, all. _____ #christmasshopping #books #44books

A post shared by Joseph Long (@josephivanlong) on Dec 15, 2017 at 10:45pm PST

MEAN MAN DAD NO GO JOE.

"Daddy won't let me watch the G.I. Joe movies,"

I heard him explaining.

"...because he doesn't want me thinking that violence is super good or something, so I'm just going to make my own stop motion movie with G.I. Joes and there's going to be a lot of fighting in it."

____

I just can't wipe the smile off my face. I'm sort of awesome...right? Or is that him?

BOY RUNNING FROM FURIOUS FATHER DOWN CITY SIDEWALK IN RAIN.

A BILLION LITERATE SUPERMANS (REASON #7,431 CHILDREN ARE RAD. AS I LIKE TO SAY: THEY'RE ALMOST LIKE OUR FUTURE).
(composited from recent conversations with my son)

Daddy, can you go sew me some Batman pajamas now? Guess what I dreamed about? Warthogs. Can I eat a thousand cookies today, or a billion? Which one? Guess what? You're tiny, and I'm big. And Mama's a lot bigger than you because she's giant and you're little. She's really huge and you're the tiniest person in the world and I can defeat you a billion times. Can we go outside? I want to find a worm. Why don't worms have faces? I like Batman more than Superman. My Superman pajamas make my neck itch so I need Batman pajamas. Shall I look at a book on the potty? I like to, because it's really fun. When can I watch Spider-man...when I'm six or nine? Are we listening to Vivaldi? Can I draw in my bed after I go to bed? I'll just draw a thousand pictures, or a billion. I had a dream and I went hiking with Mama. Am I a good homo sapien? I'm still learning to like chips and tomatoes and spicy things. I don't really like Leonard Cohen; I'm still learning to like him. And I'm still learning to like the Beatles. Can I please have coffee cake? Guess what Daddy? Your Dad is the goodest person in the world. He's gooder than you. You're tiny and he's huge and he's good. Hey...I'm going to read a billion books today!

His sister:
You can't read.

(Beat).

Oh yeah. But if I could read, I would read a billion books today.

If You Wanna Surf, You Have to Buy Your Own Board (Waterboarding is Different)

Somehow, we began speaking of snowboarding, and how fun it would be to go this winter. I gave the simple version to the children as we were driving, Man or Astro-man? quietly cranking along with the windows down:

"Snowboarding is where you're riding on a board on top of the snow. Really fun. What do you call it when you're riding on a board on top of the ocean?"

My daughter immediately piped in.
- "Waterboarding?"

I started laughing, and couldn't stop for a few moments. Tried to move on, but she is as stubborn and intuitive as her parents and refused to let me move on.

"Waterboarding,"
I said,
"is...something else for a conversation in the future. Surfing. That's what we call it when you're riding a board on the ocean -"

I started to launch into a short history, starting with Duke Kahanamoku, but she would have none of it.

- "But what is waterboarding?"

"That's kind of an adult conversation."

-"Okay...but just tell me what it is."

(There's no walk-through for explaining waterboarding to six-year olds, and she is uncannily precocious in gliding past my conversational-evasion tactics)

"Well..."
I began.
"Sometimes, umm, okay, well- there is...there are people who help protect the United States from other people who want to do bad things, like blow buildings and people up. Some of the people protecting the U.S. work for organizations like the CIA. It stands for Central Intelligence Agency"

- "Is the CIA good?"

"Well...in general, they...want to protect the United States."

- "Oh."

"Sometimes they capture people who want to do bad things, and then THEY do bad things to try to get the bad people to give them information about the bad things they're trying to do. Kind of confusing."

- "What is waterboarding though?"

"Well, that's one of the awful things that they've done to people before."

- "Who?"

"Mostly some people at the CIA."

- "The CIA? I thought they were good!"

"Well...there's some good people who work there. But sometimes good people do bad things because they think it's the right thing. And waterboarding is an awful thing that people should not do to each other. It is very different from snowboarding. Or surfing. How about we chat more about this in a few years?"

- "You're just a baby, Daddy."

"Actually, I'm not a baby. I'm an adult."

- "You're a baby. A little tiny baby."

"Then you're a zygote."

- "You're a zygote."

"That is such a sloppy comeback! That's what I just called you!"

- "Okay. You're a tiny little baby zygote."

"Slightly better. Wanna hear more about surfing?"

- "No.

Yodel


Also, my favourite Sound of Music song today is The Lonely Goatherd. Yodeling is so rad.


Self-plagiarism is style.


- Alfred Hitchcock

LEGO, Lincoln Logs, Convo and Summer Here Kids

Every once in a while, I feel especially cool. It is a strange feeling. But I feel this way right now because I have spent a night engaged in conversation with people who, instead of shoegazing at their phones while talking, have been busily building LEGO constructions. Seriously cool. And then I looked down at what I have been building and stopped feeling quite so cool.

LEGO parties. Good stuff. Next up: Lincoln Logs.
____

Summer Here Kids

Tribute to Kafka (The Metamorphosis of Oscar)

Portrait of Mother and Son with Flowers That Will Die Soon

Without Consent (When Playtime is Over).

My Precious

I love you,

I said softly as he snuggled his two-year old head against my chest and closed his eyes,

my precious boy.

I felt his eyelids drift up for a second and his lips move quietly.

You...are...my...precious daddy,

he whispered.

__

That is how to end a day.

In Defense of the Elves

You big man.
I know you big
cause you got a big gun.
Itchy twitchy trigger.
Big gun is big man.

I like your truck,
it's big. I know you big, man
cause you got a big truck;
big guns in big truck.

You so amazing,
fluff yerself in with sixteen tough man ounces
drink yourself to genius with big bottle
of fortified iron-aid pale ale,

horse coming, or zombies sneaking?
nah, just the elves rarin' to wrestle. 
Big man work hard though,
best get yourself some peace, 
solitude,

get rested up for the apocalypse;
it's a-coming. might be dragons or Russians, 
but 
most likely, either
zombies or those snozz-whizzlin liberal pinhead socialist Communistic intellectuals
gonna take us to the brink,

so thank God for those big guns and big trucks
and big bottles and big comic books 
and those
little wives
taking care of those
little children

who are gonna let the big men save the country from meltdown.

Finger on trigger,
drink from the crocodile river, keep eyes on horizon,
big man's gotta protect the weak, the littles
from the enemy
and it's so convenient when the enemy has a name

Mohammed
immigrant
Mexican
zombie

So the big man gotta step up 
Do the tough job, the jobba 
being a big man and not over-fraternizin'
with the childrens and the women-folk
and the uppity intellectualizers
who pretend there is gray when there is 
obviously

only the pure White of contrasting Red & Blue,
the Ku-el 21st century boy version of starched pointy-hat bedsheets draped on head.
and imagining the black
of approaching apocalypse; imaginary hooves on horizon 
paranoia as they imagine the pounding of phantom Nightriders racing for wives and sons and daughters.
Nothing Beyond Good & Evil;

Them and Us.

The big men,
loud bottle-clinking at their children's birthday parties;
as they toast off the ritual from a-far;
if it's a daughter;
they will outdo each other with promises of what size shotgun
they will be waiting with on the porch upon daughter's return from
first date;

it is a contest, a contest
to be big, to be the biggest dad,
to out-protect and out-shoot and out-threaten
and out-terrify
the enemy.


Keep the guns oiled
instead of lubricating conversation.

The big men have got it figured out.
It is daunting, trying
to catch up.

I think I'll be a little person.
I can fly-wall sit in on their monologues and 
take notes, and
learn how to stay small

and never get big.


at 1.30 a.m. i tumble words + scribbling to page to spill out something positive from fury.

I Bet She Better Not Forget (Again), But If She Does, I'll Hurry Up and Finish My Time Machine Yesterday

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Photography with Friends

With the replaceable assistance of her irreplaceable assistant, Magdelana artfully arranged a motley collection of her dolls and animals for a portrait shoot. There was conflict, there was emotion, there was attention to detail, and finally a single money shot she was happy with. Alas, Johannes was never able to sneak his beloved stuffed giraffe into frame.

A solid session of teamwork, slushy snow slopping outside, and Vivaldi blasting Spring harmonics on a cold Autumn morning.

Caldecott #2 (1939) "Mei Li"

Slowly, we continue working our way through the Caldecott Award winners. Mei Li is the 1939 winner; a labour of love that was written and illustrated by Thomas Handforth. It is the tale of a young girl in 1930s China who wants to go the New Year Fair in the city but isn't allowed to because she's a girl. Fortunately, she is curious, adventurous, and importantly, decides to ignore the prevailing idea that girls don't have the same privileges as boys. She sneaks out to follow her brother to the Fair.

At the Fair, the story hopscotches around a fractured plotline - she runs into acrobats, wise old men, beggars, a priest, and various animals. Her brother teases her mercilessly throughout, but she doggedly pursues adventure with spirit and bravery, finally returning to her kitchen where she finds out...I am firmly against plot spoilers, so read it and find out!

The illustrations are black-and-white; sometimes silly and sometimes kind-of realistic. Given the book was written in the 1930s, it is easy to assume it would be filled with offensive stereotypes about China, but it seems to have a tone of cultural respect and love for the characters rather than a pervading sense of stock caricature and dialogue. 

Magdelana and I have had some lively conversations and question-and-answer dialogues about China, about history, and about how important it is that girls do not just accept the expectations that a culture may place upon them - children are meant to find and create adventure and excitement. Boys and Girls both.


And adults too.


Smile.

1938

48 pages

Doubleday Books for Young Readers

written and illustrated by Thomas Handforth

Pink (Ode to My Son)

He might like trucks and
he might like dolls.


I hope he helps his dolls
drive his trucks.


Someday his sister's frilly tutu
will fit him
and he might want to wear it
which means we'll have to find one to fit me too.


I hope he will dance like a maniac.


Maybe he'll play football and hit very hard.


Maybe he'll ice skate and leap very high.

I want him to grow up and be
himself all along the way.


And keep the optimism and
curiousity and imagination of


CHILDHOOD


so I can keep clinging to it too.


Boots and blue and ammo belts,
swing a hammer and


BE TOUGH!


Little boys are like this
and
Little girls are like that.


Raise your fist, son,
to those who tell
you The Rules for (y)our gender.


Be Martin Luther,
King, do not bow to old patriarchs,
at venerated notions of manliness.


To be a man is to be yourself.
That is what I want you to be.


Do not prove your masculinity by
disparaging
Hugh Grant and rom coms.


(Thou dost protest too much)


Construct, deconstruct,
do not destruct
yourself or others.


Build up, be a bridge, open doors
for everyone.


There is a time to fix
and a time to listen.


Be a leader, and remember
to let others lead too.


A loud voice doesn't make you a leader. Sing.
Be kind.


There is an art director who got in
     hot water
for photographing her young son
     wearing
bright pink nail polish, which he liked.


     "There's got to be a 
     DIFFERENCE
     between boys and girls,"


the wise ones say.


     "Otherwise it gets confusing.
     We've got to protect those differences
      and keep things un-confusing."


Which made so much sense 
a century ago.


They have their drinking fountain, and
     we have ours,


spoke Plessy vs. Ferguson in 1896. And that's how things were,
for another 58 years.


Hunters and gatherers,
Protectors and warriors
     returning


to the caregivers, the
matrons and mothers and childraisers.


It is embedded from an early age
what toys and colours and traits


      Boys Like,


innocuously, innocently, an open feedback
loop of preconceptions turned into actions that
create self-fulfilling reality.


      Boys argue.
      Boys fight.
      Boys are about Action.


      Girls gossip.
      Girls bicker.
      Girls are about Talking.

My problem is not that there is no historic or biological reasons for differences between gender.


      MY PROBLEM


is when these traits are treated as inviolable facts, as raison d'etre for how one gender or the other responds to a given situation in life.


If Johannes grows up loving yellow Tonka trucks and camouflage attire,
     that is fine.


If Johannes grows up loving pink dolls and purple kilts,
     that is fine.


Being a man is developing the self-confidence to be yourself, to like what you want, to live how you want, to approach life with your own rulebook, not one that's been handed to you by a centuries-old code of gender expectations.


There is a troglodytic paranoia that for a 
little boy
to grow up playing with the wrong things or
liking the wrong toys
will turn him into something not...
     blue-blooded manly.


Be kind. Be respectful. Be curious and imaginative.
Those are my commandments, son.


There is nothing,
     NOTHING
that will ever make me disown, or
turn my back on my son.


MY PROBLEM
is when people make assumptions about what kind of person
he will be.


He is eleven months old,
and the wise ones make their assumptions already, because
that's the way Little Boys are.


Why are so many fathers disengaged from
     their children's lives?


(because)
They grew up with embedded ideas and
expectations of what Men do 
     and what
Women do.


And raising children is still looked at by many
as a Woman's Job.


Dad can step in at some point when the kid's
old enough to start hunting, playing football,
     or dating cheerleaders, and


     catch him up on "the guy stuff."


Another cycle continues.


     "This is who I am expected to be,
     therefore that must be who I am,"


     the implicit idea.


"You're not a normal guy," I have heard,
     an ambiguous compliment?


Thank you, I think.


I am not betraying my gender. I am proud to be a Man.


     Tarzan.
     Korak.
     Conan, I roar.


I am proud to be me.
There are many like me, similar,


     'not normal,'


and with raised melodic gorilla voices,
maybe our sons will someday be the


     New Normal.


Men of strength and kindness, confidence and humility,
     empathy and
     humor,
     proud to acknowledge the beauty in the world
     and


     to build lasting relationships of love and respect.


Son, I love you. Let's go paint our nails.