glenrockschwartz

  Dear Avery, Happy 18th birthday! I haven't seen you yet today because you have spent the past week doing business lady stuff with school and are currently on a flight home from Atlanta.  But still, you asked would I decorate your bedroom door like I have done since you could walk, even if you weren't here to wake up to it this morning.  (Of course I will! And bonus points that I could get it done the day before without any time pressure.)  As you turn 18, this theme  of grown up girls, not being as grown up as they think and still needing their mamas is one  that I would like to explore with you in more depth. When you google "what every 18 year old should know", you get lists ranging from 18 (cute) to 100!  These are life skills that I am proud to say you (and Alex) both have.  You can sew a button, follow a recipe, make a doctor appointment and do the laundry. You can also change a light bulb AND change a diaper - the latter a skill that I did...

Dear Alex, Happy 21st Birthday!  Typing this feels unbelievable as it is inherently American to believe that a person is a true and complete adult when he reaches the age of 21.  (Of course, us mamas like to hold onto the fact that your prefrontal cortex wont fully develop for another four to five years, which means, thankfully, that you will still need us.)  And yet there has been tremendous growth over this past year.  When you turned 20, I was intimately involved in the day-to-day aspects of your life.  It was a privilege to talk to you daily about general nonsense aka "stuff and things".  The reality was that the daily check ins were a necessity to combat my own fears, to make sure I was doing my job as a parent to help you grow into a healthy and content adult.  I am still here, a year later, to catch you if you fall, however you have learned the skills, you have the skills to catch yourself.  So far there hasn't been a stumble, or maybe ther...

Dear Avery, I want to get these words just right.  With you I always want everything to be perfect or at least as perfect as possible, because the details, the time and care and attention paid really matter to you.  You appreciate it.  As I write this on the eve of your fourteenth birthday, I am struck by how you have managed to be fluid in an ever changing world. Some of this is World with a capital W - like we are living in pandemic times and public health policies change, impacting us on the daily.  And then there is world - your everyday world here in Glen Rock or off at camp - and the people that you encounter.  Today I'm going to focus on your world and not make this an account of vaccines and masks and quarantine. Girl....You'll be a woman soon Cringe! Of course, don't go off and make me a grandmother anytime soon, but just sharing that your body is doing everything that it's supposed to do at this age.  You also delight in the fact that you are (ver...

Dear Alex, In just one short month, you will officially be an adult in the eyes of our country.  Old enough to vote, old enough to go to war (but not old enough to drink!) As Jewish parents in modern times, we laugh a bit at the thought of bar mitzvah being the age in which you are considered an adult by the Jewish community.  We can all agree that you are still a child at 13!  But can we also agree as Americans, that turning 18 doesn't automatically make you ready to take on the world without parent involvement? Do you know how to drive and/or navigate public transportation? Check.  How to get dressed, tie your shoes, make a grilled cheese and do your laundry? Check.  All the stuff on this list?  https://grownandflown.com/33-life-skills-college-kids-adult/ Okay, maybe we need to have a conversation about some of these. But does that mean that we can just send them out in the world and no longer worry? To this I would say, absolutely not!  18 year old...

Dear Avery, Abraham Lincoln Embraced His Honesty With Pride You are named after dad's maternal grandfather, Abraham Novak or as he was known to his grandkids, Papa Abe.  One of Abe's traits that you share with him and that dad likes to talk about was his brutal honesty.  So that's what I would like to write about as you officially turn 13 and embark on your teenage years: the interplay between your honesty and your level of tolerance. From Despondency to Exuberance You have always been my most extreme kid who lives in vivid color with everything.  Yes with your brutal honesty, but also you love hard and you hate hard, you play hard and you rest hard, you laugh hard and you cry hard.  There are very few grey areas in your life; at your best you are vivacious and exuberant, at your worst you are cutting and despondent.  Last year we talked about you working on dialing down your living life at a level eleven down to a seven.  And how sad it was that we live in...

Dear Avery Today you turn twelve years old. You have heard the old adage about the tree falling in the woods and nobody around to hear it. Is the corollary, if someone has a birthday during quarantine and nobody around to celebrate that you don’t turn one year older? Of course, I am just jesting, but I am writing this because it does speak to a description of who you are at this age.  Also, I am apologizing in advance that this post is more likely to cover the past two months of your last year.  Somehow in the midst of quarantine it is difficult to remember your life before the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic. You are a worrier. About yourself. About others. About the world.   You may wonder why I am beginning this post with something kind of negative.  I realize that it may seem that way, but I see it differently.  You may "worry" that you will not be celebrated, but in fact it is more about you being keenly aware of your surroundings.  You notice and car...

Dear Avery, Two weeks ago you turned ten.  Each set of grandparents bought you a pair of really cool sneakers for your birthday.  Yesterday I bought you ANOTHER pair of sneakers.  These ones are rose gold glitter.  That brings your shoe collection for your STILL growing feet up to sixteen pairs.  Sixteen!  They are mainly sneakers - running sneakers, lacrosse cleats, basketball sneakers, platform rainbow glittery white, hand decorated converse all stars, as well as aforementioned rose gold glitter. Shoes make you happy. Love, Mom

Dear Avery, Recently you asked me if I have a favorite kid.  I honestly thought about it instead of giving you the standard parent answer of loving you both with all my heart (which I do!).  What I said to you after having thought about it for a while is that I love Alex because he is so much like me.  It is easy for me to proud or sad of things that he says, does, thinks, because I absolutely get his motivation.  But you sweet Avery, I love you because you are just like your daddy and he is the person that I love so much that I chose and continue to choose to spend my entire life with him every single day.  So maybe not the answer that you were looking for, but I love you both, with all my heart, just in different ways. Love Mom

Dear Avery, Growing up is hard.  I think particularly for a girl in our Western society that it is even more difficult.  Girls are mean to each other.  Emotions run strong.  And even at the young age of nine (almost ten!), you are exposed to nastiness in person, via social media, across all avenues.  I want to do everything I can to shield you from this to make sure that you can grow up as easily and stress free as possible.  This morning I decided to document the days that you feel happy and the days that you feel sad to show you that there are definitely more happy days than sad days.  Every morning before school, we will take a photo and talk about how you are feeling that day given what has transpired in your life over the previous 24 hours. I look forward to sharing your happy and counseling you through your sad. I love you with all my heart. Love, Mama PS - Day 1 = happy (also, I'm choosing to go blonde right now)

Dear Alex, I’m feeling a bit emotional writing you a “welcome to camp” note for this summer.  I think it’s because I am 100% sure that you don’t need one from me to reassure you that you will have an epic summer.  And also, because a tiny part of me worries that beyond not needing reassurance, you may not WANT to read any mushy declarations of love and encouragement from your mom (the horror!).  This is of course exactly what should be happening as you fully enter teenager phase. But here it is anyway.  Welcome to camp – you are going to have another epic summer!  I’m sure of it.  Enjoy the friendships you already have.  Be open to new ones.  You never know with whom you might actually have lots in common.  Befriend a cute & smart girl.  Ask her to Bash/Bistro. Take the time to work on the stuff you want to master (like basketball and lacrosse and guitar) when nobody is watching.  Also take the time to do absolutely...

Shabbat Shalom.  Thank you all for sharing with us today as we watched Alex become a bar mitzvah.  The thing that I’m sure you’ve heard a lot of parents talk about is how proud they are of their bar mitzvah child.  I wrote this speech before today and in advance I could already write, yes, I am so proud of this kid.  That is because I had all the behind the scenes understanding of what it takes to become a bar mitzvah in 2017.  It’s a lot.  It is way more than what he made look effortless today.  A little more than 75 years ago all you did was pop by the shul with a spongecake that your mom made, said a blessing and then went on to school.  That’s exactly how my grandfather - Alex’s great-grandfather - became a bar mitzvah.  As an aside, while my grandpa wasn’t feeling well enough to make the trip out from L.A. today, he got to see Alex read his Torah readings and haftarah on Skype and shared these feelings of pride.   Okay, so let me ...

Dear Avery, I just said to you, I like your hair when it's parted on the side. Your response to me in a rather sultry voice for an almost nine year old and with a toss of your hair over your shoulder, "I woke up like this." I hope you always keep that confidence. Love, Mama

Dear Avery, Last night you went to dinner at the Glen Rock Inn and were joined by me, Daddy, Alex and Auntie Dawn.  You are nearly nine years old (just to give some context to the story if you ever read this years from now).  It was Saturday, which meant that the bar was pretty crowded, but we ALWAYS sit at the bar because there is good energy and it is social and it is always an easy time waiting for a table since we tend to know a bunch of people there whenever we go. So we waited and chatted with people and each other. And then we sat and ordered dinner and drinks and more people came in who we knew and we caught up with them as well.  The positive energy enveloped our table like a warm and cozy blanket. At some point, you started to get tired (because you had been out since 8:30 a.m. when basketball started and hadn't had any time to just rest) and a wee bit cranky (because it's a bar and it's really loud and you were squished away in the corner of the table, oh...

Dear Alex, I am alternately angry with and proud of you at any given point during your seventh grade, 12, almost 13 years old year. It is a tumultuous year filled with growth and change and there is an enormous amount of demands being put on you as you study to become a bar mitzvah in addition to all of the regular demands of school and sports and music and friends. So yes, unavoidably, there is strife.  Particularly for you, my organizationally challenged first born.  Through it all, I love you fiercely. And then there are spots as bright as the August sun, spots where you take what is amazing about you and share it with the world.  Like the project that you have chosen to achieve status as a bar mitzvah. More on that in a few sentences, but first a description of mitzvot chaveri. The rabbi taught us about two different types of mitzvot, those between you and G-d (praying, keeping kosher, keeping Shabbat) and those between you and man, also known as mitzvot chave...