Hola - Just a few things quickly, and then it's back to correcting:
T was walking the neighborhood with Mami today and they noticed how many houses have decorations up for Halloween. T did not like being outdone, and so she came home and immediately set about rectifying the situation, drawing witches and pumpkins and walking out onto the porch to hang them on the posts. She is very dedicated to image maintenance.
Q had two scooer games this weekend, and had streaks of wild action in both, but was mostly a little catatonic. Alex B's mom noticed the same thing both games. They won Saturday and lost today, to the big evil team they had tied a few weeks back. Q had a BRILLIANT run today, frighteningly controlled and showing a touch on the ball that is beyond his years. At another point, a So. Berkshire player started to make a long run toward the goal - and Q ran him down from the opposite side of the field, covering almost the whole length of the pitch, and took it away from him JUST as he was about to shoot. Brilliant plays. But much of the rest of the game, he stood around and watched things happen, yipped and jumped out of the way of players rather than trying to challenge them. Can't force him into it, I guess - he has to grow into it.
We all sat down after supper and found a program on the Discovery Channel about the evolution of the dog from the wolf, something Q and I had talked about at length before, and so we all settle in to watch it. T zonked out after a few minutes, but Q was hyper-attentive throughout. Brilliant show - they outlined an experiment at a fox fur farm in the soviet union, where a manager tried to make them more docile by simple inserting a gloved hand into each adult fox's cage, and if the fox cowered, attacked, or otherwise showed aggressiveness, it was not allowed to breed. And in ten years' time, the foxes had changed color, going to black and white rather than grey; they had gotten blotches of white over their eyes and on their bodies; their ears had lopped over; they began to bark - They turned into a tame animal! Not a dog, of course, but PRACTICALLY a dog! I was fascinated. As was Q. We both want one of them as a pet now - they showed them at that same fox farm now, being petted by school children. They have completely lost their fear of people.
T loved Mami's pound cake tonight, which made mami very happy indeed...And that's the news. Updates as time allows...
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Soccer and Other Things
Except that there are not other things in this post. They will have to wait - I just spent an hour on the phone with my sister. Cost me nothing, but kept this from being written for a good while. (Damn you, Skype! Damn you and your free, irresistible Jetson-like wiles...!!)
Two games this weekend, one yesterday and one today, both in Williamstown at the elementary school. Yesterday's first: When we arrived for warmups, the Southern Berkshire team was jogging around the field in a tight crowd, seeming to surround the Williamstown Strikers as they stretched. Even as I approached the field form the parking lot a good 100 yards away, I could tell they were big kids. And the word on the street was that there was not a single third grader on the squad. All of them at least 9, some of them 10, and all of them huge. Their coach stalked back and forth with his arms crossed, watching them jog. He seemed very serious indeed.
As I unfolded our chairs on the sidelines, I chatted with the mother of Jay, the Strikers' main goalie, who'd been there a while. And she said that while they were stretching, the So Berkshire coach had paced back and forth in front of his team slowly, demanding silence as he tried to focus them for the match. One quote she overheard: "The first time you're out of position, I'll warn you. The second time, you'll sit, and it will be for a good little while." We looked sidelong at each other and raised our eyebrows. This might be an intense day.
But I argued for optimism. "They're bigger," I said, "but I know for a fact they aren't faster. There's just no way." Q, Alex, Brady and Sam D have to be the top 4 runners in their grade, and they're probably faster than the entire grade above them. I was nervous for the boys, but I had a good feeling.
By virtue of their having been standing together near midfield when the ref called for the captains, Q and Alex were appointed to represent the strikers and marched to the center. The Southern Berkshire captains were a head taller, and both dark of hair and curly, looking down at Q and Alex, both short-haired blondies. This was the way the game would be, it seemed: Size, strength, experience, versus Williamstown's yellow-headed Tasmanian Devil-style swarmers. The coin was tossed, and Williamstown would take the first possession.
The game opened up with a very quick goal - by the Strikers. Sammy D charged through their entire collective defense for a solo run and beat the keeper squarely on the very first possession. Jubilation on the part of the Strikers, some of whom had been feeling a bit intimidated before the game. And one of whom, Q, remained so even after the quick goal. He wasn't himself - a lot of standing around and looking, a lot of shirt-holding (his own) and grimacing in a withdrawn sort of hunker - he watched players take the ball right past him, watched his teammates launch attacks and not think to go with them...Coach Foehl would cry, "Q! You are a forward!", as Q stood motionless near his own net and folded his shirt edge into itself over and over, seemingly deaf. It was very frustrating to watch, and I found myself trying to shake him out of it verbally. Never a good move - I come off as loud and pushy, and Q never reacts well to it. But it was like a compulsive need to scratch an itch - despite knowing it will only make things worse, I could not stop myself. "Q! Despertate!" ("Wake up!") "Q! Sos el DEFENSOR ahora! Paralo!" ("You're the DEFENDER now! Stop him!) Etc. Janneke tried to shush me, and I managed to keep more of a lid on it than at previous games, but I was absolutely squirming. He was stuck in second gear; he just wasn't himself, and his team needed him.
To complete their image as the heavies, Southern berkshire's coach loudly complained to a ref about a call in the first half. Having already warned the Baddies (probably not their nickname) about playing the ball rather than the man, about knocking people over on purpose, and having reminded one of their players about this not twenty seconds previous, she called one of them for sending Eli sprawling, and awarded a free kick to the Strikers. Which caused their coach to throw his hands in the air and shout, "HE GOT THE BALL!!!" And the ref, a former student of mine at BArT, held up one finger to him and said "Whoah. Stop." He continued, and she marched over and told him (as she recounted to us at halftime) that she would red card him if this continued. He got quieter and quieter as the reality of what it would be like to be known as "the guy who got red-carded at a 3rd-and-fourth-grade soccer game" ("by a girl" probably figuring in as well) became clearer and clearer.
But even without the rough stuff, So. Berkshire is formidable and skilled. Very soon it was 1-1, and then 2-1, So Berkshire taking the lead. Q was subbed out and spoken to by the coaches. "Q," as they told me later they'd said, "we do notice when you aren't playing like yourself. You're not running like we know you can run! Come on, pal! We need you!" And after that pep talk and a bit of time to blow, he went back in.
He was probably in for a minute before Sam D stole the ball from an oncoming So. Berkshire player deep in the Strikers' end, and looked for a place to send it. Q threw up his arm and called for the ball, and Sam sent it right to his foot.
Honestly, I think that at that moment, instinct took over and simply banished his jitters to the back of his mind, because he settled the ball and turned and accelerated to the goal like the Q I've seen so many times, racing past two defenders, never letting the ball get out beyond his grasp, and firing it into the upper right corner for a goal. He charged across the goal and back up the right side of the field, fists clenched and snarling, shouting primally and looking victorious, furiously satisfied, and vindicated. I was on my knees in front of my lawn chair, both fists in the air, roaring along with the other parents, who were, pretty much to a man, not embarrassing themselves to nearly the same extent.
It was a great, great goal. All speed and skill and quick reactions, ended with a calm and surgical strike right where it needed to be. But the sad thing is that I don't believe that he, as he charged and cheered and gnashed his winner's teeth, was happy.
The rest of the game he was again fairly zombie-like, with occasional bursts of attentiveness and speed. And he did contribute some very solid stuff, helping make it so that, after falling behind 2-5, Williamstown rallied and tied it, and the game ended. A huge victory, really, which should bolster the kids' confidence for the rubber match (next week already), and if their fastest player is on his game, they might actually march down there and come out with a win.
Q seemed happy afterwards, but I suspect he was mostly glad it was over. He loves to win, and to be able to say that he's on an undefeated team, but the actual business of being important, of walking under the weight of that responsibility, of taking on the knowledge that if they're going to win, it's partly up to him, of looking the opposing team in the eye (well, the chest) and not flinching - that's something he's not quite as ready for as some of his teammates. He's as talented as just about any of them, but confidence-wise, he's just not there yet.
I vowed not to call out to him at today's game, and even bought myself gum (which I ordinarily never chew) as a physical reminder at all times to be aware of my mouth. But he was zombie-like again to start, and while I was more successful in restraining myself today than I was yesterday, I still said a few too many things...Not shouting at him, not berating him, just reminding. But I must stop - it isn't my job. It's the coaches' job, and they actually stand a chance of making him hear them. I stand none.
Q scored the Strikers' second goal, another breakaway where the hapless defenders dropped farther and farther behind him as he ran and left him all alone with the goalie, who really stood no chance. And despite some more extended bouts of standing around, he snapped completely into "athlete" mode for the last fifteen minutes or so of the game, which had turned into a bit of a laugher, and must have fired four more shots on goal. None went in, unfortunately, one careening off the crossbar and a couple of others either going into the goalie or wide, but he was dominating that end of the field, making clever plays. (Two come to mind: A beautiful cross to the center when he got clogged up on the left side after a long run, which rolled to a tantalizing stop exactly where Q's teammates should have been before the keeper picked it up because no one had gone with him to support him. And, secondly: After sending a shot wide and bringing about a goal kick, Q, who had noticed that the keeper almost always kicked it straight ahead on goal kicks, hid behind the ref and streaked out to intercept the pass just as the keeper kicked it). He was simply, easily outrunning absolutely everybody down there, and seemingly never tiring out. So it was an improvement over yesterday.
But what kills me is how he could absolutely dominate like that all the time, but for a desire to do so, and a bone-level belief, not only that he can, but that he should.
"That's who he is right now," Janneke reminds me gently. "He feels it sometimes, and sometimes he doesn't. And that's OK."
Why is she so much smarter than I am...?
Two games this weekend, one yesterday and one today, both in Williamstown at the elementary school. Yesterday's first: When we arrived for warmups, the Southern Berkshire team was jogging around the field in a tight crowd, seeming to surround the Williamstown Strikers as they stretched. Even as I approached the field form the parking lot a good 100 yards away, I could tell they were big kids. And the word on the street was that there was not a single third grader on the squad. All of them at least 9, some of them 10, and all of them huge. Their coach stalked back and forth with his arms crossed, watching them jog. He seemed very serious indeed.
As I unfolded our chairs on the sidelines, I chatted with the mother of Jay, the Strikers' main goalie, who'd been there a while. And she said that while they were stretching, the So Berkshire coach had paced back and forth in front of his team slowly, demanding silence as he tried to focus them for the match. One quote she overheard: "The first time you're out of position, I'll warn you. The second time, you'll sit, and it will be for a good little while." We looked sidelong at each other and raised our eyebrows. This might be an intense day.
But I argued for optimism. "They're bigger," I said, "but I know for a fact they aren't faster. There's just no way." Q, Alex, Brady and Sam D have to be the top 4 runners in their grade, and they're probably faster than the entire grade above them. I was nervous for the boys, but I had a good feeling.
By virtue of their having been standing together near midfield when the ref called for the captains, Q and Alex were appointed to represent the strikers and marched to the center. The Southern Berkshire captains were a head taller, and both dark of hair and curly, looking down at Q and Alex, both short-haired blondies. This was the way the game would be, it seemed: Size, strength, experience, versus Williamstown's yellow-headed Tasmanian Devil-style swarmers. The coin was tossed, and Williamstown would take the first possession.
The game opened up with a very quick goal - by the Strikers. Sammy D charged through their entire collective defense for a solo run and beat the keeper squarely on the very first possession. Jubilation on the part of the Strikers, some of whom had been feeling a bit intimidated before the game. And one of whom, Q, remained so even after the quick goal. He wasn't himself - a lot of standing around and looking, a lot of shirt-holding (his own) and grimacing in a withdrawn sort of hunker - he watched players take the ball right past him, watched his teammates launch attacks and not think to go with them...Coach Foehl would cry, "Q! You are a forward!", as Q stood motionless near his own net and folded his shirt edge into itself over and over, seemingly deaf. It was very frustrating to watch, and I found myself trying to shake him out of it verbally. Never a good move - I come off as loud and pushy, and Q never reacts well to it. But it was like a compulsive need to scratch an itch - despite knowing it will only make things worse, I could not stop myself. "Q! Despertate!" ("Wake up!") "Q! Sos el DEFENSOR ahora! Paralo!" ("You're the DEFENDER now! Stop him!) Etc. Janneke tried to shush me, and I managed to keep more of a lid on it than at previous games, but I was absolutely squirming. He was stuck in second gear; he just wasn't himself, and his team needed him.
To complete their image as the heavies, Southern berkshire's coach loudly complained to a ref about a call in the first half. Having already warned the Baddies (probably not their nickname) about playing the ball rather than the man, about knocking people over on purpose, and having reminded one of their players about this not twenty seconds previous, she called one of them for sending Eli sprawling, and awarded a free kick to the Strikers. Which caused their coach to throw his hands in the air and shout, "HE GOT THE BALL!!!" And the ref, a former student of mine at BArT, held up one finger to him and said "Whoah. Stop." He continued, and she marched over and told him (as she recounted to us at halftime) that she would red card him if this continued. He got quieter and quieter as the reality of what it would be like to be known as "the guy who got red-carded at a 3rd-and-fourth-grade soccer game" ("by a girl" probably figuring in as well) became clearer and clearer.
But even without the rough stuff, So. Berkshire is formidable and skilled. Very soon it was 1-1, and then 2-1, So Berkshire taking the lead. Q was subbed out and spoken to by the coaches. "Q," as they told me later they'd said, "we do notice when you aren't playing like yourself. You're not running like we know you can run! Come on, pal! We need you!" And after that pep talk and a bit of time to blow, he went back in.
He was probably in for a minute before Sam D stole the ball from an oncoming So. Berkshire player deep in the Strikers' end, and looked for a place to send it. Q threw up his arm and called for the ball, and Sam sent it right to his foot.
Honestly, I think that at that moment, instinct took over and simply banished his jitters to the back of his mind, because he settled the ball and turned and accelerated to the goal like the Q I've seen so many times, racing past two defenders, never letting the ball get out beyond his grasp, and firing it into the upper right corner for a goal. He charged across the goal and back up the right side of the field, fists clenched and snarling, shouting primally and looking victorious, furiously satisfied, and vindicated. I was on my knees in front of my lawn chair, both fists in the air, roaring along with the other parents, who were, pretty much to a man, not embarrassing themselves to nearly the same extent.
It was a great, great goal. All speed and skill and quick reactions, ended with a calm and surgical strike right where it needed to be. But the sad thing is that I don't believe that he, as he charged and cheered and gnashed his winner's teeth, was happy.
The rest of the game he was again fairly zombie-like, with occasional bursts of attentiveness and speed. And he did contribute some very solid stuff, helping make it so that, after falling behind 2-5, Williamstown rallied and tied it, and the game ended. A huge victory, really, which should bolster the kids' confidence for the rubber match (next week already), and if their fastest player is on his game, they might actually march down there and come out with a win.
Q seemed happy afterwards, but I suspect he was mostly glad it was over. He loves to win, and to be able to say that he's on an undefeated team, but the actual business of being important, of walking under the weight of that responsibility, of taking on the knowledge that if they're going to win, it's partly up to him, of looking the opposing team in the eye (well, the chest) and not flinching - that's something he's not quite as ready for as some of his teammates. He's as talented as just about any of them, but confidence-wise, he's just not there yet.
I vowed not to call out to him at today's game, and even bought myself gum (which I ordinarily never chew) as a physical reminder at all times to be aware of my mouth. But he was zombie-like again to start, and while I was more successful in restraining myself today than I was yesterday, I still said a few too many things...Not shouting at him, not berating him, just reminding. But I must stop - it isn't my job. It's the coaches' job, and they actually stand a chance of making him hear them. I stand none.
Q scored the Strikers' second goal, another breakaway where the hapless defenders dropped farther and farther behind him as he ran and left him all alone with the goalie, who really stood no chance. And despite some more extended bouts of standing around, he snapped completely into "athlete" mode for the last fifteen minutes or so of the game, which had turned into a bit of a laugher, and must have fired four more shots on goal. None went in, unfortunately, one careening off the crossbar and a couple of others either going into the goalie or wide, but he was dominating that end of the field, making clever plays. (Two come to mind: A beautiful cross to the center when he got clogged up on the left side after a long run, which rolled to a tantalizing stop exactly where Q's teammates should have been before the keeper picked it up because no one had gone with him to support him. And, secondly: After sending a shot wide and bringing about a goal kick, Q, who had noticed that the keeper almost always kicked it straight ahead on goal kicks, hid behind the ref and streaked out to intercept the pass just as the keeper kicked it). He was simply, easily outrunning absolutely everybody down there, and seemingly never tiring out. So it was an improvement over yesterday.
But what kills me is how he could absolutely dominate like that all the time, but for a desire to do so, and a bone-level belief, not only that he can, but that he should.
"That's who he is right now," Janneke reminds me gently. "He feels it sometimes, and sometimes he doesn't. And that's OK."
Why is she so much smarter than I am...?
Sunday, September 21, 2008
T Strokes a Wild Animal Under Parental Supervision
Hello, and welcome to a quick weekend update. I write now because later in the day, i will have no time - there will be correcting to be done, as well as a Packer game to watch. And Q has a soccer game in Lee today (50 minutes away) at 4:00, so that will effectively kill our mid-to-late afternoon. And so it's probably now or never.
And we have breaking news! Yesterday, as I mowed the front lawn, Janneke came running from the back yard to tell me that some kind of hawk had bashed itself against our picture window. "Can't be a hawk," I said, and moved to the back yard.
I was right, turns out. It wasn't a hawk. It was a falcon. Here's what he looked like at first:
I sat down in the grass next to him, and took some pictures, of course, but also took care to shade his eyes, since he didn't seem like he could close them. He was breathing, and moving his beak somewhat, and slowly folding his wings - actually, the wings were probably just collapsing back into the folded position because of gravity. He was out just about as cold as a bird can be. After a couple of minutes, he started to come around more and more, to blink more regularly, and to raise his head and look around groggily. I knew from my days watching ER that the ability to move the head meant his neck wasn't broken, which was good. Here's a closeup:
T came and sat with me and sat on my lap, and we used our time as his human shade trees to talk about him - how his talons are for grasping birds, and his beak is sharp and hooked so he can tear the meat off them once he's killed them. She noticed his stripes, the gentle stripe along his eyebrow...Then it ocurred to me that while he was zonked, we could consult every possible angle in my bird book and determine what it was. I sent T in to ask Mami to send it out with her, while I kept guard against the sun and against the neighbor's cat.
T trooped back out with the book, and we determined that it was a merlin, or pigeon-hawk. Their range doesn't appear to include New England at all, but in the accompanying paragraph it said "Northern New England, rarely". So we were allowed.
After a bit more, we rolled him over onto his stomach - seemed like an easier position from which to stand up, which, given the way he was following my hand with his eyes, he was going to want to do soon. He didn't resist or panic - just accepted the whole business with admirable poise. T got to stroke his tail feathers, and I dared to venture a little farther north and feel the top of his head. Nice and hard, no blood - he seemed fine, just stunned. Probably five more minutes, and then he stood:
Utterly gorgeous. He was still following my hand when I moved it in front of him, but still seemed just shy of sufficiently present to realize that this was not a circumstance in which, evolutionarily, it would be advantageous for him to be. As it turned out in the end, Hobie hurried things along. He was snuffing and sniffing ever closer to the bird, and I tried to call him off, but realized for the thousandth time that he is almost completely deaf. My last shout as he approached the bird, coupled with my lunge to try to shove him back, snapped the bird his senses, and he leapt up and flew quite skillfully over our woodpile, across the fence, and around toward the trees at the back or our neighbor's yard, where he tried to land, but didn't quite make it and fluttered to the ground. And so our chapter in his adventure ended.
It occurs to me now that he was still in danger back there from cats, but fear not: around supper time, we saw him perched on the neighbor's fence, probably still nursing a headache and recovering his strength. Mark Brandriss, our friend from up the road, told us that in his 35 years or so of avid bird watching, he's seen one merlin. So we feel pretty lucky.
Though the lucky stuff waited until after noon to happen. I went squirrel hunting again Saturday morning, and spent almost four hours in the woods and saw absolutely nothing. It's public land near Williamstown, open to hunting, but I swear, that entire mountain (which I summitted) has not a single oak tree. At the top I did find a lot of berry bushes, and accompanying bear scat, but that was the end of my excitement. Pretty good exercise, though.
And of course there's this picture to share with you:
Why? I don't know - taunting you, I guess. Because we get to look at that every day. (Unfortunately, some times, like when she's in a panic for the tenth time because the scary part of "The Neverending Story" is coming, we also get to listen.)
And we have breaking news! Yesterday, as I mowed the front lawn, Janneke came running from the back yard to tell me that some kind of hawk had bashed itself against our picture window. "Can't be a hawk," I said, and moved to the back yard.
I was right, turns out. It wasn't a hawk. It was a falcon. Here's what he looked like at first:
I sat down in the grass next to him, and took some pictures, of course, but also took care to shade his eyes, since he didn't seem like he could close them. He was breathing, and moving his beak somewhat, and slowly folding his wings - actually, the wings were probably just collapsing back into the folded position because of gravity. He was out just about as cold as a bird can be. After a couple of minutes, he started to come around more and more, to blink more regularly, and to raise his head and look around groggily. I knew from my days watching ER that the ability to move the head meant his neck wasn't broken, which was good. Here's a closeup:
T came and sat with me and sat on my lap, and we used our time as his human shade trees to talk about him - how his talons are for grasping birds, and his beak is sharp and hooked so he can tear the meat off them once he's killed them. She noticed his stripes, the gentle stripe along his eyebrow...Then it ocurred to me that while he was zonked, we could consult every possible angle in my bird book and determine what it was. I sent T in to ask Mami to send it out with her, while I kept guard against the sun and against the neighbor's cat.
T trooped back out with the book, and we determined that it was a merlin, or pigeon-hawk. Their range doesn't appear to include New England at all, but in the accompanying paragraph it said "Northern New England, rarely". So we were allowed.
After a bit more, we rolled him over onto his stomach - seemed like an easier position from which to stand up, which, given the way he was following my hand with his eyes, he was going to want to do soon. He didn't resist or panic - just accepted the whole business with admirable poise. T got to stroke his tail feathers, and I dared to venture a little farther north and feel the top of his head. Nice and hard, no blood - he seemed fine, just stunned. Probably five more minutes, and then he stood:
Utterly gorgeous. He was still following my hand when I moved it in front of him, but still seemed just shy of sufficiently present to realize that this was not a circumstance in which, evolutionarily, it would be advantageous for him to be. As it turned out in the end, Hobie hurried things along. He was snuffing and sniffing ever closer to the bird, and I tried to call him off, but realized for the thousandth time that he is almost completely deaf. My last shout as he approached the bird, coupled with my lunge to try to shove him back, snapped the bird his senses, and he leapt up and flew quite skillfully over our woodpile, across the fence, and around toward the trees at the back or our neighbor's yard, where he tried to land, but didn't quite make it and fluttered to the ground. And so our chapter in his adventure ended.
It occurs to me now that he was still in danger back there from cats, but fear not: around supper time, we saw him perched on the neighbor's fence, probably still nursing a headache and recovering his strength. Mark Brandriss, our friend from up the road, told us that in his 35 years or so of avid bird watching, he's seen one merlin. So we feel pretty lucky.
Though the lucky stuff waited until after noon to happen. I went squirrel hunting again Saturday morning, and spent almost four hours in the woods and saw absolutely nothing. It's public land near Williamstown, open to hunting, but I swear, that entire mountain (which I summitted) has not a single oak tree. At the top I did find a lot of berry bushes, and accompanying bear scat, but that was the end of my excitement. Pretty good exercise, though.
And of course there's this picture to share with you:
Why? I don't know - taunting you, I guess. Because we get to look at that every day. (Unfortunately, some times, like when she's in a panic for the tenth time because the scary part of "The Neverending Story" is coming, we also get to listen.)
Thursday, September 18, 2008
The Rodent Slayer
Just have to tell you this quick:
Q and I went on his first hunt last Saturday. We drove to Adams, where I went deer hunting last year, and pulled out Dad's .22 rifle that he bought when he was in grade school 70 years ago. With hooded sweatshirts to ward off the mosquitoes, we marched into the woods to hunt squirrels, for which the season had opened on September 8th.
I had already briefed Q on how it works: walk a ways, stop, listen. Since there are still so many leaves on the trees, they'd be harder to see, and we would certianly hear them before we could see them. Especially on a day like Saturday - cool, with wet branches, but no rain. Just some fog. Every time they moved, they set the rain to falling from the branches.
We walked for probably ten minutes before we heard our first one, and split up to try to come at it from two sides. Q was very excited about our hand gestures back and forth - we tried to maintain a pretty silent presence, so as not to spook the little critters unnecessarily. And it worked - we trooped right up under the tree where the squirrel was doing its business, and I began to maneuver for a shot.
Q watched for the squirrel and alerted me every time he caught a glimpse; I followed his lead and eventually got a decent look. Probably forty feet up, straight above us, more or less - he stopped moving, and I fired on him, center mass.
He dropped to earth as limp and as dead as could be. As he fell, Q said "Whoa!", and I couldn't help but release a "Ha! Viste eso?" Both were still echoing in the air when the squirrel landed against the tree, caught in the light brambles there.
We examined it. I had caught it right in the belly, and it had exited high out its back. I imagine the sudden drop in blood pressure had done it in. Q was most fascinated by how soft its paws were - they have knobby ridges on the undersides of their paws, tough and soft at the same time, each one protruding outward and riding underneath the curving claw above it. It surprised me - seemed almost like the pad would prevent the claw from catching on the bark. We talked about that a while.
"I feel bad for him," Q said. I looked over at him, and he was still smiling, hands on his knees, content in the ambiguity. Caught himself on the fence between pride and celebration, and the empathy and respect he's always felt for animals. A poignant moment best not marred by any paternal yammering. So I let the emotions ring and hang in the air, and didn't interrupt.
After a few seconds, he said, "Podemos ver adentro?"
So the cleaning began. I really only split it up the middle and removed the organs, which we inspected. Intestines, stomach, heart, lungs, etc. Left the skin on to keep the meat clean, slipped it into the bag I wore across my hips, and on we went, chuckling with our success, listening for more.
Probably half an hour later, we were standing under where we had recently heard movement, and the wait was getting long. I said to Q, "Well, he's not moving. But we know he's here - we heard him. So before we move on, I'm going to see if I can provoke him. I'm going to make a sound like a squirrel, and if this is his territory, he won't like it. Let's see if I can fool him." And I made taut smooching sounds, long and high, in my best imitation of a squirrel call.
A red squirrel immediately sprinted straight down the trunk of a pine tree not twenty feet away from us, claws rattling on the bark as he came. He got four feet off the ground and leapt for us, landing on a downed branch, teeth bared and tail bristling - which was when he realized what he was looking at. I didn't see his facial expression - he turned too fast for that, floundering not to lose his balance, and sprang back to the trunk to race back up as fast as he had come down. Q and I laughed and laughed. Not willing to shoot squirrels quite that small, and unaware of its legality in any case, we spared him and turned back to the woods to look for other prey, Q firmly convinced that I am a forest Jedi.
Saw two more, but never got a good shot. And then we went home. Where we skinned and boiled our prize, and roasted him on the grill beside sausages that very same evening. Absolutely delicious.
I will be doing that again, friends. With a little bit of luck, it will be with Q. But failing that, I'm going out myself. I haven't felt this refreshed and grounded in a long time.
Other updates as events dictate...
Q and I went on his first hunt last Saturday. We drove to Adams, where I went deer hunting last year, and pulled out Dad's .22 rifle that he bought when he was in grade school 70 years ago. With hooded sweatshirts to ward off the mosquitoes, we marched into the woods to hunt squirrels, for which the season had opened on September 8th.
I had already briefed Q on how it works: walk a ways, stop, listen. Since there are still so many leaves on the trees, they'd be harder to see, and we would certianly hear them before we could see them. Especially on a day like Saturday - cool, with wet branches, but no rain. Just some fog. Every time they moved, they set the rain to falling from the branches.
We walked for probably ten minutes before we heard our first one, and split up to try to come at it from two sides. Q was very excited about our hand gestures back and forth - we tried to maintain a pretty silent presence, so as not to spook the little critters unnecessarily. And it worked - we trooped right up under the tree where the squirrel was doing its business, and I began to maneuver for a shot.
Q watched for the squirrel and alerted me every time he caught a glimpse; I followed his lead and eventually got a decent look. Probably forty feet up, straight above us, more or less - he stopped moving, and I fired on him, center mass.
He dropped to earth as limp and as dead as could be. As he fell, Q said "Whoa!", and I couldn't help but release a "Ha! Viste eso?" Both were still echoing in the air when the squirrel landed against the tree, caught in the light brambles there.
We examined it. I had caught it right in the belly, and it had exited high out its back. I imagine the sudden drop in blood pressure had done it in. Q was most fascinated by how soft its paws were - they have knobby ridges on the undersides of their paws, tough and soft at the same time, each one protruding outward and riding underneath the curving claw above it. It surprised me - seemed almost like the pad would prevent the claw from catching on the bark. We talked about that a while.
"I feel bad for him," Q said. I looked over at him, and he was still smiling, hands on his knees, content in the ambiguity. Caught himself on the fence between pride and celebration, and the empathy and respect he's always felt for animals. A poignant moment best not marred by any paternal yammering. So I let the emotions ring and hang in the air, and didn't interrupt.
After a few seconds, he said, "Podemos ver adentro?"
So the cleaning began. I really only split it up the middle and removed the organs, which we inspected. Intestines, stomach, heart, lungs, etc. Left the skin on to keep the meat clean, slipped it into the bag I wore across my hips, and on we went, chuckling with our success, listening for more.
Probably half an hour later, we were standing under where we had recently heard movement, and the wait was getting long. I said to Q, "Well, he's not moving. But we know he's here - we heard him. So before we move on, I'm going to see if I can provoke him. I'm going to make a sound like a squirrel, and if this is his territory, he won't like it. Let's see if I can fool him." And I made taut smooching sounds, long and high, in my best imitation of a squirrel call.
A red squirrel immediately sprinted straight down the trunk of a pine tree not twenty feet away from us, claws rattling on the bark as he came. He got four feet off the ground and leapt for us, landing on a downed branch, teeth bared and tail bristling - which was when he realized what he was looking at. I didn't see his facial expression - he turned too fast for that, floundering not to lose his balance, and sprang back to the trunk to race back up as fast as he had come down. Q and I laughed and laughed. Not willing to shoot squirrels quite that small, and unaware of its legality in any case, we spared him and turned back to the woods to look for other prey, Q firmly convinced that I am a forest Jedi.
Saw two more, but never got a good shot. And then we went home. Where we skinned and boiled our prize, and roasted him on the grill beside sausages that very same evening. Absolutely delicious.
I will be doing that again, friends. With a little bit of luck, it will be with Q. But failing that, I'm going out myself. I haven't felt this refreshed and grounded in a long time.
Other updates as events dictate...
Monday, September 8, 2008
Header and Footer
Well, the boys were intimidated Sunday afternoon. The Pittsfield side wasn't especially numerous, but they were a Pittsfield side - everybody knows what that means. (I didn't, but apparently the Williamstown Strikers had access to information from other sources.) Warm-ups went well, and then the match began.
Q was nervous and a bit sluggish at the beginning, slipping into his watching mode, but Sammy D opened up the scoring for the Strikers, and thereafter, Q was back to being the wolverine he'd been Saturday. He was stellar on defense, took a number of corner kicks, threw in from the sideline like a pro, and after Pittsfield tied things up, he scored Williamstown's second goal. Not a strong shot, but just beyond the reach of the goalie after a nice, quick run up the middle. He did his usual celebratory sprint away from the area with his arms out to the side like wings and the number 1 on each hand, and then went back to business.
A business that included a steal over in the right corner on Pittsfield's end, and a nifty move to shake off a defender. Now there was another defender, and the goalie, between him and the net, so he lobbed a cross over the goalkeeper's head.
To Brady, who HEADED IT IN.
I went absolutely bananas on the sideline. Talked to Brady's Dad later on at a Williams function, and he couldn't say enough about the whole play - the set-up, the headiness, the execution. "You just don't see that in U-10 socer," he said. Nice, nice afternoon. Pittsfield would score one more time, so in the end it wound up 3-2. But who's counting. AND - Quin played goalie for the tail end of the game! Which I was sure would end badly, but he did super well, always in position and always hanging his punts high and dropping them into good positions. I have to say, I think he's better suited out in the field, since nobody can keep up with him, but hey, I'm not coaching. Thank God.
We drove down and back with Alex's family, and I learned a lot about the business of being a builder. Interesting folks. Generous, too - they bought Q an ice cream after the game. (Not just Q, though. They also bought for their own children.)
Back to work!!
Q was nervous and a bit sluggish at the beginning, slipping into his watching mode, but Sammy D opened up the scoring for the Strikers, and thereafter, Q was back to being the wolverine he'd been Saturday. He was stellar on defense, took a number of corner kicks, threw in from the sideline like a pro, and after Pittsfield tied things up, he scored Williamstown's second goal. Not a strong shot, but just beyond the reach of the goalie after a nice, quick run up the middle. He did his usual celebratory sprint away from the area with his arms out to the side like wings and the number 1 on each hand, and then went back to business.
A business that included a steal over in the right corner on Pittsfield's end, and a nifty move to shake off a defender. Now there was another defender, and the goalie, between him and the net, so he lobbed a cross over the goalkeeper's head.
To Brady, who HEADED IT IN.
I went absolutely bananas on the sideline. Talked to Brady's Dad later on at a Williams function, and he couldn't say enough about the whole play - the set-up, the headiness, the execution. "You just don't see that in U-10 socer," he said. Nice, nice afternoon. Pittsfield would score one more time, so in the end it wound up 3-2. But who's counting. AND - Quin played goalie for the tail end of the game! Which I was sure would end badly, but he did super well, always in position and always hanging his punts high and dropping them into good positions. I have to say, I think he's better suited out in the field, since nobody can keep up with him, but hey, I'm not coaching. Thank God.
We drove down and back with Alex's family, and I learned a lot about the business of being a builder. Interesting folks. Generous, too - they bought Q an ice cream after the game. (Not just Q, though. They also bought for their own children.)
Back to work!!
Saturday, September 6, 2008
El futbol
Hi, sports fans - Well, Q has now donned the colors of his tribe and sallied forth to do honorable battle with rivals from another valley on the rectangular field of death. He was pretty nervous going in, but excited - he spent twenty minutes at home before we left for the game doing a kickabout in the front yard, working through his feelings. And not long afterward, he trotted out as a defenseman against the Wildcats of Lee, Massachusetts.
Lee is a football town, really, and these were probably not their best collection of athletes. A couple of real stellar players, but overall, the Strikers of Williamstown were too much for them, and the scoring started early and kept a feverish pace throughout. Lee did muster a couple of goals, and played valiantly and with admirable sportsmanship, but Williamstown scored probably triple the number of goals. Though officially, no one kept score. (Unofficially, Alex's dad can tell you who took how many shots and scored how many goals, because he wrote it down in a notebook.)
Q opened up as a defender, and that seems likeliest to be his most natural position - at one point in the first half, someone sent a lovely cross just rolling happily across the front of the goal, and Q, who, had he taken two steps and poked, could have coaxed it across the line for the easiest score in recorded history, but he watched it roll past, and then it ocurred to him that he might have been able to get to it in time. Not looking like a goal-hungry player at that point. But whenever Lee threatened to make a break, Q sprinted from wherever he was on the field and chopped them down. Defense brings him to a boil when offense cannot.
But in the second half, the nerves had dissipated, and he took that game over. He scored twice, and probably took four other shots after looooong runs, typically up the sideline, but a couple of times through the middle. Parents around us were admiring his ball-handling skills as well as his speed, and one in particular - Jakob's dad - told me how impressed he was that Q will keep the ball going forward, keep control of it, but all the time be watching the defender, and as soon as the defender commits one way, zip!, Q goes the other. I swelled up like a balloon when I heard that one. It really was a great day - he looked like the Q of old, charging around, taking command without being told to. He took three or four corner kicks - not because anyone said "Q, take it," but because it felt natural and he walked up and did it. He had a grin on his face many, many times...Crushing the other team will do that for you. Tomorrow they play a team from Pittsfield. That might not go quite so well....
It was a hoot. Alex came over for a play date afterward, and the three of us ate lunch and yukked it up at Dunkin Donuts to celebrate the victory. (Janneke and T were off doing the shopping.)
Off to continue editing the family video. We're down to 30 minutes, 34 seconds - I have got to start getting a little more merciless with the cuts...
Lee is a football town, really, and these were probably not their best collection of athletes. A couple of real stellar players, but overall, the Strikers of Williamstown were too much for them, and the scoring started early and kept a feverish pace throughout. Lee did muster a couple of goals, and played valiantly and with admirable sportsmanship, but Williamstown scored probably triple the number of goals. Though officially, no one kept score. (Unofficially, Alex's dad can tell you who took how many shots and scored how many goals, because he wrote it down in a notebook.)
Q opened up as a defender, and that seems likeliest to be his most natural position - at one point in the first half, someone sent a lovely cross just rolling happily across the front of the goal, and Q, who, had he taken two steps and poked, could have coaxed it across the line for the easiest score in recorded history, but he watched it roll past, and then it ocurred to him that he might have been able to get to it in time. Not looking like a goal-hungry player at that point. But whenever Lee threatened to make a break, Q sprinted from wherever he was on the field and chopped them down. Defense brings him to a boil when offense cannot.
But in the second half, the nerves had dissipated, and he took that game over. He scored twice, and probably took four other shots after looooong runs, typically up the sideline, but a couple of times through the middle. Parents around us were admiring his ball-handling skills as well as his speed, and one in particular - Jakob's dad - told me how impressed he was that Q will keep the ball going forward, keep control of it, but all the time be watching the defender, and as soon as the defender commits one way, zip!, Q goes the other. I swelled up like a balloon when I heard that one. It really was a great day - he looked like the Q of old, charging around, taking command without being told to. He took three or four corner kicks - not because anyone said "Q, take it," but because it felt natural and he walked up and did it. He had a grin on his face many, many times...Crushing the other team will do that for you. Tomorrow they play a team from Pittsfield. That might not go quite so well....
It was a hoot. Alex came over for a play date afterward, and the three of us ate lunch and yukked it up at Dunkin Donuts to celebrate the victory. (Janneke and T were off doing the shopping.)
Off to continue editing the family video. We're down to 30 minutes, 34 seconds - I have got to start getting a little more merciless with the cuts...
Key Vocabulary.
So, we watched "The Ugly Dachshund" last night, on Sonja's recommendation, and had a nice family chuckle at this late-sixties Disney family classic about a Great Dane pup raised with a little of "Dashies", as they called them. And at one point, the couple that owns the dachshunds is dressing to go out to the theater, and the wife says, "Why don't we stay in?", handing her husband a glass of champagne and sliding in close to him, smiling meaningfully. He catches on and reciprocates her conspiratorial smile and hug, and says, "Oh, I see." And a kiss begins.
Q looks over at me and Janneke, nodding and smiling slyly, having made the connection. He jerked his thumb toward the screen, and said:
"He's gonna get drunk."
I am so glad he said "drunk".
Q looks over at me and Janneke, nodding and smiling slyly, having made the connection. He jerked his thumb toward the screen, and said:
"He's gonna get drunk."
I am so glad he said "drunk".
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