Today I'm grateful for Cate for bringing us a BOX of mangoes from the markets, and for beautiful evenings with cool breezes.

Relationships don't matter for boys

The ABC website ran a story last night about the life-long effects of bullying. It talks positively about the need to creating cultural change - to make it acceptable for kids to tell people about it in a more realistic way. I was a bit disappointed to see that they still weren't calling for much more encouragement for bystanders to report bullying, but then it was a pretty superficial article.

It was all a little dull really, until this bit:

"Our research has shown that in fact there are probably more females bullied then males, probably because males ride it out and they handle things in their particular way.

"The importance of having relationships with others is very, very important to a girl, and we're saying it's those things that are impacted the most, when bullying goes on."

Where to start? While I accept this might well be empirically correct, it's about as informative as reporting the most prevalent colour of T shirt worn by people who have been bullied. Do boys "handle things in their particular way" or are they just socialised to hide their reactions? Why are relationships more important for girls? Surely relationships should be just as important for boys.

Further on, the article describes the socially isolating effect of bullying on Chrstine O'Leary, a Wesley Mission employee. If girls suffer from this more than boys, does that tell us more about how socially isolated boys are to start with? Does this tell us something about why men score lower on measures of empathy than women?

The report claims that 70% of Australian adults have been bullied as kids, which resonates pretty well with my experience, so I've no reason to question it. Apart from the real need to stop bullying, there is also a need to understand how we are socialising our kids to deal with it here and now - after all it's affecting most of us. Boys are taught to be tough and ignore it, girls are taught to - I don't know, what are girls taught to do? The messages I keep seeing are just that if affects them badly. So I guess they are taught to fall apart. So we raise boys who distance themselves from everyone so that the bullying doesn't hurt so much, and girls who are taught that they are nothing without other people.

This becomes part of who we are and colours our view of personal responsibility. This is where the time honoured tradition of men spouting off about how they handled bullies by fighting back/stoically ignoring/being untouchable or whatever and therefore dismissing those who report bullying as weak, starts. No-one asks what those strategies cost those men. What are the real consequences of "handling things in their particular way"? Is it so universal that we see it as the "normal" traits of men - distant, angry, independent?

This is all mere speculation, but while people like Keith Garner report bullying in such a superficial way, we'll never know. In the meantime, I'll do my best to teach my kids to look out for bullying - I'll try to remember to ask explicitly, occasionally, if there is anyone at school who is being picked on, rather than just thinking about my kids' well-being. And I'll try to work out what the hell is the best way to negotiate being the target without being ripped apart or setting yourself apart.

Today I'm grateful that I live somewhere where thunder and lightening are entertainment (and damn good entertainment, at that) rather than a threat to thousands of hectares of bush.

Every Thursday evening I go bellydancing, because I love it and because it's pretty much the only form of dance that someone with no natural talent whatsoever can do with any success. We'll be performing at the Christmas party ("Get your jinglies jangling"), and this is the song we'll be performing to.

Here is the link if you can't see the embedded goodness

I saw our teacher dance to this years and years ago, and I still remember it. There is a lot to be said for dancing to a song that demands that no-one take it seriously. There is even more to be said for it when I shall be doing so the day after Mim's Christmas party....

Cot for sale

I am in possession of a rather lovely cot - made in the US and in surprisingly excellent condition given that 3 kids have used it. It belongs to my friend, but she doesn't need it back, so we'd like to send it to a new home.


It has a drop side that can be operated with one hand and one knee (you lift it slightly and push it in slightly at the bottom) which was a great improvement on my previous cot that needed two hands to drop the side. It has a heap of height settings, including a very high one for very little bubs.


It also has a handy dandy drawer underneath it which is both useful for storage and catching dropped dummies.

It still has all its instructions, which is something of a miracle considering it has lived in 4 houses, one of which was in a different country.

If you could use it, or you know someone who could, let me know. My friend would probably like a few bucks for it if the recipient can afford it, but a deserving home that's very short on cash could have it for free. I'll chuck in some linen too.

Crafty day reminder

This Friday is the next crafting day. Mim will be making jewellery, and I will be learning to unknit so that I can fix up the mistake I made last time. Tigtog is also threatening to crack out the cross stitch and one of the women from school may be there, pending domestic commitments.

I'm also committing to actually having some music cued up this time!

Charlie's storm protection theory

The storm hit last night while I was on my way home from Fisher Library, so Crash had to deal with the Charlie angst that usually ensues. I don't know what Crash actually said, all I got was this explanation this morning.

Daddy said that the trees would protect us from the storm, but that's not true because trees are made of wood. The trunks are made of wood and the branches are made of wood and that's not strong enough to stop the storm. But the storm can't get through the windows and doors, because there's an invisible wall that you can walk through, but it's strong enough and the storm can't get through it because it's too big.

I can't wait to hear his theories on the origin of the universe, or the nature of God.

Today I'm grateful for easy access to such things as paracetamol to make my 4yr old's fever of 39.2 deg C (102.6 F) a mild concern and irritation rather than a truly alarming event.

Anti-racism week - 2009

Last week was anti-racism week at Ben's school. I ranted about this last year, but a few new things have started to annoy me.

The example posters shown at school to provide inspiration have a common theme - we may be different on the outside, but we're all the same on the inside. This is pretty much the message in Mem Fox's Whoever You Are, from which I essentially stole last year's poster theme. However, Mem Fox's version is slightly less problematic, in that it specifies particular things that are the same - love, laughter, pain and so on.

But to just generally describe us as all the same on the inside - I have a problem with that. First of all, it still implies that we need to be the same to be equal - the different outside can be tolerated because the insides are the same. But also, it lays the foundation for the "I wouldn't do it, so anyone who does is inferior/evil/wrong" kind of argument that is so, so prevalent in justifications of racism, sexism, ... *ism.

This argument is often genuinely based in egalitarianism - when I've challenged people to defend why their own stance is the gold standard, they generally say it is because they aren't any better than anyone else, that all people are the same deep down - all the simplistic messages that are given to infants school kids about racism. Some people may be hiding behind these answers, but I'm convinced that quite a lot are not. The concept that people may be very different, and yet equal seems impossible to comprehend for many.

I'd rather see a celebration of difference week. In fact, I'd passionately rather see a celebration of difference week - there is so much more to be gained in so many aspects of children's lives from such a celebration.

More gardening

My wonderful husband let me sleep in this morning, so I wondered down stairs about 9:30am and headed straight out the front to start digging the Bloody Big Hole. I dug for a while and then Crash took over. After some significant time, this was the Bloody Big Hole.


Of course, once you have have a hole, you must fill it. We battled with removing the pot from the root ball for quite a while, before conceding defeat and cutting it off.


It's a shame, I was going to plant a citrus tree in the empty pot.

Tree finally went into the hole, and we straightened it as best we could. Following some random Canadian website on planting trees, we part filled the hole with dirt and then filled it with water. The whole process fascinated the kids, who loved the opportunity to play with dirt. Charlie was chief clod breaker uperer. Elissa (who didn't actually manage to get out of her pyjamas today) was in and on as much as dirt as she could possibly manage - with the doll, as you can see.


After this photo was taken she picked the doll up and said very seriously "Dolly, you're filthy!".

Crash made lunch while I filled the drained hole with all that dirt on the right, and voila! we have a tree.


When I drove home after a pleasant afternoon with jennifergearing, I was eagerly anticipating the new view of the tree, but was disappointed to realise just how much smaller it appears when you're not trying to pick it up.

While Crash was completing the BBH, I rescued the dug up plants from the back yard, who were all looking substantially worse for wear and planted them in the front garden. I don't know whether they'll survive, but they have more chance there than in a dodgy pot in the back yard. So the garden is a little less barren now.


The hose is trickle watering in all the new transplants.

Still on the to-do list:

• put edging around the tree and mulch the base of the tree
• plant some more herbs
• rip out the plant by the gate
• mow the lawn...