Matthew Dicks's Blog, page 350
April 3, 2015
One is the loneliest number, even if you’re an American Girl doll.
Our six year-old daughter wants another American Girl doll.
Given the price of these dolls, we said no. Her grandparents bought her the first doll, and her aunt and uncle gave her an American Girl doll baby, plus she has a hand-me-down baby from a friend.
When it comes to American Girl products, my daughter is set for life.
“You know, Mom,” Clara protested when she was told that there would not be a second doll. “One is the loneliest number.”
We have no idea where she gets this stuff.
April 2, 2015
Ladies: Leave my choice of winter clothing alone. I’M FINE.
Over the course of the last seven days, I have been scolded by three different people – all women – for wearing shorts. In each case, I was either heading to or from the gym, but I’ve also been known to wear shorts in cooler weather simply because they are comfortable and I don’t require the warmth of a pair of pants.
I was also repeatedly chided all winter long for wearing my winter coat of choice: a blue hoodie.
I own an actual winter coat. More than one, in fact. But with the exception of a few New England Patriots games, I wore a hoodie all winter long and was perfectly fine. Warm and toasty.
Except that wherever I went, friends and strangers – also only women – admonished me for not wearing something warmer. People at the grocery store and outside restaurants and in parking lots told me to put on something warmer. Stop being ridiculous. Act my age.
Many of them also warned me that I would catch a cold if I continued to dress this way, disabusing themselves of hundreds of years of germ theory and reverting back to a time before science when it was assumed that a cold was caused by the cold.
Honestly, I don’t understand this.
Who cares if I’m wearing a pair of gym shorts on a 38 degree day?
Why would anyone be concerned with my choice of outerwear on a winter afternoon?
How is what I wear in order to stay warm anyone’s business other than my own?
And why is this form of criticism exclusively female?
For the last year, I have attempted to avoid any negative comment about anyone’s physical appearance, regardless of their physical eccentricity. And I have become fairly adept – albeit a little smug – in doing so. In fact, I’ve reached a point where thoughts about a person’s physical appearance often fail to register as well.
When they do, I push them back, reminding myself of how petty and cruel and absolutely juvenile they are, even when said behind someone’s back.
I realize that scrubbing your mind and voice of all comments on physical appearance is a ridiculous goal, but can we at least agree these admonishments over seasonal appropriate clothing should be eliminated from our societal lexicon forever? If these women – and perhaps there are male critics out there, too, but I have yet to encounter one – want to go home and tell their loved ones about the man at the grocery store wearing shorts and a hoodie, fine.
They are heathen, unkempt trolls for doing so, but still. Who cares?
But why must they verbally reprimand me in public for not dressing to a standard that they feel is adequate?
I had a mother. She passed away in 2007. I miss her, but honestly, I’m fine. I don’t need any ladies – young or old – treating me like I ‘m a ten year-old boy in need of verbal reprimands about the warmth of the clothing that I’m wearing.
Even my mother didn’t do that.
Please leave me the hell alone. I’m fine. If I wasn’t, I’d put on a pair of pants and a warmer coat, jackass.
April 1, 2015
Little routines by little people that mean so much to me for reasons I can’t explain.
Every morning my son runs down to the hallway from his bedroom to this window at the top of the stairs and takes in the landscape of the day. He looks for sun or rain or on this particular morning – snow.
It’s not much. A simple routine by a two year old boy starting his day. But when I’m able to catch it, I’m so happy that I did.
Last week I caught it forever.
Resolution update: March
Each month I post the progress of my New Year’s resolutions here as a means of holding myself accountable. The following are the results through the month of February.
PERSONAL HEALTH
1. Don’t die.
Didn’t even come close to dying.
2. Lose 20 pounds.
I remain just one pound down. At this pace, I will miss this goal by a lot. It’s mostly been my inability to get to the gym regularly in March due to illness and scheduling.
3. Do at least 100 push-ups and 100 sit-ups five days a week.
Done. I’ve added a plank every morning as well.
4. Stop drinking soda from two-liter bottles.
I didn’t drink soda from a two-liter bottle in March, and my soda consumption remains cut by well over half. I’m also drinking more water than ever before.
5. Practice yoga at least five days a week.
I tried last week to restart my yoga routine after healing from an injury and realized that I could barely remember it. I’ll be meeting with my yoga instructor in April, I hope.
6. Learn to cook three good meals for my wife.
No progress
WRITING CAREER
7. Complete my sixth novel before the end of the summer 2015.
The book remains about half finished, and I am about to launch back into fiction, but for reasons that are complicated, I may actually be putting that half-finished novel aside temporarily and beginning a new one.
It’s crazy. I know
8. Complete my seventh novel.
This book remains about half finished as well.
9. Sell one children’s book to a publisher.
I have three books written and ready to go. I have three new ideas that I plan to work on in 2015. We will submit one or more of these books to editors at some point soon.
10. Sell a memoir to a publisher.
The memoir is written and is being polished now.
11. Sell a book of essays to a publisher.
My book of essays did not sell, but the responses that we received from editors were exceptionally positive. In a few cases, it was not a pass as much as a request that the book be reorganized and written slightly differently than it is currently constituted. I will do so. Fiction is now my main focus, but this remains a priority in 2015.
12. Complete a book proposal for a book on storytelling.
Progress continues.
13. Write a new screenplay.
I’m still revising my first screenplay based upon film agent’s notes. No progress on the new one.
14. Write 50 pages of a new memoir about the years of 1991-1993.
I have 25 badly written pages for this memoir that must be transformed into 50 good pages in 2015. No progress yet.
15. Write a musical for a summer camp
Excellent progress. It’s moving along well.
In addition, I completed revisions on the musical that my partner and I wrote last year. In the fall, it will be produced by a local theater company.
We also have interest in our first musical – a rock opera – from another local playhouse.
16. Publish at least one Op-Ed in a physical newspaper.
I published three more pieces in the Huffington Post last month.
12 Things Teachers Think But Can’t Always Say to Parents
Why “Your Child is Not As Gifted As You Think” Is the Worst Thing That a Teacher Can Say
Again, this is not a physical newspaper. Writing pieces for physical newspapers is part of the plan to launch my next novel, so this may happen in the fall if not before.
17. Submit one or more short stories to at least three publishing outlets.
No progress.
18. Select three behaviors that I am opposed to and adopt them for one week, then write about my experiences on the blog.
My first idea: Backing into a parking spot. I rightfully assume that anyone backing into a parking spot is a lunatic of the highest order. I shall spend a week backing into parking spots and see what wisdom I can glean.
I have not begun this experiment yet.
19. Build an author mailing list.
Third email sends today. Things are good. The job remains twofold:
Create engaging content that will keep readers interested.
Build my subscription base.
20. Build a new website for matthewdicks.com
Nearly finished. I will be migrating my blog and website over to the new website at some point in April.
If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you will open this blog one day in April and find an entirely new look. I hope you like.
STORYTELLING
21. Produce a total of eight Speak Up storytelling events.
Two down and six to go. We have two more shows scheduled in April, at both Real Art Ways and Connecticut College, and we have two new partnerships with local venues that we will be announcing soon.
22. Deliver my fourth TED Talk.
I will be delivering a TED Talk at Boston University in three days. I have also pitched talks to two other TEDx events in 2015 and await work.
23. Build a webs
ite for Speak Up.
Done! It’s a single page on my new author website, and it’s not nearly as robust as we want it to eventually be, but Speak Up finally has a webpage where you can find dates of events, ticket information, an opportunity to sign up for the mailing list, and more. You can find our webpage at speakupstorytelling.com.
24. Attend at least 10 Moth events with the intention of telling a story.
I performed in a Moth StorySLAM at Housing Works in New York and a GrandSLAM at The Somerville Theater in Somerville, MA, bringing my total number of Moth events in 2015 to four.
25. Win at least two Moth StorySLAMs.
I’ve competed in one StorySLAM in March, receiving the two highest scores of the night from two judging teams (9.6 and 9.4) and the lowest score of the night (7.9, which is also the lowest score I have ever received) from the third team, which landed me in second place. I still cannot understand what happened, and when I think about it, I still get a little upset.
26. Win a Moth GrandSLAM.
Like the February GrandSLAM in NYC (and six before it), I placed second in the March GrandSLAM in Boston. I was chosen to tell from second position, which is an exceptionally difficult spot to win from, but I was still in the lead when the seventh storyteller took the stage and beat me by a tenth of a point.
I compete in another GrandSLAM in NYC this month.
27. Launch at least one podcast.
The MacBook Pro has arrived, complete with GarageBand, which was critical to my podcasting efforts.
I have crossed over to the dark side, at least in terms of podcasting.
My website is nearly ready to receive podcasts.
This will happen soon.
NEW PROJECTS
28. Pitch at least three new projects to two smart people.
I pitched one of my projects to one person in January. No further progress.
29. Host at least one Shakespeare Circle.
Nothing scheduled yet.
MISCELLANEOUS
30. Enroll in the final class needed for certification as a high school English teacher.
No progress.
31. Set a new personal best in golf.
There are rumors that the golf course may open in April. .
32. Post my progress in terms of these resolutions on this blog on the first day of every month.
Done.
March 31, 2015
If the teacher tells you that your child is not gifted, it’s more likely that it’s the teacher who is not gifted.
The most common response to a piece I wrote last month entitled 12 Things Teachers Think But Can’t Always Say to Parents was a suggested addition to the list. It was phrased in many ways, oftentimes sarcastically, and it generally went something like this:
Your child is not as gifted as you think he or she is.
There was a reason I left this particular item off my list:
It’s stupid. It’s shortsighted and narrow minded. It’s unproductive. It’s adversarial. It’s not true.
This is not to say that I haven’t heard this sentiment expressed many times in my 17 years as a teacher. But whenever I hear a teacher express this idea, I push back immediately, and I push back hard, for three reasons.
1. Parents are supposed to think that their child is gifted.
It’s only natural for them to think more highly of their child than the rest of the world does. Their child is the most important thing in their life. They will invest more time, money, and energy into their child than anyone or anything before or after. It makes sense for them to believe that the person who they love the most in the world is gifted in some way.
And we all deserve to have someone in our lives who believes in us above all others. It should be our parents. They should be our champions. To think that parents should feel differently is short sighted and stupid.
2. Wouldn’t it be a better world if every teacher thought like parents and assumed that every student in their class was gifted in some way?
I’ve taught about 350 students in my 17 years as a teacher, and I have yet to meet a kid who I didn’t believe was gifted in one way or another.
In fact, some of my most accomplished students were the ones for whom learning came the hardest. Their gift was not intellect but effort – a willingness to do whatever it took to succeed.
Give me a student gifted in effort over a student gifted in intellect any day.
I assume that every one of my students is gifted, and this assumption has served me well. When a teacher sets remarkably high expectations and demands more from his students than ever before, students perform better. The research on this is irrefutable.
Yet history is littered with presumptuous, ignorant, and arrogant educators who assumed that their students wouldn’t amount to much and were later proven wrong.
Albert Einstein. Helen Keller. Robert Strenberg. Thomas Edison. Louis Pasteur. Enrico Caruso. Ludwig Beethoven. Leo Tolstoy. Louisa May Alcott.
Many more. Too numerous to count. Myself included.
Each of these men and women were told by teachers that they were hopeless, half-witted, and doomed to a lives of mediocrity.
It turns out that it was the teachers who were hopeless, half-witted, and mediocre.
As a teacher, why not err on the side of gifted? Why not assume the best? Expect the best. Demand the best. Give students the chance to shine by assuming that they can and will shine.
3. Why promote an adversarial relationship with parents?
If a parent thinks that their child is gifted, and you – for whatever reason – disagree, why not find some middle ground?
Yes, it’s entirely possible that your child is gifted, and if he begins working to his fullest potential, we may start to see more evidence of that. Let’s find a way to make that happen.
There’s no reason to quash a parent’s hopes and dreams for their child. The teacher-parent relationship is one of the best tools available in my teaching arsenal. When it is strong and trusting, learning increases. Behavior improves. But that relationship only exists because I understand how parents feel about their children, and I embrace those feelings.
Yes, your child is gifted. I’m not sure about the scope of that giftedness, but let’s get your child working as hard as possible and find out together.
That strikes me as a more productive and respectful position than the smarmy “You’re child isn’t as gifted as you think” response that so many teachers who responded to my initial piece seemed to default to.
Every child in my classroom is someone else’s whole world. I try to remember this at all times. When I do, it’s never too hard to see every child in my classroom as gifted in some way.
March 29, 2015
Students were required to listen to Ted Cruz – under threat of fines – which seems just plain mean. Also agonizing.
In case you didn’t hear, the students at Liberty University were required to attend Ted Cruz’s speech announcing his candidacy for President last week.
Failure to do so would have resulted in a fine of $10.
Even worse, when students attempted to leave after realizing that they were at a political rally, they were refused exit.
“I felt very acutely that I was being used as political bait today” sophomore Emily Foreman said on Monday. “I think our freedom of speech was hampered today when we weren’t allowed to leave.”
A slightly embarrassing launch to a dead-in-the-water Presidential campaign
Most important, you can’t make this stuff up.
Students were required to listen to Ted Cruz, which seems just plain mean. Also agonizing.
In case you didn’t hear, the students at Liberty University were required to attend Ted Cruz’s speech announcing his candidacy for President last week.
Failure to do so would have resulted in a fine of $10.
Even worse, when students attempted to leave after realizing that they were at a political rally, they were refused exit.
“I felt very acutely that I was being used as political bait today” sophomore Emily Foreman said on Monday. “I think our freedom of speech was hampered today when we weren’t allowed to leave.”
A slightly embarrassing launch to a dead-in-the-water Presidential campaign
Most important, you can’t make this stuff up.
14 Things That Annoy Me (and probably you)
1. People who live in the suburbs of a city but claim residence to that city
2. Drivers who fail to understand that “No Right on Red” really means “Be careful before making your perfectly legal right on red.”
3. Continuous discussions about body ailments and/or illnesses
4. Invitations to play stupid Facebook games
5. The recounting – word for word – of conversations that are clearly only interesting enough to warrant paraphrasing
6. Missing out on an argument or debate because I was a second too late or unaware of the proceedings
7. The massive stores of memory lost forever when a person dies
8. The almost universally incorrect use of the phrase “Begs the question”
9. The New Yorker way of saying “on line” instead of “in line”
10. The bizarre pride that some New Yorkers feel (and openly express) about saying “on line” instead of “in line”
11. Songs about specific people that are named after those specific people (Elton John’s Daniel, Journey’s Amanda, Eric Clapton’s Layla)
12. The muddy, brown, cold days between winter and spring
13. The rhetorical use of the question “Guess what?” – as in “I listened to everything he had to say, and guess what? I didn’t believe a word he said.”
14. Almost every rhetorical question ever asked
March 28, 2015
The two reasons that people like foods that they initially despise are exactly the two reasons that I still don’t like those foods.
I’m known to have a limited palate. It’s not as limited as many of my friends contend, but there are admittedly large numbers of foods that I do not like, including salad, a great number of vegetables, many nuts, most Asian cuisines, most sauces and dressings, and more. I also don’t drink coffee or alcohol.
People have many theories on my limited palate. People like to express these theories to me often.
I have many theories on their more expansive palates, including the belief (backed by science) that we have little control over the foods that we find palatable, so shaming, harassing, or otherwise disparaging a person’s food preferences is insensitive and stupid.
My friend actually purchased a testing kit and confirmed that I am a supertaster, which means that I taste more flavors – and am therefore sensitive to more flavors – than the average person, which goes a long way to explaining my limited palate.
I am tasting all the awful flavors that your less effective taste buds are missing.
Recently, Paul Rozin, a cultural psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania, has added to the research on food preferences. Rozin is especially interested in why people learn to love foods they initially hated, a phenomenon he calls “benign masochism.”
He has come up with two reasons to explain how this happens:
Repeated exposure
Social pressure
This explain a lot in terms of my limited palate.
Repeated exposure means that in order to learn to like a food that I don’t – say avocado – I would have to suffer again and again until I theoretically began liking it.
This sounds insane. I have to eat a food that I can barely swallow without feeling ill or vomiting in order to expand my palate? There are far too many palatable foods in the world for me to spend time torturing myself over a food item that doesn’t even grow naturally where I live.
But it’s the aspect of social pressure that perhaps explains my palate best. I am and have always been a nonconformist in the most extreme sense of the word. Social pressures have never meant all that much to me, oftentimes to my detriment. The thought that I might eat a food that I consider unpalatable in order to better align myself with the people around me sounds ridiculous.
Then again, I am often sitting at the table in a restaurant, staring at people who are enjoying the salad course while I gnaw on a piece of bread and politely readjust my napkin on my lap.
This doesn’t bother me, but perhaps it would make most people uncomfortable.
Maybe it’s a person’s desire to join his friends for sushi after work on Fridays that causes him to find a way to enjoy eating something that the civilized world has always cooked before eating.
Maybe it’s the incessant fawning over guacamole – made right at the table! – that pushes the avocado hater over to the dark side and decide to dip a chip.
Maybe it’s the pervasive, inexpensive nature of salad that causes so many people to adopt the dietary habits of small woodland creatures.
Rozin’s theory makes sense. If social pressures cause people to walk around with brand names plastered to their clothing and handbags and somehow think this is a good thing, then why would this not also apply to foods that initially make us feel ill?
Rozin also coins the term “hedonistic reversal” – the ability of our brain to tell our senses we’re going to turn something we should avoid into a preference. This applies to the person who decides that the spiciest buffalo wings are his favorite, mostly because he has become convinced that eating foods that most people find unpalatable makes him feel superior.
You know the type. These are the people who eat eye of newt because it’s the newest, latest food trend, and they want to appear cutting edge. Hip. Brave.
They never do. Instead, they often appear cloying. Desperate. Sad.
I’m not that kind of person, either. I hope.
