Matthew Dicks's Blog, page 436

I admire this violent, malicious man.

On a good day, former New England Patriots and current Washington Redskins safety Brandon Meriweather is a hard-nosed, hard hitting football player.

Those days seem few and far between. More often, Meriweather is a dirty player with a disregard for the safety of his opponents. During his tenure in New England, I watched him make purposeful helmet-to-helmet contact with opponents on several occasions, even after the player’s forward progress had been stopped.

He’s also known for hitting players after the whistle and hitting them out of bound with great frequency.

Meriweather has been fined at least four times over the last four years for hits to the head, with fines totaling more than $100,000, and he has been penalized countless times in games for unnecessary roughness.

Based upon the way he plays the game, it would seem that Brandon Meriweather is not a nice man.

But when Chicago Bear’s receiver Brandon Marshall criticized Meriweather after last week’s game for two penalties and a suspension for leading with his helmet, Meriweather responded with this:

“Listen, everybody’s got their opinion of things, you know. Everybody’s got their opinion. He feels like, you know, I need to be kicked out of the league. I feel like, people who beat their girlfriends should be kicked out of the league too.

“You tell me who you’d rather have: Somebody who plays aggressive on the field, or somebody who beats up their girlfriend. Everybody’s got their opinion. That’s mine. He’s got his.”

Meriwether was criticizing Marshall for his role in a domestic abuse case involving his then ex-girlfriend back in 2008. Marshall was eventually found not guilty of the crime and was later arrested but not charged in a separate, similar incident. Even though Marshall is innocent of all charges, I can’t help but admire Meriweather for his comments.

The NFL is full of men who commit the kinds of violent crimes for which Meriweather criticized Marshall, and yet they often remain on the field, earning millions of dollars, and rarely are they criticized by their fellow player.

Check that: They are never criticized by their fellow players.

Unfortunately, in this instance Meriweather chose to criticize someone who has not been convicted of a crime, but two separate arrests for domestic abuse is troubling at best, and a reasonable person might call it a pattern.

In all, 31 NFL players have been arrested since the 2013 Super Bowl, including three for domestic abuse.

All three are currently on NFL rosters.

While I support the idea of innocent until proven guilty (perhaps more than most given my background), I also admire the fact that Meriweather is willing to criticize a fellow player for his off-field behavior.

It simply never happens.

And while it would’ve been better for Meriweather to criticize Marshall at the time of the incident rather than in self-defense, it’s a start.

Meriweather is right. If given the choice, I’d much prefer to watch an aggressive player as opposed to a player with a history of domestic abuse.

Unfortunately, Meriweather is more than simply aggressive. He is often malicious and dangerous. While he is admittedly the lesser of two evils when  compared to a man who hits a woman, I’m not sure if either man belongs on the field on Sundays.

Ending the engagement is sometimes the only correct choice

A question recently asked of Slate’s Dear Prudence:

Q. Always Take the Wife’s Side?: I’m about to get married and am caught in an argument between my fiancée and my parents. This will be the first time in over five years that our whole family will be together. My parents want to take a picture of just them, me, and my siblings, and a family photo obviously means a lot to them. My fiancée heard this and became immediately offended. She says it’s rude to exclude her on the day she “joins the family” and any family photo should therefore include her in it. We’re not talking about taking an hour for a separate family photo shoot; my parents simply want one photograph of themselves and their children. I don’t understand why my fiancée is so annoyed and now she’s even more angry because I’m not supporting “her side.” Should I back up my fiancée on principle, even if I disagree with her?

Prudence describes this as “one of those silly little fights every couple has” and suggests that the groom calmly discuss the issue with his future wife and help her to understand that this is but a single moment in the grand scheme of the wedding and important to his parents.

I hate this advice.

First off, he’s already done this. He’s said as much in his question. And “talk to her” is not exactly what I would call advice in almost any circumstance.  

More importantly, I don’t see this as “one of those silly little fights every couple has.”

No reasonable, unselfish, decent human being would ever be offended by the idea of this photograph taking place. As a wedding DJ for seventeen years, I can assure you that these kinds of photos happen all the time.

As unrealistic as this advice may seem, I would advise the man to strongly consider calling off the wedding altogether. If he were my friend, the last thing I would want to see is him marry a person as despicable as this, and as his friend, I would say as much.

I’ve said as much to friends in the past, and though these words are often received poorly, I am also often in the position to say “I told you so” later on (as was the case just recently).

I actually think that breaking off the engagement is the only choice here. Try to imagine the level of selfishness, self-centeredness and narcissism required to reject a request as simple and innocent as this from your future in-laws.

It’s astounding. Don’t you think?

Some might attribute the bride’s actions as the result of the stress involved with planning a wedding, but in my experience, if you act like a jerk during the planning and execution of your wedding, it’s likely that you will act a jerk in the future when life becomes complex, challenging and stressful.

Planning your wedding is not an excuse to act like an animal.

A bridezilla often becomes a wifezilla after the wedding.

Beyond the Margins today!

I have a piece in Beyond the Margins today about the unexpected (and almost unbelievable) benefits of publishing novels.

Enjoy!

I don’t like Wes Anderson’s films

There. I said it.

This trailer explains my dislike perfectly. Every trope that’s used in this spoof is every reason why I don’t like his films.  

Lionel Shriver needed to take better inventory before she lamented the tragedy of her career in The New Republic.

Bestselling author Lionel Shriver has been criticized this week for a piece she wrote in The New Republic in which she complains about the amount of publicity and the demands on her time that an author of her stature endures in today’s literary environment.

She writes (I suggest you skim):

Thus, at a time I desperately need to get my next first draft off the ground, check out my commitments for the next couple of months or so: multiple-hour interviews with Dutch and Belgian periodicals, along with the dreaded photo shoots. Literary festival appearances in London’s Soho, Charleston, Birmingham, Cheltenham, Newcastle, Folkestone, Cambridge, Wapping, and Bali (yeah, yeah, tell us another sob story—but Southeast Asia involves a 17-hour plane trip and a discombobulating seven-hour time difference; I still have to work on more than my tan). A reading of one of my short stories at the Arts Club in London. Dinners with my publisher and editor to discuss a new imprint. Copious radio interviews. A ceremony for the National Short Story Award, for which I’m short-listed—and prizes are a particularly destructive time and emotion suck, since in most cases you don’t win. The delivery of a “sermon” in Manchester, which for an atheist will be a big ask. A formal lecture in Amsterdam, replete with mini author’s tour for the Dutch translation of my last novel. A panel on “storytelling” for Mumsnet. A presentation to prospective supporters of Standpointmagazine, for which I write a monthly column. An “in-conversation” for a medical conference. What already awaits in 2014? A reading at the Royal Academy, a two-week promotional tour of Australia, a six-week teaching residency in Falmouth, events in Muncie, Indiana, and Bath, and invitations, as yet mercifully unaccepted, to festivals in Alberta, Vancouver, Estonia, and Singapore.

I don’t know Lionel Shriver and have never met her, but based upon her piece, I think she kind of sucks.

As I explained to a student just yesterday, when you complain loudly and vociferously about the 99% that you scored on your essay, you sound like a jerk. Yes, the 1% that was deducted for a couple of unfortunate misspellings is annoying, but just think about all the students around you who worked long and hard on their essays and only received a B or a C for their efforts.

It’s fine to be disappointed. It’s perfectly acceptable to be annoyed. Just keep those complaints in your head, or express your frustration to some trusted friends. Not the entire class.

Or in Shiver’s case, not the world.

For every bestselling, in-demand author like Lionel Shriver, there are tens of thousands of authors and perhaps millions of want-to-be authors who would love to receive a modicum of the attention and adulation that she has. Many of these writers work just as hard or even harder than she does but are simply not as talented or haven’t found the right editor or agent or haven’t written their breakout book yet.

Shriver needs to recognize this before she complains so loudly and vociferously in a publication like The New Republic, and then she should think better about writing a piece like this.

Like I told my student, it’s fine to be frustrated and annoyed by your success. Just don’t broadcast those feelings to the less-than-successful world. It’s difficult for me to imagine a single person feeling sympathy for her, particularly when she is fully capable of declining most, if not all, of the commitments on her list.

In the spirit of realizing how fortunate an even less-than-bestselling author like me is, here is my meager but amazing schedule of commitments for the week:

Yesterday I had the opportunity to Skype with a book club from Saudi Arabia. We discussed my most recent novel, Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend, as well as my writing process and a little bit about my personal background. We even spoke a bit about my previous books, another pet peeve of Shriver’s.

While Lionel Shriver may have found the hour that I spent with these ladies bothersome and distracting, I was honored and thrilled to speak to them, and I had a great time doing so.

Later, I exchanged emails with the coordinator and and administrator of intellectual property for a college in New South Wales, Australia, who was requesting permission on behalf of a student to adapt Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend for the stage. While I won’t be paid for this adaptation and will likely never have the chance to see it, the idea that a person on the other side of the world in interested in adapting and directing a play based upon my book is thrilling. I wish I could attend one of the performances, which is scheduled for February, but sadly I’m not in a position to fly to Australia to see a play, even if it’s based on my work.

Lionel Shriver may have found the writing of those emails tedious, and if she were invited to one of the performances, she might add it to her long list of laments, but once again, I am honored and thrilled that someone liked my book enough to bring it to life on the stage.

Tomorrow evening, I will be traveling to Madison, Connecticut to speak to a happiness club about some of the ways that I have achieved happiness in my life. When I received this request six months ago, I was honored but a little befuddled.

Why me?

Am I really in a position to speak about happiness?

Am I even happier than the average person?

I asked friends and family for their thoughts on the subject, and the most common response went something like this:

If you’re not happy, there’s something wrong with you. You have the perfect wife and two amazing children. You’re a teacher who loves his job and has been recognized for his skill and expertise. You’re an author who has published three novels that have been translated into more than twenty languages  around the world. You own a small business with your best friend that you started from scratch. You have a enormous collection of diverse friends. You love golf and play it more often than most people. And in just the past two years, you’ve become an award winning storyteller who performs routinely in New York and Boston and have launched your own storytelling organization with your wife. If you’re not happy, you’re a stupid jerk.

My friends and family are right. I am exceptionally fortunate, uncommonly blessed and should be extremely happy with my life. And I am. Sometimes it’s good to be reminded about just how lucky I am.

Something that someone should apparently do for Lionel Shriver.

Frozen carrots on a stick

This is an excellent reminder about how fortunate we are.

I think I’ll show it to my students the next time they complain that the cafeteria has run out of chocolate milk.

The video is great, but the image alone speaks a thousand words.

Harry Dicks is almost worse.

Late last summer, a judge in the town of Newport, Tennessee , saying that “it’s a title that has only been earned by one person … Jesus Christ.”

This decision was eventually overturned and the judge was reprimanded for her obvious religious bias.

The baby naming laws of individual states vary widely.

In California, baby names cannot contain umlauts or accents. In South Dakota, if a mother is unmarried at the time of conception, her surname goes on the birth certificate (unless a man signs an affidavit saying he’s the father). Roman numerals are allowed for suffixes in Texas, but not Arabic ones, so a boy could be Rick Perry III but not Rick Perry 3. In Massachusetts, the total number of characters in first, middle and last names cannot exceed 40. New Hampshire, meanwhile, prohibits all punctuation marks except for apostrophes and dashes.

None of these laws helped Adolf Hitler Campbell, the boy who made headlines when a New Jersey bakery refused to decorate a cake ordered by his father.

Adolf Hitler Campbell is probably the worst name that I can imagine.

Right behind it, however, are my father and uncles.

My father is Leslie Jean Dicks. He goes by Les Dicks.

My father says that his mother must have hated him at birth.

My great uncle is Harry Dicks, and my uncle is Harold Dicks, but he also goes by Harry Dicks.

The last name is admittedly not the easiest, but you would be hard pressed to find two more unfortunate first names to attach to it.

Baby pushing baby

My wife played with the stroller that my son is pushing as a child.

I have nothing like that from my childhood.

I have nothing at all from my childhood except for a single stuffed animal.

I can’t imagine what it must feel like to be standing in your childhood home, watching your children play with toys that you once loved.

It must be amazing.

What teachers know about bedtimes

New, compelling research on the connection between sleep and student success:

Researchers reporting in the journal Pediatrics studied more than 10,000 kids when they were three, five and seven years old and compared reports of behavior issues to their bedtimes. Kids with irregular sleep were more likely to have lower scores on tests that measured their ability to problem solve, and higher rates of hyperactivity, emotional difficulties, and problems dealing with peers.

While the research is good, teachers have known this for years.

I routinely ask my students about their bedtimes, the consistency of their bedtimes and the presence of a television in their bedrooms, and this is what I know:

Student success can almost always be determined by these three factors.

Students with later bedtimes, students with inconsistent bedtimes (or no bedtime whatsoever) and students with a television in their bedrooms are almost always my most struggling students.

These three factors are quite possibly the most predictive of student achievement and behavior than any other.

Of course, these these factors might also be symptoms of an underlying problem, but the recent research would appear to indicate otherwise.

This should be good news to parents and would-be parents everywhere. Impose a consistent, relatively early bedtime and keep your child’s bedroom television-free, and you’re child’s academic and behavioral performance will almost surely improve.

There are no easy fixes when it comes to kids, but in comparison to many, this one isn’t too hard at all.

Witchcraft, I tell you!

My daughter was much less impressed with this than I was.

But she’s four, so what the hell does she know.