Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Childhood, Comment, Dad, Daddyhood, Family, Fatherhood, Jill, Love, Otis, Parents
OK, so now we have got over the fun and frolics of yesterdays April Fool post, I want to bring it back to something serious.
Recently we decided we would have a day where Otis could make all the decisions.
He immediately went for it big time by asking to go to a local builders cafe for breakfast, where he ordered chips, drank a Coke Zero and watched Paw Patrol on his iPad.
You can see him in the photo at the top of this post.
Living the dream.
Anyway, I mentioned this on Facebook when someone I’ve not met but vaguely know wrote:
“We practice ‘good choices’ day, you should try it”.
Now while I was sure it had come out more condescending than intended – this person does have form in being judgemental from their self-appointed pedestal – and Jill decided to inform him of this.
She replied:
“You don’t know me or my son.
Your comment comes across as judgmental and condescending and makes me uncomfortable because it implies my son was making ‘bad’ decisions.
Perhaps if you did know us you would understand our parenting style more and that we aim not to use words like ‘good’ or ‘bad’ because of their unfortunate side effect of creating shame.
Decisions are just decisions, and I believe that kids need space to make a whole variety… nobody makes ‘good’ decisions all the time and I want him to grow up knowing that that’s ok, normal and part of life.
Perhaps your comment really was just about sharing what you see as a fun idea, but your way of expressing it missed the mark…”
As I am sure you will all agree, that was a pretty awesome response.
But more importantly, it highlights how we are attempting to bring up Otis.
Coming back to England has been wonderful, but the one thing that has surprised us is the pretty draconian approach to instilling certain qualities into our kids.
Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate it’s being done for good reason, but the overt shame/reward approach bothers us. A lot.
There are many reasons for it – and of course, each to their own – but this poster sums up the one we fear the most.
This situation applies to all.
Not just kids … but family members, friends and colleagues.
What’s worse is this tends to stick with people.
It is one of the elements that has driven so many of the Corporate Gaslighting stories.
I get situations can make us angry.
I get people can do stupid things.
But when your approach to correction is shame, you’re trying to improve the outcome of one thing through the destruction of another.
You might not mean it.
You might not want it.
But you are doing it.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Anniversary, Attitude & Aptitude, Birthday, Childhood, Comment, Dad, Daddyhood, Emotion, Empathy, Family, Home, Jill, Love, Mum, Otis, Parents
Yesterday would have been my Mum’s birthday.
My Mum’s 87th birthday.
That means she has been gone 4 years and frankly, that seems incredible.
So much has happened in that time …
From moving countries twice.
To changing jobs twice.
To selling our family home to buy a new one.
And while I am in a much better place than I was after the tragic days that she died, I still am prone to being hit by moments where her loss is almost overwhelming for me.
I wish she could have met Otis for real.
I still remember her words when I called her minutes after he was born.
I was incredibly emotional and she was so tender towards me.
Making sure I was OK, Jill was OK and Otis.
Asking if the baby crying in the background was her grandson.
Telling me how happy she was and how happy she was for us.
How she loved the name Otis.
And while she was alone in her home in Nottingham – wishing madly that she was with us – she still told me to go and be with Jill and my son because she was the most compassionate, thoughtful person I have ever known.
While Mum saw Otis on video chat, sent me countless emails/SMS’s about him and – for a brief while – was in the same room together [though sadly it was after she had passed away] … the fact is they never were together in the flesh and I would have loved to have seen that happen.
To see her face as he called her Nona.
To watch her smile he wrapped his arms around you and gave her a big hug and kiss.
To look at my Mum reading her first grandchild a story or walking him through the gardens and explaining the flowers or just watching him run around like a tsunami and then look at me with that look in her eye that tells me everything.
How he’s perfect.
How she loves him so much.
How she is so proud of me and Jill.
How happy she is right at that very moment.
That would be the best present for her – not to mention for me – and while none of those things will be able to happen for real, I will think about them tonight when I’m home and giving Otis a big hug and kiss, because while there are many things I can do a whole lot better at, my Mum [and Dad] taught me one thing I am very good at.
How to love.
Happy birthday Mum, I miss you so much.
Hope you and Dad are laughing and holding hands.
Rx
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Comment, Culture, Dad, Daddyhood, Emotion, Empathy, Family, Home, Jill, Love, Mum, Mum & Dad, My Fatherhood, Nottingham, Otis, Paul, Resonance
So the time has come to close the door on the house I grew up in for one final time.
I’ve written the reasons for why this is happening in the past – as I have the reasons why the house was, and always will be, be so important to me – but it is the beginning of a new chapter for my family and my Mum and Dad would be so happy.
Anyway, we went to visit her one final time.
While the garden remained pretty much as my parents left it – thanks to us having a gardener visit every fortnight for the past 4 years [and we’ve taken a couple of things from there to plant in our new home so we will forever be connected] – going into the actual house was a very different feeling.
Part of it was because there was nothing in it.
No furniture.
No people.
No noise.
And so the overall effect was the house felt smaller … more fragile … and yet, as I walked through each room, there were so many emotions going through me.
As I watched my son run through the place holding his toys, I could see me – probably at his age – doing the same.
I saw where my Raleigh Grifter was waiting for me in 1989, on Christmas day.
I could see where my Dad – and then Mum – would sit in the lounge, on their rocking chair.
I could hear my Dad shouting ‘it’s ready’ from the kitchen our Saturday Beefburger was ready for scoffing down.
I could see my old clock radio when I was in the ‘small bedroom’ and my big stereo when I got ‘upgraded’ to the bigger room.
I could see the bed Mum and Dad slept in … where I would sit by them and chat throughout my time in the house.
Mum and Dad’s bedroom was especially poignant to me.
Regardless what happens in the future, it will always be ‘their room’ as they used for the entire time they were alive [and I was around].
Below is a photo of their empty bedroom that I took.
I’ve superimposed another photo of Otis that I took on the day after Mum died.
He’d just flown with his Mum overnight from Shanghai and he’s lying on the side Mum used to sleep on, looking at a painting of a mother and her child that hung above her bed.
He never got to meet her in person – he was supposed to a couple of weeks later when she recovered from her operation.
Alas it didn’t work out that way which is why this photo is so precious to me and why I feel, in a weird way, they did get to be together – hugging each other tight – if only for a second.
Another thing that got me, was when I went to the garage.
When we were having the house refurbished because we wanted to help a family live in a good area, we wrote a message on the wall about how much that house meant to us.
Well, when we checked at the weekend, we saw the tenants had left their own note and I have to say – it got to me because while my life is moving on, it was built in those 4 walls and I hope it does the same for anyone and everyone who lives there.
Thank you Mum.
Thank you Dad.
Thank you house … you will always be treasured.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, America, Attitude & Aptitude, Audio Visual, Authenticity, Childhood, Comment, Communication Strategy, Content, Creativity, Culture, Daddyhood, Emotion, Empathy, Equality, Experience, Fatherhood, Honesty, Human Goodness, Innocence, Jill, Love, My Fatherhood, Otis, Parents, Prejudice, Relevance, Resonance
One of the things that is a beautiful nightmare for parents is watching the speed of their children grow up.
At each stage of their development, you think they have reached ‘peak perfect’ and you want them to stay that way forever … but you can deal with their growth because they bring an even more delightful element into their behaviour and, as a byproduct, your relationship.
It’s utterly, utterly magical.
That said, it still doesn’t stop the fact it all happens in the blink of an eye, so while you want to always encourage their development, you just wish it would slow down a little.
The reason I say this is that I recently read about a graphic designer was so appalled at the cover of a young girls magazine, that they decided to release what they thought it should be.
Now I must admit, my first impression to this story was that the graphic designer was probably a self-righteous individual who wanted kids to grow up in the same conditions as they did.
That was until I saw this …
The original cover of the magazine is on the left, their version is on the right.
I’m going to ignore their cover – because you can read how it came about and the story behind their idea, here – however the magazine they redesigned is a real magazine and, according to their own website, supposedly stands for:
Girls’ Life (GL) magazine was founded in August 1994 (yes, we’re ancient, we know) by Karen Bokram. Since then, GL has grown from a 23-year-old’s pipe dream project to a best-selling and award-winning platform for tween and teen girls.
Tweens and teens.
An incredibly impressionable age.
Now look at that cover.
Look at those story headlines.
Now I appreciate I am an old, white male … but they seem to place huge subliminal pressure and expectations on young women.
Wake Up Pretty.
Dream Hair.
Fashion you need to own.
Boyfriends.
If young women want to explore any of those things, then that is wonderful, but I wonder how much of it is because they are being made to feel that way rather than being something they are naturally interested in. Of course, there is something wonderful about learning to develop and grow … but this seems less about personal growth and more about playing to stereotypes – and advertising dollars – so that they can then be judged by broader society.
Of course parents have a big role to play in managing the environment their children play in, but at a time where the World is finally waking up to fighting the prejudice, oppression and stereotypes women have had to face for centuries, it becomes increasingly difficult to achieve this when the World they are surrounded by continues to push an agenda of compliance … especially when they’re titles supposedly designed for the betterment of young women.
Of course this is not limited to content for young women, young boys also have stereotypes of behaviour and aspiration shoved down their throats that are unrealistic and add incredible pressure to their development.
I get children will always grow up too fast for parents, but it is scary how even that isn’t fast enough for media outlets.
What makes it worse is so many of them say their ‘purpose‘ is to inspire brilliance in their readership.
Girls Life specifically say their role is ‘dedicated to informing, inspiring and entertaining girls around the globe—and that includes everything from starting your business (we LOVE spotlighting smart, successful teens) to putting up with periods to styling a personal look you’ll love’.
Which is why I look at the Graphic Designer who screwed with their cover and say ‘well done’ … because I now realise what they did was not act like a judgmental parent, but simply show Girls Life how their cover should look if they are serious about what they claim they represent.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Anniversary, Attitude & Aptitude, Birthday, Childhood, China, Comment, Confidence, Context, Culture, Dad, Daddyhood, Death, Emotion, Empathy, Family, Fatherhood, Football, Goodbye America, Goodbye China, Grand announcements, Health, Home, Hope, Innocence, Italy, Jill, LaLaLand, Love, Loyalty, Mum, Mum & Dad, My Fatherhood, Nottingham, Nottingham Forest, Otis, Parents, Sentimentality, Shanghai, Shelly, WeigelCampbell
So today is June 1.
In 11 days, I wave goodbye to my forties and enter a decade that seems impossible for me to fathom.
50.
FIFTY.
Seriously, how did this happen?
I still remember sitting on the hill outside Erica’s newsagent with my best mate Paul around 1978, when we worked out that in the year 2000, we would be turning 30.
But here we are, 11 days from 50.
[Though it’s 15 days for Paul, who will LOVE those 4 days where he can bang on about how he is a decade younger than me … though he will also moan that my present for him isn’t like the full page newspaper ad I got him when he was 40, but a Forest shirt signed by all the members of the 1980 European Cup team. Asshole. He knows about this present as I bought it for him years ago so I’m not ruining anything for him. But I still have a surprise for him. Oh yes.]
Turning 30 bothered me a bit.
I was totally fine with becoming 40.
But 50!
I’m both bricking it and utterly casual about it.
And while there are some practical reasons for the shitting myself part – health, work, life in general – the fact of the matter is the older I get, the better my life has become.
I totally get the privilege of that statement, I don’t take it for granted at all, but it is definitely true.
Personally, professionally, emotionally …
Sure there have been some bumps along the way – some terribly hard and emotionally destructive ones – but looking at the big picture, the reality is my life has generally been on an upward trajectory.
Now even I know that it can’t keep going like that forever … but it doesn’t mean I have to stop trying.
The fact is, the older you get, the more you discover …
From what you like, what you don’t … to what you didn’t know and what you want to know.
And what makes it even more amazing – and annoying – is that every step you take, in whatever direction, reveals a whole host of other possibilities you would like to explore and investigate.
The problem is time is now officially, not on your side … so there’s a point where you have to accept you won’t get to try, play, experiment with all you want to do, so while that might put some people off, it kind of makes me want to try and pack more in.
And I am … because on top of work, Metallica, the school with Martin, I’ve already agreed to do a couple more projects that are intriguing and – frankly – ridiculous.
But there’s another reason for this attitude and it’s because my Dad died at 60.
Death is something I’ve talked a lot about over the years – mainly due to both my parents passing away.
I’ve talked a lot about the importance of taking about it, but I must admit, I’m scared of it.
I’m in generally good health, but fifty is still 50 and my Dad still died just 10 years on from this age.
Now of course it doesn’t mean I will … and I’ve come to this completely unscientific view that I should live till I’m at least 71 because if you take away my Dad’s age of dying [60]from my Mum’s [83] … that leave 23 years. Halve that … add it to Dad’s age … and voila, I will live till at least 71.
But then that means I only have 21 years left.
TWENTY ONE.
That’s nowhere near enough.
My wonderful little boy is only 5 for fucks sake. 26 is way too young to lose your Dad … hell, that’s even younger than I was when I lost mine.
Years ago, an old boss I looked upto said that if you can’t feasibly double your age, that is when you know you are – at best – middle aged or – at worst – the last stage of your life.
Well I suppose I can still feasibly double my age – even if it’s against the average age of death for a man in the UK [79.2] – but the reality is where I’m going is shorter than where I’ve been.
But shorter doesn’t mean less interesting.
And arguably, I have more exciting things in my life now – both personally and professionally – than I have ever had.
It also helps I am insanely immature with a desire for mischief, experimentation, creativity and adventure.
And I intend to fill it up with even more.
Fortunately I get that from a number of sources.
My wife.
My son.
My job.
My other jobs.
My friends.
My mind.
A while back, Pete said something I found pretty profound.
He said the narrative of strategy tended to focus on the importance of curiosity when discovery is far more valuable for driving the standard of the work you create and the adventure you go on.
Now I’ve written a lot about how I hate when planners talk about curiosity – as if they’re the only people who have it – but I really, really like that idea of the hunger for discovery.
I absolutely have that.
I owe so much of what I have to that.
The countries I’ve lived in. The people I’ve worked with. And most importantly, the family I am fortunate to have.
So while I enter a new decade, I will continue to live like it’s the old one.
Not in terms of dressing like I’m younger than I am – mainly because I have always dressed like I live in 1986 – but with the hunger, ambition and desire I’ve always had.
I genuinely believe my best work is still ahead of me.
Truly believe that.
And the goal of this decade is to achieve some of that while discovering new things that make me believe even better work can still lie in my future.