Apologies

Apologies are in the news.

As Jian says he’s sorry (http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/jian-ghomeshi-cathryn-borel-sexual-assault-charge-1.3576702) I reflect on my time as an Early Childhood Education instructor at Red River College. I helped my students learn about positive guiding techniques that could be used with young children.

We talked about firstly preventing problems by setting up positive, inviting environments for girls and for boys. These places offered all children choices, space, time and respect. The directors of such child care centres developed, reinforced and enforced policies to insure the safety and happiness of all.

If problems occurred among children, in spite of our best efforts, we never encouraged apologies. My students often questioned this.

“It’s good to say you’re sorry,” they said.

Is it?

Is it meaningful to say, “I’m sorry I took your toy” when the Early Childhood Educator (ECE) gives the child those words? Does the child’s behaviour change in any way? Or does the child learn that it’s okay to hurt, intimidate or frighten others as long as he or she apologizes after?

Empty words. Guilt free. No opportunity for discussion. No voice for the victim. No solutions. No learning or growth.

Gradually and with a lot of practice, Early Childhood Educators learn to help children solve problems with each other.

Perhaps a young girl is painting at the easel. A little boy comes up behind her and pushes her against the wet paint as he grabs her paintbrush. She cries out and an ECE approaches.

“It looks like you have a problem here. What’s happening?”

“I was painting a picture and he pushed me and took my stuff,” says the girl.

“But I want to paint too!” exclaims the boy.

“So you both want to paint. What do you think you can do about that?” asks the ECE.

“He could paint at the other easel. He’s crowding me,” replies the girl.

The ECE checks with the boy, “What do you think about that idea?”

“Okay, I’ll go to the other easel, but I want the same colours as her!” he retorts.

“So you have decided that you will each paint at your own easel with your own paints?” confirms the ECE.

“Yeah!” they agree.

“You figured out how to solve your problem. Have fun painting!” says the ECE.

Problem solved.

By four year olds.

With a little support and a respectful environment, the perpetrator and the victim can speak.

The ECEs provide expectations for appropriate interactions, knowing that they will have the support of the centre director.

There are opportunities for change through positive guidance. The girl feels safe in speaking up and the boy works with her to find solutions. Both learn.

It’s not that difficult.

And it’s so much more effective than the emptiness of a scripted apology.

©Conni Cartlidge  May 2016

My Mother Before I Knew Her

Mary (in the front) with her family.

As the dirty thirties hit, my mother was born.

Was it possible to have a joyful childhood during a great depression?

Could a person find love during a hateful world war?

Born on the Canadian prairies in October 1930 to Danish immigrant parents, my mother arrived on a day so cold that her freshly laundered diapers froze to the clothesline. She was called Mary Elisabeth, an English name her parents knew.

They moved from home to home, one right across from the railway station. My mom performed acrobatics in the yard, hoping to catch the attention of travellers. It was usually hobos that approached her, looking for food and odd jobs. Her mother provided a meal and sent them on their way.

“Hoo hah,” her mother would exclaim. And my mom just laughed, not realizing that she was almost as poor as the beggars at the door.

Mary during WWII.

She found kittens and dogs and horses to love. She taught her favourite pup how to do tricks. He could ride on the handlebars of her bike! And though my mother never had a horse of her own, she befriended those who did, and rode with confidence and pride.

Riding high.

When World War II wreaked its own personal havoc on her family, my mom found a room to rent and a job.  She was just a teenager. Some might say it was her thick wavy red hair that gave her such gumption. It certainly caught my dad’s eye! In 1949, they were married. They are together to this day.

Dating my dad.

In this tumultuous new millennium, she is still spirited and brave. She knows joy and brings love.

I think my mother before I knew her is the mom I know today.

©

Conni Cartlidge  March 2015

Escaping with Prince: CBC Opinion piece

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/prince-conni-cartlidge-commentary-1.3550048

Escaping with Prince

I was approved! In September, 1979, I was allowed to be initiated into “the Path”, a spiritual group that I thought would answer all my prayers. I would see god’s light and hear god’s voice as long as I practiced a few simple suggestions. Non-violence, truthfulness, chastity, humility, special diet, selfless service and meditation were all that was expected.

Sounded pretty straightforward.

I quit smoking and drinking. I ate vegetarian food. I got married. I helped out with the group’s publications. I meditated every morning for at least two hours. And I never told anyone the five secret names of god I recited whenever my mind wandered. I corresponded regularly with my “master", a civil servant in India who didn’t claim to be god. But who also didn’t claim to not be god. He seemed like a nice man. All the others said so.

I was going to have a beautiful life.

My family and friends struggled. Some just walked away. My mom asked many, many questions, trying hard to understand. “I feel like I’m losing you,” she cried. And eventually, I was convinced that non-initiates of “the path”, including my own parents, were a negative influence on me.

I sold all my books. I sold all my favourite records. I packed up and I moved very far away to a state I had only visited once before. But it was a place where many other initiates lived. They were my new family.

As I settled in, I made friends on “the Path”. I enjoyed this clean living. I hosted parties where we ate cookies and listened to Indian music and talked about “Master”. “Have you met him?” “What’s he like?” “Did he look at you? No? Oh, too bad. Maybe next time he visits he will acknowledge you. They say he only talks to you if you really need it.” And we all tried to be so very virtuous.

But a little piece of the old me was niggling and wiggling and wanting out. If I was all alone, I turned on the television to watch the brand new channel called MTV. I secretly danced with Hall & Oates. I sang along with Madonna. I marveled at the newly transformed Michael Jackson. But nothing jolted me as much as the commercial for the upcoming Prince concert! I was mesmerized by his voice, his moves, his heels, his beauty. I had never heard of him, but oh, I wanted to see him live. However, I was sure that a good initiate would never go to such a show.

Then, as I heard the front door open, I hastily turned off the TV, made a mad dash to my cushion on the floor, and pretended I was getting in a little extra meditation time. 

Needless to say, I did not see Prince.

My shame grew daily as I filled out my required diary checklist, marking off the number of failures I had committed in thought, word and deed. Every three months, my forms were sent to “Master” and he would reply with a basic form letter saying, “meditate more”. And I dragged myself out of bed at four a.m. hoping I might see one tiny flicker of light from the heavens or hear one small whisper from god.

My daily diary of failures.

But meditation led to nothing.

Darkness. Silence. Guilt. Exhaustion.

Finally. Rage and rebellion. And a giant leap back to my home…my family waiting patiently, my old friends breathing a sigh of relief.

And all the music I loved.

No secrets.

No shame.

And Prince blasting as loud as I wanted.

I had escaped.

Over the years, as I watched Prince struggle and fight with music executives, I never ridiculed him. I knew what it meant to be controlled by another.

And finally, in 2011, Prince came to my city. After waiting thirty years, I saw him.

Live.

Independent.

We danced together for hours.

Free.

Written in loving memory of Prince. April 21, 2016.

© Conni Cartlidge

Feminism: The New F Word

1966

I’ve been hearing there’s a new F word out there, and coming from rural Manitoba Canada, I thought maybe it was frost or freezing or frozen. I thought it was that little four-letter word my mom won’t say out loud. But no, feminism is the new F word.

Okay.

So what does that forbidden term mean to me? It means a whole lot more F words.

It means follow,
                           failure,
                                        force.

As a teenager, feminism was called Women’s Liberation. There was much eye-rolling and many sarcastic comments about those bra-burning women’s libbers. Why didn’t they just stay home and take care of their families? Follow the natural order of things. Look pretty and shut up. I wrote a paper for school. The teacher failed me. He said I didn’t know what I was talking about when I presented my views on choice. I guess he didn’t know that my peers had already experienced pregnancies, miscarriages, abortions and adoptions. Our fears forced us into silence.

It can be futile,
                          fight,
                                   feminine.

The futility of the fight seemed overwhelming. We had to stage a sit-in at the principal’s office in order to gain permission to wear pants and jeans to school. Girls were supposed to wear dresses. I guess we had to look feminine. The big companies still push this on us. “You’re beautiful just the way you are”…but buy our deodorant so your under-arms are soft. Really?

It’s also fear
                      and
                              fault.

The fear of labels. A frigid bitch if you don’t want sex and a slut if you do. Catcalls when you’re young and silence when you’re old. Rape and assault tucked firmly into our minds as a constant threat no matter what we look like. And somehow, it will be our fault.

But the word can be fair.

What is fair? Equal pay for equal work. Safe spaces for all. Choices and opportunities and acceptance for everyone.

It’s freedom.

Now there’s an F word that works. Freedom is the word that means feminism to me. It’s a good F word. I think my mom would approve.

2016

© Conni Cartlidge
February 2016

Percentages

0% chance of cure means manicures right?

#icebergrightahead #fuckcancer

This was the facebook status I read. This was how I learned that my daughter’s first love was not going to make it.

Mary met Andrew at nursery school. It was not love at first sight. While he was a confident four-year-old senior, she was a timid junior, only three at the time. She sat at the playdough table watching the other children, too shy to join in.

When both children graduated to kindergarten, Mary attended a small community school. Andrew bravely took the bus to the French-immersion school in a nearby city. For many years, they lost touch, even though they lived only four kilometers apart.

Everything changed in high school, when their love of the arts reunited them.

All grades played and worked together on drama productions and symphonic concerts. Andrew’s seniority no longer mattered, and Mary was beginning to find her own voice. He drove her home after late night rehearsals of “The Crucible”. They laughed together in the back row of the school band as they kept the beat in the percussion section. She finally announced to me that they were “going out”.  Andrew was her first boyfriend. She was sixteen. She was head over heels.

When he started coming around our house on a regular basis, I was so happy for both of them. They giggled. They made silly videos, always including Mary’s little brother. They hosted parties for their group of self-proclaimed band geek and drama nerd friends. At Halloween, everyone wore costumes. Mary was a rag doll and Andrew was a ghost. They played hide and seek in the dark outside, screaming and squealing and stealing kisses, I’m sure.

Andrew charmed Mary’s grandparents by attending family dinners. His ability to chat with anyone put us at ease. And he treated Mary like a queen. They got all dressed up to attend symphonies and plays, she in her vintage black cocktail dress and he in a sharp suit, both beaming from ear to ear.

Ready for a night on the town.

But over time, some distance developed. Andrew moved into his own apartment while Mary was still finishing high school. One afternoon, as I was packing to go away for a few days, Mary came out of her room in tears. “Andrew broke up with me,” she sobbed. “I don’t know why.” I held her as she cried and cried and cried. And I was cursing him in my head, knowing that I had a plane to catch and couldn’t stay with Mary for very long. She assured me she would be okay and that she would get together with her best friend while I was gone. We talked on the phone several times a day, and when I returned, she seemed to have accepted the situation. I was probably angry longer than she. How dare he break my daughter’s heart?

Some time later, Andrew moved to Toronto. Mary went to his going-away party and I marvelled at her open-mindedness. I was still holding a bit of a grudge.

The going-away became Andrew’s coming out.

Freed from small-town Manitoba, Andrew found his true self. My daughter’s first boyfriend became her best gay boyfriend. Suddenly, it all made sense.

When she moved to Toronto a year later, Andrew was there for her. He took her to Nuit Blanche and they recorded a tangled video of themselves wrapped in string, laughing hysterically in the middle of the night. They posted YouTube videos, with Andrew giving garish make-up lessons to Mary. As I watched their antics from afar, I felt so relieved that Mary had a hometown friend with her in the big city. He was an anchor for her. He was a comfort for me. It was a new kind of love.

Glitter Fest 27th birthday party!

And now, Andrew has cancer.

It is terminal.

He is twenty-seven years old.

Mary phoned me last night. She was crying again. She had said her final good-byes to Andrew at a “funeral dance party” in Toronto. At the end of the night, Andrew said to Mary’s friend, “Take good care of my Mary”.

Andrew is headed back to Manitoba with his mom. He is coming home to die. He has planned his funeral. He wants glamour, glitter, Madonna and Cher. I know I will fly Mary home for this.

100% chance she will always love him.

Glamdrew

ÓConni Cartlidge

February 27, 2016

Ambitions: Child Care in Canada because it's 2016!

Sitting in a booth at the Winnipeg Folk Festival, I watched young children playing delightedly with the wooden toys my friend was selling. As a disillusioned men’s hairstylist in the late seventies, I thought I would scream if I had to attempt one more “John Travolta Saturday Night Fever” style on a balding middle aged man who would never measure up on the disco dance floor.

“These kids are so cute,” I commented. “Maybe I should work with children.”

My frustration led to new ambitions. My goal was to earn my degree in Developmental Studies at the University of Winnipeg and my Child Care Services diploma from Red River College. It was a joint program between the two institutions that intrigued me. It cost some money, but part-time barbering wages saw me through. In 1981, I packed away my shears and clippers and began work as an Early Childhood Educator (ECE).

Now I read that the Social Development Minister Jean-Yves Duclos is meeting with provincial and territorial counterparts to discuss their ambitions in moving forward with a national child care system. (http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/social-service-ministers-child-care-meeting-1.3433626)

I am sad that he didn’t stop by rural Manitoba. I would have been so happy to give him a cup of coffee and tell him about my thirty-five year career working with children and their families, college students, and dedicated but exhausted ECEs throughout Manitoba.

I would tell him:

·      About a roomful of two-year-olds chanting “Conni Bonni! Conni Bonni! Conni Bonni!” as I entered the centre that first hired me after graduation. I thought, “How lucky am I to have this hilarious, joyful job?”

·      About the distraught single parent, sobbing as she arrived at the child care centre at the end of a long day of college exams. I sat close and held her son for a while because she needed me to.

·      About the eight-week old baby I was trusted to care for, as her professional parents needed to get back to their jobs as doctors. I felt thankful and proud that they respected my education and expertise.

·      About the young boy who was diagnosed with the somewhat unsettling label of “oppositional defiance disorder” that I was tasked with caring for. I knew that everyday he would throw stones at me but he would never hit me, because he knew I was his ally.

·      About the nervous high school students that planned activities for the children at my nursery school, and then implemented them as best they could. The big kids helping the little kids. Everybody learning together.

·      About the hundreds of college students I worked with as an ECE instructor, with their own perspectives and ambitions changing as they learned that children were not just cute. They were smart and creative and dependent on the adults in their lives.

·      About the many, many child care centres and family child care homes that I visited over the years, where staff were enthusiastic, professional, worn-out, under-paid, nurturing, disrespected, light-hearted, frustrated, educated, loving people. But often, like the exasperated barber that I had been, they were ready to leave the field for new opportunities.

·      About the local politician that presented herself as an advocate for child care but then told me how lucky she was that she could stay home with her own kids and “didn’t have to put them in daycare”.

Yes, I would tell Jean-Yves that it is high time for a child care framework that ensures quality care for all the children that need it. A framework that supports Canada’s families, and respects their differences and their shared needs, is crucial. There will always be some families that do not need or want early childhood education services, but for those that do, Canada should be providing the best.

And like my post-secondary education, it will cost some money. It will take some work and effort. But if it is truly the government’s ambition to create change, come and have a cup of coffee. Early childhood educators can make some plans with you. They are a very innovative bunch. Parents can help too. 

The kids are counting on us.

©Conni Cartlidge

February 2016