An Experiment, Days 2-5

Things here in screen-free land are good.  Not perfect, but good.  And very different. It wasn't until we traveled to this strange new land that I realized just how dependent we are on these passive plastic and glass objects for our entertainment.  By "we" I mean all four of us, each guilty in our own way.  It became much easier to see how much of our time was devoted to firing up the electronics and zoning out when we got away from doing exactly that. I'm not going to sugarcoat it, people...it's been hard.  Yet it's learning-to-drive-on-the-other-side-of-the-road hard, not I-can't-afford-food-for-my-children hard. I'm well aware that this is a shining example of what people refer to as a first-world problem. 

The house is quiet without the usual variety of electronic noise.  I miss the sound of the TV in the background, probably for no other reason than I'm so used to it.  I grew up with the TV pretty much always on and that has been the case for most of my married life as well. It's not even as if someone is always watching it, or that there's anything worthwhile on the screen.  Troy is an only child and says the TV was his constant companion growing up.  I can only imagine how much he'd like to give me a swirly right now. When the boys were babies, we realized we had to leave the TV off if they were around, simply because at a certain point they were so mesmerized by it they wouldn't pay any attention to us. The more things change the more they stay the same.

Not only have I seen changes in the patterns of my waking hours, but my whole sleep addiction has changed as well.  Now stay with me here, I'm going to take a roundabout way to my point.  Since the boys were little and Reid wanted to be awake for absolutely everything, I have used the phrase "sleep begets sleep."  It's the one thing I remember from all of the pre-natal, post-natal and non-natal reading I did.  He would get into this downward spiral of being awake more than he should have been.  The less he slept, the more he didn't want to. He'd just get more and more ornery until the circles under his eyes turned pitch black and he fell into a dead sleep.  That one sleep would get him back on track (sleep begets sleep) and he'd do great at bedtime until the next special event, like the annual parade of one million ants through our laundry room, heralding the arrival of spring.  I can't blame him; who would want to miss that?  Anyway, my point (at long last) is that I can normally sleep for at least 10 hours on any given night.  Even if I haven't been up long, I've been known to go back to bed and sleep another 12 or 14 hours.  No worries, I know this is not normal and yes, my thyroid disease is being followed and managed.  But since Monday, I have actually had a hard time falling asleep at night and have the energy during the day that I never thought I could have.  I used to need a nap in the middle of the day (see...sleep begets sleep.  I'm telling you, it's a thing).  I still need to figure out a way to adjust my body clock so I can get to bed earlier and wake up before noon, but at least I haven't been spending 50% of my day in bed.


Over the past several days, I've been bowling three times, gone for four walks and rode all the dust right off my stationary bike.  The four of us crept across the border to purchase tantalizingly forbidden illegal fireworks in Wisconsin.  Truth be told, they were not as spectacular as we'd hoped for, but at least now we can say we've done it.  We've taken the boys to the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden (their first time - I know, BAD Minnesota parents!), spent a lovely evening with our next-door neighbors, whom we adore, and supported a local restaurant by lunching there.  I've played more hands of gin than I care to admit and two games of Sorry where, as it turns out, I wasn't all that sorry.  I've had a long heart-to-heart with one of my children that had us both in tears. I've harvested rhubarb and baked it into some righteous desserts, ironed no fewer than 31 articles of clothing, and completed numerous small projects I've been meaning tackle since the boys were potty trained. Taken together, it might not seem like much and it definitely isn't in comparison with my more industrious friends and family.  But for me, contrasted with my pre-experiment routine, it's nothing short of astounding.

I've had to remind the boys and my husband that this grand experiment is not simply an exercise in finding other ways to entertain ourselves, though I can think of worse unintended consequences. To their credit, all three of them have been good sports about my temporary descent into madness.  In this short time, we have renewed some of our lost family connectedness, which makes me a little sad because it forces me to admit that it was lacking in the first place.  We have been productive, but the small amount of progress has shined a light on what a mammoth effort is needed to get us where we should be.  We've been non-productive for a long time. This time spent being more awake and aware has revealed to me chinks in the armor of our family and it is a gift to see the areas that need to be repaired before it's too late.  One week is not going to fix anything, but I hope the lessons we learn will encourage us to embrace some sort of long-term change.

Stay tuned.

An Experiment, Day One

My mom posed a great question: "how can you blog without using any screen time?"  Of course, any writer would devise her own unique way around this problem.  Me, I've chosen to write my pieces by hand and then submit them to Stink Dog for typing, posting and sharing.  Any spelling or grammatical errors are his alone.

Saw right through that one, didn't you?  Kudos.  In truth, we have decided that we may use the computer or TV as a tool when necessary.  I like to think of myself as a fairly low-tech chick.  I don't have a smart phone or an iPad.  Our family calendar is kept with paper and pen.  My iPod is circa 1854.  But a good part of our communication with the outside world is done via email.  As any soccer mom knows, those emails alone take up a full 90% of your inbox.  We've also become so dependent on the internet for finding information about local events and the monthly specials at Dairy Queen, I don't know if we'd be able to do it any other way. The only thing I can really see needing the television for is breaking weather news.  Given the changeable Minnesota weather and in particular these past "someone up there hates us" six months, I feel confident that we will have at least 3 dates with Sven Sundgaard this week.  The boys haven't yet come up with a way to use the XBox or PS3 as a tool, but these are smart young men, folks.  They will find a way.

The first day of the experiment didn't go too badly, as evidenced by the fact that I am blogging about it and not tied up in my crawl space.  I woke excited about the challenge of the day and week ahead.  I began mentally planning my day as I lay in bed but was quickly brought to my senses.  In the world's worst stage whisper, one child said to the other "I. Am. Incredibly. Bored."  We were approximately one hour into day one of seven.

After showering and getting ready for the day, I asked the boys what they'd like to do.  Honestly, I was hoping they'd say they had already made fascinating plans with their friends and they'd be home in time to enjoy a superb home-cooked meal and some family togetherness.  Instead I got "uhuhuh" which is shorthand for "I don't know," a phrase far too cumbersome to utter in its entirety. Ian's eyes brightened and he said "Let's go to the Children's Museum!"  Something died inside of me.  Barely more than a month ago I went to the museum on a field trip with the kindergartners I worked with.  I don't mean to say they were the only kindergartners there that day.  In fact, every kindergartner from North America was there.  And a few from Liechtenstein.  I was not anxious to return.  Add to this that when the boys were young, we had a membership for many years and went to the museum frequently.  It was very easy to get to and with the membership, we never felt like we had to spend all day there.  Ian asked about all the exhibits he remembered.  Were they all still there?  Yes, yes, they were ALL still there.  Apart from the traveling exhibits, everything was remarkably unchanged.  I tried to imagine my teenagers among all the little kids, playing in the pretend grocery store, making merry at the water tables, climbing through tunnels in ant costumes  Oy.  I decided that if that's what they wanted to do, if they wanted to feel like little kids again, that's what we would do, pride be damned.  I would wear a big floppy hat and sunglasses, keep my distance and not answer to the cries of "Mom!  Help!" when they realized they were too big to fit through the ant tunnels. As  I was planning all this, Ian broke into laughter, saying "no, no, no, no, no, no, no."  I had been punked.  And never so happy to have been. It really shouldn't have come as a surprise.  We've been messing with the boys' heads since they were very small.  Apparently, payback is afoot.

Our day was actually spent quite pleasantly.  The boys and I went bowling, Troy and I watched Reid's soccer game, and in the evening the boys and I took Stink Dog for a walk and talked about all kinds of things.  Troy fell asleep on the couch at about 9:15.  The only unusual thing about this is that the TV wasn't on at the time.  He went to bed at about 10 and the rest of us were up for several hours after that.  I read the Sunday paper, which usually lays on the floor until the following Saturday, and went through several magazines I've been saving for clippings for my vision board.  The boys played a lengthy game of something I don't understand downstairs and then came up to read.  I don't think any of us went through the withdrawal we thought we would feel, but it's early in game.

Stay tuned.

An Experiment, In Seven Parts

My family spends way too much time sitting opposite screens.  For the boys, it's TV or video games.  Troy's drug of choice is any D-grade movie on Netflix. And my poison?  Games on Facebook.  I've said it before and I'll say it again: Candy Crush is pure evil.  This behavior is not without far-reaching consequences.  Our house is being neglected in a big way. The deck and landscaping project we were going to do this summer is going nowhere. A full 50% of us are obese. Worst of all, for me, is that there is not enough connectedness in our family.  I know that some of this is due to the fact that the boys are firmly in their teens and heading into high school.  If they still wanted me to get down on the floor and play Candy Land with them, I'd consult a therapist.  But when all four of us are home, eyes glued to our various screens as if sleeping with our eyes open, it just feels...wrong.

A tiny seed of an idea came to me at the start of summer break and has quickly grown into a fierce 'Little Shop of Horrors' man-eating monstrosity.  The more I thought about it, the more I liked it.  I waited to see how our summer would start to play out.  Would it be a nirvana of spontaneous picnics, free-wheeling drives to destinations unplanned, lying under the stars talking about our hopes for the future, and cooking all our meals with foods grown in our garden or purchased from the local farmers' market?  Or would it be like last year, when I was oh so sedentary due to my freshly diagnosed RA and blood clots in my leg, and by osmosis the four males in our home (Stink Dog included) became less active and less interesting?  Because as you may know, as Mama goes, so goes the household.

For most of their lives we've had strict guidelines on how much screen time the boys could have.  Last summer, we became much more relaxed about keeping track of their media consumption.  It was at the bottom of my list of problems, right after how to get Stink Dog to prepare and bring me refreshing beverages.  Additionally, I find that my Zoloft makes me much less concerned about cleaning bathrooms and balancing the bank account as I used to be.  As a result we've become far too lazy and accepting of a sub-par life.  There are so many things we could be doing - visiting museums, going to free concerts in the park, biking to new ice cream joints, crank-calling Mrs. Peach, the boys' horrific kindergarten teacher...

A few days ago I asked my family "what do you think about doing a screen-free week?"  Reactions varied.  Reid, who least needs to be pulled away from the hypnotizing rectangles of magic, was immediately enthusiastic.  He listed off things we could do with all our new free time and the benefits of taking a 7-day media break.  What a brown-noser.  Ian's take on the idea was precisely as I expected. "Nope.  Not gonna do it.",  with arms crossed, eyes closed and a firm shake of the head.  Sadly for him, he was born into a family that while democratic on things like how much clothing Mom must wear to go out in public, is a dictatorship on things that really matter.  Refusal noted and denied.  Stink Dog became very anxious, since he doesn't know what to do with himself when I'm not ensconced in my chair at the computer desk. Troy was cautiously supportive.  He liked the idea in theory but I wouldn't describe him as excited.  "I could see doing it during the week, but that's how I relax on the weekends" he whined protested.  Ah, but that's the point.  We relax ourselves into a near comatose state and when the hours pile upon hours we become too tired to do anything other than more of the same. Yes, Isaac Newton, I know you figured this out a long time ago.  Don't be so smug.  No one likes that guy.
 
Here we are on Sunday evening. The boys will likely watch 'Family Guy' or play some horrible "first-person shooter" video game (which I abhor, but that's another post) until they're tired enough to go to bed. Troy and I watched 'Big Brother' and then he retreated downstairs to watch some shitty movie starring Adam Sandler's younger half-cousin Shirl and Carlos Baldwin, the long-lost fifth Baldwin brother.  I've assumed my position in front of the computer and shall creep on Facebook and mentally list and silently berate myself for all the things I should have done today but didn't have the energy for.  We will get up tomorrow and it will be a whole new world in the Jarvi household.  I can't wait to see if this experiment will be a magnificent success, accomplishing all the things I want it to: more togetherness, more productivity, more exercise, more exploration, more creativity.  Or if we'll lose our minds and kill each other in a Hunger Games style frenzy.

Stay tuned.