My Mom & Jackie Robinson?

In writing about taking the little Goofs to see 42: The Jackie Robinson Story on Mother's Day I forgot to mention that I actually have a story about Jackie Robinson and my mom.

Not that they ever met, or were even in the same city at the same time.  It isn't that kind of story.

When I was a kid I was extremely interested in baseball history including lots of biographies of baseball greats including Pee Wee Reese, Tony Conigliaro, Walter Johnson, Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, and of course Jackie Robinson.

Robinson, sadly, died relatively young from the complications of diabetes.  Whether this was connected to the enormous stress from his years in the majors or just bad breaks is not clear - although this particular biography made the direct causal connection and discussed his medical case in great detail.  I don't know why a children's biography of Jackie Robinson would go into such medical details, but it was the 1970s - an odd time.

One afternoon a friend of my parents came by for coffee.  His youngest son had just been diagnosed with diabetes.  As we sat around the dining room table chatting my mom encouragingly said 

"Well, no one dies from diabetes."

"No, people do die from diabetes!  Jackie Robinson died from diabetes," I announced, happy to contribute to the conversation.

"That was a while ago, the treatments are much better now," my mom said - in what I now realize was a very cool tone.

"No, it was only seven years ago.  And before he died he was bleeding out of his eyes!" I added helpfully.

"Thank you for sharing how smart you are." mom said, her tone just a few degrees above Kelvin. 

Our guest smiled wanly and took his leave.

Later that day mom asked to speak to me.

"Do you think Brian's dad has already talked to doctors about diabetes?"

"Yes."

"Do you think he probably knows all about the risks of diabetes?"

"Yes."

"Do you think he wanted to hear about how awful diabetes can be?"

"No."

"It's called tact - you'll need to learn it," mom dismissed me.

I won't claim to have learned tact - but an important part of growing up is at least knowing that it exists.

42: The Jackie Robinson Story (Our Mother's Day Movie)

So it was Mother's Day, and I did what I do - take the children away so Mama Goof has time to herself.  She sorted through old paperwork - you can lead a horse to water...

After chauffeuring them to their morning activities I plotted out an adventure for the little Goofs.  It was a beautiful day and the greater DC area abounds in opportunities, but the little Goofs resisted.  So I made them lunch and insisted they accompany me on a walk in the park before I took them to dinner and a movie.  They reluctantly agreed.

But the park means a stream (and the little Goofs really, really like streams).  More, GoofGirl has found a new redoubt from which to hurl rocks into the water.  This spot has particular charm because it is at least 30-40 feet above the water, leading to extremely satisfying splashes.


After over an hour of this I had to drag them away if we were going to get to our movie.  I would like to do an experiment and see just how long they could keep at the project of digging up rocks and dumping them into the stream.  I'll need a tent and some food because I think they'd be happy doing it for days.

I hope they never change.

Dinner and a Movie
The options for kid movies appears a bit weak right now, but GoofGirl suggested the movie about Jackie Robinson.  Like any responsible parent I checked to make sure it was appropriate and found out it contained bad language. I don't have a big problem with my children seeing modest bad language in a movie - I assume they already know the words, but they also need to know not to use them.

So we got dessert and dinner - in that order  - and saw 42: The Jackie Robinson Story.

The kids really liked it and I liked it a lot more than I thought I would.  Yes, it could be sappy and there were few chewy twists to the plot.  But it is simply a great and inspiring story.

GoofGirl was furious that people were treated the African-Americans were treated in that era.  She demanded to know why people could believe the things the bigots in the movie believed.  I didn't have an answer that satisfied her, my efforts to introduce historical context had little weight to GoofGirl's outraged sense of justice.

She also showed some keen insight, recognizing that had we lived then, these things would have applied to us since MamaGoof is Latino (and I guess so are the little Goofs.)  This only made her angrier.

Her big problem with the movie was that the baseball scenes weren't as clear to her.  So I went over the rules and basics.  As I did so, she narrowed her eyes and said, "Oh, like in kickball."

Sigh.  "Yes, like in kickball."

GoofBoy loved it to and hoped to apply some of the tactics in his upcoming Little League game.

I warned him sternly, "If you yell racial epithets at the other team, I will kill you!"

GoofBoy rolled his eyes, "Dad, the whole point of the movie is that it didn't work!"

Unfortunately, GoofBoy did not have the opportunity to sow dissension on the basepaths like Jackie Robinson - he was hampered by not getting on base.

As for me, well I liked it.  The story is inspiring pure and simple.  But there were other touches I liked.  Seeing the era of post-war baseball brought to life when crowds came to the ballpark wearing jackets and ties and General Managers sat around their leather and wood offices smoking cigars evoked of an era of grown-ups.  When I was kid, the old Brooklyn Dodgers were already legends - I remember reading a biography of Pee Wee Reese and names like Ralph Branca and Eddie Stanky were already bits of baseball lore.  And Red Barber, the great radio announcer...

But all of that was lost in the shadow of the real center of the movie - Branch Rickey.  Harrison Ford was terrific portraying that worldy, sanctimonious fox.  Rickey could was a giant in baseball history - a genius executive and a tremendous judge of character.  Rickey could deliver a sermon while counting ticket receipts and mean every word.  Ford captured Rickey's tremendous charm, but could not hope to capture Rickey's boundless energy.  The big screen is simply too small.  Robert Rice in The New Yorker back in 1950 wrote:

"Any pitcher who has experienced the physical, mental, and emotional strain of working with Rickey for half an hour is likely thereafter to regard pitching a nine-inning game as a peaceful way of spending a summer afternoon."

I have to end on this note - three decades after Robinson integrated the major leagues - when I was at the plate I wanted to be Eddie Murray.  That I was an awkward white kid, while the great Eddie Murray was graceful and African-American was irrelevant - I really wanted to be him because he embodied everything 10 year old me thought was awesome.

And I wasn't unique.  The equally awkward and white Ken up the street wore a shirt that had "Singleton" on the back (for Ken Singleton) while other kids wanted to be Lee May or Jim Rice.

I understand GoofGirl's anger at the incomprehensible injustices she saw in the movie and am sympathetic to those who argue times don't change fast enough.  But I am glad that they have changed at all.

Oz the Great and Very, Very Long

Mama Goof is cleaning the house for Pesach, and while I have been offering to help clean for weeks she has not even acknowledged my offer.  Normally, if I want to help, I just do the task.  MamaGoof assumes I will do "it" wrong (and she's probably right.)  But if I don't do it too wrong, than - as long as it is fait accompli - she tolerates it.  But I am bound to do Pesach cleaning incorrectly.  (Pesach is a Jewish holiday in which bread and a huge range of other foods are not consumed and the house must be cleaned thoroughly.)  MamaGoof knows that if Pesach cleaning is left to me I will thoroughly scrub the house with a flour-based cleanser thus necessitating that we burn our house to the ground (or at least she re-wash everything thoroughly.)

So the best thing I could do was take the children out of the house and leave MamaGoof in peace to scrub to her hearts content.

So I took them to a movie.  They unanimously agreed on Oz the Great and Powerful.  When they don't agree on things, I can usually manage to get my way on these things.  I was pushing for ZeroDarkThirty.  With its theme of the triumph of good over evil, plus a healthy dose of waterboarding I thought it was the perfect family movie (although GoofGirl might have gotten ideas.)  But the little Goofs were a solid majority voting block, so we were off to see the wizard...

It is visually incredible (especially in 3D) and very long (130 minutes.)  It isn't fair to call it spectacularly boring, but it is accurate to call it boringly spectacular.

There are some neat moments and, while I had my problems the kids loved it, and that's what's important.

But from my perspective, before we get to the odd and/or predictable plot points and constraints needed to make the story work, were my problems with the witches.  There were three (just like in MacBeth - but there the similarities end.)  They really annoyed me.  Rachel Weisz was ok.  Mila Kunis (who I generally like and enjoy seeing on the big or small screen) was unbearable.  Her tone, her words, just did not work for me.  Then Michelle Williams, who is also a fine actress, was yet another witch.  This might not have been her, but the dialogue she uttered was all wrong.  At one point she began a sentence by saying, "For the record..."

Young urban professionals in contemporary rom-coms might say this.

But do magical beings in fantasy worlds say "For the record"?  Especially when that fantasy world links to Kansas circa 1905?

That one sticks in my mind, but there were plenty of other anachronistic big-city screen-writer bits like that.

Also, when people were evil - they were ugly - always a good message.

Finally, there was an odd constraint in which the people of Oz - haha - could not kill.  Now where did that come from?  This forced a dramatic confrontation of illusion and fireworks.  (I mean, if you can make gunpowder for fireworks, you might have some other "kinetic" options.)

On the other hand, it was kind of fun and it amused the little Goofs.  What more can I really ask for?

A Pair of Great Books from Clare Vanderpool

"Dad, this story is so good!"

I was relieved to hear this.  On our drive home from an excursion to Philly we finished Watership Down.  I knew this would happen, so I had gotten a new book.  But we were out of Percy Jackson, Harry Potter, and the City of Ember - and the kids had started reading Lemony Snicket on their own.  So I just started poking around looking for something new.  I stumbled on the 2011 Newbery Award-winning Moon Over Manifest by Clare Vanderpool.  I guess Newbery Award should be enough of an endorsement, but I worried that it would be too precious, or without action the Goofs would be bored.

I needn't have worried at all.  Within moments of listening we were swept into the story (cynical Father Goof included!)

Set in the Depression it is about Abilene, a streetwise girl who had been riding the rails with her father when suddenly he sends her off to the town of Manifest where he had been raised.  She lives with the man who took in her father when he was a teenage drifter, discovers a cache of letters from almost two decades earlier.  The story moves back and forth between the narrator's present and the stories told by the letters, set during World War 1 and the Great Influenza.

Abilene, feeling that her father has sent her to Manifest to abandon her, begin exploring the town's past in order to learn who her father really is.

Moon Over Manifest is a nice change of pace from all of the fantasy and adventure.  There are fantastic, mysterious moments but the story is based in reality.  It is sad and sweet, with a history lesson thrown in.

In short, the little Goofs description was dead on.

Best of all, Ms. Vanderpool has another book, Navigating Early.  Another story of a young person feeling abandoned by his parents.  Set in Maine during World War 2' Jack 's mother in Kansas has died and his father is serving in the Navy.  Jack is sent to a boarding school in Maine where he falls in with the odd outcast Early who sees the number Pi as a story.  Over a school break, Jack joins Early on a quest through Maine's deep woods.  We are still in the middle, but, while completely real, Navigating Early also has a magical, mythical quality to it.


The little Goofs say Navigating Early is even better than Moon Over Manifest.  I say, why choose.

A Participation Trophy that Counts

GoofBoy won a trophy. He was named "Runner of the Meet" at his last track meet. He is absurdly proud, and he should be. No question there has been an absurd proliferation of trophies for participation. A couple seasons of rec-league soccer running randomly up and down the field will garner enough trophies to make a kid's room look like Yankee Stadium. I was that kid - I was always far away from the ball - sometimes by design, more often by sheer cluelessness. But not GoofBoy - he really participates.  He may not excel, but if he is on a team he really wants to play.  This is good, because he has been on some terrible teams - but he doesn't mind as long as he gets to play.  I was also on terrible teams, but I didn't want to play because that increased the chance of me being hit in the head by a ball.  I did hope, through careful observation, to develop stratagems by which my terrible teams would be transformed into world-beaters.  Sometimes I would outline my plans in great detail.  The coaches always appreciated this.

In athletics, and hopefully most everything, GoofBoy is not me, he likes practice and, whatever the sport, he is in position and doing everything right.  He has really taken to track.  We go out on runs together.  I get winded keeping up with him.  He cruises through two miles and turns to catch and pass me at one and a half miles.  He is by no means the fastest kid, usually he is in the middle of the pack.  But a participation trophy in track is no self-esteem bauble.  Being on the team means running at least 15 miles a week - so even the slowest person on the team is doing something pretty demanding.

GoofBoy is really proud of this trophy and so am I - he earned it.

GoofGirl's Gift

3C had a birthday party recently.  GoofGirl attended, of course, but did not want Carpool Gal to feel left out (there is now a decent working arrangement between the three of them in which they can all play together or pair as seems fit - the Byzantine Empire muddled through for centuries, so why not...)

So, GoofGirl decided to write Carpool Gal a book.  The book is about the Carpool Clan's dog Declan who GoofGirl initially feared and now loves.  It was a pretty funny book, so - with GoofGirl's permission - I've shared it here. Like most great works (Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Back to the Future, and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man) it is a trilogy.


Part 1


Part 2


Part 3