Entry 25.24

This past weekend has been a whirlwind. But very relaxing. A relaxing whirlwind. Fairly paradoxical, but entirely possibly. My daughter, Alexis, had a couple of big events going on in her life. First, she graduated the fourth grade. Fourth Grade! For those of you who are young and don’t have children of your own, you don’t understand how fast the time goes. I hear the comments from some of you about how old you are, yet two decades on the third rock from the sun is not that long. Some of you haven’t even hit that mark yet. Yet others of you have more life experience than I do. I’m coming up on four decades, but that still makes me young (I still have two birthdays until I get to the big “four oh” although that will soon go down to one). It’s honestly just a matter of perspective though. Age that is. And every aspect of golf has it’s own individual age. You can be one age physically, another emotionally, a third mentally and yet another socially. I won’t let you know where I think I am in each of those. I will say that most of, actually all of them, I feel are much younger than my overall age despite the fact parts of my body show the deterioration of my previous careers far beyond my birth age (for example, last time I had an x-ray on my left shoulder, the doctor told me my shoulder looked like that of a person who is in their sixties and that was over five years ago). So when your daughter graduates fourth grade and is looking at entering middle school, it makes you reflect (notice I didn’t say feel old. Remember, perspective).

Graduating fourth grade is not something I am familiar with. Not because I never finished the fourth grade, though at times I’m sure you and I both wonder about that fact. I went to a small private school in New Hampshire. Kindergarten graduation I am familiar with. I can confirm that I did graduate from kindergarten. A bunch of little kids who are clueless about the world walking across stage more to give the parents a feel good story than it is for the kid. That kid ain’t gonna remember that event in their life. I sure don’t. I have “imprinted” memories about it, but they aren’t real. They are just stories that my parents or teachers have told me that make me believe I remember, but I remember their stories, not the actual event themselves. This phenomena happens to people a lot. But anyway, watching your kindergarten graduate and walk across the stage to receive a certificate or in my case a rolled up piece of paper with a ribbon tied around it (do I actually remember that, or is it a referred memory? Hmm…), gives parents hope. Hope that their kid will one day graduate again. That their kid can be successful. Do I think all the hoopla is worth it? Five years ago when my daughter graduated from kindergarten I would’ve told you no. I probably used the words “worthless” and/or “stupid” to describe a kindergarten graduation. But really that ceremony has a ton of worth to it. In my journey as an Applied Functional Scientist and in my own personal life, I have learned how important successes early on in an endeavor are to provide encouragement, increase engagement and provide empowerment. Like I said, that early success isn’t for that five year old with a bad haircut and his finger up his nose, it’s for his or her parents. I know my parents needed that early encouragement that I wouldn’t be a complete waste of oxygen. What I truly do remember about my childhood, I was a demon child. At least that is how I would describe myself. My daughter is nothing like me. She is so incredibly social, bold, strong and puts my intelligence to shame. So, when my daughter was set to graduate fourth grade, I was ecstatic. I don’t have to wait another seven or eight years for her to graduate again. I get to see her succeed again already. What does this to for a parent? Well, it makes you proud. But it is also another draw to engage with her education. How is she doing in her challenge classes (an honor’s program her school district has that starts early)? What classes interest her? What does she want to do when she grows up (a question I’m still asking myself)? Does she want to go to college? This is the power of a fourth grade graduation. Again, not so much for the kid. It’s for the parents. See how it has increased my engagement in her education? Exactly what it should do.

As this was my first fourth grade graduation to attend, I was interested to see how this would go. I mean, she told me that rehearsals lasted over two hours. Two hours! What was I getting myself into? Even worse, we were attending the second of the two fourth grade graduations at her school so there was no back stop to run into. The first one had to finish on time for the second one to start on time. The second one? No such luck. And ours had three classes of fourth graders and not two like the first one. But the ceremony was smooth and painless, for the most part. There was a small part where six graduates got up and read small parts to the introduction and presentation of the class gift. You could tell how nervous they were. The normal person can read a few hundred words a minute at best. These kids were going eight hundred words a minute. That wasn’t the painful part. The painful part was when the first teacher got up to talk about her class and read at twelve hundred words per minute. This woman can tackle a rowdy class of fifteen to twenty fourth graders, but facing a little over a hundred people obviously terrified her. But her part was over rather quickly and I’m not sure who was more relieved, us or her. The second teacher got up, read about her class and called her students across the stage to receive their certificates. Finally, Lexi’s class. I don’t know if it was the fact the first teacher was terrified or the second was monotonous, but I only remember what Miss Marek said. Well I remember about the first paragraph she read. Not because she was also boring or the fact I didn’t care, but her second sentence stuck in my brain. Not because it was a new concept or fact to me, but because it is something I have started teaching and have written about. “… or whether we were learning to be comfortable being uncomfortable…” This woman was teaching this concept to fourth graders! I don’t have a lot of contact with my daughter’s teacher. She lives in Connecticut so it’s not like I can pop in for Parent-Teacher Conferences easily. And shocking to you I’m sure, I don’t trust people very much. But in an instant with one phrase, I no longer worried about the last year of my daughter’s education. A total Halo Effect move I know (for those of you who I haven’t taught this to yet, the Halo Effect is when one fact changes our actions completely. My example is always how airplane crashes stop people from flying despite the fact air travel is far safer than driving. Fun fact, I just wrote that sentence as we were rolling down the runway taking off from JFK heading back to RDU). One fact should not surround and include all other aspects of my daughter’s education. But if that is the only thing that I know about Miss Marek, I will let it at least let it tilt the scale in her favor. What I consider in my life a complex and difficult concept that I didn’t learn until after I was thirty was taught to my daughter in fourth grade. I will revisit it with her consistently to make sure she doesn’t forget it, but that is a huge head-start that I didn’t have.

In fact, I already have. The second (and third) big events this weekend were my daughter’s dance recital(s). It’s called a dance recital but this is a production. They hold five shows starting Friday evening with the opener and then two on each Saturday and Sunday. And while the Academy’s Company Ensembles perform the same number for each of the shows, the dances performed by those not in the Company and Senior solo pieces change with each show. So it could really be considered five different productions. And since my daughter is not in the Company (yet) and she takes two styles of dance, she performed in two of the productions. And these girls are very good at every level. I’m not a dancer. I took dance lessons after I was injured because it was the one athletic activity my doctor would approve (I think it was a joke, but I ran with it). But I was learning dances you do with a partner like the waltz and Jitter-bug, not choreographed performances. Still way harder than you would think. Really. So watching these girls dance really impressed me. The strength, coordination and endurance needed for ballet, hip-hop, jazz, tap and even contemporary is incredible. The first performance I just sat back an enjoyed it for what it was even though I wanted to look for those girls who were just slightly off and analyze why. It honestly takes me a great deal of mental effort not to slip into that mindset. It’s what I am so used to doing that it’s almost second nature now. It’s harder for me not to do it than it is for me to do it no matter what the physical event is and how much I understand of that event. The second production though I let my bio-mechanical eye roam. Why could one girl go fully up on her toes in the ballet while another girl struggled? Was it completely strength related? How do they make their feet face opposite directions like that? (I have no idea what those moves are called but I know they have names. Cut me a little slack). I marveled at their speed at executing some moves and their ability to slow to and rotate slowly in positions with one leg pointed almost vertical in others. Incredible displays of athleticism that I have never stopped to marvel at before.

I’ve always ignored that kind of dancing. Honestly, I’d much rather my daughter play soccer, or softball or volleyball. Real sports. Well I thought that up until I start looking at them like athletes and less like performers. Now my brain is searching for answers about how they develop the strength, skill and feel to execute these dances to such perfection. Like I have started to see the “imperfections” in golf swings as critical to the beauty and wonder of the sport, I let the Halo Effect take this view of these dances as well. No longer was I looking with a critical eye, but rather one of appreciation for the tiny differences of each dancer. I think next time I go up to visit Lexi, I may try to schedule it at a time where I can go with her to dance class and watch her train. Maybe set up an appointment to sit down with the director of her dance academy (from England, this lady “majored” in tap, ballet and jazz from the Royal Academy of Arts) and pick her brain on her ideas of creating that kind of feel to control their movements so precisely. It took me three of these productions to get to this point, but I have a new found respect for these athletes. Which is how we tie this back into Miss Marek teaching her class to be comfortable being uncomfortable. After her second performance, we went out to Bar Taco (highly recommend the Duck and Pork Belly Tacos) and I asked her about what she wanted to do in dance next year. She said she wanted to stay in jazz and hip-hop and add tap and ballet and maybe lyrical. Which means she would meet the required number of disciplines to be part of the Company (you have to have a minimum of four). So, to me, logically, it would follow that she wanted to be part of the Company. Her answer? “No, I don’t think I’m good enough yet.” To be fair, this is only her second year of dance. But she has been one of the primary dancers in all three of her recital dances so far. She’s good enough. Strong enough for some of those moves? Nope. Coordinated enough? Nope. But she’s got a love for dancing and a will to work hard at it. You can’t teach heart. To me, heart means way more than talent, strength or smart. Way, way more. Give me a hundred kids who will work hard to make up the gap over those who are talented any time, every time. Comes from my days in the Army going through selection. I want someone who will never quit. But sometimes those people never give themselves a chance to quit. They need someone to tell them they have what it takes. I think that’s where Lexi is right now. She’s afraid to fail. Afraid to be comfortable being uncomfortable. So we talked about it. No pressure, I will encourage her to expand her abilities, but I will never pressure her. Ultimately it is her choice, not mine. Like my parenting style or not, I don’t really care. I’ve seen too many parents push their kids to do something and then the first choice they get, they quit. Then mom and dad are all “But Johnny! You loooove football!” No, mom and dad, you love football, little Johnny just was too afraid to tell you for the last seven years that he doesn’t love it as much as you do. So Lexi and I had a conversation, just applying one lesson she has learned to a completely different part of her life. Not feeling ready to do something is ok. It may actually be a sign that you are ready to. And if you aren’t, then you just back out just a little. If this summer she changes her mind and wants to do the Company thing, great! If she wants to walk away from dance all together, great! Where she is at life, she’s not quitting, she’s exploring. There’s so much that life has to offer. Some things she will explore more deeply than others. For Lexi, that’s dance. For me, it’s the overlap of the physical, biological and behavioral sciences where they come together in the realm of golf as seen through every lens I can possible draw knowledge and experience from. As we get older, we shouldn’t stop exploring, we just explore domains at different levels. Going into this weekend I never thought that I would have this much to write about coming out of it. And I didn’t even get to the go-kart racing that we did! Stories for another time I guess. I tell you what. I didn’t plan on covering so many topics, but I hope you all have as much fun reading this entry as I did writing it. Until next week…