Remember when your mother shrieks from the other room, “Did you WASH YOUR HANDS???!!!” And you called back that you had but really didn’t? Remember when you’d splash some water on them so they’d be moist in case she felt them? Remember how most of the time she’d know you were lying, and you never understood the big deal. Well, I’ve got a story for you.

Claire’s Papa had been scheduling a surprise visit to Arizona for her birthday the first week of April, and he was to arrive Monday, April 4th. Well Sunday afternoon Claire began to feel a little under the weather and was not enjoying her time with a friend who was visiting. She was a little warm and we both were a little concerned since Papa flew in 24 hours later and hoped to help her ride her bike, swim with her at our local pool, play games, take walks, etc… Of course Papa knew she would attend school every single day he was here, and he could see her afterward (Boy, was I wrong!).

By Monday’s end, Claire wouldn’t play with her friends at kid’s express and just sat there after school. By the time Donna picked her up and got her home, Claire only wanted to go to bed. I was picking Papa up at the airport, and we planned this whole unveiling that was quickly forgotten. Later Monday night she woke once and was confused but happy Papa was there. By now her temp was between 101-103 for a day, and she was not attending school Tuesday. Tuesday she also went to the pediatrician who believed it was viral as were a lot of cases they’d seen recently. She was regularly vomiting and having diarrhea by this time. She stayed home Tuesday and Wednesday, but by Wednesday she didn’t want to get out of bed at all and refused to eat or drink anything at all. Back to the pediatrician’s office we went Thursday morning. She was down a pound and our regular pediatrician told Donna and her father to take Claire to the ER immediately for fluids.

I met them Thursday afternoon at the ER, and Claire already looked better. The fluids perked her up but they took blood and stool to check just in case. After a few hours, Claire came home and was back to “normal”. She was not permitted to attend school on Friday, her birthday, but she was doing well. Now she had a good excuse to spend her entire birthday with Papa! I came home at noon Friday, April 8th, to spend time with her and make sure she was ok, and she looked great. Friday we went to the pediatrician’s again, and the doc said it definitely must’ve been viral (which I had a really hard time believing by this point!) and Claire looked great. Friday we celebrated. Saturday she and her friend spent part of the day together for her birthday, and then she and Papa spent the evening together. Sunday we took Papa to the airport and said our good byes. Even though Claire was on the couch a lot sick, they did get a lot of time together.

Before going to the airport, the ER called. They said a test came back abnormal and she had to go back in. Donna and I decided that would happen after the airport. We felt it was routine so I went about my own pre-planned event for the afternoon while the three of them headed to the airport. I told Donna to email me at my event if there were any issues or if they wanted me to headed to the hospital after my event if they were still sitting (as people do often in ER waiting rooms).

Around 4:00pm Sunday, Donna texted me and it read: “Salmonella. Sending home on antibiotics.” My reaction was “yuck”, but who the heck gets salmonella? This is something your mother threatened so you would take a bath before bed, or your Mimi threatened you with because you would not get out from under her feet while she cooked a nice chicken dinner.

I told my wife I’d meet them at home, and then I kept doing my thing. Someone at my event talked my ear off for half an hour, and then I got in my car to head home. I glanced back at my phone almost an hour after the last text. This one said “Infectious Disease not letting her leave. Being admitted. IV antibiotics.”

My response is not appropriate for a PG-13 blog post.

I channeled Mario Andretti while frantically trying to call my wife’s mobile and/or my mother, the nurse. Donna’s response (almost always calmer than my own) was to go home and get together a list of stuff she and Claire would need, and then grab dinner before heading to the hospital. That made sense to me but I was a little strung out. I was worried about what we needed and when we’d go home and why was she even in the hospital in the first place. She was fine. She looked fine. She felt fine. She was sick last week, not now. This did not compute.

I arrived at the hospital Sunday evening three hours after she arrived, and she was still in an ER room. Neither of us was too happy and expressed our concerns to the nurses outside of the room before Claire was finally taken upstairs. Now this isn’t a bad hospital and overall we’re happy with them. Donna even picked this hospital in the first place was because it’s the new “children’s hospital” five minutes from our house.

That evening it was assumed Claire would be at the hospital for 48 hours while we waited for the test results. The goal was that by Tuesday the results would be negative and she could leave. This would pretty much mean that any salmonella in her streams was transient and we would worry less. In the mean time the CDC wanted her on aggressive IV antibiotics, and the doctors prescribed more fluids since she was still a little “dry”.

Her spirits were good, and her new room was more like a suite with a pull out bed for Mama and a TV with tons of kid’s movies, games, and even the internet on the TV. We determined I would work the first half of each day and then relieve Mama who went to work from the afternoon into early evening before going home to get work clothes for the next day before settling into the hospital at night. Donna’s college is across the street from the hospital, so this worked out for everyone.

We quickly got into a pattern of me getting my sub and heading up in the late mornings, and Donna showering in the hospital room’s bathroom. Even though Claire was definitely in good spirits and utterly asymptomatic, by Tuesday we were done with this hospital thing. We wanted to go back to our normally schedule lives. (Remember by then Claire had not been at school in 7 school days).

But it was not meant to be. Claire’s test came back positive. Two more days in the hospital, Mr. Groundhog. So we continued. The days meshed into each other, and I was in the hospital by noon each day and didn’t see fresh air again until after dark. Dante, the dog, was spooked because our home felt so empty since it was just me from about 9pm-6am each day. People sent well wishes and hoped she felt better soon, and I had to remind them that she felt totally fine… that we just needed to kill the salmonella swimming in her blood before anything really bad happened. Donna worked later and later, trying to fit 8 hours of work into 4, and we waited.

We knew that when they reran the blood tests Tuesday that there was no way we’d be home until Thursday at the earliest, and when the Infectious Disease doc came into the room, I got him to tell us that outright so we could plan our week.

We also asked him how she got sick and what it really meant. He said that it’s not uncommon for people to get Salmonella in Arizona (one strain is even named after the state!), but many people who get it are adults. Many times they don’t even noticed it. He said it could come from reptiles or amphibians. He said it could be found in unfiltered water. He said it is in nature. He even said it could be found in peanut butter!

My response was “what if Claire was recently playing in a creek, in the forest, down stream from a cattle ranch, eating peanut butter filled pretzels and playing with crayfish far from a sink where she could wash her hands?” He looked at me and said “that’d be the perfect storm.” Little did he realize that over break, while camping, Claire did exactly that. Even the incubation period matched with when she became symptomatic.

All the while, each day, we’d email Claire’s teacher, principal, kid express’ teacher and attendance officer. She received several nice emails back, a wonderful gift from Donna’s colleague, a beautiful card from my student’s mother, and even a personal call from her principal. We got homework done, played games, and watched television. By Tuesday the fluids were done, so she was not tethered to a machine 24/7. (Better for us all as she kept moving around the room, and we were worried she’d yank the IV out of her arm.)

By the time I arrived at the hospital on Wednesday, the preliminary culture was still negative. The doctor said after 12 hours of negative growth, the chances of the culture staying negative increases with each passing hour. We were pretty happy about that. If by Thursday the culture was positive, we need to start examining her for bone disease or Meningitis (in other words, we did NOT want the test to turn positive!).

By the time Donna returned Wednesday night, we felt really good about Thursday. We had so many well wishes via texts, Facebook, Twitter, and phone calls to us or Claire in the room. The thoughts and prayers were flowing in, and Donna packed up most of our belongings in the hospital room for me to bring home. Each night Donna had picked what Claire would have for dinner, and I’d order it each afternoon. That night as Claire had her dinner, we began laughing out loud! Donna had ordered her Salmon without thinking. It was hilariously coincidental!

Thursday morning, it was a matter of waiting. I had my own drama to deal with at work, so I didn’t stick by my phone much until 10:30 am when I had a new email that simply said “We’re Outta Here!”

It’s Thursday afternoon now, Donna’s back at work, I’m at home with Claire for the remainder of the day, and Claire’s excited to get back to school tomorrow just in time for her first kindergarten field trip and a relaxing weekend. She even had a gift waiting for her. Mimi ordered Claire stuffed bacteria. This company makes these stuffed animals that aren’t really animals. They come in the shape of bacterium or viruses but they’re plush and magnified by 10,000,000. (They’re about 4″ long and 2″ wide.) Guess which one Claire got in the mail? Salmonella. Three of them living in a petri dish. Very funny.

Donna got a Wii for graduation. The primary person who plays it is Claire who knows she better not even ask on a school night. Usually Claire’s MO on a Friday is get home from school pop in a movie, check her DVR list from the week or boot up the Wii. Tonight it was Wii. She began with some of the basic Wii generic games like Frisbee.

I hesitated for years about getting a gaming system in my own home. I remember college, high school and younger when we’d get into a game and play until the sun came up (literally). I finally acquiesced and knew I’d stay away. Well, Donna came home and we were enjoying watching Claire play so we decided to play a game with her. We picked Super Mario Bros because a) we only had to of the extra little pack thingies that go on the remote and b) cause, it’s totally Old Skool (I killed it on Nintendo 64).

It was 7pm. We started playing. We had such a great time, yelling at the tv, spilling over our beer (me, not Claire), having Donna video record us jumping around, etc… At ten til 9pm we made Claire go to bed, saved the game, and turned off the console before we played well into the night.

This was truly the very best night we three had together in a long time. Awesome awesome.

At 7:30pm tonight Claire was tucked into bed. I remember when I was young I would hide a book in bed and read. So when Claire started to want to take a book to bed, I could not be hypocritical. With that said, Donna went down the hall at 8pm and her door was open; she was reading. Donna closed the door so we could watch “adult tv” (i.e. cable shows not meant for little ones). At 8:31 I had to reset the server (in Claire’s closet). Guess who was still reading??? I asked her what was happening to check her reading comp. She proceeded to summarize last large section of the book before reading the current page to me, smoothly with a single error in the last sentence when she got to the word “attractive”. I asked if she’d begun the book tonight, and she said yes. She was on page 22 of a Junie B Jones book.

After rebooting the server, I kissed her, closed the door, shook my head and went back to the living room.

Well, I guess I should tell you a little about myself. There are things in our pop culture world that bug the hell out of me. Some of these things include celebrity teen girls getting pregnant, High School Musical actors posing naked online, everything about Miley Cyrus, and Britney Spears psychosis. With that said, here’s a recent conversation with my 5year old on the way home from Kindergarten.

Claire: “Dad, we had an argument today.” She said this as if I knew who “we” are. I assumed it was the few kids she ALWAYS talked about after school each.

“Oh, yeah?” I asked innocently. “What happened?” Kindergarteners can really blow things out of hand.

“Well, J______ said it’s Justin Beiber. But I know his name is Justin Beaver.”

I gulp audibly. Oh know. “Um…. well, Claire, who is that?”

“He’s a singer, Daddy. J_____ loves his songs. She and O______ said his name is Justin Beaver.” She presses.

“Well, have you ever heard his music?” I ask, almost fearing the response. I suddenly could see the music posters and pop idol posters she’d want for her room. I remembered my own Simon LeBon photos on the ceiling above my bed, and the zipper jacket I just had to have.

“No, but J____ has.”

“Oh.” I just keep driving quietly and Claire seems to drop the conversation. I head up the road wondering how I can raise a child outside of the pop culture, sugar pop garbage that permeates our lives. I seriously know that I can’t. I can share information about the media, I can teach her Media Literacy like I do in my classes every day, I can love my daughter, teach her my values, and I can trust her.

After a few miles of silence, “Claire? His name is Justin Beiber.”

Posted by Jeff Glagowski on Flickr.

It’s odd to be on the opposite side of things as Claire now begins kindergarten. We went to meet the teacher two weeks ago, and Claire acted goofy. She hid. She wouldn’t say hello to her classmates who were also there. She sat in her new classroom seat and read a book loudly as if to say “see, I can do this already”.

The first day of school I was blessed to have friends cover my morning classes so I could join Claire and Donna at the elementary school. We were there super early with teacher gifts, kleenex, and cameras in hand. We took photos of Claire on the recess equipment and smiled as her second grade friend ran up to us. We chatted with her teacher and the other kids in the class, too. The first week was all about procedures, rules, and how to pay for lunch. I was eager for her to begin bringing home homework because I knew this was something I was good at doing with her. That week she had no homework.

This week though it was a little different. She had homework every night. For example, one night she had to write the letter “A” over and over again to practice it in some oddly formatted handwriting called dinelian. We also got our first teacher phone class. Claire was being gregarious and was moved to a solitary table where she broke a handle off a materials carousel. We made her write her teacher and apology and take dollar bills our of her piggy bank to pay for her mistake. It’s Friday now and she’s come a long way in just two weeks. Wednesday she was to recite “Mary Had a Little Lamb” which she did by reading the lyrics online on my Droid. I’ve watched her sit down at her desk when she gets home to do homework or read through directions for other worksheets that weren’t assigned. Sure, there’s been consternation on Claire’s part about not coming to high school with me, as she’s done for four years now, but there’s also the excitement of the day to tell Daddy when I pick her up after kids express.

Claire, the 4 year old, has a fascination with Farmville. Mama taught her to play and she can navigate the farms better than many adult players. This is a shot I popped off the other evening as she quietly fertilized her neighbors farms by herself while we cooked dinner.

Recently Claire and her classmates were asked what their favorite books are. Claire said her favorite book is “Dante’s Journey”, which is a cute little children’s book we purchased for her in Florence, Italy last summer. It’s a cute little children’s book where Dante’s a little boy and goes through this land with Virgil, his doll. One level includes people who lie and what happens, and so there are these positive messages. She was excited to take this book to class, and at the end of the day, I asked her how it went. She said she wasn’t allowed to share her book “because it’s too scary.” She told me that her teacher said that, then i wondered if her teacher bothered to actually read the book. Perhaps she just saw the darker images or the child walking through a land that was depicted to be hell. Her teacher had the book put away where the kids could not see it.

So now we censor in kindergarten? It’s a child’s book, for God’s sake. It explains why you should not be greedy, why you should not lie, etc… It shows consequences. It’s not the original Dante’s Inferno (which they do teach in schools), so why censor? The kids read Where the Wild Things Art (at this age and younger) with their monsters gnashing their terrible teeth, etc…

So far I have kept my mouth shut, chose my battles and took the book home. But it still bothers me. How much censorship shall my daughter and I go through in her education over the next 13 years?

The day Donna knew she was pregnant one of the first thoughts that went through my mind was driver’s licenses and prom dresses. None of the thoughts had to do with kindergarten. Last week, it was the only thing on my mind as Claire and I went off to register for school. Originally we considered her attending an elementary school near my work but we don’t know what the future holds so recently we spoke to friends whose son attends an elementary school about a mile from our house. They only had great things to say about the school and both are teachers.

So we checked out the school and realized that if Donna were to drive to or from school, this elementary would be so much more convenient for our family. We stopped in one day to pick up the paperwork and we took it home. It was odd to fill it out because it was the same exact paperwork the students fill out at my high school.

Together Claire and I drove the paperwork over to the school; as we exited the car she took the packet from me to take inside. I shot a few photos and followed her in. We met with the attendance clerk and turned in all of her paperwork. The woman said Claire needed to take a placement test, and we asked what it entailed. She said Claire would be asked to identify her colors; Claire’s response was “do you want me to spell their names, too?” Very very fun.

Before Christmas break I informed Claire’s karate instructors that she would be out for two weeks for our trip back east. Since I knew tip testing was right when she returned, I asked her instructor if i could video record the steps. We video taped it, and it looks really hard. She had to do a jump kick and something that looked like a flying front kick. It looked terribly tough.

The first week I forgot about the video, but then I sent it over to Donna and I’m not even sure if Claire’s papa really saw it. Claire just wanted to be silly over break and would only kick and hit to mess around. So, mostly she didn’t practice.

When we returned this weekend, I resigned myself to the fact that she’d probably not get a tip this month and definitely wouldn’t have enough time in to get a new belt. Today I took her home early so she and I could watch the video and try to practice before class tonight. When watching the video, Claire kept trying to do everything backwards because she was standing towards her instructor’s video. She couldn’t get the whole concept of the reflection of the video.

I kept trying to get her to let me show her how to do it, and she kept getting frustrated. She began getting irate and was yelling about how she knew how to do it. I challenged her to show me the moves, but she kept refusing. I finally just took her to class and stopped trying. We had a few errands to run before class, so we got there very early. She was able to watch the classes before hers but she rather played. She kept telling me to leave her alone and she was being really stubborn. I tried to get her to watch the tip testing in the class immediately before hers, but she was yelling and kept trying to get away. I was so mad I was going to spank her and drag her out of there before her class or I’d just let go.

I let her go and she ran onto the mat for her class. I didn’t even watch at first, but then they were practicing the moves. She kept screwing around and her teacher had to stand there with her. Then it was finally tip testing time.

She got up there when it was her time, jumped into position and immediately did the entire routine almost perfectly. Her teacher asked her to repeat her kicks, which she did as best as a 4 1/2 year could. He congratulated her (and not everyone was passing!), gave her high five and sent her back to her seat. She immediately flipped around and gave me a look that said, “What was the worry?”

As she smirked, I couldn’t help but chuckle under my breath. After the last kid tested, they all came out to get drinks, and she walked up to me with her hand on her hip and literally said “See Dada, I told you so.”

(Epilogue: It also turned out she has enough hours in to belt test for her white/blue/white belt this weekend.) Oh boy.

Since my parents bought a new house and had more room and since we’d not spent Christmas Eve night at my parent’s in years, it was time. Earlier in the day Donna and Claire met us there while I pretended to help my sister cook dinner. Later after dinner, Claire didn’t want to go to bed. She was waiting for Santa, and all I was waiting for her was for her to fall asleep sdo I can drag a crapload of presents out of my parent’s basement to put around the tree. This is the first year where I had to keep two things in mind. 1) Claire would recognize if grandparent and Santa gifts came in the same wrapping paper, and 2) we cannot put any presents under the tree before she goes to sleep on Christmas Eve.

As I always expect with Claire, she never wants to go to sleep. And since it was Christmas Eve, she was even more excited than usual. By 11:00pm everyone was way sick of waiting for her to go down by herself and something had to be done. Uncle Jaime, my brother, decided to climb into the attic and take matters into his own hands.

Over the couch, through the roof, suddenly Santa and his reindeer were loudly walking around on the roof, preparing to come down one of my parent’s chimneys. (Yes, I know she’s smart, so I kept one chimney/fireplace free from a fire that night incase she asked!) Claire, sitting on the couch full dressed, looked towards the ceiling, looked around at her people and bolted to the bedroom. Donna followed her into the bedroom, as Claire grabbed her PJs and threw herself onto the bed.

“Mama, help me get changed! I need to go to sleep now! Santa’s here!” She screamed as she stripped her clothes before throwing herself into bed.

Thank you, Uncle Jaime.