Sabbatical 2025

My quadrennial sabbatical from work has come and gone, leaving many pretty pictures in my mind and even more on my digital film roll--a selection of the latter, above. A few details for the curious, and for me as I plan my next one:

• I took separate vacations with each boy and with Talia and that was exactly the right thing to do. Dan and I also had our first overland adventure. These trips were mostly mixes of the same key ingredients--camping, seafood, and good company--and I loved every moment of them. I saw friends who live far away but relatively little of those who are nearby. I apologize to the locals, but I trust this prioritization makes sense to you as it did to me.
• Brekkie readers will not be surprised to learn that I began sabbatical with an aspirational To Do list. The number of items that were completed is not large, but I made good progress on many more. As important, I fixed the problems--cluttered garage space, broken table saw, no personal computer--that were roadblocks to my productivity generally. I face the remaining items with confidence, numerous though they still are. Also a confidence builder, the great if not always real expertise of GPT 5: between that, Youtube, and Amazon I'm now prepared to tackle anything.
• I read, of course, though only one book really made me think: Huber's Climate Change as Class War (see here for last sabbatical's reading list). We are, obviously, in the midst of both climate change and class war, and we're losing both, badly. Huber shows that the two are really the same fight against that tiny horrible cadre that runs our current economic system.

I'm back at work now, watching workers finish our new driveway while attempting to reframe my job and trying to get useful results from our enterprise version of ChatGPT. No sawing is required, and I miss it. 

 

20 years

Some ask, "where did all the time go?" I ask, "what happened to all those great shirts?" In memory of some that clothing, and of a marriage that's just getting going, a photo album:

 

Parenting, a history

Let me tell you what I think of you

Felix's high school held its annual "Last Chapter" event the week before last, in which graduating seniors invite those who raised them to celebrate this milestone with a dinner and a bit of ceremony. Talia was in LA on her second AIDS Ride so I went with Felix. After dinner and a few speeches we were all invited to circle up with our Senior for their reading of an obligatory Thank You note, scribbled, in Felix's case, in the library some hours earlier. His note is reliably summarized, and not greatly shortened, by these bullet points:

• I think we can all agree that I mostly raised myself.
• You, my parents, are due some credit for having the wisdom not to interfere in that process too much.
• Peace out.

The note, being brief, left Felix and I time to walk about before the closing class slideshow. As we did, we passed other Seniors who, it seems, needed more time to read the notes they had prepared. Their bullet points, caught in passing, ran along these lines:

• I can't begin to tell you how much I love you
• I can't ever repay you for all you have done
• Everything I have I owe to you

And so forth.

I am not writing this as an offended parent who feels underserved by my child's plaudits. If, in fact, Felix is sui generis (look it up, Felix), then good for us for letting that unfold as it has: the results, as detailed elsewhere, are excellent. However, as a trained historian I cannot let this gross misreading of the historical record go unchallenged. The truth is we taught you a lot, Felix, and here's proof:

We taught you to eat

We taught you to walk

We taught you to read

We taught you to ride

We taught you to slide

We taught you to travel

 

We taught you to dress yourself 

We taught you to sing

We taught you to exercise, or tried to

We taught you to sleep, and believe you me, that took some doing

And on and on and on. The fact that you have elevated and built upon these and the many, many, many other skills we taught you should not lead to a misevaluation of the importance, and difficulty, of establishing a base for them in the first place.

In writing a history that is complete as well as accurate, I must record that Felix did offer additional public feedback on and to his parents during his high school graduation ceremonies the week after. There, with the eyes of the world upon him (photo above and 11m into this video), Felix declared that he loves his mother and father. OK, he said it in Dutch, but trust me, he said it. We houden ook van jou, Felix, maar dat weet je al.

Dear Felix, here is your 18th birthday card

Happy (belated) birthday to you

I don't often write about you, Felix, because you make me intensely proud and I find pride embarrassing. Also, it doesn't make for good copy: you have a 4-and-then-some GPA, you're a captain of the MTB team, you’re handsome and well-spoken and have rizz…but see here we’ve fallen into boasting, and besides, Brekkie readers know these things already, surely? I’ll have to dig deeper. And what’s deeper than pride?

Respect.

I respect your adventurousness. You throw yourself out of bed before dawn to go rampaging across the fog-bound coastlands, spend summer weeks battling deadly thistle, think nothing of a 50 mile bike ride or a 10 foot ski jump. You've gutted wild boar, gavelled unruly Fairfax residents into submission, attended private school socials on boats in the Bay. Your mud-spattered face, your (formerly mine) wrecked outdoor gear, your often (not that I look often) surprising location on Find My: it all speaks so well of you.

I respect your resilience. You face challenges squarely and with great determination. In the face of adversity you turn quickly to solutions or to other matters altogether where something is broken that you can’t fix. You've long since learned not to add to your own troubles with worry or self-incrimination or even, your brother excepted, with blame. You do not dwell: you spring back, move on, find a way around.

I respect your entrepreneurial spirit. You've created your own tutoring and bike instruction businesses, plotted your own path through high school and our local community college. From your early "like this is around?" attempts to dress yourself to yesterday's "off skiing, see you," you scoff at obstacles and for the most part that's because for you they really are not there.

I respect your social presence. You show care for your peers, accept roles of responsibility and mentorship willingly, and have a light-handed ability to influence and lead others. You are appreciated by adults and kids alike and are a social fixture even at high schools you don't attend. You know how to have a good time and are yourself quite fun. I would be happy to have you as a friend.

Finally, and not least, I enormously respect your ability to skip stones. Really, you are amazingly good at it.

Felix, you are a top student, a gifted athlete, friend to many, and as best I can tell a sought-after candidate boyfriend. You are kind to animals and small people and to yourself. You love learning, are deeply curious about the world, and have great intellectual capacity. You are charismatic and, in that overused college application phrase, a born leader. You have direction and ambition and you, and I, have every reason to think you will be able to achieve your lofty goals. Most important, from my selfish point of view, you are a good son and brother. All of which is a great puzzle to me for I was hardly any of these things at your age and am not many of them even now. Respect.