After a week of exile in South Florida, I am finally finishing writing about the Country for Kids Concert.
Last but certainly not least, Rodney Atkins closed the evening at QDRs Country for Kids concert, supporting the N.C. Children's Hospital. It's been well over a week since the concert, so hopefully my memory will serve me well.
First, the serious. I learned this at the concert. Rodney Atkins was a very sick baby who was put up for adoption. He was adopted and then returned, if you can believe that, a number of times because he was so sick. Happily a family did adopt him, nurture him to good health, raise him with love, and he was able to become the successful artist he is today. Next to me sat a highschool friend of mine, coincidentally, a farmer's daughter. She has adopted two children who were born with birth defects. Last year, between the two children, there were thirteen surgeries. She has just moved to N.C. and specifically to an area where the N.C. Children's Hospital is an easy drive. In addition, the friend sitting on the other side of me knew one of the mothers in a video they showed about families who have very sick children in the hospital. Quite frankly, until this concert, I had never given the N.C. Children's Hospital much thought, because, Thank God, my daughter has been very healthy. Sitting next to my friends and hearing Atkins' story made me realize just how important it is to support pediatric hospitals.
Next, the completely superficial. Rodney Atkins was wearing as bedazzled a t-shirt as any person should ever wear, even a country singer. From where we were sitting, we couldn't actually see the image on his back but it was probably an eagle. My friend was rather enamored by the shirt. "Turn around. What's on your back? That's hilarious. It's so shiny." We were very far back and she didn't actually say it loud enough for him to hear. That would be rude. But I think we were all in agreement that he was sporting some dazzling bedazzling.
Rodney Atkins performance was a whole lot of fun. He played hit after hit and got everyone up on their feet singing. He had the audience sing the chorus of Farmers Daughter and taped it. I think we flubbed the lyrics in the middle, but Lovin' Lyrics music promotions who is kind enough to be one of my few twitter followers, videotaped it. (Click link above and you also get a glimpse of his bedazzled shirt. See the glint over the shoulder.)
He went out into the crowd and audience members sang "If you're going through hell" which was rather poignant considering the battles many of the kids at the hospital need to fight. I'm assuming that some of the audience members were parents of children, or even the children themselves, that have been in the hospital. For a lively rather rocking song, it was quite the tear jerker.
But the performance aside, this is what I love about Rodney Atkins. He sings super-twangy country songs with a sense of humor. He always keeps it positive. In "About the South" (couldn't find an official video) he doesn't imply some sort of moral highground like, for instance, Josh Thompson's "Way out here". My husband has never picked a turnip and am not a farmer's daughter, but I love his songs because they are funny, sweet, warm and occassionally inspiring. He never comes across as mean. Even "Cleaning this gun" can probably get a smile out of about the most anti-gun father of a daughter. It's charming and the feelings expressed are universal.
Rodney Atkins has something slightly goofy and very loveable about him. After considering the four performers, I'm sending my friend who comments on my blog a Rodney Atkins CD. Thank you for reading and participating, Rachel.
Showing posts with label Rodney Atkins. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rodney Atkins. Show all posts
Monday, November 29, 2010
Monday, November 8, 2010
Alyssa Lies, Zahra Baker, Maimonides, and Self Control
Read to the end. I'm giving away a CD.
I've been listening to quite a bit of Jason Michael Carroll (JMC). He's performing in the Country for Kids concert to support N.C. Children's hospital on November 18th, together with James Otto, Clay Walker, and Rodney Atkins. I've made a nice mix of their best songs to get me in the groove. It's a little pre-concert routine I have.
Lately when JMC's "Alyssa Lies" comes up in the shuffle I can't help but tear up. Assuming he plays this song at the concert, there isn't likely to be a dry eye in the place. Many of us are going to be thinking about the sad search for the Zahra Baker, who has been missing a month from the Hickory, N.C. area. The fact that Zahra Baker has battled cancer, which resulted in her losing her leg and partial hearing, and that the concert supports a childrens hospital, is going to hammer home the sad circumstances of her recent life and assumed death from abuse. There is a certain communal guilt in stories like hers, and one that is expressed in the song. If you want to read an article detailing how Zahra was treated in the public setting of her neighborhood, read this article from the Winston-Salem Journal.
The song isn't new, but if you haven't heard it, Alyssa Lies tell the story of a father who takes a couple days to understand that his daughter has a new friend who comes to school full of bruises. He decides to go to the school the next day to report what he has heard but it is too late. The child has died. This story isn't far fetched. Neighbors and family reported Zahra's abuse to social services but ultimately not enough was done to help her.
It makes me question my response to something I witnessed on the beach this summer. There was a group of adults and their kids sitting nearby, listening to music and playing in the water. Then all of a sudden a father starts yelling at his eight year old son because he dumped sand on his mother's feet and towel, puts him over his knee and proceeded to spank him on his bare tuchas, a handful of smacks. I shook my head and moved my chair away. Others shook their heads and glared at them. My sister-in-law, an attorney, told me that I should have called the authorities, but on what grounds? Spanking is legal in South Carolina. The man wasn't beating his son. He humiliated his son in public and proved to all the world that he's a humorless father with a terrible temper and weak parenting skills, but he didn't damage the boy physically.
Now, looking back, I ask myself, if that father was angry enough to spank his kid in front of everyone on the beach for something so trivial, what does he do when the child truly misbehaves? To this day I'm not sure what I should have done. Should I have spoken up? "Hey there! Take a deep breath and get a grip, Mister."? Perhaps.
I was reminded of this incident further during a Jewish ethics class I take once a week. We were discussing the characteristics of an ethical person. Maimonides, a renowned Jewish philosopher from the Middle Ages, said that anger is one character trait that we should avoid completely, even in situations where anger would be a normal response. "Therefore, [the Sages] instructed us that one should distance himself from anger so much so that one accustoms himself not to feel even things which [would ordinarily] incite one to anger. And this is the ideal path." To apply this to parenting, Maimonides says that if one needs to act angry to get a child's attention, that's OK, but one shouldn't actually be angry. Why? One reason is that when people are very angry, they do irrational things. Their wisdom and good judgement escapes them.
But the culture of using corporal punishment is not based on anger. Anger escalates it and ultimately is what kills children, but if we take the Montgomey Gentry song "You Do Your Thing" that says "I ain't gonna spare the rod, Cuz that ain't what my daddy did, And I sure know the difference between wrong and right" it shows a rationally made parenting decision. One of my graduate school professors tells a story about how she learned basic carpentry. She misbehaved in a way her father found so egregious that he had her go out to his workroom and use his saws, drills and sand paper to make a paddle that he later beat her with. It was obvious from the telling of the story that the memory of her father's cold cruelty was far more significant than any memory she had of the lesson learned. An angry parent who inflicts pain as the standard consequence for misbehavior is not going to be able to make good decision regarding the intensity of such a punishment. A parent who isn't angry, and still uses pain as a method of punishing or training a child, is either a bit of a sadist or sadly misguided by family tradition.
One of my favorite parenting songs is "Watching You" by Rodney Atkins, who is also performing at the Country for Kids concert. His song sweetly states that our children see how we behave and behave accordingly. In the song, the boy uses a swear word and tells the father he learned it from watching him, and when the boy prays, and the father realizes that the boy’s faith comes from watching him as well.
What part of our behavior do we want to see reflected back at us when we visit our children's households? How are we going to prevent sad stories like Zahra's from happening over and over again? I bet that some people don't think that these things are connected, but they are. Our tempers and methods of discipline are on a continuum. It's up to each one of us to decide where we are along that line and if we're really comfortable with how our behavior could ultimately affect our children and our children's children.
To promote discussion, I'm giving away the latest CD of one of the four artists performing at the Country for Kids concert, James Otto, Jason Michael Carroll, Clay Walker, or Rodney Atkins. Leave an interesting comment on this subject. Extra credit goes to the writers who uses a musical reference in their comments. I'll announce the winner on Monday Nov. 15th. The winner chooses which CD they want. If the winner doesn't want a CD I'll make an equivalent donation to N.C. Children's Hospital in thier honor.
I've been listening to quite a bit of Jason Michael Carroll (JMC). He's performing in the Country for Kids concert to support N.C. Children's hospital on November 18th, together with James Otto, Clay Walker, and Rodney Atkins. I've made a nice mix of their best songs to get me in the groove. It's a little pre-concert routine I have.
Lately when JMC's "Alyssa Lies" comes up in the shuffle I can't help but tear up. Assuming he plays this song at the concert, there isn't likely to be a dry eye in the place. Many of us are going to be thinking about the sad search for the Zahra Baker, who has been missing a month from the Hickory, N.C. area. The fact that Zahra Baker has battled cancer, which resulted in her losing her leg and partial hearing, and that the concert supports a childrens hospital, is going to hammer home the sad circumstances of her recent life and assumed death from abuse. There is a certain communal guilt in stories like hers, and one that is expressed in the song. If you want to read an article detailing how Zahra was treated in the public setting of her neighborhood, read this article from the Winston-Salem Journal.
The song isn't new, but if you haven't heard it, Alyssa Lies tell the story of a father who takes a couple days to understand that his daughter has a new friend who comes to school full of bruises. He decides to go to the school the next day to report what he has heard but it is too late. The child has died. This story isn't far fetched. Neighbors and family reported Zahra's abuse to social services but ultimately not enough was done to help her.
It makes me question my response to something I witnessed on the beach this summer. There was a group of adults and their kids sitting nearby, listening to music and playing in the water. Then all of a sudden a father starts yelling at his eight year old son because he dumped sand on his mother's feet and towel, puts him over his knee and proceeded to spank him on his bare tuchas, a handful of smacks. I shook my head and moved my chair away. Others shook their heads and glared at them. My sister-in-law, an attorney, told me that I should have called the authorities, but on what grounds? Spanking is legal in South Carolina. The man wasn't beating his son. He humiliated his son in public and proved to all the world that he's a humorless father with a terrible temper and weak parenting skills, but he didn't damage the boy physically.
Now, looking back, I ask myself, if that father was angry enough to spank his kid in front of everyone on the beach for something so trivial, what does he do when the child truly misbehaves? To this day I'm not sure what I should have done. Should I have spoken up? "Hey there! Take a deep breath and get a grip, Mister."? Perhaps.
I was reminded of this incident further during a Jewish ethics class I take once a week. We were discussing the characteristics of an ethical person. Maimonides, a renowned Jewish philosopher from the Middle Ages, said that anger is one character trait that we should avoid completely, even in situations where anger would be a normal response. "Therefore, [the Sages] instructed us that one should distance himself from anger so much so that one accustoms himself not to feel even things which [would ordinarily] incite one to anger. And this is the ideal path." To apply this to parenting, Maimonides says that if one needs to act angry to get a child's attention, that's OK, but one shouldn't actually be angry. Why? One reason is that when people are very angry, they do irrational things. Their wisdom and good judgement escapes them.
But the culture of using corporal punishment is not based on anger. Anger escalates it and ultimately is what kills children, but if we take the Montgomey Gentry song "You Do Your Thing" that says "I ain't gonna spare the rod, Cuz that ain't what my daddy did, And I sure know the difference between wrong and right" it shows a rationally made parenting decision. One of my graduate school professors tells a story about how she learned basic carpentry. She misbehaved in a way her father found so egregious that he had her go out to his workroom and use his saws, drills and sand paper to make a paddle that he later beat her with. It was obvious from the telling of the story that the memory of her father's cold cruelty was far more significant than any memory she had of the lesson learned. An angry parent who inflicts pain as the standard consequence for misbehavior is not going to be able to make good decision regarding the intensity of such a punishment. A parent who isn't angry, and still uses pain as a method of punishing or training a child, is either a bit of a sadist or sadly misguided by family tradition.
One of my favorite parenting songs is "Watching You" by Rodney Atkins, who is also performing at the Country for Kids concert. His song sweetly states that our children see how we behave and behave accordingly. In the song, the boy uses a swear word and tells the father he learned it from watching him, and when the boy prays, and the father realizes that the boy’s faith comes from watching him as well.
What part of our behavior do we want to see reflected back at us when we visit our children's households? How are we going to prevent sad stories like Zahra's from happening over and over again? I bet that some people don't think that these things are connected, but they are. Our tempers and methods of discipline are on a continuum. It's up to each one of us to decide where we are along that line and if we're really comfortable with how our behavior could ultimately affect our children and our children's children.
To promote discussion, I'm giving away the latest CD of one of the four artists performing at the Country for Kids concert, James Otto, Jason Michael Carroll, Clay Walker, or Rodney Atkins. Leave an interesting comment on this subject. Extra credit goes to the writers who uses a musical reference in their comments. I'll announce the winner on Monday Nov. 15th. The winner chooses which CD they want. If the winner doesn't want a CD I'll make an equivalent donation to N.C. Children's Hospital in thier honor.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)