BABIES, CONCERT, AND THE BEST DAY AT SCHOOL I'VE HAD ALL YEAR

This is NOT Amanda . . . .yet

So now you've seen our little bean. It was absolute MURDER holding it in and keeping it from the blog--its all we think about, talk about, or want to write about. Finally, now we can. BG (baby Goldsmith) or "the bean" is, currently, 13 weeks old (in utero of course . . .today actually marks 13 weeks on the spot). He/she now has, at this point in their development, fully functional kidneys, liver, and heart. Also, it has fingerprints. This is cool. We wanted to wait for the first trimester to be over before we wrote, but this seemed impossible to do. And, BG's nannie respectfully asked if we could wait on the announcement until she had her final mammogram--this way she could tell her family she was cancer free AND was going to be a Nannie. We honored her request. Yesterday, she had her final mammogram, and she is indeed "okay." And she gets to tell everyone about her grandkid. Amanda has been horrendously sick for most of the tenure of the pregnancy, feeling tired, nauseous, and shaky, in her words, 95 percent of the time. She has no appetite, and throws up most things anyway, but she is doing awesome trying to get as much protein as she can. We go next week for our next appointment with Bjarni (jar-nee) who is the midwife we see at the OB office. Now we'll be posting a lot more about the little bean.

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The concert went extremely well, and I did two 40 minute sets. My voice was very tired and dead at the end, since I havent performed like that for a while (thats what she said). A great turnout too, including some parents, twin sisters who brought their father for his birthday, Winslow alumni from as far back as 4 years ago, neighbors, faculty members, two brothers--about whom I will refer to after, a ton of seniors, and two kindergartners who are dating. I got to debut a few new ones, including a song called "the world to come," which is a song I wrote after being inspired at our first ultrasound. Some other crowd favorites included "Acadia," "Untitled," "Pauly Kober: He Loved to Rock," and "Lover's Hand." It is always such a rush/blessing to play these shows for students, who come back to school on a FRIDAY to PAY MONEY to hear my music. Quite surreal. One girl, who goes to college, even wants to use my song to write an interpretive dance for her "choreography" final coming up. Awesome.

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There are two boys at Winslow High School who have reputations which precede them. We'll call them Ricky and Jeremy. They are the archetype of the type of kid who hates school--they were expelled last year, in fact. They seem to find their way into all sorts of trouble with teachers and administration, always serving detentions, etc. I happen to have both of these young men in class, and I have nothing but good things to say about them. I can't speak for all their teachers, of course, but, for me, they are a pleasure. They have obviously had a difficult upbringing, and they live in abject poverty. Amazingly, they both showed up at my concert tonight at 7--kids who hate school so much they got expelled last year go out on a Friday night . . . back to school . . . .and pay 8 bucks between the two of them to see me in concert?

This was the best day I have had at school in probably a year, and it had NOTHING to do with curriculum, assessment, special ed, data, IEPs, tests, or content. It had to do with relationships. I was thrilled upon seeing them, sought them out, shook their hands, and made conversation. In between sets they would come up to me, explaining how beautiful they thought a song was, quoting lyrics they enjoyed, and introducing themselves to my wife, offering their congratulations on our pregnancy. After the show, they stuck around and Richie explained how much "Paulie Kober" had touched him; he had tears in his eyes as he explained how his "real mom" died of cancer years ago. I gave him a CD on the spot, and told him to go home and listen to more. The crowd . . . compliments I got on a great set . . .making lots of money for the senior class . . . .having people laugh at my stupid jokes . . . .all of this PALED in comparison to the conversations I had with Jordan and Richie tonight--tough kids with a tough background who live a tough life who, just crazily enough, were inspired by the music I could share. I truly thank God for the gift to be able to do this.