March 2009

So yesterday, April 5, Zola took her first unaided step.

To me this is an indication of how much her leg ailment set her back _ she was standing unaided before Christmas. Anyhow, it's been quite a good time of life for us all lately.
I think the parents feel overwhelmed at times, but the big picture is all of us are doing pretty well in our own ways.

From youngest to oldest:

Zola is a big imitator, so she really is parroting words back quite a bit, even though she's not saying any. I can't remember but I'm pretty sure Zeph was earlier with his first words. Zola does say a convincing "Uh-oh!" when she drops something. And she pays close attention to us when we're in a 'language teaching' moment, like pointing to papa or mama (she says both, but not uniformly correctly).

I was on the phone the other day getting harrangued by a bigwig in the AP who is a major league asshole (Anthony: Nick Tatro) with Zo-zo on one arm.
Gradually it became impossible for him to ignore her babbling away, one hand on her ear. You'd have to have a heart of stone not to laugh at that.

Anyhow. She's doin fine.



Zeph is now among the oldest at his nursery school _ in fact I'm a bit worried that he will be the oldest, by a long shot, for the final 9 months or so before he turns four. I really would like to see him interacting more with other kids, but I have to face it that some play-by-himselfedness is inherent in the boy.

That said, he's getting more interesting all the time, very fun to talk with him now (there's no language barrier at all anymore, Yankees) and it's fun to hear him bring up expressions at random moments: "Daddy, daddy, I saw a big old honkin spider."

Hinke relates an episode at his dance "class" (this is movement session for kids) where they were supposed to act like dogs.
The teacher asked him whether he was being a dog, and he replies, "no, a dog has five legs."
"Oh?" Asks the teacher. And how many legs do you have? "Twenty five."

I've backed off on trying to teach him numbers for a while.

Yesterday, before Zola's big step, we were barbequing and Zephyr suddenly calls uncle Marten what can only be described as a made up word. "You're a kookla" he says, without menace. "And Zola's a gooble." Or words to that effect.

Today we asked him to repeat what he said, but this time he called Marten a 'Kaka', which demonstrates the potential downside of his growing exposure to kids on the square. I'm going to warn everyone in advance, Dutch people often use English curse words in the way SOME Americans might say "merde" ... so I can't prevent that. Fortunately the pronounciation is way off...

(Dutchies: he also said 'gatver de gatver' the other day while I was changing his diapers. I can't be blamed for teaching him that! On the other hand, I couldn't help thinking he stole my line, given that I was the one doing the wiping).

He is progressing steadily toward being potty trained, by the way. I don't know if it's Kosher parenting, but a system of pure candy bribes has worked well for us so far. Hope we're not courting disaster with that.

Next, Hinke. She's taking on a lot of the bookkeeping for our house. I won't bore you with the details, but sufficeit to say that landlording 5 appartments is a bigger time-sucker than you might think. We've also been working on back-taxes and on trying to accomodate Anthony's on-again, off again plans to return from Jakarta to the Netherlands and live in the top floors _ which would require both renovations and evictions.



There's also a massive backlist of things that we need to do to get our appartment on the ground floor fixed up and ergonomic for the growing Sterling brood _ we generally make less progress on those adjustments than we'd like, but now and again we make a little headway.
Her work remains a 'job job' , but I think it's safe to say she appreciates the time away from house and kids.

I've been working on my book, yes. Not nearly as much as you might think _ I'm supposed to have 20 hours a week to do it, in practice it's been less than that. The scale of the project and the speed of my progress, well, both are disappointing so far, that's clear.
At the same time, the changes in my lifestyle and mental focus have been a very pleasant and needed change, so I'm hopeful that it'll get better soon.
I toyed with the idea of posting some of the writing on my blog (which is temporarily in suspended animation so I can focus on the book), but for the time being I've decided against it.
I want to have the flexibility to _ how do I describe this _ flip around scenes and leave paragraphs half written along the way, without any pressure of judgment from readers.

In a way that's very uncharacteristic for me, I have the "big picture" of the plot and progression already worked out, so what I'm doing is trying to fill in the details and tell the story in a way that maintains 'dramatic' tension along the way. Well, that's the goal. Pretty different to anything I've tried to do before and I guess it's too early for me to give any appraisal of how well it will go.

Anyhow, a great challence and one benefit of the time spent so far is that a lot of what I learned in school is coming back to me, sometimes even with much clearer vision, since I'm more motivated to learn now, I think.

On more mundane notes, we feel we're doing a pretty good job of keeping our costs down while my great experiment progresses, and I have made some investments in technology that I'm happy about _ the purchase of a "net book" laptop, and a system of playing films from a hard-drive on my television.

We're planning our trip out West for June 20-July 11th, and reservations are fillling up fast. Hope to see many of you during Cousin Camp.

That's that. Hope you all are well.

Love

Toby

Up to January 2009

(Count 'em!)

Dear All,

It's been three huge months since our last update.

Actually I wrote an update about a month and a half ago; but I can't find it, and I don't think it would help to dump it on y'all now anyway. I have published the photos intended to go with it (below) because hey, that's easy.

The photos that accompany this note were all taken in the past week.

I don't think I'll even try to chart all the changes the kids have gone through in the past quarter year. It's been amazing, so exciting and so much fun.

The big news is that Zola turned one year old last Wednesday. She's doing great _ at least, that's the big picture.



Sadly, we had to cancel her birthday party because she's got an odd ailment at the moment: her thigh abruptly developed a lump on it the size of a grapefruit after a vaccination shot almost two weeks ago. She's pretty distressed, but Tylenol helps.

(but she still got cake!)

I won't give further details because I just think it's too depressing to rail about sicknesses. My last word on that topic: the whole house was down with the flu for about two weeks in January, which kind of took the heart out of us.

Apart from that it's just been busy! So busy that I've been re-appraising how much time I can spend on various things like blogs, and, yeah, family letters.

Tonight is a good example: I've got to get this written and turn it in soon or suffer the consequences tomorrow.

With babysitting help from Hinke's parents we managed to re-arrange the house to create some small room-lettes for the kids. The new "flow" of the house is much better and we're doing a hair better at keeping things clean.

If anybody was wondering whether I followed through on the various ideas outlined in my previous letter: well, yes.

I went to half-time with the AP, which is pretty daring in these troubled economic times. I also quit the board of the foreign press association, and have more or less stopped updating my blog. I really should leave a note explaining things to my readers there _ I was getting pretty good traffic by the time I tapered off last year.

(A Portrait of the Author)

I've started work on my book, with mixed results so far. Lots of ideas about the structure & content, but what I've written feels a little flat. More on that next time.

Hinke is starting to get a little involved in her brother's massive project. If y'all don't know about the project _ it's kind of hard to explain: saving the world, somewhat along the lines of Kiva.org. They're going full speed ahead and I will definitely send you the link to their website once it's operational later this year.

(cold weather).

Zeph! The young man is getting more fun and full of surprises all the time. He interrupted my first attempt at writing of this letter (late Sunday evening), curious to know what I was doing. He insisted that I include the fact that he baked a cake for Zola's birthday.

As far as I know, that's a total fabrication.

Tonight he was berating whoever it was who stole my bike about 4 months back, an event he vividly remembers ("The dirty rats"). He refers to the villain as the "purple thief", a reference whose significance eludes me & Hinke.

He's addicted to TV, and so far his major interests include swords and fire engine sirens, but not balls or dinosaurs (okay, a little bit dinosaurs).

Apologies that I haven't sent thank-yous to anybody from Christmas yet. I guess the comments above about being short on time _ blah blah blah it's so boring but it's true _ will have to serve as explanation for now.

I love you all and hope everybody is well!

Love,

Toby

October and November 2008

(Hinke's Birthday)
(Klaartje and Anna)
(Riky and Zola)
(Zephyr and Fern)

Half of August and all of September 2008

Dear Friends and Family,

"Look out! Here comes Zephyr."

-Zephyr, age 2.5

There's lots going on in the Amsterling household, but let's start below 1/2 meters (yard) and work our way up.

Two months is an eternity in kid time. The changes are most dramatic in Zola. She's now fully crawling, pulling up and furniture surfing _ I'm pretty sure she's hitting all her developmental milestones earlier than Zephyr did. Admittedly he was in a cast for part of the time, but still.



She continues to be the spitting image of her father, poor thing. Not because of that, I find myself enjoying her babyhood much more than I did Zephyr's. Her parents are more relaxed, so probably that helps her be the same. She's a pleasure to have around: healthy, laughs a lot, plays well, an easy eater, an easy sleeper, never (knock on wood) had diaper rash problems, etc. A jolly chubby Gerber (Dutch: Olvarit) baby.



Perhaps it's my imagination, but lately I see her grappling with the recognition that I exist. Hinke, obviously, is Zola's number one favorite. The baby is always craning her neck to see what she-of-the-red-hair, bearer-of-milk is doing. Zephyr is also a subject of great interest to Zola, especially when he is holding a toy or making loud noises (i.e., often). But as for me... I can just hear her thinking: "What's the point of that guy, anyway?
"He seems to be on our team. Hmm. Sometimes he's handy for moving me about and giving me bottles. Note to self: must research his function and role further."

Zephyr is getting more complicated, more interesting, and, sigh, acting his age. In addition to a general rebellious temperament, he can flare into bouts of anger and misery pretty quick when he doesn't get his way. More interestingly, I've witnessed him telling a few lies _ untruths, really. He is the worst possible source of information about, for instance, who was in attendance at nursery school on any given day. Anyone who was there, he usually doesn't mention. Anyone who wasn't there _ including pretty much anyone he has met or heard of in his life, may pop up. So: Jack Jack is at school sometimes, and so is Sascha, but the teacher never is. I can't decide if he's playing a game with me or what.





He's also taken to "hiding," which he does with no warning. He is surprisingly good at keeping quiet, given that the other 99 percent of the time he is either yelling or pounding something. Needless to say the abrupt disappearance of a child is a good way of inducing panic in a parent _ which may in fact be the motivation.

Here's just a couple of random things that jumped out of his mouth:

Q: Where did you find those blackberries, Zeph?
A: On branches.

and

Q: Wow, that new shirt is pretty cool Zephyr. Where did you get it?
A: The hamper.

"Wake up, spiders!" (shouted frequently at drainpipes. Because of the tale of the Itsy-Bitsy spider).



Many fellow parents have asked us _ sometimes with what sounds oddly like a note of hopefulness in their voices _ whether Zephyr has gotten jealous of Zola yet.

Well, to dwell on the negative, after a period of model behavior, he's becoming gradually more territorial. He makes a point of bossing her around and taking away almost anything she happens to be playing with. When he's in a hyper mode, and misbehaving, he is (intentionally) reckless in ways that are likely to hurt her...yet that preserve 'plausible deniability' for him. So, jumping on the bed right next to her while she's lying down, swinging things on strings around while in her general area, running right past her while she's trying to stand, etc.



Zola = oblivious to all this.

When she gets hurt, he makes a point of kissing her. If there's anybody watching.

I'm feeling glad, given all the turmoil in the U.S., that I didn't rush the family back to California this summer. My latest plan _ no laughing please _ is to spend the next year (or so) writing my novel. It's going to be historical fiction, based on the life of Alcibiades. Athenian history. The closest comparison with my idea that some of you might be familiar with would be "I, Claudius." This is an idea that I've been toying with since college graduation, so I'm really going to give it a try.

Yes, I'm serious. No, I don't have a publisher. Failure is an option. If it doesn't work, I'm prepared to bury this dream with an easy heart and move on with my life. But if I feel good about how things are going part way in, I will accelerate work and start looking for an agent. We'll see how things are going in a few months.

With an eye to this, I'm doing several things:
-Curtailing my "blog" dramatically
-Quitting as secretary of the Dutch "Foreign Press Association"
-And looking to move to a part-time job. More news on that as it comes in.

***



And since we were going vertically through the family: Hinke is fine too. She's settling into the rhythym of her job and fantasizing often and loudly about renovating parts of our house. A can of worms, it seems to me, but the gaping crack in our bathroom wall leaves me in a weak negotiating position.



Love,

Toby and crew



Next: Chapter One

July and Half of August 2008

Dear Friends and Family,

The recent past was dominated by our epic voyage to California.

I could spend some time explaining who's who to those of you who don't know the intricacies of my family, but suffice it to say there were at least 6 different households represented at the "camp" (my parents' house) and 8 people there under 1.5 meters tall (Dutchies: not including me, ha,ha.).



Cousin Camp was amazing. We laughed, we cried, we bumped our foreheads. It was very important for Zephyr to get some exposure to pure English, and he's been speaking a little more of it to me since we got back. "No way, Jose" and "I'm making a racket" have become staples in his patois.

It was also quite a trip for Zola, who was stunningly well-behaved. She's gone through a dramatic number of changes in the past month: started grabbing stuff, tasting stuff, first tooth, second tooth, eating solids, and now even crawling a bit if you could call it that. She raises her butt in the air and then smooshes her face (somewhat painfully by appearances) along the floor. All she needs is a little more upper arm strength and she'll be fully mobile.

I've uploaded a few more photos of cousin camp to Picasa. I'm trying very hard to limit the number of pictures I produce, but if parents are interested in more of their brood I have about a bajillion outtakes. Admittedly a lot of Zeph, Anna and Jack Jack compared to everybody else.

Lambert, my father in law, got a few key people I missed, though. I recommend this album he's put up on Picasa for the photo junkies. Although it's AmSterling-centric, there are some nice shots of cousin camp, plus the old house on La Para, and a side trip to Big Basin with Rachel. Plus many waterfowl in Pajaro. Anyhow, Picasa makes it easy to skim though and see what grabs your interest.

Unfortunately I didn't get to see some old friends who I would have liked to hook up with (Jason Gray & family) and at least one other person that got in touch out of the blue (Jason Slater, who plays in a thrash metal band). I think he might have seen me on Facebook...

I didn't apply for any jobs or do any interviews while I was out there, if anybody was wondering. No time. At least my cousin Lisa (who has connections in the biz) gave me a few job-hunting tips...cousin camp isn't just for the rug-rats, you know.

I thought it was pretty stimulating to see other parenting styles up close and personal. Especially American parenting styles, for a change. And of course the kids are a rogue's gallery, a Doestoevski novel, a living study in nature vs. nurture ... pick your comparison, but in sum its fun to see them all thriving and being their individual little selves.

After cousin camp we went to a condo we rented on the beach at Pajaro Dunes, where we saw seals on the first day, then dolphins on the second, then a gray whale (!) on the third, breaching (!!)

Never have seen anything like that before.

(and the kids got to watch "The Cat in The Hat" movie.)

Then it was a long long flight back to Amsterdam, where we were greeted by a dismal cold rain. Zephyr hailed it like an old friend, and dashed gleefully outside to stand in a downpour. You can take the boy out of Holland, but you can't take the Holland out of the boy.

Zola had a trial run at day care last week which went well, which means that Hinke will be starting work this week (3 days/week) if all goes well.

We briefly saw Sidart Deb and his wife Celine and son Sascha, who came up from Paris to say hibye to Anjuli (his sister) who's now returning to journalism grad school at Cal. Thanks for the "Pirates Don't Wear Diapers" book, Anjuli, it was a big hit at cousin camp.
(Sascha, approx 9 mos)

Sascha looks as much like Sidart as Zola does me (poor thing, Zola, she'll grow out of it). Sascha's parents claim he's a handful, but he seemed like a pretty relaxed kid to me. On the other hand, I thought the bags under the parents' eyes were pretty noticeable.

(el Cid)
(Anjuli)
(Celine, la Parisienne)

Enough for now!

Love to all,

Toby

Next: The Hemonyhouse is a changin'

June 2008

(coy boy)

Dear Friends and Family,

A brief letter to let you know we are alive, in the sense that zombies and other undead are alive, despite being sleep deprived. And we are well, in the sense of not being sick.

Hinke has worked a few days at her new job, Zephyr has received a professional haircut.

Zola has achieved quite a few milestones _ she's really growing like cabbage, and I'm enjoying the time I spend with her more and more.

(zooitje)

Life is circling viciously around me. I feel like I wake up in the morning, race to help Hinke (and often fail due to work obligations), then race to work, then race back, then attempt to complete all my various communications and projects in the late hours of the evening after Hinke wisely goes to bed.

And then it begins again with Zephyr's morning wail (or Zola's early hours crying).

But happiness reigns. We're having a lot of fun when we stop to think of it.

Zephyr: enjoying being read to, but starting to whine and now capable of being intensely annoying when giddy.

Zola: laughing and gumming our faces and cheeks. She has a habit of gyrating her hips wildly whenever the diaper comes off. We think, reveling in the freedom of nakedness.

(Zoey)

And so it goes. A few decent AP stories from my hand lately and a few setbacks, notably a piece about the architect Rem Koolhaas that was brutally spiked by philistines on the desk.

Our office has been lightened up by the presence of Anjuli Deb, whose name some of you will probably recognize: she's Sidart Deb's little sister. We hope Sidart comes up from Paris to visit us all with his wife Celine and son Sacha later this summer.

Anjuli is now at my Alma-Ungraduated-Mater, UCB's School of Journalism, and she's doing a summer internship with us. Unpaid, unfortunately, which is not fair.
But of course it's good experience. She's been here a little over a month and has already had a couple of good stories some of you may have seen: one on the brain of the oldest woman in the world that was dissected here, and another on a Rembrandt that was marketed for $1500, sold for $1.5 million and is probably worth 20 times that much.

We're all super-excited now for our big trip to the U.S. We leave Saturday, so please: any last minute addendums, comments or requests to meet up, please let me know. Looking forward to a week of madness with the kids, and then a little R&R at Pajaro Dunes. I may be sniffing around a job or two in the Bay Area while I'm there...

Love and all that,

Toby

Next: Cousin Camp!

May 2008

(a hint of the Sterling worrier in her eyes).

Dear Friends and Family,

Zola is four months now, and after the expansive treatment I gave Zephyr in last month's letter, it's only fair that I devote a few words to her.

Her owner's manual is more straightforward than Zephyr's was: laughs and coos when happy, and when unhappy, yells her head off.
(blurry laugh)
(Can't you see her not suffering a fool gladly someday).

She also just vocalizes contentedly, or sometimes discontentedly, for minutes at a time. Those voluble Jones genes?

A moment with her much loved by me and Hinke alike is when Zola stops crying abruptly and starts grinning when she realizes you're looking down at her in the bed. Like: you DO care about me!



Because she's chunkier and less floppy than Zeph was, she's a very satisfying cuddle.

She also quite likes being dandled on my shin. A portent of horsey rides to come?

My pet names for her so far are "Zo-zo" and "Zoey." I'm feeling a little uncomfortable with Zola, but not thinking about trying to carry out a putsch and have her go by "Arden."



I spent most of the day with her Thursday for the first time in quite a while, as Hinke spent the day learning the ropes at a part-time job she's starting in August. Administrative work for a travel agency.

It's not exactly her dream career, but it's important for us financially that she works a bit outside the home. And I think she's glad to be around people she is not required to discipline. Not that I need much disciplining.

Me: I've never felt so busy and drained in my life as in the past few months, and it's really difficult trying to decide how to answer that most basic of questions, "what do I really want?" In career terms. Ambitions.

Family life is very happily settled.

Thing have been made, if possible, more complicated by the prospect of a (for my feeling) enormous inheritance from my grandmother, enough money to go back to school or take a year "off" to try to write a book.

To be honest, I never quite believed that I would even live to be this old.

Now that I have, I feel like I have all the choices and opportunities in the world, if only I could dare to make them or take them. What a great but intimidating era we live in.

I'm fascinated by what's happening in the world of technology, specifically media. I have a front row seat as the industry I'm working in, somewhat by chance, explodes before my eyes.

Strangely, jobs at AP appear to be safe, if you have one and happen to like it. Which I don't so much anymore. I'm missing any deeper meaning in my professional life.

I remember back in 1994 when I heard that some people I knew at Swarthmore were going to be heading to California and trying to cash in on that Internet thing. And I was thinking 'what a mistake, it's too late now.'

In 2008, a person would have to be crazy not to see that there's no end in sight, that the Internet revolution is still just beginning.

My biggest outlet for fun lately has been my blog, which got linked to by a big Dutch site around April 30 _ and for a few days traffic went up by like 10 times normal.

(peek a monkey)

It was exciting, kind of like winning at the casino or something.

Unlike work, the blog has no editors to restrain me other than my own conscience and better judgment.
Believe it or not, I get more feedback on the blog than I ever do on AP stories. Even though no more than a few dozen people typically read any entry on the blog, but thousands (presumably) see any AP story I do.

But the feedback makes it much more rewarding.

I'd like to spend more time on it and learn to do all the coding myself. Unfortunately a blog is, as someone once remarked to me about chess, "too much for a hobby, but not enough for a job."

All of this is a roundabout way of saying I haven't decided what I'm going to do next professionally. But I have decided I won't rush in to anything, and am making plans for yes, another year in Amsterdam.

Love,

Toby

Next: Midsummer

(Zoe bathes well)
(anything she can do, he can do better)