on community

Years ago, when we first decided to homeschool, I didn’t know a single homeschooler. I was desperate to find community for the kids. I wanted them to have friends; I didn’t want them to be isolated, didn’t want to make them weird.

We started going to a Park Day in Berkeley when H was just four. The boys his age, a little older, worried me. How they pounded other kids on the backs when they played tag, tripped each other purposely. How they taunted each other: “You’re so lame!” “You’re so gay!”

The mothers were off in a circle, not really watching, singing choral rounds. The irony of this not lost on me.

My gut told me that this wasn’t what I wanted for my kid, but he needed friends. Was this just how boys were? Was I being overprotective?

There was one mom I liked–young, closer to my age. One rainy day she invited me and the kids over for play, for tea. Her kitchen, so cozy. She put out a plate of homemade scones, honey for my tea. H played with her son, L played with a basket of Playmobil at my feet, and the mother and I talked about our read-alouds and recipes for butternut squash soup.

A few weeks later, after a Game Day at someone’s house, the boys circled up to kick a soccer ball. H was five by then, had never played soccer. The ball rolled to him, waiting there in his denim overalls. He did the natural thing and bent to steady the ball with his hands. Up shot a great wall of objection, variations of “You can’t touch it, idiot!”

One of the ringleaders was the son of the woman who had invited me to tea. He trash-talked constantly, a fact I’d been trying to ignore. Despite the hollering, H stayed in the circle, kicked at the ball, watched it bumble its way to the opposite side. The other boys pinballed it back to speed, boom boom boom, back and back and back, setting it up for one of the boys to hammer it across the circle, right at H, hard at his pelvis. 

“Haha! Got him in the nuts!” the kid crooned. The others joined in, “Haha! Got him in the nuts! Got him in the nuts!” 

H didn’t cry. I don’t remember what he did. I don’t remember what I did. I just know I got us out of there, skipped saying goodbye to the mothers, knew we’d never go back.

He was five. He still drank from a sippy cup.

* * *

I’ve been lucky, recently, to be in a couple different writing groups with young mothers and the topic of community has come up. The need for it. The longing for it.

Back in those early homeschooling days, I was so bent on finding community for my kids that I pushed down what my intuition was telling me. That at five and two, it was okay if they had a small handful of friends. The neighbor girls. Cousins. The little girl from the preschool that we’d quit a year before–a year younger than H, smart and sweet, with hands like hummingbirds. H adored her. And even more: my kids had each other. At five and two, H and L played endlessly.

In my journal back then, I wrote about “Got him in the nuts!” and the trash-talking boy. I did not write about that boy’s mother and the afternoon she served me homemade scones and we chatted about butternut squash soup and The Jungle Book. That floods back from memory, all these decades later.

At the time, I don’t think I understood how much I needed to sit with another mother, stirring honey into tea.

Something I’m learning as I write my book is how expectations for parents–especially mothers–have shifted in recent years. Intensive parenting has become the norm.

With so much focus on kids, what’s rarely discussed is how mothers need support. I’m not talking about the “self-care” you see on instagram–wine and spa time and weekend getaways–but real community.

* * *

A month after the soccer incident, we tried another homeschooling group. A smaller one, with mostly younger kids. The vibe was different from the moment we showed up, the mothers turning to us in unison with big smiles, hellos. One took H to meet the other kids, off playing tag. None of them trash-talking, pounding kids on the backs.

Something in my chest released that day. Thursday, April 23, 1998—it’s there in my first homeschooling notebook. Under an old oak, kids chased H and H chased kids. I could not know how many hours L would spend playing house with friends in rooms formed by that old oak’s roots. I could not know that one day H would be a preteen at that park, jostling with friends, wandering off to the corner store while his stick-loving baby brother waddled across the circle, pulling needles from my friends’ knitting projects. Could not know that many of these women would become beloved lifelong friends.

We were homeschooling parents, raising our kids outside societal norms. We needed each other.

But all parents need this, mothers especially. What I didn’t see at the time was how lucky I was, building community at a time when many parents are losing it.

* * *

One of my newer writing friends is the parent of a teenager. She laments how, when she’s with other parents at school events and such, it almost seems like a pitch session. Other parents use the time to tell about their kids, the activities they’re involved in, their college application plans.

Which is not the same as a trusted community, where you share what’s hard, what’s honest. Where you share yourself.

In my new writing communities with younger mothers, I find myself giving advice–though I bristle at advice. I want them to know how in recent decades, the media has trained mothers not to trust their intuitions. (That’s a TikTok link where I go deep into some of the enraging parenting shifts I’m uncovering as I research my book.)  I want them to understand that one of the best ways to hear your intuition, especially if you want to follow any path that differs from the dominant culture, is finding like-minded community.

Not an easy task, especially for working parents. Start small, I find myself saying. Find one like-minded parent, meet some weekend at a park. Let the kids play while you chat. It sounds simple, but in this there can be magic.

Maybe, eventually, invite a few others. Maybe skip the youth sports that society pushes and meet at a playground instead. Maybe plan a camping trip–maybe plan regular camping trips. When I walked over to that oak tree back in 1998, I had no idea how many camping trips we had in store. That they would be among my kids’ most cherished childhood memories, days of endless play with kids who would become their own lifelong friends. That these trips would bring my husband his own set of friends.

That this community would give me ongoing–still ongoing, as a parent of adult children–comfort and confidence as a mother.

* * *

I’d love to hear from you. Have you found the communities you’ve needed for yourself? If so, what did yours look like?

If not, what do you long for? What might the community of your dreams look like?

Mia Birdsong’s How We Show Up is an excellent guide to making family and community. I recommend the audiobook, which she reads.

* * *

A few things I’m loving lately:

• Courtney Martin’s awesome adventure making her own mini book report ‘zine after reading Naomi Klein’s Doppelgänger. I’ve done so many of these folded paper booklets with kids–I’m smitten with the idea of doing it as an adult.
• I know I’m constantly tagging psychologist Peter Gray’s research on play; this piece which includes the voices of kindergarten teachers expressing fury at how kindergarten has shifted away from play–due to wrong-minded systemic change–is heartbreaking.
• A synchronicity: Austin Kleon’s recent (excellent as usual) 10 Things Worth Sharing newsletter included a link to an older article by Lawrence Weschler that looks at the origins of kindergarten and its surprising influences on art and architecture.
• And since we seem to be, as ever, dwelling on the theme of play, allow me to suggest Summer Camp for adults who want to play with words, led by my writing teacher and friend Sarah McColl. It’s an online experience that sounds creative and fun and I know you’ll fall hard for Sarah, your camp counselor.