Strong parent child relationships

Having a strong parent child relationship can really make it easier to parent, and to guide your child to the kind of life you wish them to live. However, like with every relationship, it can be difficult to find the right balance. The following is a look at some tips for how to develop a strong parent child relationship.

Tip one: Know where to draw the line. Being a friend and a cool parent is great, enjoy concerts together, shopping, playing video games, etc. but encouraging your child to drink, take drugs, or enabling their bad habits is crossing the line, and will undermine the parent child relationship rather than strengthen it. Make sure your child knows that while you want to have a fun relationship with them and be their friend, you are their parent first.
Tip two: Set boundaries. While your child may relish the idea of having all kinds of freedom to do what they please, good parent child relationships include rules, boundaries, and consequences that are attached to the said rules. You can let your children go out at night with their friends, but they should be back by a reasonable hour. You can give your child free reign when it comes to when they do their homework, for example, let them do it when they want rather than on your time line, but if they start ignoring it and their grades drop, you step in. The list goes on. The idea is that your kids should have freedoms, and be allowed to make choices, but within acceptable boundaries. Rules show your child you love them enough to not let them screw up their life.
Tip three: Have fun with your child. Parenting can seem like endless rebukes, enforcing rules, and hounding your kids about their choices. It can be difficult to get a good relationship with your child when most of your interaction seems to be negative in nature. So, improve the relationship, and help make it strong by mixing a fair amount of good and fun into the parenting. Let them know they have to spend time with the family, but make that time fun. Take your kids to movies, the beach, to do things they enjoy, etc. Life does not have to be all work and no play, and your family and child or children are the best people to play with.
These three ingredients are going to make a huge difference in the strength of your parent child relationship. Take the time to sit down with your child and establish rules they will follow, and consequences that will be enforced when those rules are broken. Then, be sure to have fun with them, talk to them, and know what is going on in their life. As a parent it is your job to make sure they are not engaged in things that will hurt them, damage their future, or inhibit their potential.

Theft in relationships

Relationships are always going to be somewhat complex. There are going to be things that upset the balance of things, cause fights, problems, and upsets. There are also going to be the times when things are going really well. So, what do you do when you experience theft in your relationships? Consider the following:

1. Relationships are based on trust, and theft is a severe breach of that trust. Whether your sister, father, or significant other steals from you, theft breaches trust. In your relationship, the person should be able to come to you and ask you for money, items, etc. if they need them, not take them from you. Theft has a way of undermining years of trust, and making you weary, and uncertain around the person. It does not matter what they steal or why, theft dooms a relationship because it kills the one thing required for a relationship to truly be healthy.
2. There is not a good reason for theft. Theft is a serious offense, and if you wanted to report it, they could get a criminal record for it. Even if the theft is small, it is illegal and immoral to take something that does not belong to you without permission, whether it is money or an item. If the person you have a relationship tries to justify their theft, you need to remember that it is a character flaw, and let them know that in relationships you require honesty, and that you expect someone to be able to come to you and ask if they need something. This does not mean you will always give them what they ask for, but that you will not tolerate someone stealing from you, especially someone you have a relationship with. You have to put your foot down, or it will happen again and again.
3. Decide what your line is. If you are okay with them stealing small things from you, what will stop them from stealing larger things. If they are willing to take $10 from your wallet or purse, what would stop them from taking $10,000? The point is, theft is theft, and if you justify or allow "small theft" larger thefts will eventually happen. Usually thieves escalate. The relationship may be important enough to you to forgive a theft, but never make it okay. As soon as you do, you ruin your relationship and condemn it to always being subject to the breach of trust, and the insecurity of never knowing if the relationship is real, or if you are being used.
It is unfortunate, but true that people tend to steal from those they know. It is easier, they have better access to things, and are less likely to be reported or punished for it. However, it is a poison to relationships, and should not be tolerated. Report it to the police, put your foot down, and let them know you love them, but not their actions, and that you will not support such actions, or sit by idly and allow them to happen.

Working with family

We all have work, and we all have family, and on their own they can be wonderful. However, sometimes mixing the two can be a nightmare. Most people would caution against working with family. However, there are ways to make it work. Just as any relationship, you can make a working relationship work with family, as long as you follow some rules of conduct. Consider the following:

1. It is professional, but no one can completely separate his or her personal and professional life, so you should not expect someone to. If you do, you are set up for disappointment, and problems. So, if you do not think that working with someone because of personal feelings may conflict with your ability to act professionally, then do not work with them. If someone is going to use personal feelings and problems to blackmail you into higher pay, more time off, or something else, then do not work with them.
2. No favoritism. When working with family, the thing you have to be the most careful about is not favoring family. This is especially important if you are in a position of management, or make decisions regarding pay rates or something else that could be construed as favoritism. It is difficult not to give a little favoritism to family, but be careful that no one else is getting the shaft because of it. For example, do not give a lousy employee extra shifts because they are family, and exclude a good employee from the extra shifts they want.
3. Don't get involved with large amounts of money. Money has a power over people and can make them do stupid things. So, if you want to maintain the relationship, and have happy business dealings, do not get involved with family with large amounts of money. If you want to invest with family, or work with them involving money, only use the money you can manage to lose.
4. Set up professional, legal contracts. It can't hurt, and it keeps everyone being fair and honest, so that personal grudges and problems can't get in the way of you having a job. If you work for your parent, and you get in a fight over how they cut your child's, their grandchild's. hair, would you want your job to be at risk? The point is that if you want to feel safe in your job when working with family, make it a legal contract.
5. Know whom you can work with and whom you can't. Some family is too sensitive, or too confrontational to work with. It can mean a large headache with the guilt factor in that if you fire someone, or reduce their wage, they will not be able to make their bills, and the family will blame you for leaving them destitute.
The rules of working with family are strict and difficult to follow, and it is like working in a mine field, one wrong step can not only affect your relationship, but your business. So, avoid working with family.

When you miss family

The bond some families have is so strong it can stand the test of time and distance, but that does not mean you won't miss your family. In life there are all kinds of reasons we end up far away from family, from jobs, school, missions, etc. But the one thing in common for most people is that they eventually start to miss their family. No matter how exciting or new the place is, when you are away from family, even for a short time, you may miss them. The following are some tips for coping:

1. Journal. A fun way to stay connected and not miss out on what is going on with your family when you are separated is to keep a journal of events and thoughts. This is not like your personal journal, this is more like a record of your day, time, and big deal things. So, this way your family member can read it when they get back, and they won't feel like they missed anything. They won't need any catching up because you will have it all written down for them. An example entry may look like this:
Went to the zoo today, left late, of course, and when we got there it was freezing cold. Most of the animals were indoors, so it just looked like a bunch of empty enclosures. We still had fun though. Not many people were there, so we goofed off, sang silly songs, and rode the carousel.
2. Skype. When you have to be away from your family, it helps if you can talk to them and see them. A great way to do this without expensive flights, and long distance phone charges is to use Skype. It is a program for computer chat, that uses webcams to allow you to talk. It is free, easy to use, and makes for a fun way to see everyone while you talk and catch up.
3. Social networking. While this is not as personal, it does give you a decent sense of what is going on in people's lives, and allows you to see pictures, events, comments, etc. So, when you can't be with your family, you can still communicate (despite time differences), with notes on walls, instant messages, messages, photos, and the like through social networking sites.
4. Emails and letters. A good old fashioned letter is a wonderful way to communicate with family when you miss them. An email is great as well. Send a little note or update about yourself, ask them about them, and you don't have to feel so far away. People who were separated from those they love have communicated like this for years, so use it, it works!
5. Phone and text. Most everyone has cell phones, and text messaging, so use it. It can be hard to carry on a phone conversation with someone you haven't seen in a long time, but it is possible, so call to say hi, or tell them about your day, or send them a joke through text just to stay connected.

Footwork: An Evening of Tap Dance

Click Up Your Heels: SLC Tap’s Deborah Robertson brings a classic dance style out of the shadows.

Posted // March 3,2010 - It’s early evening in the middle of the week in a Salt Lake City nightclub. Like many nightclubs, it’s dark and deserted midweek. But once inside the door, you find complete chaos, a clamoring from above that thunders down a narrow staircase. Reaching the top landing, the disorienting racket smacks you square in the face as a group of … tap dancers? … attempting a new rhythmic sequence displayed by their fearless leader.

The makeshift dance space—tucked into an upstairs corner of the dance club Studio 600—at first feels quite incongruous, sandwiched as it is between billiard tables and a large DJ plinth. But Debby—Deborah Robertson, instructor and leader of the performing group SLC Tap—explains it this way:

“It’s nothing fancy, but it has a great hardwood floor, mirrors and a sound system.

It’s hard to find rehearsal space because most dance studios now have marley-type sprung floors. That doesn’t work with tap. And although it’s a great warehouse space, it does make us feel like we have to hide in a closet. But, we’re used to that.”

With that simple aside, you get the hint that Robertson and her cohorts feel a bit like outsiders in the broader dance community. That slightly bitter tone has been a long time building—mainly fed by a divide propagated by the other half of the equation, if you ask her. But fixing that problem and bringing the raucous joyfulness of tap to everyone is a conscious goal at this point for Robertson. Footwork, a new SLC Tap performance staged in conjunction with the Foot Poetry Tap Dance Ensemble, is one small step toward bringing tap to the people.

It must be hard for tap devotees everywhere to know that the heyday of their beloved dance form peaked decades ago. The precarious plunge into backroom rehearsal spaces began soon after the motion picture industry came of age, eclipsing vaudeville and its whimsical, amusing live shows.

Sure, subsequent iconic cinematic images are now culturally indispensable—like Bill “Mr. Bojangles” Robinson, little Shirley Temple in hand, tapping up and down a set of stairs or busking on the streets for loose change. Unfortunately though, the original greats quickly gave way to the onset of the serious 1960s. Tap dancing seemed to die a long, slow death, falling out of favor with popular audiences as the civil-rights movement and the Vietnam War raged on.

Not until the late 1970s and early 1980s did New Yorkers begin a tap revival of sorts—coaxing the old legends out of their apartment caves, urging them to pass on the memories, the moves and the rhythmic vibrancy of earlier days. By the late ’80s—a time Robertson herself remembers fondly—Gregory Hines and Robertson’s own mentor, Brenda Bufalino, helped to make the whole tip-tap thing popular again. They moved quickly onto the main stage of Broadway with productions like Tap Dogs and the urban stylings of Savion Glover during the 1990s.

But, according to Robertson, even though the popularity and acceptance of tap has grown thanks to such contemporary artists, it is a tradition that has deep roots. That is why it is important that Footwork has a strong foundation in historical pieces, like “Taking a Chance on Love.”

“It is the quintessential tap class act,” says Robertson. “Originally choreographed by Coles & Atkins and then reworked by Coles & Bufalino, I’ve been very lucky to inherit one of the most iconic tap routines of all times directly from my own mentor.”

The piece is not fancy footwork, dizzying spins and acrobatic leaps. No, this soft-shoe routine is pure style, perfectly demonstrating amazing foot skill, balance and percussive grace. Performed as part of the same program will be pieces choreographed by Bill Evans, plus works by Colleen West, founder of Foot Poetry Tap Dance Ensemble, and others.

As much as Robertson hammers home the necessity of lineage, she is also keenly aware that by pushing the boundaries of tap, she keeps interest fresh for future generations. “I personally love to choreograph to anything with a strong percussive beat,” she says. “I love a lot of rap, and my piece ‘Green Sally,’ which will be in the program, uses a song by Moby. Colleen, for her part, has a great Michael Jackson tribute and a piece called ‘Discomania’ that people just love.”

Therein lies the kicker, because as much as those tap aficionados feel forced to hide in the closet, percussive dance is always an audience favorite. So, although tap dancers everywhere might be relegated to rehearsing in shadowy locations far off the beaten path, the bright lights of the main stage are ready to spotlight that contagious click and clack of the tap.

Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company: Propel

Accidentally on Purpose: Propel disrupts the expected with choreographed improvisation.

 Choreographer John Jasperse

Posted // April 21,2010 - There is an oft-quoted John Lennon lyric from his song “Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy),” which was penned as a lullaby for his son Sean: “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” This sentiment about the accidental nature of living—and the splendor to be found therein—plays an important role in the inspiration for New York City-based choreographer John Jasperse’s new work, premiering as part of Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company’s spring performance Propel. In fact, the title of the commissioned piece “Spurts of Activity Before the Emptiness of Late Afternoon” comes directly from a poem of another New Yorker, John Ashbery. Embedded in the aesthetic of Ashbery’s poetry is that idea of embracing the slapdash way life comes at us, sculpting those meanderings into meaningful structures and artistic explorations.
“Our lives are very full,” Jasperse says. “We spend a lot of time doing, trying to shape our experiences and our world. What time is left is often filled with planning other things to do. Accidents, where experience diverges from our plan, are mostly considered something to avoid.
“Nonetheless, the accidental is constantly interrupting this flow, ‘messing up’ our plans. Sometimes our plans are so willed that we don’t even notice these accidents in our experience. Virtuosity and the display of difficult actions, where the accidental has been conquered, is a key feature of dance’s history.”
As a creative jumping-off point, Jasperse began with an improvisational score and movement sourced in ideas of confusion and disorientation. He laid out a few basic rules for the dancers and then let them loose. After taping the sessions, he returned to the dancers and extracted specific cells of movement, pulling phrases out of one context and plying them into another, or removing them altogether into a solo space all of their own. By fashioning various pieces in this manner—ultimately creating a collage interspersed with space and experienced over time—Jasperse’s choreography engages the audience in a unique way that will have them questioning the accidental or intuitive nature of both everyday movement and the artistic development of dance.

Lost by Charlotte Boye-Christensen.

If My Right Hand Would Say What My Left Hand Thought  by Alicia Sanchez

“The way we developed this movement became about material that was generated not because we thought something looked cool, or we wanted to make a cool-looking move,” says Jasperse. “We wanted to try and embody a certain experiential state, extract that pedestrian aesthetic of the movement and use that as building blocks.
“The thing is, even with the most excellently trained dancers, the scope of dance is relatively restrained. This way, rather than look at that as some sort of disability or something that dance lacks, I could focus on the way in which it brings you into a new kind of experience of corporal reality.”
Another aspect of doing so is by incorporating heavily designed sets and props, an aspect that Jasperse’s work is also well-known for. With “Spurts …” he clearly departs from this well-worn path; the lack of a set becomes the design. The wings are left open, the stage lights hang bare and the audience can see all the scaffolding that normally sits well-hidden behind the scenes. In fact, the rear wall of the stage—a wall that hardly ever sees the light of day—remains bare, becoming the backside of a proscenium box that almost feels as if it has no boundaries.
Because dance is inherently a visual form, that bare stage and the sheer distance between the dancers and the audience imbues the piece with the important nature of silence and empty space—more specifically, how action and movement openly defies and shapes that emptiness and silence. Further, the seemingly pedestrian movements and lack of set contribute to an overall sense of familiarity, like you are watching someone you think you know moving about a space you almost feel a part of. While sitting in a theater watching a choreographed dance, nothing feels more accidentally natural. 

Jerry Joseph

New York Groove: Former Salt Lake City/Portland singer-songwriter Jerry Joseph finds a new home in Harlem.

Jerry Joseph’s story—addiction, applause, anonymity— is familiar to most Salt Lakers, since this was the singer-songwriter’s home base for so many years. Newbies need to know at least this: His late-1980s band Little Women was poised to be huge. They had famous-friend fans who bowed to Joseph’s songs and wanted to help. Drugs ruined everything, and by 1994 the band was no more. Joseph got clean, moved to Utah (briefly, before returning to Portland, Ore.), and formed The Jackmormons. The powerful support never abated, and each new album got the same effusive praise, but still, success eluded Jerry Joseph.

Each time City Weekly has spoken to him over the years, Joseph has talked of redemption and continuing struggle and gratitude for what he’s accomplished, not what one might call his “due.” Relentlessly philosophical, occasionally cynical, he trudged on, looking ever the picture of forward motion. Talking to him now, hearing about the birth of his third child (many years removed from Joseph’s first two children), that picture is clear—at least until he says he’s been living in Harlem for three-and-a-half years.

Harlem? Harlem, Harlem? As in, New York City? Seriously? “Yeah,” says Joseph. “It’s a little weird, standing here talking to you on the corner of 3rd and Adam Clayton Powell, where I live. It’s like, ‘Welcome to the world, kid.’ Crazy, crazy place to have an infant.”

He says it’s different from the rest of Manhattan.

Everyone knows, even if it’s a stereotype, that this is the alpha ghetto—literally and figuratively. “It’s ridiculously crazy. It’s also kinda cool.”

Joseph knows from crazy, knows from cool. This is almost his world, or at least something like a place he lived for a while and can navigate fairly well. So, when he says it’s kinda cool, “maybe a little more community-oriented on some level,” it sounds like a joke. He laughs, follows up his comment with, “Certainly a lot more dangerous.” It’s funny ’cause it’s all true.

On the corner where Joseph stands, he sets the scene.

Within a 50-yard radius—right now—he can see “all the shit that’s going on,” all the “dealers and hookers and homeless and cops.” All this among the citizens of Harlem, a melange of “Africans, African-Americans, Dominicans, Mexicans” all of them “figurin’ it out.”

“We sit on the corner and watch the struggle,” says Joseph, trailing off and mumbling something that sounds like “Bob Marley,” as if the sentence is a lyric. Whoever said it, the reggae sage or the rock & roll bard, it’s powerful. Finally, I have to ask Joseph if that’s the best place for him. Isn’t recovery a lifelong endeavor?

He laughs a sheepish mea culpa. It’s funny ’cause it’s true. It’s also a huge bummer. Relapse is a bitch. But he’s going to meetings, and it helps to see that others have it worse than he does, and it helps him stay grateful. “It’s not something I really wanna talk about … in print,” he says. He does, anyway; he never runs from it, which may be why he’s still alive.

Life now is good for Joseph. Since 2001, his profile has increased tremendously—on a relative scale—as he released each new album. He wrote about how he was starting to gain on that brass ring, and more and more, it appeared Joseph actually was. In 2004, he formed The Stockholm Syndrome with Widespread Panic bassist Dave Schools (Panic being one of those famous-friend fans) and that record got more attention. So did his next two albums, Cherry and April Nineteenth, and his new band project The Denmark Veseys (with erstwhile Dexter Grove member Steve Drizos). There’s a new EP, Charge, a stopgap release on Joseph’s own Cosmo Sex School label, that could increase his profile even more if its title track manages to circulate.

In the song, he sings of standing on that same street corner on the night Obama won the presidency and being overcome by the power of the moment. “It was like the first democratic election in El Salvador. It was like, so heavy,” Joseph marvels. “I’ve never been hugged by so many strangers.”
Joseph’s audibly still awestruck by the experience—and happy. He has a new family in his house and in his neighborhood, his meetings and his music. (Joseph wants to say here that he’s especially thrilled that friend and former Jackmormons drummer Adam Sorensen will join him for a Salt Lake City show on Sunday.)