Room to Grow

by Kline, Christina Baker

• ISBN13: 9780312263843
• ISBN10: 0312263848
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-05-05
• Publisher: Golden Guides from St. Martin's Press

Summary

Candid, reflective, and intimate essays that capture the essence of parenting. Harnessing the writing skill of a score of top contemporary writers, Christina Baker Kline has crafted an outstanding collection that touches the core of modern parenthood. The writers share their experiences as parents of children between the ages of two and ten-the period when our children are young and wholly dependent, before they have established separate identities. Each of these entertaining and evocative essays focuses on one central issue about raising young children: the complexities of being a stay-at-home dad the urge to avoid making the same mistakes our parents did birth order and sibling rivalry giving our children a sense of racial identity. Room to Grow is a kaleidoscope of the early years of childhood, revealing new patterns and yielding insights at each turn. A remarkable exploration of the parenting experience, Room to Grow eloquently discloses those priceless moments of joy and heartache, closeness and separation, wonder and exasperation, amazement and exhaustion that parents encounter every day with their young children.

Author Biography

Christina Baker Kline is the author of two novels, Desire Lines and Sweet Water. She is the co-author, with Christina L. Baker, of The Conversation Begins: Mothers and Daughters Talk About Living Feminism and editor of Child of Mine: Original Essays on Becoming a Mother. Her work has appeared in The Yale Review, Ms., Parents, Southern Living, Family Life, and The New York Times Book Review, among other publications. She lives in Montclair, New Jersey, with her husband, David, and three young sons, Hayden, William, and Elias.

Table of Contents

Introduction	1	(8)
PART I: CONJURING A FAMILY
On Naming a Child	9	(12)
Susan Fromberg Schaeffer
The Education of a Stay-at-Home Father	21	(14)
Michael Laser
Turf Wars	35	(6)
Maxine Chernoff
Atlanta: The Riddle of Fathers and Daughters	41	(14)
Gordon Churchwell
In Love with Boys	55	(7)
Rosemary L. Bray
Wrestling with the Angel	62	(9)
Yona Zeldis McDonough
The Problem at the Center of the Universe	71	(9)
Richard Panek
A Second Chance at Childhood	80	(9)
Rob Spillman
PART II: ROOM TO GROW
Just the One	89	(9)
Alice Elliott Dark
Befriending Zoe	98	(11)
Hilary Selden Illick
Reading to Brendan	109	(8)
Tony Eprile
A Matter of Quality	117	(5)
Jill Smolowe
As One	122	(9)
Lindsay Fleming
Uprooting the Kids	131	(3)
Francine Prose
Of Names and Hair	134	(7)
Valerie Wilson Wesley
Soccer Practice	141	(10)
Kevin Canty
PART III: TAKING WING
Childtime	151	(8)
Noelle Oxenhandler
Looking Away	159	(8)
Carol Muske-Dukes
Choice	167	(10)
Annaliese Hood
Driving	177	(8)
Jon Katz
Five Snapshots from the Year Take Turned Ten	185	(9)
Roberta Israeloff
Taking Wing	194	(5)
Larry Brown
Acknowledgments	199	(2)
About the Editor and Contributors	201