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Back when my kids were much younger, they didn’t always play with their best friends at school or even on playdates. Sometimes, their friends would push trains around a room while they would bounce a ball, connect the dots or create an original drawing. The first time I heard the term “parallel play,” I remember nodding in agreement.

Fast forward to the teenage years, and on most days parents and their children live parallel lives. We occupy the same house, we walk in and out of the same bathroom, we sometimes sit at the same table, but we don’t always connect or even interact with each other on a substantive basis.

Just to keep my kids on their toes, I sometimes ask them on a weekend how school was. The conversation goes something like this.

Me: “Hey guys, how was school?”
Kids: “Good.”
Me: Smiling.
Kids: Replaying the short tape of the conversation to see why dad is still looking at them.
Kids: “Wait, we didn’t have school today.”
Me: “Right, so tell me, how was your Saturday morning.”
Kids: “Good.”
Me: Sigh.

Recently, though, the stars all aligned for my family, giving us a chance for more than the usual brief interactions on our way to something else. My daughter started reading the John Green young-adult novel, “Paper Towns.” She finished it in little more than a day and left it on a counter. My wife and I took turns reading the same book.

When we suggested our son try reading something during the summer, he initially resisted. Given the consistent message from my wife and me, he relented and grabbed the nearest book which, as it turned out, happened to be “Paper Towns.”

What’s followed has been a bending of those parallel lines. Remarkably, our daughter who considers herself something of a morning person in the late afternoon woke up one day and entered into a discussion with me about the book. Yes, that’s right, a discussion. I consider any exchange of dialogue that involves more than two sentences, eye contact and a continuation of a conversation beyond a single room a discussion.

It’s not that she or I loved the book, or even particularly related to it. The interaction allowed us to share what we thought of the overall plot points, of the characters in the book and the story arc. We had also both read another of Green’s books, “Looking for Alaska,” and compared some themes that overlapped in both books.

In the meantime, conversations with our son about what he’s read have included a detailed recall of the most recent chapter he completed.

No, this isn’t a ringing endorsement of the book or of the author. In fact, none of the four of us is eagerly encouraging friends and family to get a copy as soon as possible so they can read it before they see the movie.

I am, however, suggesting that a family book club is a way to create a delightful and meaningful intersection of those parallel lines, enabling us to converse and connect. We have had our moments when two of us have wanted to read the book at the same time. Given our different schedules, however, that has happened considerably less often than I would have imagined.

The benefit of a book over, say, a trip to a lake or an amusement park is that the words on the page give us common ground. That becomes the starting point from which we can share our respective perspectives.

Without a specific assignment, our kids can share a relaxed view of a book. The conversations can, and have, brought us together.

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MaryEllen Elia succeeds John B. King Jr. as the state’s next education commissioner. Photo from state education department

School boards across Long Island swore in new members and re-elected trustees in the last couple of weeks to kick off a brand new school year. With every fresh start, we have an opportunity to better our communities, and ourselves, but this idea carries even greater weight when a top state education official is also starting a new term.

Our greatest hope is that our superintendents, school board trustees, parents, principals, teachers unions and other leaders will make every effort to partner with the state’s new education commissioner, MaryEllen Elia.

The New York native, who was a teacher in this state and a superintendent in Florida, took the helm from controversial former Commissioner John B. King Jr. this month. She certainly has a rough road and a lot of work ahead — agreeing to pilot an education system in which large numbers of students are refusing state exams and concerned parents are protesting the Common Core Learning Standards on a regular basis. It’s not a job many would envy.

King’s approach to implementing the Common Core left a bad taste in a lot of parents’ and educators’ mouths, but we should be careful not to allow that sourness to affect our relationship with Elia — she deserves a chance to prove herself.

We should do our best to open the dialogue and calmly communicate our grievances. We should keep open minds and be willing to collaborate.

Our children and our education system are important to our communities. In order to stay competitive globally and to further challenge our teachers and students, we need to keep as our No. 1 goal the improvement of our educational system. It sorely needs improvement.

Let’s do everything we can to build a positive relationship with this new commissioner, and thus build a more positive school environment for our students who will inherit the future.

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Loss is upsetting. Leaving a favorite scarf behind in a restaurant cloakroom is annoying. We return to the restaurant and the silk scarf that we treasured from our trip to Thailand is no longer there. Losing one’s keys, or driver’s license or even passport is aggravating. Having to remake the keys on our ring is time consuming. Going to the DMV for a new license is beyond time consuming. And applying for a new passport, always just before we need one is the epitome of high stress. But on a relative scale, these are trivial losses.
There are other kinds of loss. We might lose our job. Our company, under economic pressures, may have eliminated our department, and there are not a lot of openings for our position in other places. Such a loss might herald serial losses to come. Without a job we might not be able to pay the rent and be forced to leave our apartment, and move back with parents. Or depending on our stage of life, we might not meet our mortgage obligations with dire consequences for our family home. Financial losses can sometimes trigger the loss of a relationship if the stress becomes too great. Marriages break up, families divide, lives take unexpected turns as a result of different kinds of loss. As we know too well, the loss of a treasured relationship can be caused by any number of factors.
Sometimes people lose their way. They may think they are set on a particular path but enough obstacles may cause them to rock back on their heels and try to figure out what to do next. They may even, for a time, lose their sense of self and have to figure out who they are and what they want right from square one again.
The ultimate loss is death. The death of a loved one is irreversible, and whatever we may feel about life after death for the deceased, that person is physically lost to those who continue living. If we have lost a friend, no longer will he or she be there to listen, to lend a hand, to give advice, to suggest fun trips or provide bottomless hospitality or just precious companionship. Those whom we have loved for a long time are no longer witness to our lives, to our triumphs and our sorrows. They seemed as much a part of our lives as our limbs, but now they are severed and will no longer walk with us into the future. It is hard to comprehend. It is even harder to bear. The heart hurts.
So what do we do in the face of such loss? We tighten the inner circle that existed around the loved one by holding each other close. We dwell on the wonderful attributes of the person who is no longer with us and use them as an inspiration for ourselves. We chuckle together over the shortcomings of that person because we don’t want to lose the humanness of our friend. Indeed we may have loved him or her as much for that person’s perceived failings as for the virtues. Nor do we want to lose the truthfulness of our memories.
The deceased lives on in our heads. We can talk with that person, however one sided the conversations, ask advice and reliably supply the answers because we knew that person so well. We can remember the endless times and places we have been together, the secrets we have shared, the many ways our horizons were broadened and our knowledge increased because of our common experiences and our relationship throughout our lives.
And we can move on. Our friend would want that, in fact, insist on it. When one dies, his or her story ends and is physically left behind at that place and time. But the stories of the living continue and sooner or later must be embraced.
Goodbye, dear friend. We will miss you for the rest of our lives. Thank you for all you have been and all you have given us. It has been a blessing to know you.

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Anxious, muted conversations filled the church. People in mostly dark colors tilted their heads to the side, offering sympathetic hugs, knowing nods and long handshakes.

The attendees had come to pay their final respects to Dr. Phil Riggio, someone my family has known for more than four decades.

A husband, grandfather and friend, he shared a positive, patient energy, which made him an effective doctor. As I sat in the church, looking up at the stars and moon on the stained glass windows, I could hear his calm voice as he offered comfort to a much younger version of myself. Whenever I contracted yet another case of strep throat, he talked to me, looked me in the eye, and waited until I was ready for that unfortunate moment when he had to swab the back of my throat.

Once the mourners entered in the back of the room, the church became completely silent. Holding the hands of her children, Marge Riggio took one slow agonizing step after the other toward the front of the room. Her eyes nearly sealed shut to the painful reality, she showed the raw emotions of someone suffering from the agony of an irreversible loss. As the widow passed each row, the mourners reached for tissues and handkerchiefs. She was at the leading edge of a powerful wave of emotion for him that moved through the room one row at a time.

Whatever she or others felt about her husband going to a better place and finding everlasting peace, it was clear that those still living on Earth would feel his absence keenly.

More than half a century earlier, the Riggios were married, starting their life together. All these years later, Marge has three children and eight grandchildren she shared with her dignified, respectful and warmhearted husband. Her family embraced her, offering to hold her hand, to listen to the words mixed with soft sobs and tears, and to bring their bodies into close contact.

We all felt and will continue to feel the absence of this remarkable man who shared so much with my family and, after my father died, with my mom. The friendship my mother had with the Riggios didn’t change at all after two couples became a couple and a widow. Marge and Phil stood shoulder to shoulder with my mother, whether their shoulders were on Long Island, at an opera in New York City or waiting in line to ride an elephant in South Africa.

On this impossible day, when Marge Riggio said goodbye to the man she’d loved for more than 50 years, I could see and feel the depth of the love they shared. My wife asked me when we got married if everyone felt the same way we did when we started out; if they had the same sense of belonging and fitting together; and if they saw the whole world in each other’s faces. I can’t answer that for the rest of the world, but I could certainly see it in the way the Riggios lived.

Love is not an entitlement, given to us the same way our genes are handed down from one generation to the next. We earn it and work at it and, when it’s mutually shared and respected, we use it to power everything we do. The end of a life threatens to remove the air we breathe. Surrounded by family and friends, we dare to take those next steps, buoyed by years of memories, holding parts of those who have left us deep within our hearts.

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When does what we do matter? More importantly, how do we handle the moments that matter?

Each day, we go through so many activities that are so mundane as to require little to no concentration. We can walk to a deli, order a sandwich, nod at someone familiar on the street and engage in a conversation with our boss on a cellphone.

We have become incredibly adept at multitasking, making it so much easier not to focus on any one activity or even thought. We are not exactly grand masters of chess, thinking several moves ahead to gain an advantage over an ingenious opponent. We allow ourselves to wade through a pool of activities and decisions that are a collection of loose change jingling in our pockets.

But then there are those days, hours or moments that turn the ordinary into something filled with so much electricity that the muscles in our legs that hold us up threaten to buckle.

The thrilling and terrifying collide in our minds. Something real is at stake and the outcome isn’t predetermined, at least not as far as we know.

We need these moments that matter, even if they make our mouths dry, send pinpricks to our fingers and make us feel as if we can suddenly sense the rotation of the Earth.

Why? How does leaving our comfort zone help? Well, for starters, it reminds us of who we are and what we want. Yes, she might say “no” and yes, we might not pass our driver’s test. So what? If this is what we want, the only mistake would be avoiding trying to get what we want because we might not get it. It’s easy to believe we are not ready or that we are not good enough. Why not roll up our sleeves and give it a shot?

Maybe if we could convert all that energy and anxiety into something else, we’d feel empowered by big moments. Those pinpricks in our fingers might make them even faster and more nimble than we could imagine, allowing us to play the piano more efficiently than we ever have, while that racing heart and dry tongue could be just the kind of internal obstacles we need to overcome to
believe in ourselves. When these telltale signs return, they might become familiar companions on the road to something bigger and better.

Butterflies feel strange in our stomachs because they give us the sensation we don’t get when we turn the ignition on for our car, when we pick up the phone and dial a number we know by heart or when we walk down a familiar hallway at work to hear our colleagues share views they have constantly offered for years.

Maybe we need a few more butterflies in our lives. We need to feel something unusual and exciting, something bigger and brighter and something that shakes us up. Maybe we need to imagine seeing those butterflies outside of our stomachs and fluttering around us.

While we take for granted that those butterflies are a sign of nerves, they are also an interesting choice. Butterflies fall in the same category as bunnies. We like them. If we can somehow imagine them fluttering just outside us, circling a room or a field, we can breathe deeply in the moment.

When we look back on any given year, we can gain a new appreciation and perspective on these opportunities. They may not only define a time, but they may also help remind us that our lives are not just about the ordinary — they are about embracing and conquering the moments that matter.

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When I come across a wonderful story, I like to share it with you, and so I will tell you today about a Briton named Nicholas Winton. You probably don’t recognize his name because he told no one about his extraordinary deeds, not even his wife. It was only after she found a scrapbook, in the attic of their home in 1988, that the world began to learn of his courage and humanity defying Hitler on the eve of World War II.

Winton was a London stockbroker in December 1938 and about to go to Switzerland on a ski vacation when a friend, who was aiding refugees in the newly annexed Czechoslovakia, urged him to come to Prague.

There, Winton found huge numbers of refugees, who were trying to escape Hitler, living in “appalling conditions,” according to The New York Times obituary on July 2 that told of Winton’s life. There was little hope of escape for those on the run because other countries had closed their borders, especially to Jewish immigration, except for a unique effort that was mounted by Britain. Kindertransport was an attempt to rescue unaccompanied Jewish children up to the age of 17 if they had a host family willing to accept them. The Refugee Children’s Movement in Britain reached into Germany and Austria and according to The Times, some 10,000 children were saved before the war began.

There was no equivalent effort made in Czechoslovakia, despite the clear danger evidenced by such horrors as Kristallnacht — the “Night of Broken Glass” — that had shortly before Winton’s trip struck Jewish shops, homes and synagogues in Germany and Austria, As Winton said in a Times interview in 2001, “One saw the problem there, that a lot of these children were in danger, and you had to get them to what was called a safe haven, and there was no organization to do that.”

That is what Winton did: He created an operation that worked with furious speed, racing against the murderous rampage of the Nazi war machine. The modest stockbroker, albeit from a blue-blooded background, cleverly used every means at his disposal, including “dangers, bribes, forgery, secret contacts with the Gestapo, nine railroad trains, an avalanche of paperwork and a lot of money,” as described in the obit.

The volunteers called themselves the British Committee for Refugees from Czechoslovakia, Children’s Section and received aid from the Refugee Children’s Movement. They made appeals in newspaper ads, also church and synagogue bulletins, for host families and money in Britain, and in Prague “cultivated the chief of the Gestapo, Karl Bömelburg — they called him ‘the criminal rat’ after his inspector’s rank of kriminalrat — and arranged for forged transit papers and bribes to be passed to key Nazi and Czech railway officials, who threatened to halt trains or seize the children unless they were paid off,” according to The Times. As word spread and desperate parents brought their children to a rented storefront office, the long lines attracted Gestapo attention. “Perilous confrontations were resolved with bribes,” according to The Times. When the money ran out, Winton used his own.

Can you imagine the searing pain involved with giving up your children to strangers? “Winton’s Children” numbered 669 lives saved. The survivors include the film director Karel Reisz — “Saturday Night and “Sunday Morning” (1960), “Isadora” (1968) and “The French Lieutenant’s Woman” (1981) — and other celebrities. Today there are some 6,000 descendants.

Winton was a most reluctant hero, not wishing to have his wife, Grete Gjelstrup, a Dane he married in 1948, tell anyone. She gave the scrapbook to a Holocaust historian, and then newspaper articles, books, television programs and movies ensued. He was showered with honors, knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2003, astonished all the while at the fuss being made.

Sir Nicholas Winton was the son of a merchant banker of German-Jewish origin who had converted to Christianity. He had grown up in a safe and comfortable world of privilege, yet readily risked it all to help others in dire peril. He would serve as a Royal Air Force officer in the war, and later worked for refugee organizations and a charity that assisted the elderly. For all his exceptional efforts, he was richly rewarded with a long life. He died last week at the age of 106.

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Stock photo

What if we told you that you could travel to Paris this summer? What if you could finally achieve your dream of becoming an astronaut? What if you had the opportunity to travel back in time to the 1890s or 1960s? Well, you can. Just pick up a book.

Some of our school districts already require students to read one or multiple books over the summer. We commend those districts and think others should follow suit and implement their own summer reading programs in the future.

Summer learning loss, or the summer slide, is real — but we can prevent it. This is more important than ever before as students are being held to a higher standard.

We’ve heard the argument from parents that summer break should be just that — a break — and mandating a child to read a book defeats that purpose. We disagree.

Instilling the value of reading into our lives and those of our children is important. Reading stirs the imagination, helps you think critically and makes you a lifelong learner.

While reading may be difficult for some kids and others may just not like it, there is a book for everybody — or at least an educational magazine — and there are so many places to find them.

Visit your local library to find summer reading programs for kids and adults. Go online and download an eBook. At the bare minimum, try out Audible and listen to an audiobook.

We urge everyone to turn off the video games, get off the computer and escape for a few minutes in the pages of a book. Relax — you will be OK and you may even find it fun.

In the time-honored tradition of required reading, we end with a quote from Betty Smith’s 1943 classic, “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.”

“The world was hers for the reading.”

May the world be yours this summer.

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The first half of 2015 ended locally with a fun and singular lineup of cultural events. Stellar activities this past weekend began with a distinguished gala under a tent at the Long Island Museum in Stony Brook. In a tribute to the Great Gatsby-era, the elegantly dressed guests at the fundraiser celebrated with a look back at the Roaring ‘20s and F. Scott Fitzgerald, even as they basked in the prominence of the Long Island Museum, with its director, Neil Watson, looking forward to cultural and historic successes to come. Dancing and dining combined with renewed friendships and endless conversation made for a lovely evening.

Fast forward to Sunday afternoon and an ArTalk, sponsored by Gallery North of Setauket, on famed local artist Christian White. In two parts, the event started at the Gallery with a viewing of some of White’s latest works, entitled “Christian White: Fifty Years of Art.” White, who is 65, began showing his art at Gallery North, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary, at a young age.

That is not surprising. The great-grandson of Stanford White, the renowned New York City architect who designed Washington Square Arch in lower Manhattan, among many other landmarks; the grandson of Lawrence White, also a prominent architect; and the son of noted sculptor and St. James resident Robert White; he carries an abundant supply of artistic genes, both on his paternal and maternal sides. His maternal grandfather was the famed Dutch artist Joep Nicolas, with whom White studied welding, stained glass and mosaics as a youngster in Holland. His mother, Claire Nicolas White is a popular and prolific author. And the creative genes continue in his children.

Then the event moved over to the Simons Center for Geometry and Physics on the Stony Brook University campus, where the Iconic Wall was viewed and explained by its creator, Christian White. The brainchild of Nina Douglas, helped by Anthony Phillips, the limestone wall features ancient and modern equations in math and physics spread over an area of 465 square feet. It is a gravity-defying marriage of art and science in the sparkling Simons building, which encourages innovation and collaboration as its mission. In the Center, there followed a talk by Franklin Perrell, the former senior curator at the excellent Nassau County Museum of Art, about the art world in which Christian White grew up and has worked over these past 50 years.

We then went on to an outpouring of love at Theater Three in Port Jefferson Village. Called “A Tale of Two Mayors,” the evening featured singing by some of the talented performers of the theater group interspersed with talks by prominent members of the community, including Dr. Philias Garant, all honoring Mayors Jeanne Garant and Margot Garant. Mother and daughter, these two women have given boundless energy and creativity to village government, making a formidable political dynasty in the process. The event was, in part, a fundraiser for the restoration of the Rocket Ship Park in lower Port, but in its entirety, a show of appreciation for the work of these two talented and committed women. Their lives were profiled and serenaded throughout the two hours of packed theater. It was as if the village were offering the Garants a valentine in June.

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John had the miles-away stare, while Alissa poured a wall of words to the next table’s occupants. He had probably heard it all before. While he couldn’t hit mute or change the station with some magic spouse remote control, he didn’t have to listen closely.

She wasn’t talking to him anyway. She was directing her word waterfall at Linda, the five-months pregnant woman eating at the next table. She suggested parenting websites and shared advice on where to find the best strollers at the lowest price. She even suggested the name of a villa in Italy they “had to visit” before they became parents because it was the perfect final trip for a family of two.

Linda’s husband, Victor, slowly ate his mahimahi, nodding the few times Alissa looked at him. This was a woman-to-woman conversation.

My son and I observed these couples we didn’t know from a bench outside a restaurant as we waited for our table.

What is it about expectant parents and newborn babies that turns so many people into authority figures on that unlicensed job known as parenting, dispensing free advice about what to expect, how to handle everything, what to buy and what lists to make?

When my wife was pregnant with our daughter and she walked around Manhattan, people used to go out of their way to find out if she was having a boy or a girl: “Oh, honey, you’re carrying more in your back, so it must be a girl.” Then these strangers would share their thoughts on the best place to buy clothing, the ideal kindergarten in the area and the things she should do to prepare for the baby’s arrival.

The positive side of all this unsolicited wisdom is that it shows that people have a sense of community: They want to help and they see a newborn and a new parent as people in need. Birds do it, too. I’ve heard that birds flying through a forest, minding their own business, will sometimes feed a hungry bird demanding food in a nest.

There is a magic that surrounds a new life. This small person inside the bigger person could become anything: a president, a senator, a doctor, an astronaut, a teacher. While this is all true, it’s also a time when adults make that abrupt transition from one world to another, when everything comes within the context of your role as a parent.

The downside of some of that advice is that it can be worth what we pay for it.

“Buy only pink clothes for your daughter, because she’ll wind up liking pink anyway.”

“Feed your son from the floor so he gets sick now and develops a stronger immune system.”

Once a baby is born, there are parents who absolutely know better and seem to see you as younger, nervous, anxious, inexperienced version of themselves. You are the comedy to their reality, the ridiculous to their rational and the neurotic to their well-balanced lifestyles.

“She’ll be fine going outside in 40 degrees in a T-shirt. Trust me, nothing bad will happen.”

As parents, we have every right to worry about whatever is important to us, to take whatever advice works for us and discard the rest.

There’s a kicker to the story about the couples at the restaurant. While sharing advice about parenting, Alissa sat next to her 2-year old daughter for close to half an hour. Not once did she speak to, or look at, her own little girl, who disappeared into a video game during the meal.

Parents giving parental advice are not always perfect themselves.

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Our nation suffered yet another tragedy last week when an avowed racist allegedly murdered nine people at the famous Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in South Carolina, and it didn’t take long for the debates to start.

Should the Confederate flag still be flown? Does institutional racism still exist? Should the suspected shooter, Dylann Roof, be labeled as a terrorist?

The correct answer depends on whom you are speaking to. Most people already have an opinion and are sticking to it, which really doesn’t solve any of the important issues this most recent incident brings to light. Nine innocent people are still dead.

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, the number of hate groups nationwide has increased by 30 percent since 2000. In addition, antigovernment groups rose from 149 in 2008 to 874 in 2014 — numbers that jumped following the financial downturn and the election of President Barack Obama. The center also cited an influx of nonwhite immigrants as another factor.

“This growth in extremism has been aided by mainstream media figures and politicians who have used their platforms to legitimize false propaganda about immigrants and other minorities and spread the kind of paranoid conspiracy theories on which militia groups thrive,” the center said on its website.

We are lucky to live in a country that values freedom of speech and there are countless platforms to voice our opinions today as the Internet continues to connect us. But, it also gives individuals a space to spread their message with like-minded people. Our nation has a serious case of confirmation bias — the tendency to read, listen and seek out information that we agree with — and it is a big issue.

Those who condemn the killings but continue to spew vitriol are fueling a fire. The effects of the South Carolina shooting rippled throughout the country because they could happen in any community, including our own. In fact, one of the victims was a blood relative of a family from Port Jefferson.

The chilling notion that hatred and racism still persist in modern American society should not be ignored. Our freedoms come with responsibility and those who preach hatred against any group of people are wrong. As a society we need to be kinder, or at least remember the lessons we learned as children.

Let’s think before we speak, and if we don’t have anything nice to say, let’s not say it at all.

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