Out of the Mouths of Babes

Readers' Odds and Ends

August 2006

Have some more turkey, Grandma -- and give me back my wallet!

I was caught off-guard when my seven-year-old, who was six at the time, was asked if he knew why we celebrated this holiday or that. It was around Thanksgiving, and the adult questioner expected, I'm sure, the pat answer of Pilgrims and Indians and Plymouth Rock. My son thought about it for a moment or two before responding with a very stern look on his face, "Thanksgiving is about learning giving and not stealing."

"What do you mean, sweetheart?" I asked.

"People came over here on big boats, gave the Indians a bunch of beads and shells, and then stole their land, their pumpkins, and ate their turkeys. So now we eat turkey to remember we shouldn't steal."

I almost choked, tears running down my face as I tried to hold back my laughter. He learned this all by himself, from where or why who knows.

But how do you know they're learning if they aren't in school?

My three-year-old was attending a library storytime, listening to a story about monkeys. Right in the middle, he felt the need to interrupt and explain that "the monkeys in the picture are New World monkeys, because they're clinging to the branches with their prehensile tails."

The librarian, without missing a beat, asked how we would know if they were Old World Monkeys. He answered, "They would have non-prehensile tails, of course."

And I stopped worrying about whether or not we're "keeping up."

Located right next door to Dark Wednesdays...

One afternoon, my eight-year-old daughter and I were driving through a rather seedy area of town, and we were seeing a lot of graffiti on buildings. Jennifer said, "Man, there was a lot of graffiti on Open Sunday." Sure I had not heard her correctly, I asked her to repeat that. She said the same thing again. I asked, "What does 'open Sunday' mean?" She replied, "It's the name of that store back there." Apparently she'd read a sign in a window offering information about the store's hours of operation.

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