What you see is what you get?

Recently "G," otherwise more properly know as, "Griffin," turned 5 years old.  He's grown some, but he's not overly tall for his age.  He's gained some weight, but you really can't say that he's chubby.  His run is more of a shuffle.  He's got glasses that Mr. Magoo would be lucky to have and he's got hair like Dennis the Menace.  Amazingly enough, he's a good reminder of the complexity of people.  Often enough, we look to categorize people so that we can better understand the world.  That's exceptionally difficult to do with a child because aside from major themes, their personalities usually aren't determined until they are much older.

That said, why is this important to know?  Well, G, has a very simplistic, naïve point of view that is pretty normal for a 5-year old, but it's also balanced by an innate wisdom and strength of will not normally found in much older people.  It's impressive.  Am I biased?  …a bit, no doubt.  However, and this is the important part, he reminds me that I shouldn't lose that balance that comes quite naturally to him.

Awesome like a hotdog…

…more like a hundred-billion hotdogs as Eddie Izzard would say.  Late last year I searched Facebook for an old grade school friend of mine.  Found him and reconnected - cool right?  Well, today a different grade school friend posted a picture of our 6th grade class (yes I had funny hair, but it was 1982 ok?) …and Neil, my old buddy tagged me.  Now, several hours later, I've re-connected with about a third of them.  These are people who I have not seen, talked to, or heard about since 1982.

Now I'm not simply surprised that this has happened, I'm actually awe struck.  We've all got our own lives, we live hundreds or thousands of miles apart and yet, as serendipity would have it, we're now re-connected.  If we all lived in New York City this would have been a crazy coincidence.  It wouldn't have been unheard of rather, just uncommon.  Clearly however, Facebook has also enabled this kind of thing, and I'm sure that I/we aren't the only occurrence.  In fact, I'm sure that Facebook has made this kind of thing more common.

Lastly, I'd like to point out (perhaps it's obvious) that today's elementary students will likely not go 28 years before they re-find their old friends.  As a Gen-X kid, I was juxtaposed with analog technology and digital technology.  My kids won't think that this even was all that special.  They'd agree that it was cool, not much more …but I think that it's still awesome.

She's proud of me (…awww)

So Quinn, the three year old and only daughter, told me that she was "proud of me" today.  I told her that she needed to go to the bathroom to poop (sorry, we use real words 'round here).  Normally she argues, complains, something to let us know that she is the one who is in control of her body.  While this is true, and I like seeing her self-determination, I'm not a big fan of the arguing when it comes to bodily functions.  This time, however, no complaints, no arguments, not even a comment other then "ok dad."  Needless to say, I was surprised.

When she got back I told her that I was very happy with her attitude and proud that she listened so well and went to the bathroom to do as instructed.  …that's when she told me she was also proud of me.  [Warm fuzzies right?]  She told me that she was proud of me because I wasn't yelling; hitting; fighting; throwing; kicking (kicking?); and biting (biting? -yes, "b-i-t-i-n-g").  Now, I've been known to yell at the kids, even spank them once or twice, but I don't recall ever doing any of the latter.  Anyhow, she proceeded to tell me that I should "keep up the good work and maybe mommy will be proud of me too" and then she reminded me (very gently) that I hadn't said "thank you."