Today's Happy Thing Saturday, 09 May 2009 (the best, how much, legal, speech)

[MidwesternBookWorm]

My happy thing today is watching parents interact with their children in a loving, involved manner.

We ate breakfast at our favorite little diner this morning, and I had so much fun watching the young family at the table right across from us. Both parents were focused on their children, talking with them, listening to them, laughing with them, and just totally engrossed in the joy of the moment. And interestingly enough, the youngsters, who looked to be about 3 and 5 years old, were some of the best-behaved and most mature little folks I've ever seen. Coincidence? I don't think so.

So what is your happy on this fine Saturday, on this or any other subject?

[Crew Chief]

Midwetern Bookworm, it's ALWYS nice to see involved parents with well-behaved kids. Wish there were even more like that nowadays.

Our happy for the day so far: Poetic justice! On our way to breakfast, we were stopped at a major intersection. When the light turned green for us, the car in the left turn lane coming the other way refused to yield. We had to stop to avoid a head-on collision. Luckily, there was a sheriff's deputy a half block behind him who saw it and pulled him over!

[brokencrayola]

Yesterday I had a speech therapist call me about making an appointment for my two teenage sons. My sons both have Asperger's, which is an autism spectrum disorder and one is ADHD. At the end of the conversation she asked if they were well behaved or not, as she said they are not set up for behavioral problems often see with children with Autism. I told her no, they are very well behaved, and they are. I suddenly was really filled with pride and joy knowing I have raised these boys, 18 and 16and they are really good kids. I am proud.

[bjh]

Crew Chief, I think that's legal justice...

It's definitely great to see people being good parents. It annoys me when I see kids in public asking their parents questions and the parents just ignore them like they don't matter.

Every kid is born with natural curiosity...one of the hallmarks of our species is this awesome brain, after all. How much do you want to bet that if we fast forward 10 years,let's say the questioning 5 year old is now 15, and the parents wonder why he doesn't care about learning anything at school? They'll never make the connection that they dampened his interest in learning early on when the kid would see satisfying his interest in the larger world as a reward all its own.

Lecture over.