Not sure where to post this, so here it goes.
Life
It must come to an end
For even though we lived a good one
It's time to go away
Remember the good times you had|
and all the fun you had
'cause it's time to go away
But if you have a strong friendship
you might remember them in your next life!
But sadly, it's time to go away
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Kids are wild. One minute they’re dumber than the dog and the next minute they surprise you with something super thoughtful.
So true. And other times they utterly wreck your ability to function out of nowhere.
I interned at a kindergarten once and was on breakfast duty sometimes. Meant you had to meet at 5 in the morning and prepare breakfast for all the early birds who were dropped off at 6.
They’d always sit there, so sleepy and slow and soft in their movements. Gradually they’d liven up after a bowl of cornflakes or a piece of toast with butter and cheese. Then one by one they would leave the table and run into the playroom and start their day.
There would always be a few leftover kids who were extra slow.
This morning there were two boys left. Both 4 years old at the time. They sit there and one of them has the “lights are on but no one’s home” look in his eyes while he’s chewing his food. The other one is a bit more lively and he looks up at his friend while I’m putting plates in the dishwasher and he says:
“Hey A?”
A: “Mh?”
B: “is it hard for you to pee in the morning?”
A: “Mh.”
B: “I think it’s very annoying. I can never hit the toilet bowl because my weenie is all pointy in the morning. Is it like that for you too?”
A: “Mh.”
B: “it’s so annoying.”
Meanwhile I have silently collapsed on all fours behind the counter, trying NOT to laugh.
Took me a few minutes before I was able to return to my job with a neutral face. They are so precious. It was some of the best things about working with kids. Getting to experience the world through their eyes and be confused and amazed alongside them. And then sometimes they just throw a curveball out of nowhere and you just can’t react with laughter because they don’t know why it’s funny and will think you’re mocking or shaming them for something they can’t control.
I still cannot comprehend that they are adults now. 20 this year. Those sweet little toddlers with their funny or profound observations. I wish I remembered some of the profound things they said back then, because I know they did, but alas, I mostly remember the accidentally funny things.
Truth
Little correction: your 10 year old correctly wrote “come to an end” but you typed “come to and end”
Nice job on the poem, kid! I hope the death stuff is more hypothetical than from any tragedy in your life.
Thanks for pointing out. I sincerely have no idea where the death stuff came from. I mean, I sort of do. She wrote a poem about humans and thought it was not good. I was floored by how mature and thought provoking it was, that I probably went overboard in complimenting her. Now she says I liked the way she wrote like a grown up, and grown ups most think of death, so she wrote this one. I don’t know what that says about her or me or her perception of grown ups lol.
I once did a project with my 3rd graders where we looked at a bunch of poems and cartoons from The New Yorker and then they tried to do one of each. It seemed like almost all of the adult poems had death as a major theme, so I specifically told them something like “that’s a topic for old people, try to write about Life instead.” I sent them outside to look at something in “Nature” (well, a suburban school playground) and come up with a metaphor for their poem. The only rules for the cartoon were, one picture, one line, and both should be necessary. Humor preferred but optional, same for social commentary. They came out surprisingly well as a whole, and I bound them as “The Third Grader” for the class library.
I don’t know how I feel about this
I didn’t get it until I saw the version with syntax highlighting
What did the syntax highlighting reveal for you? I’m still lost on the green text
Meaning the handwriting was very difficult to read until they read the text
lol I don’t know how to make it look normal
