How to make lots of driving harmonious with my existence? Listen to the children.
It’s guilt-tripping to drive so much, knowing about the carbon footprint we’re creating for ourselves… However, our children are in schools 1/2 hour away, and the buses are so badly coordinated that we’d end up on the road more rather than less trying to catch different buses at different times. So this year my husband and I decided to share share the school runs and drive all the way to school each day.
Last week I had collected my five-year-old and he had many interesting observations. Here are two (accompanied by emphatic chubby-5-year-old hand gestures):
Doing nothing makes me tired, but doing something makes me un-tired. … Eating is something that I do that doesn’t make me tired. [followed without pause by:]
I know what cow poos look like. (Oh?) They’re greenish brownish. (How do you know that?) I went into the cow field once [pause, to see if I'll reprimand for going without permission into the cow field]… and I saw the big brownish but with greenish … stuff… sort of greenish brownish poos. (I see.)
There was more… I’ll have to take notes. This is our 4th child and I don’t seem to tire of their unique observations. My dad’s favourite is “empty puddles”. That’s what potholes were to my daughter some years ago. My niece, aged 4, hand out to feel the rain drops beginning to fall, said “I can smell the rain.” In French, “sens” (“Je sens la pluie”) can be smell or feel, and my niece was learning both, from each parent. The translation to English was priceless. (Of course, you can smell rain too, but I’m quite sure she meant “feel” the rain drops on her hand).
Listening to the older children brings me up to speed on the latest crude & rude school yard sayings as well as all the lyrics to Avril and Killers songs. Aren’t I lucky.
