Habitian Proverbs

1.
Sometimes words of wisdom are written in crayon.

2.
Most of life's lessons can be learned in a sandbox with a few friends and at least one enemy.

3.
Kids say the darndest things — at the damndest times.

4.
Parents of young children must realize that in their task of teaching lessons in morality and ethics they must allow their child to act immoraly and unethically with them now if the child is to act morally and ethically with the rest of the world in the future.

5.
So much of our "knowledge" is indeed second-hand, overheard opinion. We must allow ourselves and our children to experience something first-hand before calling it "knowledge."

6.
As a parent, never take "I hate you" or a "You're the meanest mommy/daddy ever" personally. This will only lead to bloating, premature balking and that really annoying sense of eternal damnation you may have heard about at Sunday church or Monday happy hour.

7.
A Habitian riddle

There is a group of children at a baseball field. They have bats, balls and gloves. Two parents sit on the bleachers — talking, reading the newspaper and humming songs from Saturday Night Fever. The children spend an hour playing baseball. They are the players, the umpires and the fans. The rules are theirs. The strategies are theirs. The arguments and the resolutions are theirs. The play is theirs.

There is another group of children at a baseball field. They have bats, balls and gloves. Many parents sit in the bleachers — advising, ordering, cajoling and humming the "Be a Good Sport" pledge that the children must say before each game. The game lasts an hour. The umpires are paid professionals — contrary to what the parent-fans are calling them. The coaches are adults (parents). The rules were created somewhere else, by a group of adults — experts no doubt. They are enforced by the adults. The strategies and decisions are almost exclusively made by the adults.

Which group of children has before them — within this one summer hour — opportunities to grow emotionally, socially, mentally and physically? And if you were 8 years old, which group would you rather be with?