Today when we were shopping at Target, Christopher did something that really impressed me…
He and David had been looking at toys from the upcoming Sonic 3 movie and we couldn’t find a display that they’d had up a few weeks ago. So without any direction or prompting, my ten year-old walked up to an employee in the toy aisle and asked him if he knew where they were!
It’s the first time that I’ve personally seen him do something so independent all by himself – the guy walked him a couple of aisles over to the main area where we had already looked and very patiently listened as Christopher explained in detail what they were looking for, and eventually he pointed us towards a mostly empty end-cap a few more aisles away where at least we found something close enough.
These kids are growing up way too fast, yet it’s so rewarding watching the milestones along the way as they learn how to do things for themselves, as simple as things like this.
On the other hand, a few days ago I shockingly found myself explaining what the n-word meant because they’d heard it in a YouTube video and thought it was just another swear word. So we spent five minutes talking about it and I think by the end they understood that it’s actually a lot more than just a swear word and more importantly, why it’s not ok for us in particular to say it.
Both moments left me feeling proud as a parent – the first for obvious reasons, but the latter because I think that they genuinely listened and learned from it, which is a big deal as they’re confronted with other kids who don’t know why it’s not ok to say in the future.