4/18/08

Living History

I rather wish that the local PBS channel would make it perfectly clear to their smallest viewers that historic events are just that: historical. That they happened a loooooong time ago (well, everything happened a long time ago to someone who's only 4 years old.

My son just rushed into the room, exclaiming: "The TV just told me that there was a fight going on between Indians and cowboys, and there was a train that ran over some people on its tracks!!!"

Who knew that PBS had their own version of the nightly, grisly news?

4/17/08

Talks With God

Tonight, as we were going through the nightly ritual (pj's, toothbrush, cleanup, story time, drink of water, music box/song)...E caught me at the very end: "Mom, we didn't say prayers."

(Which, my parents always said prayers with us before bedtime, I don't know why I never remember to...Yes, I'm the devil, you may say it.)

So we began our prayers. There's something ridiculously endearing about a little boy reciting his nightly prayers. First, there's a sweet Catholic prayer to a guardian angel that starts out "Angel of God, my guardian dear..." Me and my sibs recited it as very small children. Then as we grew up, my mom added "Protect us, Lord, as we stay awake..." which is a night prayer from the Liturgy of the Hours. (That oldie about dying before waking is a bit too scary for my mother to try to explain to small children, I suppose. I don't blame her, it still terrifies me a little bit.)

When he spends the night at Nanay and Poppa's house, E always adds The Lord's Prayer and a Hail Mary for good measure. I'm just glad he knows them (yes, I taught him. Don't judge.), but I'm too impatient and stressed out to say those two with him every night. I figure that he says them at church once a week, that should be good enough, right?!?

Anyway, so tonight, as usual, we plowed through the first two children's prayers, and I bent down to kiss him instead of moving on to the "grown-up" prayers.

He immediately protested: "Aren't we gonna say the others?"
I assume this is just another ploy to get out of bedtime, since it's already waaaaay waaaaaay past, so I'm like "Nope, but if you want, you can say them to yourself before you fall asleep."
E, reproachfully: "You always forget to say prayers with me."
Me: "I know, honey, but if I forget, you can still say them without me."
E: "I could even say them in my head?! And God will hear me?!"
Mom: "Yep."
E: "Wow, that's really cool. That's a miracle."
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