Aimee’s World Tour

In the spirit of the previous post regarding the possible North Korean rocket launch, my mind wanders to the tiny slippers I see every day.  Most of them are Spiderman or  Hello Kitty but you can certainly find some Thomas the Train ones if you look. 

It amazes me how children function.  And if adults could be the same, how different the world would be. They don’t hold grudges.  They take the bad and bounce right back.  In fact they literally hit the ground running.  One kid can smack his classmate into the wall or steal her lego car but after some crocodile tears it’s like their minds are wiped blank and they are the best of friends.  It happens at least 10 times a day among this culture of tiny people – the less sophisticated ones… or are they? 

I’m constantly telling my kids not to hit, push, or throw and always, always to share.  Actually I’m working on explaining the meaning of share to this latest batch.  And then I think of myself.  I think how some things annoy or frustrate me and then I realize Aimee, that’s because you’re NOT sharing.  You’re not saying please and thank you and you’re not letting things go.  In fact adults might struggle with this concept even more than our younger counterparts- only we’re “mature”.  Sure we don’t poop our pants, (well not until we’re really old anyway) but we could stand to open up our “open minds” and learn a thing or two.   

I was outside with my Dover class during Outdoor Time (I can’t take credit for these clever names…)  when I heard “Teacher! Look here! Look here!”  My little prodigy Lauren (ok she’s not a prodigy… she’s just been lucky enough to have lived in the states by the age of 3 and a half) basically looks like a giant baby.  The way her hair is and even the little booties she wears.  Matthew is also a tiny tiny little boy but they can’t really be much bigger at this age. 

Matthew and Lauren were walking toward me ever so slowly, ever so carefully, cradling an indestructable green bouncy ball like a baby chick.  “Look,” said Lauren.  “We’re playing together.”  I was completely taken aback and delighted at the same time.  It was one of the sweetest and most innocent things I had ever experienced.  For all of us who may have forgotten what it is like to share, to find pleasure in the good, I am sharing this tale. 

I now present to you Mr. Robert Fulghum.

(Applause)

“All I really need to know I learned in kindergarden. 

All I really need to know about how to live and what to do and how to be I learned in kindergarden.   

Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate school mountain, but there in the sandpile at Sunday School. 

These are the things I learned:

Share everything.

Play fair.

Don’t hit people.

Put things back where you found them.

Clean up your own mess.

Don’t take things that aren’t yours.

Say you’re sorry when you hurt somebody.

Wash your hands before you eat.

Flush.

Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.

Live a balanced life – learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.

Take a nap every afternoon.

When you go out into the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands, and stick together.

Be aware of wonder.

Remember the little seed in the styrofoam cup: The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that.

Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup – they all die.  So do we.

And then remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned – the biggest
word of all – LOOK.

Everything you need to know is in there somewhere.  The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation.  Ecology and politics and equality and sane living.

Take any of those items and extrapolate it into sophisticated adult terms and apply it to your
family life or your work or your government or your world and it holds true and clear and firm.
Think what a better world it would be if all – the whole world – had cookies and milk about three o’clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankies for a nap. Or if all governments had a basic policy to always put thing back where they found them and to clean up their own mess.

And it is still true, no matter how old you are – when you go out into the world, it is best
to hold hands and stick together.”

“Why thank you Robert.  That was lovely though I must say I never had nap time then or now.  Thanks for coming everybody.  There is only one cookie on your way out.  Please share. Bye-bye.” 

© Robert Fulghum, 1990.
Found in Robert Fulghum, All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten, Villard Books: New York, 1990, page 6-7.

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