Don't erase others' thoughts

  The beauty of being a young parent is the joy of watching kids grow up. It was no different for me. Two toddlers grew up to go to play home, then to half-day school, and finally full-day school. Morning chores of getting them ready in time for the school bus was no different than running an Olympic sprint, if missed, had to run the marathon of dropping them at the school.

After they are back from school in the evening, it's the beginning of the broadcast of the events at school to everyone at home with never-ending enthusiasm. One of the avenues the newspapers found to sell their content was schools. They started distributing the "Student Edition" of their publication every day to students. An integral part of the morning assembly was to read "Thought for the day", a privilege students get in rotation for a week. My elder one got a chance to present "Thought for the day" for a week. After back home from school, would promptly write thought for the day on my whiteboard for me to read. In the next few minutes, the thought for the day was gone, the younger one would wipe the board clean. This was an activity the 6-year-old enjoyed the most, which would upset the elder sibling. This continued for a few days, but no complaints from the elder one even though was not impressed.

Another day in the store, the same routine. To my surprise, instead of whining, the elder one had written a few golden words - Don't erase others' thoughts. The younger one was awestruck by the writing, it was not erased for weeks. Alas, I should have taken a picture of the writing - but no regrets. I have imprinted that image in my memory.