As I prefaced in my last post about grace, I am not a terribly
religious person, but I find the simple act of taking a moment at dinnertime to
reflect on what we are thankful for an important one for our family. It also, incidentally, is often the
most revealing and sometimes humourous time of our day, especially noting the
differences it brings out in our two children.
Toby loves to say grace and does so earnestly and
thoughtfully. He is very careful
to cover all of the necessary gratitudes and often throws
in some extra special thoughts and thank yous at the end. It’s a great way for me to gauge what he’s worried about and
whom he is playing with in the playground. Often it’s the only way I get a glimpse into what he has
done all day…
Mia, on the other hand, finds the whole process long and
tedious and wants to get on with eating (or complaining about) her dinner. We have tried to engage her by asking
her to say something; she staunchly refuses. Lately we have had to resort to
crossing our hands while Toby is speaking just in order to keep her from rudely
eating while her brother slowly and meticulously says his grace.
The other day we were engrossed in something Toby was saying
when all of a sudden we heard a loud SNORING sound coming from Mia. She had put
her head down on her arms, closed her eyes and was loudly pretending to
sleep. I don’t know HOW she knew
it was a way of indicating boredom – but it certainly caught our attention. Thank GOODNESS Toby burst into angry
accusations; it somewhat covered up my inadvertent guffaw of laughter and gave
me a second to regain control before politely disciplining
Mia against interrupting Toby’s grace with her snoring.
Yesterday Toby demonstrated to us a song they sing at
school. The words go something
like, “Thank you God for giving us life! Thank you god for giving us (insert something nice)” and he sang a hearty round of it.
To our surprise Mia perked up a little, listened attentively
and then clapped along! Finally,
some participation! And just to
reinforce her commitment to dinner-grace-rebellion she threw in an enthusiastic
“Ah---MEN!....BABY!!!” at
the end. We may have to send her
to Evangelical school…
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