Quotable Day

Our activities today have, quite accidentally, made me think of several familiar quotes from past readings.

We spent most of the day working in the yard, everyone contributing with different tasks based on age, ability, and aptitude.  I asked one of my boys to create something to put over the strawberries so that they could grow unhindered but so birds cannot get to them.  As some of the children were doing more manual-type labor in the sunshine and heat, this son spent quite a bit of time sitting in the shade.  It may have seemed unfair, and like he wasn't really working, but in fact he had been measuring and thinking and designing and gathering materials and creating scale drawings of what he wanted to build.  He was working, just in a different way.  It reminded me of what Ralph's father told him in Little Britches by Ralph Moody:

"There are only two kinds of men in this world:  Honest men and dishonest men.  There are black men and white men and yellow men and red men, but nothing counts except whether they're honest men or dishonest men.

"Some men work almost entirely with their brains; some almost entirely with their hands; though most of us have to use both.  But we all fall into one of the two classes--honest and dishonest.

"Any man who says the world owes him a living is dishonest.  The same God that made you and me made this earth.  And he planned it so that it would yield every single thing that the people on it need.  But He was careful to plan it so that it would only yield up its wealth in exchange for the labor of man.  Any man who tries to share in that wealth without contributing the work of his brain or his hands is dishonest."

I love, love, love this lesson from Ralph's father!  (Actually, if you really study it, it's at least THREE lessons in one.)

I'm sorry to say that after an entire day's work of planning, etc., my son's original design did not work out.  He had a great idea, but the materials available weren't quite what he needed. (He actually spent quite a bit of time hammering metal and trying to reshape it to get it to work, but it wasn't thick enough so it started to crack.) He was frustrated, but I felt the exercise of it, and even the "failure," were both valuable.  My husband came outside about 5:00 p.m. and  together they rigged up something a little simpler.

I asked him tonight if he learned anything today.  He said, "Yeah, don't use crappy parts."  Meaning, he learned that quality materials make a difference.  Not a bad lesson.  I think his father also showed him that you CAN use what you have, you just need to modify your plans.

While I was watering a newly planted flower bed, a butterfly ((or maybe a moth) joined me.  I don't know what it is about butterflies, but they make me feel so happy.  I'm so glad God created them!  The encounter reminded me of these two similar wise quotes by two famous authors.

"Happiness is like a butterfly; the more you chase it the more it will elude you.  But if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder." - Henry David Thoreau

"Happiness is like a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you." - Nathaniel Hawthorne

Finally, after a long, hot day of work, a little play was in order.  The kids asked if they could run through the sprinkler and I said yes.  I next found them, on the one day this week that no one had an evening baseball game, playing baseball together in the sprinkler!  

I'm so thankful that each of my children loves this game because it bonds them together at any and all points in time regardless of their age and other differences.  I was once told I had bred my boys for baseball and I was quite offended.  I've done nothing but allow and encourage them to pursue excellence in their talents and interests, whatever they be.  They just happen to all love the game.  They each play it differently, and have a different skill set and specialty, but they all love it.  In fact, I cannot get them to stop playing baseball, today's example being just one in a long list of free time baseball creativities.  And in fact, it reminded me of this, from Plato:

"You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation."

I'm thankful for work.  It gives purpose.  I know children are happier when they have learned to work and to appreciate the value of work done well.  I'm thankful for literature and the time to work with my brain so that when I need to work with my hands my mind has something to reflect on.  (And the same for my kids.)  I have such clarity of thought when I'm working!  I love it when we experience things together as a family and one of the children makes an association with something we've read.  I'm so thankful for homeschooling, which gives us so much to reference together in both our reading and our experiences.  And I'm thankful for bases of wet t-shirts and home plates behind a sprinkler, where an 18 year old, a 9 year old, and everyone in between enjoy playing at home together.