The Most Important Lessons

No matter how hard a parent tries to teach their children Life's important lessons, the core values that you hope will stick, and carry them through, it seems like the mundane, repetitive stuff won't even get in there.  "Look both ways!"..."Wash your hands!"... "If it's not a toothbrush or food, DON'T PUT IT IN YOUR MOUTH!"..."Don't yell."... "What do you say? Excuse me. Thank you."

Then, sometimes, without any sort of prompting, they just blow you away with what they know.

My daughter and I went out to do some Back To School shopping. She's going into third grade.  Long ago I learned to just buy the PTA packet, rather than spend many stressful hours running all over town to get the best deals, or find that elusive drawing paper the art teacher wants. Plus our school always pools supplies, so it's just heart breaking for them to pick out special stuff they like, only to have it confiscated and put in the supply closet.  But we always go find a brand new backpack, and lunch box to start the new year. Any special supplies get kept on her homework desk at home.

Well, she picks out a backpack.  Yay! Her favorite was only $10. Matching lunchbox. Check. Cute pencils. Check. Then we spot some pretty pink calculators, and some erasers. Check. Check. We load all this up into the backpack, because we forgot to get a basket.  We go check out. I pay. The cashier puts everything in a sack and hands her the backpack.

She stops me and says, "Mom, this is still in here." The pink calculator. We turn back and I get out some cash to pay for the dollar item.  As we are walking away, she says, "I know that it would have cost us less money not to say anything, but it's worth it, because I want to feel that feeling in my heart, being close to God."

Uh, yeah. What she said. I don't know when or where she learned that, because I don't recall giving her a specific lesson about it, but I know plenty of grownups who don't get that.

I'm also going to sleep a little more soundly, knowing that my girl is going to be okay in her life. She's got "that feeling in her heart", and that can teach her better than I can, any day!