Comments on: Grandpa’s Information

By: Zoe Spriggle

Zoe Spriggle — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 00:16:39 +0000

This post is very helpful for me to know the right product.

By: Steve

Steve — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 09:17:18 +0000

Looks like I’m commenting a bit late. Believe it or not, I ended up here as a result of trying to register the domain “bea.st” Great minds think alike, don’t they?

Anyhow, this post was very interesting and I’m glad you went to the trouble of sharing this story, and your personal reflections on it. I’m surprised and refreshed to read such a thoughtful existential discourse between parent and child, excluding religious concepts. I agree with your opinion that you simply can’t resort to giving children illusory promises about the hereafter. Death is not a comfortable topic for people, young or old, and it shouldn’t be. So, it’s for the better that you handled that conversation the way you did. To allow your child to learn how to handle all his emotions on his own shows extraordinary sagacity as a father. The fear of death not being the least of those emotions he’ll have to face. One day, perhaps, he’ll be fortunate enough to help his own son the way you’ve helped him to better understand life and death.

Cheers,
Steve

PS. I discovered Disqus not long ago, and it’s a great tool for bloggers. I recommend Disqus Comments integration. It’s fairly easy to setup, and adds a lot of great features for trackbacks. I’ll be following your feed. Kudos on a great post.

By: Alicia

Alicia — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 03:02:58 +0000

Thank you for sharing a beautiful part of your life with Rhett with us. I was moved so deeply. Will you be my Mom? I realize that I don’t get another chance at raising you. All the things that I didn’t know I know now. All I knew was to love and cherish every moment of your life with me. I am so blessed to be apart of your and Rhetts life. I remember when he asked me about me dying before him. He said that he would be sad but that it was okay. I could not hold back the tears that gently rolled down my cheeks. I smiled at him and said that I would be sad to leave him,but we have everyday until that day. And we spent the next whole year together. He told me he hoped that I lived along time. I told him that I would do all I could to have more time here with him,momma,papa and grandpa. Then he gave me a big hug, smile and a kiss. Then we went fishing
and riding on the tractor.The best part of my life now is just being grandma.Thank you so much.

By: Darren

Darren — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 11:43:56 +0000

pure beauty, thank you.

By: eric

eric — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 18:31:49 +0000

There will come a time when the idea of information, DNA, evolution, chaos theory, and all that jazz (told in meter and song probably) will be as satisfying to a crying little boy as heaven and all that jazz is now.

This story continues to inspire me. A template for all matters of teaching kids about the universe and their place in it.

By: jeff

jeff — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 14:46:33 +0000

honesty.

By: Alita

Alita — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 16:59:26 +0000

my daughter is 3.5 years old now, and as potrayed on the blog above, she asked so many realistic questions and i must say sometimes it does gives me a great shocked. she did questioned me about where she came from [i framed all my ultrasounds pic] and she seems to be amazed that she was so small to fit in my tummy. and had once tried to sneak underneath my shirt to see if she still fit. it really took me awhile to answer her but i did eventually, so i told her that papa and mama made you and because we made you, your ears and mouth is exactly like papa and your eyes & attitude more like mama. She’s satisfied with the answer and had never asked me since. Thank God for that.
She once question my hubby, this is her daddy’s explanation version, papa married to mama and then came you as our stress-relief toy. and she look confused [my hubby enjoy to see her confused face...cute from his point of view] poor thing ;p
kids this days consumed formula that contain vitamins from A to Z, not like us when we were growing up. poor us..haha
Now she’s growing so fast, i have to prepare myself with all the informations that she needs cause she will never stop questioning cause kids never does till they are satisfied.

By: Kathleen

Kathleen — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 00:43:36 +0000

Thank you for your post. I’ve been struggling with these issues in myself (since childhood, really) and though this post got me a little teary, you handled it great. I’m a little sensitive about it this week since I’ve been thinking about mortality a lot, especially since I have a 1 year old who makes time fly so fast. My beliefs are Buddhist in nature, so I will most likely follow your lead when the time comes and he starts asking these questions.

By: danielle applestone

danielle applestone — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 14:35:38 +0000

:] We’ve had an interesting revisiting of religious ideas in our life lately, as rhett is attending a Lutheran school. I like the morals and values that go along with a lot of religious teachings when the kids are very little (be it buddhist or lutheran or whatever). It is a bit overpowering for me, as the concept of instilling a _particular_ religion (christianity in this case) is unimportant in my view. I do like the ideas of mercy, acceptance, being a ‘good samaritan’, hand-washing, etc that they promote at his school. Religious people already know that kids like stories so they are all over that type of media. So I would agree with you that religious stories are a good way of transmitting beneficial values. I suspect that we’ll be having more conversations regarding ‘god’ and ‘heaven’ as concepts in the near future.

By: Richard

Richard — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 14:02:52 +0000

What I would give to have had a mother like you cannot be measured. Thanks for brightening my day.

By: Surely, This

Surely, This — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 06:13:11 +0000

Having kids of my own, I want to say how simple and true your terse transcript of the conversation is. In this sense, it’s beautiful. A template for the future of honesty without religion. Well done.

By: Thankful

Thankful — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 06:01:12 +0000

It’s good to know that there is some responsible parenting going on.
While I think that if you have a faith-based belief, it is okay to pass that on to your child, but you MUST also give the child an explanation that can be rationally explained and objectively demonstrated such as this. To not do so is to rob your child of the development of rational thought.
Personally, I believe that faith has a role to play in life (as you said it is comforting, but I believe it is also another method of transferring norms and values), so I would explain both the scientific and faith-based view (in my case, Buddhist), hopefully as clearly and simply as you have.
That way, (if I ever have a child), they will be able to grow up and choose what they believe for themselves. (hopefully through the use of critical thought and rational debate)

Good Job!

By: CannedBabyDicks

CannedBabyDicks — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 04:16:41 +0000

That was really beautiful. I sometimes think about having to handle this when I have kids, and I think I’ll handle it in exactly the same way as you did.